Good question - especially since everything else in that realm is quite popular in the US. D&D, lord of the rings etc. Maybe it’s considered more cheesy here? I remember thinking it was kind of cheesy growing up in Europe and listening to various types of metal

Tennessee, Texas, Minnesota, and California have castles. They pop up all over the U.S. if you look hard enough. Some of them are fassades, and some of them are 100% legit imported organic homegrown European.

There was one where I used to live:

https://historicelgin.com/pratts-castle

It was largely unknown in town. Contrast with trips I have taken to Europe (yes even work trips) where randomly I would come across a castle. For example in Swansea near the train station there was a castle a couple blocks from a TGI Friday's. It is different over there!

https://castlesy.com/ has a big list of "castles" in the US.

Its nothing to do with the USA. Older metal genres are in general quite niche today. Death metal and black metal is ubiquitous everywhere. Power metal and speed metal are relatively obscure these days.

A friend from the US I got to know on a US-based metal cruise (I'm German myself) told me that US metal concerts and European concerts are quite different: there's a lot of clapping, hopping and similar engagement routines in European concerts, while US concerts, at least according to him, apparently are more static, with maybe some fist pumping, but otherwise mostly people with crossed arms looking serious.

If that's true, there might indeed be a cultural difference in the breadth of metal fans from the US and Europe, which might as well lead to the more "happy" metal styles like power metal be more favored in Europe.

That seems fair. Unless the band has really worked the crowd up, which then you might get mosh pits and crowd surfing. I saw Haken last night, and it was as you said, bunch of people standing around (granted the venue was an old movie theater, so it's not like you could move around much with the seats in the way). Meshuggah a couple years back was pretty similar.

Bands like GWAR never disappoint, though. Some bands back in the day which were like that as well: Pantera, System of a Down, Metallica (pre-black album). In Flames recently had a decent mosh pit going on when I saw them.

> My working theory is one of culture...

my theory is that because most of the bands are writing lyrics in english and it's not their native language, they don't quite grasp just HOW ridiculous their lyrics tend to be.

please don't take this as a negative, because to me it's a positive. they sing those ridiculous lyrics with full passion without a hint of irony-- and that's why i love them. american power metal is a bit too wink-wink-nudge-nudge-amirite-guys?

Read through some lyrics by these bands and see if your theory holds up:

Dragonforce (of course) Brocas Helm Manowar