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Recently I discovered the Australian site Metal as Fuck. The name is a hard sell, but the content isn’t. It’s interesting to see how another part of the world operates. Some posts I found particularly engaging stemmed from TweetChat, Twitter’s version of chat rooms (at last, a constructive use for Twitter!). MaF got its readers to convene online and discuss issues in real time, which is potentially much more dynamic than blog comments or message boards.
A particularly compelling chat was EU Versus US Metal: ideas, factors, and themes. Having lived in Europe for a year, I’ve thought about these differences a lot. I didn’t go to Wacken or other major European metal festivals. But just from going to shows, metal pubs, and record stores, I observed six major differences between European and American metal cultures.
Epicness/tolerance for cheese
Bands like Sonata Arctica and Hammerfall don’t come from the States. Being a secondhand culture, US metal is too self-conscious to engage in the unabashed frilly shirt-ery that pegs bands as “European, probably on Nuclear Blast.” American bands like Pharaoh and Symphony X that have a European sound are usually more serious. This doesn’t just apply to happy power metal. Even a “death metal” band like Arch Enemy has blatant “billowing hair/wind machine on 11″ moments that are patently European. Americans are too busy grinding on one note and cursing their lack of health care.
Classical vs. blues influence
This ties into epicness and tolerance for cheese. Europeans have hung onto metal’s classical influences much more strongly than Americans have. This makes sense, since they invented classical music. But it’s not a foregone conclusion. Metal came from UK rockers (Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin) borrowing/stealing American blues music. For whatever reason, bluesiness largely disappeared from European metal, only to be resurrected by Americans via Southern sludge metal.
Infrastructure
Perhaps this isn’t a fair comparison, since metal started in Europe and has had more time to develop infrastructure there. Europe and America have significant differences that shape their metal infrastructures. Europe’s biggest advantage is its small size, which lets bands tour many countries quickly. The EU has also made passport control fairly painless, in contrast to the difficulties bands have in entering the US and Canada. The MaF article also notes that Europe has a long tradition of arts festivals (again, probably aided by short distances). In general, Europe is much more arts-friendly, whether in terms of government support or cultural awareness. It is well-known how European touring conditions are more humane than American ones.
Community vs. individual
For how nationalist Europeans can get (very), their borders are quite open (too open, for some). They routinely travel for things like football matches and techno clubs. They have networks like Hospitality Club that facilitate hosting of travelers in people’s homes. Americans, in contrast, defend their homes with guns. (Then they go to their basements to make one-man black metal.) You see European openness at metal pubs. Metalheads go there to hear metal, drink beer, and meet other metalheads. With enough beer, you can be singing folk metal anthems with total strangers. Americans don’t do this.
Physical reactions to metal
Americans mosh. Europeans headbang. Sometimes they do “brothers-in-arms” headbanging, where they link arms, bend at the waist, and headbang in unison for entire songs. It’s cute.
Women
Once in Berlin I saw women do brothers-in-arms headbanging. Granted, they were making fun of men, but, still, it was something you’d never see in America. The European metal shows I attended usually had fairly even gender distributions. Also, I frequently saw women shopping in the “Hard ‘n’ Heavy” sections of record stores. Even if women aren’t filling the ranks of European metal bands, they’re active in the scene as photographers, journalists, publicists, label employees, and, yes, fans. Are European women wired differently than American ones?
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Note that these are gross generalizations. Many Europeans bristle at having a cross-national identity assigned to them, for good reason. German metal, for example, is a much different beast than French metal. Why are Germans the kings of power metal cheese? Why did they embrace thrash but not death metal? Why do the French dominate orthodox black metal? After pioneering heavy metal and death metal/grindcore, why is the English scene so inconsequential now? Why is Denmark’s metal scene almost half as small as Norway’s (in terms of numbers of bands), despite the countries having comparable populations? There’s a book in there somewhere.
The milking of anything that is ripe for easy hilarity seems to be a big priority for entertainment consumers in the US, but it's not as pronounced in Europe (though the trend is catching on). Irony isn't an American invention, but the priority 'look, that is ironic! LOL!!' seems to be, to me. The internet especially, is training every 13 year old kid that gets on it through shock tactics: 'be amused thoroughly or be thoroughly mocked for not being amused'. So since everyone's primed to exploit hilarity in everything, people are also very self-conscious about letting their guard down and being made a joke they're not in on. In this mindset, even when an artist or listener opens themselves to ridicule, it is in a self-aware manner "yes haha how funny I am" as if when you're in on your own joke that speaks better of your situation.
