Neofolk

[2] Neofolk originated in the 1980s, with bands from the post-punk and industrial music scenes, including Death In June, Current 93 and Sol Invictus, who began taking influence from this sound.

Runic alphabets, heathen European sites and other means of expressing an interest in the ancient and ancestral occur often in neofolk music.

Webb writes that for bands like Sol Invictus, this leads to "a type of esoteric spirituality where paganism comes to the fore because of its respect for nature, its openness about sexuality, and its rituals and ceremonies guided by the seasons".

[8] Many bands use metaphors, sometimes borrowing terms such as Ernst Jünger's Waldgänger and using fascist symbols and slogans, which has led to an association of the genre with the far-right, though this is contested by fans.

Stefanie von Schnurbein has described the genre's approach to these types of material as an "elitist Nietzschean masquerade" which expresses a "(neo-)romantic art-religious attitude".

[11] As a descriptor, apocalyptic folk predates neofolk and was used by David Tibet to describe the music of his band Current 93 during a period in the late 1980s and early 1990s.