Dimmu Borgir went from arming themselves against potential murderers to the biggest band in black metal. "We heard people were starting to wear knives and weapons, so we did the same."

Dimmu Borgir press.

Dimmu Borgir frontman Shagrath remembers queuing up at an ATM in central Oslo when he was recognised by a group of local metalheads. Rather than giving a nod of appreciation, one of them offered a withering put-down: “Oh, are you going to take out some royalties then?”

This wasn’t recently, or even during the band’s initial breakthrough in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Rather, the year was 1994, and the band had only just released their debut seven-inch single, Inn I Evighetens Mørke, (‘Into The Darkness Of Eternity’) amidst a black metal scene still churning in the wake of Mayhem mastermind Euronymous’s murder and an ongoing wave of church burnings across the country.