there are many good things to say about quorthon, but he did commit some serious musical crimes as well. he surely did not consistently put out good material and even his best work has major flaws. the first couple bathory albums, bathory and the return are not as good as venom's first couple albums. many of the tracks are rather poor and very sloppy. quorthon really found himself with blood fire death, especially with the tracks "a fine day to die" and "blood fire death" which set the direction for bathory for the next two albums. hammerheart is the pinnacle of bathory's music. twilight of the idols is perhaps less epic and more emotional, but it is certainly a worthy follow up. the major problem with both of these great albums is the really cringeworthy singing. quorthon could never sing properly, but even his scream on the earlier albums was more bearable. he is at his worst trying out clean vocals here. after releasing two great albums quorthon unfortunately lost his direction. the viking theme, the innovative orchestration etc. was gone for about ten years. the next two raw "thrash" albums, reqiuem and octogon, are at most enjoyable for one song at a time (and barely at that). the only good thing about them is that quorthon no longer sings in the style of the viking albums. also around this time quorthon released two truly atrocious rock albums under the band name quorthon. utter garbage, on the level of cold lake, even (the guy who wrote "one rode to asa bay" sings "i will never eat pussy again"!). destroyer of worlds was mixed bag of stuff, displaying the worst of bathory along with reminiscences of the viking albums. and the following nordland albums finallly found quorthon returning to what he does best, but the material is rather mediocre and certainly not on the level of hammerheart.
what is most laudable about bathory for me is the influence quorthon has left. it seems he could not execute even his best ideas properly for the most part. i find it rather difficult to go back and listen to bathory these days. celtic frost, for instance, seems to have a greater lasting quality.
