Production

Low-cost production quality was a must for early black metal artists with low budgets, where recordings would often take place in the home or in basements; a notable example of such is the band Mayhem, whose record label Deathlike Silence Productions would record artists in the basement of the shop Helvete. However, even when they were able to raise their production quality, many artists chose to keep making low fidelity recordings. The reason for this was to stay true to the genre's underground roots and to make the music sound more "raw" and "cold". One of the better-known examples of this is the album Transilvanian Hunger by Darkthrone – a band that has been said to "represent the DIY aspect of black metal" by Johnathan Selzer of Terrorizer magazine. Many have claimed that, originally, black metal was not meant to attract listeners. Vocalist Gaahl claimed that during its early years, "black metal was never meant to reach an audience, it was purely for our own satisfaction".