Though it is a version of the overused “don’t judge a book” topic and a bit trite, this is an issue I’ve been wanting to type about since I started this. Metalheads and anti-metalheads alike, listen up (or look up, I guess).
I have been a fan of metal music for about as long as I can remember. I truly love all kinds of music, with the exception of country after 1989 and stuff like the Norwegian scream-singing that you can hear frequently on NPR. I am a citizen of the world, but a lot of that world music is too much for me, though I do enjoy a lot of the traditional stuff from the UK, but I’m getting off topic.
As I said, I love metal music, have since I was young. Everything from Dio and Pantera to Mastodon and He Is Legend. It all sounds awesome to me. From the straight up metal of Slayer to the technical, poetry-laden music of The Refused. I have some die-hard favorites and some bands that shift in and out of focus. My 2 absolute favorite bands of all time are Coheed & Cambria and Slipknot, if you’re interested. Currently, I’m listening to a lot of Beartooth and I the Mighty.
There really isn’t any way to describe your “typical” metalhead, we’re a pretty mixed group, just like most fans of a musical genre. I’m 35, married 12 years, father of a beautiful 2-year-old son who is learning to headbang. I do have a couple of tattoos, but they’re so geeky it borders on laughable. I’ve not been unemployed ever. I’m not violent, unless you count wasting doods on XBox. I listen to metal because I love the sound, I love the energy, I love when you can feel it on your skin when you turn the speakers up. I also listen to metal music when I’m having a frustrating day because it helps me CALM DOWN. This is one of the biggest misconceptions of metal fans is that the visceral screams and ultra-loud guitars and pounding double bass runs make us angry, even violent. I can’t tell you how many fellow metalheads I’ve talked with about this very concept. They listen to metal to cope with a bad day, not amplify it. They listen to metal to quell the murderous rage, not to fuel it. Metal music is the wrench that loosens the bolt to let steam out of the valve. It’s soothing.
To those who love the time-tested “That’s just noise! How can you even understand that? That’s just screaming about nothing!” allow me these arguments. What hooks me on a metal song is the initial sound, but if it’s something I really like and I can’t understand the words, I’ll look them up. That’s not even necessary a lot of times though. I often compare it to opera. Many people say they don’t like opera because it’s in a different language and they can’t understand it, but I proffer this. If you REALLY listen to opera, and especially if you can see it live, you’ll understand what’s happening in the music. Listen to the emotion being conveyed, listen to the inflection on phrases, the tempo and dynamic changes. The same can be said for heavy metal.
And on the intelligence factor, it can’t be denied that there are some metal bands who write their music only for the shock value and don’t have any real message (though I think there’s something to be said for being shocked out of your norm). For every band that is writing to shock and sound bad ass, there’s 20 bands who are writing about reality, or escaping it. Some of my favorite examples: Pretty Lush by Glassjaw – I loooove Glassjaw. Their lead singer loves to play with word pronunciation and dropped words, and the song has some moments of real anger. He wrote it about a girl he loved who left him in favor of a bottle of booze. The Melting Point of Wax by Thrice – Great melody, awesome off-time rhythm, some great heavy hits. Dustin Kensrue, singer and guitarist, transitions so smoothly from a nasally but strong singing voice to a growling scream. What’s the song about? It’s a telling of the Greek legend of Daedalus and his son, Icarus, (one of my absolute favorite Greek stories) and their attempt to escape from King Minos’ labyrinth using wings made by attaching feathers to a wooden harness using wax. Icarus became so ecstatic about flying that he flew too close to the sun and melted his wings, despite his father’s warnings. And let’s not forget metal royalty, Metallica, who used many awesome stories to craft their songs, especially the older stuff. Two songs from Ride the Lightening especially come to mind: Creeping Death, which was a heavy metal rehash of the story of God sending the final plague through Egypt to silently kill all of the first-born children, and For Whom the Bell Tolls, written after reading the Ernest Hemingway book of the same title, written about a young American’s experiences as a guerrilla fighter during the Spanish Civil War. Hemingway? The Bible? Greek mythology? Dealing with rejection and substance abuse? That’s right. But tell me some more about how metal music is just mindless screaming and noise.
Well, I hope this has put a dent in the stigma that befalls the metalheads around the world, but that puts forth a level of self-importance that just made me throw up in my mouth a little bit. I’ll leave with the wise words of one of my favorite comedians, Bill Burr. “(in an old man voice) THIS MUSIC TODAY IS TERRIBLE! When I was a kid, you dressed up like a woman and you sang songs about the Devil. Now THAT was good music!” See you in Hell, losers.
Fatty Wants His Lunch 
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