Falconsbane's latest column recounting the grim tale of metal slipping back into the murky bogs of hippie rock from which it emerged had me wondering what could be the cause of that loss of impetus. Bands which play metal music yet share none of metal's spiritual standpoints, opting instead for those impotent, sentimental, pseudo-despondent and moralistic modes of expression which are the "easy way out" for those who live in modern mainstream Western society and would like to fancy themselves to be thinking humans, these bands receive praise instead of being ridiculed all the way to oblivion. This is a sure indication that the fanbase itself has fundamentally changed - and there are few more obvious telltale signs for this transformation than the fact that too many metalheads today are, simply put, nerds.
People who are uncomfortable in social situations, are considered quirky and somewhat odd by their surroundings, and are given to uncontrollable drooling the first time they go online and discover that a thing such as "metal chicks" actually exists. You can see it on message boards, where many freely admit to being such. You can see it in metal gigs too - around here, every gig you go to is bound to contain at least one large group of fans who belong to what has come to be called "the local internet metal scene", chiefly comprised of an immensely crowded message board on which sexually frustrated, bepimpled (© Satyr) male teens try to impress female, slut-wannabe teens who got into metal when they were tired of grunge, mallcore and "Israeli rock". Not surprisingly, their favorites among the local bands are Salem (a ridiculously overrated band with mediocre songwriting mired between half-assed aggression and boring, uninspired melody; their claim to fame is that Euronymous was once photographed wearing one of their t-shirts, and their lyrics veer between sappy, quasi-goth sentimentalism and "political awareness" songs which read like governmental propaganda), and Orphaned Land (a band which mixes run-of-the-mill melodic doomdeath with middle-eastern music, and which openly espouses Judaism). They obsessively take pictures of each other with digital cameras and are often found approaching members of the other sex and introducing themselves as "Hi, I'm ______ from the forum".
This is indicative of the whole. Metalheads used to be outcasts out of choice - they were free-thinkers who were aware of the world and disgusted with the way it was operating, choosing to eschew acceptance along with mainstream modes of thought. Nerd-metalheads are outcasts not out of choice; they are because they have always been such. Nerdiness is characterized by lack of social awareness, and thus, within even the most intelligent nerd is hidden the desire to be normal, despite the fact that they might listen to music which started out with the single raison d'etre of challenging what is 'normal'. They will shun long hair, for example, not because they don't like the look of it themselves or because they feel it's uncomfortable (both legitimate reasons), but because "the fact that you listen to metal doesn't mean you have to look different" (a.k.a. "it would be harder for me to get chicks if I grow my hair"). They will ridicule artists who seem too extremely devoted to an occultic practice, to an extreme ideology, or to unaccepted stances and activities, because "face it, you aren't gonna change the world". They will be the ones who claim that music has nothing to do with culture or ideology. They are the ones who wish to be accepted as normal, and think that they achieve this by the mere fact that they act like normal young people who belong to some subculture which has something to do with music.
This contributes in heaps to the fact that music which is technically metal, but shares none of its artistic/cultural standpoints and does not challenge or excite the spirit, is accepted as the future of metal. This is why the relatively new subgenres which are Gothenburger-metal, norsecore/fag-goth, and flower-metal (suckifications of death/heavy metal, black metal, and power metal, respectively) are the ones achieving the most stellar success nowadays.
I watched this movie once called "SLC Punk", about the punk scene in Salt Lake City. One of the final scenes of the movie shows the moment in which the two protagonists had gotten into punk in the first place. They're seen as little kids sitting at the table and playing Dungeons and Dragons while listening to Rush. Suddenly one of them says to the other, "You know what, I've had enough of this nerdy crap" (or something to that effect), throws away his D&D dice and plays for his friend the cool new punk tape he's got. His friend says something to the effect of "...but Rush are so technical and have such complex and diverse composition". I don't have a particular affinity for either Rush or punk rock... but that scene seems to summarize the state of metal nowadays, if you just reverse the roles and replace Rush with Opeth.