So US bands are polarized, either they're very reserved and play it safe, or they plunge head-first into total self-aware ridiculousness.
European bands (like Sonata Arctica, pictured) I'd bet that before American interviewers prodded them about, you know, how cheesy they are, it might have not even occurred to them. They listened to Helloween and wanted to make their own power metal band, adopted the tropes and so on, what's so cheesy about that?
The US entertainment industry recycles cultural tropes every few years, the fear of being behind the times, not resonating with some spectral concept of their consumer base ("the kids") dominates. Sonata Arctica probably do not have the same concept of what is vital and enduring in music. They grew up with something, they stick with it. The depth of history and culture differs.
Taking a step back a couple of decades, the biggest difference is that, in the UK and in the US, English is a first language. Any ambiguity or irony in early 70's proto-metal seems to have been lost on most young misunderstanding metalheads in most parts of Europe (compare Judas Priest, a band who in their 80's incarnation and onwards were very self-aware, very tongue in cheek, with their German babies, Accept), but the prime substance of what HM is, was potently distilled through this 'misunderstanding'. These fans went on to create their own, completely earnest HM. Great quote by Greek band, Deviser, whom when asked to explain their black metal sound circa the release of their second album (in 1998), exclaimed "We play occult satanic black metal, like Venom!". No offense to Venom (or Deviser for that matter) but 'teacher caught me masturbating…', you know, occult stuff.
Great Heavy Metal (from any location) doesn't bother with how it can mitigate its own ridiculousness. Any great art, any great endeavor, every human being that has ever believed in something, all ridiculous, so… why bother with social defenses? You're going to be made fun of relentlessly anyway, at least have the strength of spirit to do your thing and not bother with being in on your own joke.
So, if you look at Master's Hammer from the Czech Republic (or early Rotting Christ, or Burzum, or whatever else of value) you'll see openly ridiculous people making deadly serious music. A lot of American listeners, while they'd have no problem grasping this apparent contradiction (because it's funny!!!), don't arrive to the meaning behind the music because they automatically latch on to the hilarity on the surface. "I can't listen to this, it's too ridiculous", or "I'll listen to this ridiculous thing although I don't understand it, just to be an ironic hipster" are common things I've noticed with American listeners. The former betrays the insecurity that the type of art one enjoys says much about themselves, which I find baffling. Art is an exploratory tool, it's not here to define you. The latter just belies a hidden fascination with the material ironically appropriated. You just like Manowar, deal with it.
Australians are in a weird halfway space. We tend to be kinda self-conscious like Americans, but we are open and appreciate musical camaraderie (we'd probably call it "mateship") like the Europeans at the same time – despite having a tiny population spread over a large area and a very small metal community (although a huge "rock" scene which has birthed bands like AC/DC, Rose Tattoo, and more recently Airbourne and Wolfmother).
Going to Wacken and other European festivals is a very popular pastime for Aussie metalheads (I've done two Wackens and have tickets for 2010 already). I think it's because we really like the open attitude they have, and the fact that we can participate in the cheese at the same time as laughing at it without offending anyone.
For the most part we just don't get Manowar, however.
Nice analysis here. Enjoyed the comments also. Greetings from the EU Metal side of things (Spain).
I always thought that part of the tone of American metal might have to do with how relatively quickly it crossbred with punk (and then hardcore), here. Punk is both more "spare" than metal (and thus less likely to be perceived as cheesy) and more likely to deploy, within the music at least, a self-deprecating sense of humor–this also seems to describe the difference in tone between a lot of US and European bands. Of course, the punk thing isn't a hard fast rule, but it might account for some things. It probably explains the moshing versus headbanging thing pretty well too.
I also have this idea that American pop culture is a little more comfortable with itself as pop culture. I read an essay a few months ago where the author said that the major difference between English and U.S. punk was that U.K. punks were obsessed with class conflict, and U.S. punks were obsessed with television and fast food (I'm not certain he was right, but for the sake of this discussion right now I'll pretend he's mostly right). He meant that as a comment on the shallowness of U.S. bands, but I would much rather hear the Ramones than the Sex Pistols any day-and not because Ramones are goofy or ironic, but because they took the detritus of Americana and put a heart and soul in it.
