Band Flees Iran After 15 Year Sentence For Playing Heavy Metal

Members of heavy metal band Arsames fled Iran after being sentenced to 15 years in prison for playing “Satanic music”.

In a statement to Loudwire, the band said:

“We [were] arrested in 2017 when we were in our studio during rehearsal. They moved us to jail that day and [did] not [tell] our family about where we [were] for a week. Finally after nearly a month later we paid bail to come out of prison and they told us you should not work, release [or sell] your merch until your final court … and do not talk with media!

Our Instagram page, official website … banned and they shot down all for a year, but we built a new Instagram again and [started] to be active until few weeks ago [when] the court called us again and they gave us 15 years [in] prison. So we had to escape from Iran.”

Arsames also posted a video to YouTube claiming to be patriotic Iranians and offering details of their trial.

“Is it a crime that we are playing metal music!?,” states the band in the video. “Is it [a] crime that we are talking about Persian history?! Is it a crime that you think we are into Satanism when we have songs about Cyrus the Great and monotheism!? Is it a crime that we love music and our country?!”