I actually copied it and paste it from other forum... I think it was an interesting topic.....
you know in my school there are a lot of nerds that wear fucking metal shirts and hear to metal because they hate the world, beacuse they dont have friends or girls, and thats fucking pathetic .... fuck those losers
People who are uncomfortable in social situations, are considered quirky and somewhat odd by their surroundings, and are given to uncontrollable drooling the first time they go online and discover that a thing such as "metal chicks" actually exists. You can see it on message boards, where many freely admit to being such. You can see it in metal gigs too - around here, every gig you go to is bound to contain at least one large group of fans who belong to what has come to be called "the local internet metal scene", chiefly comprised of an immensely crowded message board on which sexually frustrated, bepimpled (© Satyr) male teens try to impress female, slut-wannabe teens who got into metal when they were tired of grunge, mallcore and "Israeli rock". Not surprisingly, their favorites among the local bands are Salem (a ridiculously overrated band with mediocre songwriting mired between half-assed aggression and boring, uninspired melody; their claim to fame is that Euronymous was once photographed wearing one of their t-shirts, and their lyrics veer between sappy, quasi-goth sentimentalism and "political awareness" songs which read like governmental propaganda), and Orphaned Land (a band which mixes run-of-the-mill melodic doomdeath with middle-eastern music, and which openly espouses Judaism). They obsessively take pictures of each other with digital cameras and are often found approaching members of the other sex and introducing themselves as "Hi, I'm ______ from the forum".
This is indicative of the whole. Metalheads used to be outcasts out of choice - they were free-thinkers who were aware of the world and disgusted with the way it was operating, choosing to eschew acceptance along with mainstream modes of thought. Nerd-metalheads are outcasts not out of choice; they are because they have always been such. Nerdiness is characterized by lack of social awareness, and thus, within even the most intelligent nerd is hidden the desire to be normal, despite the fact that they might listen to music which started out with the single raison d'etre of challenging what is 'normal'. They will shun long hair, for example, not because they don't like the look of it themselves or because they feel it's uncomfortable (both legitimate reasons), but because "the fact that you listen to metal doesn't mean you have to look different" (a.k.a. "it would be harder for me to get chicks if I grow my hair"). They will ridicule artists who seem too extremely devoted to an occultic practice, to an extreme ideology, or to unaccepted stances and activities, because "face it, you aren't gonna change the world". They will be the ones who claim that music has nothing to do with culture or ideology. They are the ones who wish to be accepted as normal, and think that they achieve this by the mere fact that they act like normal young people who belong to some subculture which has something to do with music.
This contributes in heaps to the fact that music which is technically metal, but shares none of its artistic/cultural standpoints and does not challenge or excite the spirit, is accepted as the future of metal. This is why the relatively new subgenres which are Gothenburger-metal, norsecore/fag-goth, and flower-metal (suckifications of death/heavy metal, black metal, and power metal, respectively) are the ones achieving the most stellar success nowadays.
I watched this movie once called "SLC Punk", about the punk scene in Salt Lake City. One of the final scenes of the movie shows the moment in which the two protagonists had gotten into punk in the first place. They're seen as little kids sitting at the table and playing Dungeons and Dragons while listening to Rush. Suddenly one of them says to the other, "You know what, I've had enough of this nerdy crap" (or something to that effect), throws away his D&D dice and plays for his friend the cool new punk tape he's got. His friend says something to the effect of "...but Rush are so technical and have such complex and diverse composition". I don't have a particular affinity for either Rush or punk rock... but that scene seems to summarize the state of metal nowadays, if you just reverse the roles and replace Rush with Opeth.
I actually copied it and paste it from other forum... I think it was an interesting topic.....
you know in my school there are a lot of nerds that wear fucking metal shirts and hear to metal because they hate the world, beacuse they dont have friends or girls, and thats fucking pathetic .... fuck those losers