All of this is a roundabout way of saying that I'm not sure if American bands that get tagged as "ironic" are necessarily just that. A metal band that perceives itself as part of junk culture, or whatever you want to call it, isn't necessarily taking a jab at metal's expense: it's plugging itself into a tradition that tries to make seriousness out of junk.
Don't forget, the Dictators and Manowar shared a guitarist (I wish that helped my point better, but I still think it's striking). Manowar always seemed to be walking the edge of irony, but their fans take them deadly seriously. I don't see why other, contemporary U.S. bands like 3 Inches of Blood (often accused of irony) are necessarily any different.
I just think in Europe the whole fantasy side of Metal is easier to take seriously for people because of the history of the place.
I'm originally from a town (Thurso) named after Thor for example and drive by a Roman viaduct and druid burial ground on my way to work, no dragons or Warlocks mind you.
I'm not into war/viking/power metal myself but can see how it's easier to connect something like that to a folk tradition without needing the distance of irony.
Oh and 3 Inches of Blood are from Canada buddy, don't get that lot started.
Good point with the Canada thing. In my defense, though, Canada and the U.S. have sort of a similar thing going, with regards to pop culture (moreso than politically, I mean): it's an understandable mistake for me to have made. If we're already lumping all European countries together, we might as well lump the U.S. and Canada together.
The folk history thing is a good point too, but I don't think it necessarily disproves the whole North America/Europe attitudes about pop-culture generalization. I think part of the reason why North Americans latch onto pop-culture the way they do is because they usually don't have much else (which is not necessarily a bad thing, either, given that folk culture is often just really old pop culture).
Wagner was German wasn't he? That guy should be considered Mettlehead Numero Uno in Germany. His stuff was HEAVY (and steeped in mythology fantasy and local folk culture). It's no suprise that existing EU and/or German metal bands carry on in similar ways.
Both metal and punk were largely 'outsider' or 'outcast' cultures in the 80s. The convergence of both was inevitable as Pushead writing music articles for Thrasher.
The 'hipster / irony' arguments about US pop culture do not hold as much weight to me as the way we define our sense of community and social structure and how music plays a role. EU is probably more sophisticated (or has more history to learn from) in that respect. Perhaps it is easier in Europe to establish an honest or pure form of your own art with support and without ridicule. Or perhaps not.
Manowar always seemed to be walking the edge of irony, but their fans take them deadly seriously.
They weren't 100% serious in the early years; it was only when Ross the Boss left, in '88 or thereabouts, that they became the Joey DeMaio show full-on. Ross was the balancing element that kept them from toppling full-on into cheese. Mind you, I like the post-Ross albums quite a bit, but there's definitely a difference between '80s Manowar and '90s-'00s Manowar.
Well, what do we mean when we say ironic metal? Are there any indisputably ironic metal bands that anybody really listens to in the U.S.? Everybody always seems to want to point to The Sword as an ironic band, because they wear glasses or have nice shoes or something, but as far as I can tell–issues of musical quality aside–they are pretty sincere.
There are bands like Iwrestledabearonce, of course, which seem pointedly ironic to me, but those bands don't seem to be regarded as metal by either metalheads or their own fans. It also seems important to acknowledge that bands that are tongue-in-cheek (that being distinct from irony?) in some way seem to exist in both North America and Europe. Still, it seems to me that there is a certain attitude that is more common in American metal circles than in European ones which often gets mistagged as irony, in a reactionary way. My idea earlier (which I'm rethinking more and more) was that it is easier for North Americans to designate something as kitsch or schmaltz, but still be serious about it–in other words, what gets perceived as irony in the North American scene isn't necessarily irony at all.
So that we can all be on the same page, I want to know: how are we defining irony, and why are we saying Americans are more ironic? Where do we see irony in the North American scene?
Ironic metal could be defined as that which doesn't mean what it says/does.
As for irony in North American metal, I agree with Anthony in that I mainly only see it in bands that aren't really metal (screamo crunkcore, hair metal, etc.)
