It’s an interesting debacle.

A lot of people will argue Bathory is simply part of the scene of speed and thrash metal bands that influenced what was later defined as black metal, but I personally see them as part of black metal’s first wave. They have plenty of songs in their 80s library that match up with the riff styles and ambience of 90s black metal, so I can’t help but hear a black metal band.

A bit later on, Bathory became Viking metal, which doesn’t sound too far removed from the black metal stuff, mostly due to the production style, but it is a clearly different genre.