Nergal recently recalled how he’d receive “death threats” once Behemoth started changing its style, noting how evolving one’s art is all but inevitable for artists that started out very young.

As much as black metal is famed for its dedication to artistic integrity and reinventing the raw heaviness of metal many times over, this subgenre has also attracted more than its share of hate-filled, gate-keeping bigots.

With that in mind, it’s sadly no wonder that Nergal started receiving death threats from Polish National Socialist – i.e. Nazi – black metal “fans” for putting a “wrong” image on an album cover. Speaking to Metal Injection in a recent interview, the Behemoth frontman recalls it went as far as having armed individuals invade his living space once Behemoth departed from its strict black metal roots in the ’90s:

“I remember getting death threats back in the day for changing my style and for putting a ‘wrong’ image on the cover, and I mean it. I had fucking people invading my room with a gun, and (this did) happen in the ’90s when I supposedly… it was a sacrilege for some (National Socialist black metal) people or whatever who were not friends of mine, who thought ‘You shouldn’t be doing this so we’re going to execute you.’

“Well they didn’t. I’m still around and I’m still a pain in the ass. Things like that did happen because I was evolving.”

As someone who started out at a very young age, Nergal says how evolving past his music roots is only natural:

“When I started Behemoth I was (either 15 or 16 years old). So I see a 15 year old or a 16 year old (now) and I’m like ‘Holy shit, it’s a baby. It’s a walking fucking toddler with his laptop and his video game’ and I was writing lyrics about something I wasn’t aware of. I was so naïve and inexperienced, and I was aiming for something out of my (league) or abilities, you know? I was young (young). What do you know when you’re 17 (years old?) You’re just a piece of shit and you know nothing, basically.”

Nergal goes on to note how some of the aforementioned groups of Polish black metal “fans” kept “lists” of enemies. For the Behemoth frontman, charting as high as possible on such lists was a matter of pride:

“I always wanted to be number one (on the list), and at least once I was. So they accused me of changing styles, but then at the same time those guys were the biggest Bathory worshippers.

“That should make you think. It always made me think ‘Why are they after me? Why are they not after Quorthorn?’ Every record was fucking (different)… no one had problems with that because it was sacred to them.”

Source: Metalinjection