Also, Europe is not irony-free. Or, at least, it has tongue-in-cheek bands – Dragonforce and Edguy come to mind.
Edguy took 10 years to catch up to the concept of irony, though. At first they were the same 'german humour' power metal that Helloween did circa Keeper II or something… really childish, really not very funny, but that's besides the point.
Haven't really listened to a Dragonforce record. But yeah of course I'm not saying Europe is irony-free, after all the world meaning one thing and saying another is an aspect of the human experience, heh. Just spotting generalities.
Oh I also go by the working definition of 'saying one thing and meaning another/the opposite'. It's not a full literary definition of irony, but it's the exact shade of blaze dejected facetious "I, like, don't even care" posturing that describes how irony is usually attempted in pop music.
It's true that not a lot of really ironic bands are considered prominent in HM today and that makes sense because irony fails to gel with HM very well. But, Cosmo, think back to the mid nineties (or perhaps you weren't listening to HM then?) think when once bastardized 'alt-metal' bands were considered the next big thing, what were their thematics and philosophies? Weren't they mostly American, also? You might have to strain your memory here, their material isn't well-remembered.
Not to say that there aren't any bands that are ironic and are considered full-fledged metal by most, but they mostly didn't start out as such. This is an interesting topic in itself if you think about it: Judas Priest, Manowar (I think this band became more and more of a self-aware joke as they kept going), Dodheimsgard, Ulver (well, once metal, but their audience is still metaleads), actually a lot of the Norwegian black metal scene after 1993 or something seems to be just eager posturing, not exactly ironic, but certainly very self-aware and (therefore) self-defeating. Old bands either becoming cynical and proud of it, or just pretending to not be.
Then there's all of the gore/grind/pornogrind/slam metal scene (wholely American contraption). And a *lot* of technical/math shit.
The idea expressed above about junk culture as American tradition is as interesting as it is alien to me. I don't really consume any junk culture, I avoid it even on the internet where it's very prominent. I'll think about it a lot. I do agree that there's a very 'American' style of metal that could not have happened in any other place in the world that is certainly self-informed and often doesn't have a clear vector, spearheaded by bands like Mind Over Four, Last Crack, Thought Industry. Still heartfelt and real. I would have gone for more of that, personally.
Really interesting comments in this post.
Helm – Mid-'90s alt-metal is still fresh in the memory here in America, as, yes, we are to blame/credit for it. The kids that grew up on '90s alt-rock now control popular media like Pitchfork, hence the massive revived interest in things like Jane's Addiction and Nine Inch Nails.
That zeitgeist was decidedly irony-free. Grunge was a big part of it, and grunge was a rather morose music. (Personal catharsis, Eddie Vedder, etc.) If anything, it was *too* heartfelt and real.
Self-consciousness is a necessary but not sufficient condition for irony. The subgenres you named, while very self-conscious, are mostly serious and singleminded, often unimaginatively so, and thus not ironic.
Also, irony is not per se bad. Towards their end, Strapping Young Lad (or perhaps just Devin Townsend) got somewhat ironic about their music/pomposity/metal as a whole/the industry/their audiences/etc. It was interesting to see Towsend call for circle pits and then openly mock his audiences for acceding to his commands.
Heya,
Awesome, cheers for the positive comments about our site!
And yeah, the tweetchats are great: we find now that if we miss a week people get sad about it. And that EU vs. US chat was particularly interesting to be involved it – so many people had so many great things to say.
Our only question is did you mean that the name of the zine is a hard sell in terms of advertising and sponsorship? Amongst metalheads we find that the name really hits the spot.
Thanks again for your comments!
MaF
But see, 'Grunge' didn't even exist, it was a marketing ploy to sell a collection of very disparate-sounding punk bands under the guise of a 'movement'. I find that pretty ironic in itself, also if we look at the message of a band like Nirvana… "Well, whatever, nevermind". Loud, abrasive music with screams and feedback about gen x idle disaffection is in my opinion very ironic. I don't think of irony in just writing a lyric that means one thing though seems to say the opposite (though bands like Helmet or Nirvana or the Melvins certainly seemed to do a lot of that), there's irony in aesthetics and public relations and in core of the band's existence too, I don't think straight-talking was a priority at all.
