ABSTRACT
While there are many commercially successful Swedish metal bands, this chapter maps and scrutinizes factors contributing to the particular Swedish proliferation of non-mainstream and primarily extreme metal music. It exemplifies extreme metal by death metal, black metal, and their respective subgenres, although it usually also includes speed metal and thrash metal. In order to understand the Swedish inclination towards extreme metal, one must make a trip to the starting days of the death- and black-metal scene. The Swedish metal scene has been described as one consisting of people who find it "particularly apt and fitting" to play extreme metal in the Swedish context. A relative openness in public-service channels have made dark, occasionally satanic and heathen lyrics and aesthetics exposed to censorship to little degree in Sweden. As a contrast to the destructive tones of metal music related to climate and seasonal effect, political and welfare incentives have been crucial in stimulating musicianship at an early age in Sweden.
