5 Black Metal Musicians Who Actually Love Pop Music (And the Pop Artists They Like)

Here, we will be presenting our list of five black metal musicians who not only rank among the genre’s finest but are united by their love of pop music.

Indeed, many of the most fearlessly authentic practitioners of the black metallic arts enjoy and sometimes even lace their music with unexpected influences: Take the legendary Kim Carlsson, for example, and lose yourself in the single “Stonerpop” from his magnificent full-length debut as Ritualmord, This Is Not Lifelover (2025).

The venerable Ivar Bjørnson of Enslaved once revealed to me that he’s a big Pet Shop Boys fan. Mayhem’s Teloch too has a playful side. He is an admirer of synth-pop and creates electronic music under the Bergeton banner. The iconic Gaahl (currently of Gaahls Wyrd and Trelldom, formerly of Gorgoroth) counts the pop sensation Aurora among his friends and boasts a varied palette as a listener.

READ MORE: 11 Bands Who Started Out as Black Metal but Aren’t Anymore

Although Scott Conner of Xasthur has moved on from black metal in favor of genre-defying explorations, we must mention that he always has incredible recommendations. This celebrated California musician often says that if more black metal artists kicked back to jazz and the blues, their corner of the music world would be a far more interesting place overall. Scott is especially fond of Chaka Khan, the “Queen of Funk.” We asked Scott for a couple of pop picks and he named Eddie Money’s 1977 self-titled pop-rock debut and praised Blondie.

As a black metal soul, I will now seize this opportunity to champion the brilliant Ljungblut as my “pop” favorite. Although it might not have occurred to me to call this inventive outfit’s output pop, Apple classifies some of their ear candy releases like Over Skyene Skinner Alltid Solen (2011) as such. The related Zeromancer are just as amazing and have incorporated pop elements as well.