Which isn't to say that IRONY IS BAD. It just doesn't seem to work well with Heavy Metal. I'm not trying to make up a theory and then force it on reality, it's the opposite way, I listen to these great HM records and I wonder why there's not a single trace of intentional hilarity or irony about them and try to understand why.
Nirvana's actually a pretty interesting case in this because the band's success apparently drove their mainman to suicide. Actually that's awfully presumptuous based on a force-fed media spectacle, but in the case there's even a shred of truth to it: Their ambiguous message was completely glossed over by meatheads that went for the pop hooks and the packaged anger and it's probably difficult to be in a band that is adored world-wide by the people you hate.
Do you think Brocas Helm ever had that problem?
Strapping Young Lad is an excellent example of irony in metal. Townsend has said that 'The New Black' album is written with a purpose to be massive, crowd-pleasing and full of festival singalongs about how stupid it is to do it. I mean, read the lyrics of 'You Suck' and you'll see exactly what I mean
I have to admit, I'm not the biggest fan of grunge. I like the early stuff, before it went big (not out of commercial snobbery or anything, but because those early records sound more like punk or metal to me, and the later stuff starts to verge on moose rock) but wasn't it perceived as a scene when it first appeared in Seattle? I don't know that I understand the "grunge didn't exist" idea.
Seems to me like there should be a difference between being ironic and just being a phony or a poseur. Irony is artistic in some way: it's creating intentional dissonance between statement and meaning, whether that's an interesting dissonance or not. Weirdly, irony can actually be quite sincere, at least as regards the message conveyed between the statement made and the statement intended.
Phoniness can have similar traits, but it's usually unintentional. When it is insincere (and it might not be), it usually arrives there through lack of commitment or understanding, rather than through intentional effort–as a result, it's much harder to diagnose. However fake Nirvana may have been, there didn't seem to be any artistic motive for it. My diagnosis: merely phony, not ironic.
The idea Helm is getting at with an expanded use of irony seems cool, but I'm not sure if reappropriating the conventional meaning of irony is the best way to get it across. I don't want to put words in his mouth, either. Where are you going with that exactly, Helm?
I've got to get concise with these damn posts.
First of all, I appreciate the lucid dialogue.
Also yeah I did not mean to stretch irony out so much.
The problem with your distinction between ironic and just phony is that it puts a judgment of intention ontop a judgment of intention. It's already kinda difficult to tell when someone's saying one thing and meaning another (at least for myself that hasn't made it a priority to be internet-savvy, I've got better things to do), it's even more difficult to tell if they're doing it on purpose or if they're lying to themselves also. I'm not sure those are binary concerns too, I'd guess most liars partly believe their lies just a bit and most ironic artists are also doing what they're doing because it comes naturally. So yes, the use of the word is risky, but so is calling stuff straight-up phoney. There's an element of truthful personal exposure even to the worst ironic hipster shit record because that's just what happens when you make art, inner exposition.
So I'm not interested in condemning people for being phoneys and straight-up liars, I'm more interested on why they're not telling their truth. See what I mean? If I shouldn't be using the word ironic, I'd have to go with something like facetiousness, and that's fine I guess, as long as we can understand each other.
I do not disagree that irony, facetiousness, evasion, circularity, whatever, in art could have potent applications and I'm open to listening even to HM that does this, it just hasn't happened so far that I can tell. If Strapping Young Lad is the best example of this then I might have to keep waiting. I mean, I have Manilla Road exclaiming "we shall slay evil with logic, crystal logic" here and Fates Warning going "walk hand in hand with the fear-striken child, strengthen the weak and the lame" or even Carnivore going "live your life by your will, learn to be an animal" and these things elevate my spirit, I'm not sure what Devin's record number 20 about how "it's all entertainment, folks" is supposed to be doing…
My problem with most of the ironic metal I've come across is that it's very pleased with itself for its ability to not tell a truth, and I find that, as very early realization about what language and communication does, not very interesting. I mean, I once was probably impressed with my ability to circumvent a direct question with irrelevancy also, what, when I was 14? For example Dodheimsgard's latest is just so bad, a totally empty record, just 90's dated future shock and bad 'cool' lyrics, yet a lot of people were impressed and bought it. Am I missing out on anything? Even if ironic art is doing… something… somewhere, shouldn't we be more concerned with those that are proud enough, ridiculous enough, human enough to tell their truths instead of just non-lies?
