'Satanist' rock star to stay on talent show

Nergal; photo - behemoth.pl

A draft resolution calling for the dismissal of Adam 'Nergal' Darski, lead singer and guitarist with the Behemoth death-metal band from the Voice of Poland talent show was proposed by three of the council’s 15 member-board after protests by conservative bishops.

The bishops point to a gig Nergal played in Krakow in 2007 where he ripped up a Bible on stage as proof of his unsuitability for prime time TV.

Barbara Bubula, one of the members of the board who wrote up the resolution said the decision not to condemn Nergal's presence on the show was “a shame because we have received a record number of complaints from viewers,” she claimed.

Though cleared last month by a court of offending religious sentiment – the judge said that the bible-ripping was an “artistic act” - Archbishop Leszek Glodz argued at an open air mass recently that the commercialization of TV and the desire to attract viewers should not be more important than the “cultivation of values that make up the nation”.

Bishop Wieslaw Mering in Wroclaw and Bishop Grzegorz Kaszczak in Sosnowiec appealed to the faithful to refuse to pay the TV license fee in protest at Darski's employment by the TVP public broadcaster.

Former MP and leader of a movement against religious sects Ryszard Nowak called Nergal “a Satanist and blasphemous criminal,” adding that his presence on the talent show is a “scandal”.

Though TVP's programming council has refused to condemn Nergal's role in the show, the Rzeczpospolita daily reports that the broadcaster has considered replacing the rock star on the programme – the problem is that many parts of the episodes in the current series with Darski appearing have been recorded already and are scheduled to be broadcast until late October.

The makers of the programme, Rochstar, have defended Darski's participation in Voice of Poland.

“As a juror, Adam Darski has been a warm and friendly man with a great sense of humour,” Rochstar said in a statement.

Voice of Poland is trailing similar programmes on other channels in the fierce talent show ratings war, however.

The show gets around 2.2 million viewers an episode while TVN's Poland's Got Talent attracts 3.2 million viewers and Polsat's It Must Be Music gets 3.4 million. (pg/kk)