Alright, I think I'm with you.
It seems to me that when bands aren't telling the truth, they aren't telling the truth because it's hard to tell the truth (I think you've already been getting at this, actually). It's *work* to find out what's important to yourself, emotionally, and then find a way to convey that to others. It's especially hard work to do this in metal, a genre where the stakes are raised considerably by the baroque nature of most of the material (both musically and lyrically).
A lot of bands just opt out, I think, by either going for generic shtick (this could include a billion black and death metal bands, as well as stuff like The Sword, most new thrash, and perhaps the new Dodheimsgard), or going goofy (Strapping Young Lad, perhaps… I'm not sufficiently familiar with their material).
New thrash, for me, is a great example. Last year, I was listening to Exodus's Fabulous Disaster album, enjoying it a lot, but also thinking that a lot of stuff on it was sort of awkward, potentially even embarrassing (the Lowrider cover, the part in the song "Like Father, Like Son" where Steve Souza shouts "please Daddy, no more!"). Nevertheless, I found those parts charming: I wouldn't like the album as much without them.
What seemed potentially embarrassing about those moments was how they felt like emotional overreach–the band had gone for something big and flopped at it (for me, anyway). Old thrash is full of moments like this, which makes sense, because it was mostly created by young guys with huge ambitions. That's part of why I like old thrash albums. I like the honesty there, even (or especially) when it comes off as slightly clumsy. It's humanizing.
New thrash (and I enjoy a lot of that stuff too, up to a point) lacks those moments, and in my opinion that's the problem with it. Pretty much all of the newbie bands play it safe: they don't lack enthusiasm for the music, but they also don't go for ambitious socio-political statements, or even extremely original fantasy scenarios (no "Cajun Hell" in other words). As a result, the stuff never feels awkward (which is probably their goal), but it also never feels very personal or substantial.
It is, of course, possible to make great metal without seeming awkward, but a lot of metal I love is admittedly *very* awkward. Still, if somebody I knew called it cheese in the wrong spirit, I'd be pissed.
Yeah we're in understanding on the subject. I guess actually abusing the concept of irony as a catchall for a host of post-modern artistic tensions of the last couple of decades is a bit unfair to Oscar Wilde or some other, so I'll better stick with insincere, facetious, whatever.
You put it better than I could about how it's hard to tell a truth (I don't know about 'the' truth) and it's always potentially awkward if you don't pull it off (but as you say, charming) and particularily in this climate, ripe for ridicule even if you do.
A lot of people just want the fantasy of being in a band and ripping out riffs or going on tour and the meanings assigned to the sounds, if any, are an afterthought. I won't blame them but it seems there's so much of this material of this type sometimes I almost forget there's more sincere music too. So, although I don't begrudge anyone for starting a band focused on riffs and little else, so much of this dilutes the genre and lowers the standard.
I don't think that musicians in the 80's were fundamentally more honest or visionary or anything, though. It's more that HM at that time was a pretty fresh and innocent sort of music and pretty much anything went. It was outside of the mainstream (circa 1980-1984 especially and then again during the rise of romantic doom and black metal during 1990-1995) so it didn't have to look at itself critically. Teenagers with grand ambitions. Now it's probably difficult to create without the fear of scrutiny by established scenes, in fact it'd probably be revolutionary if people did it. Somebody asking a band in an interview 'what do you think about [this or that new band]?' and they would go 'nothing'. That'd be refreshing.
What you say about new thrash, it's very neatly made to fit into preconceptions of what a genre sounds like and what the scene around the genre expects, but if art is comfortable it's just passing entertainment. Even if in the 80's some stand-out bands made uncomfortable, ground-breaking music by accident or due naivety, it sure as hell beats today's calculated banality.
Good point about "a truth" versus "the truth." It's a semantic difference, but it's a distinction worth making.
I'm also with you in the idea that bands weren't necessarily more visionary in the 80s. The firm establishment of genre categories has probably added to the complacency of some artists (like with a lot of newbie thrash, to continue abusing that example), but if anything, I think that part of the reason it seems like there's a lot of junk right now is because there's just a lot of everything right now.
Even within very codified genres, I think exciting stuff is coming out. The last track on the new Dead Congregation album, "Teeth Into Red," for example, I think is one of the most emotionally effective straight death metal songs I've ever heard. It does everything by the book in a lot of ways-you've got blasphemy, death, etc.–but the way it spins it makes the promise of immortality seem like such a disgraceful joke, and the acceptance of death seem surprisingly painful and dignified. That's theoretically being done in a lot of death metal songs, but I feel like that track really nails it, and if genre study can pull off stuff like that… so much the better.
I don't know, I'm not nostalgic at all. I think now is a great time to be listening to metal, no matter what it is you like.
Damn. I totally want to move to Europe again.
You're right. It is blindingly difficult to find any girl that can talk about any sort of metal here in the states.
Just that conversations such as this are happening means that our HM era will be very interesting. People being more aware of what they're doing doesn't lead only to self-defeating ironic facades, it also leads to even stronger personal statements. Musicians and fans moving into their third decade in such a critical environment will make for some more directed HM, instead of just genre worship. Bands like Wrathblade, Maudlin of the Well, Warning, Dead Congregation, Litany, Hammers of Misfortune or Negura Bunget couldn't have existed in a different time, so I'm happy.
Hell yeah.
Mr. Lee, you sir, are a fucking genius!!!
Great analysis, and great comments. A real pleasure to read.
I think the big difference is that America doesn't have the mythological heritage that Europe has – unless you want to count Daniel Boone or something. We're basically caught up in a stale form of irony and self-awareness because that's all we have. The ghosts of Wagner, the Celtic and Viking myths, medieval influences, etc, still loom large in Europe. Everywhere you walk in some cities, you see a four hundred year old building. In LA, you won't see a building more than 50 years old.
Additionally, from a business point of view, we have no festival culture in the States; that hurts us. We also don't have the democratic socialism that allows one to not worry about things like health insurance. Many European fans have the freedom to pick up and go to a festival five hours away for three days; most American working stiffs (which we US metal are) don't. We have WAY more bills than our Eurpoean counterparts.
Also, we have almost no female fans, and that hurts us. American female music fans are fairly limited. In fact, I'm hard pressed to find many American women who even listen to music at all, unless you travel to Brooklyn, NY to include the annoying hipsters.
One thing that surprises me about the states is the MASSIVE explosion in the popularity of extreme metal, i.e. Hate Eternal, Job for a Cowboy, Nile, etc. Seems that we went right to the heavy and surpassed a lot of things. Not surprising that we went straight to the aggressive. I'm still surprised to find Americans who've EVER listened to Nightwish, Epica, etc.
"My problem with most of the ironic metal I've come across is that it's very pleased with itself for its ability to not tell a truth, and I find that, as very early realization about what language and communication does, not very interesting."
Exactly. The mark of an 'ironic' band is that I become very bored or annoyed with them after only two listens. I can go spend some time talking to my lawyer – or listen to Pavement – if I want to hear someone talk AROUND something and be non-committal.
I worked as an intern at SPIN magazine many years ago, and what I found completely suffocating there was the snotty, 'ironically detatched' attitude of the other young interns. They basically had a too-cool-to-believe in-anything air about them combined with a prissy form of liberalism. The females were uptight, boring women's studies types, and the males were complete wuss-bags. God forbid they actually enjoyed something.
Regardles – what I like about European metal is the 'ALL-IN' attitude of it. There's no halfway. If they're going to to fantasy based metal, they DO IT. If they're going to do symphonic metal, they DO IT. Shit blowing up on stage? Fire? Confetti? A full choir? Why not? Metal is also about THE SHOW; it's not just a few people on stage twiddling around and an audience gazing at their Chuck Taylors.
Was that a rant?
MetalOver30 – Thoughtful rants are certainly welcome here. I agree with most of your points. Nightwish and Epica might not resonate with Americans because they appeal (however successfully or not) to a more fantastical, mythical aesthetic, which Europe's history allows and America's doesn't.
I would disagree with the assertion that there are almost no metal fans in America. They are certainly fewer in comparison to Europeans, but they are there. It depends somewhat on the kind of metal. Brutal and technical death metal are very male, while black metal and Hessian-style bands like High on Fire (one of their SF shows was almost crawling with women) potentially draw more women.
The "all in" nature of metal is one of its best attributes.