666 : What is Metal?

Our universe is vast. It is full of melodic mountains made up of euphoric life-affirming anthems. Music that makes you feel invigorated. There are also dark recesses where the pain and anguish run as torrents of harrowing human misery. Music that speaks to the broken and down-trodden. Yet, both exist side by side. Both are Metal. Metal started as Sabbath. Sabbath was Metal, Metal was Sabbath. Simple. But then like any virus it started mutating. And that's the point. There is no blueprint or grand plan for this music. It is not built to some preordained structure, it creeps, it develops and it evolves. Which begs the question “What actually is Metal?”. I personally think it’s an infusion of three distinct elements and the most bizarre is that none of them are music or a catchy tune.

The initial element is energy and passion. Metal awakens an emotion in me and makes me feel. I love the bombastic symphonic majesty of Nightwish and I love the brutal minimalism of Carcass. Poles apart sonically, but they both stir an emotional response from me, they both make my heart beat a little faster. That for me is the first defining factor of Metal. That pure shot of adrenaline, that riff that just makes you move and that line that makes you sing.

Metal fan at Bloodstock 2019.

That is all well and good, but you can use that description for so many other types of music that are not necessarily Metal. They are plenty of people who would claim that Coldplay, Adele and, god forbid, Ed Sheeran makes them feel like that. So there must be something else, additional ingredients that makes something Metal. Some form of alchemy that mixes with the passion and the emotion and creates this unique un-quenching music. 

The second ingredient in my mind is attitude. Metal is as much about how you feel and what you believe in, as it is about what you like musically. We have right wing and we have left wing Metal. We have Satanic Metal and we have Christian Metal. We have political Metal and we have hedonistic party Metal. What they all share in common is that call to arms, that voice of dissent and anger. As Mr. Snider once screamed “We're Not Gonna Take It ”. Metal is a force for change and reactive rebellion. It is about standing up and screaming (quoting Mr. Snider again) “I am, I’m me”. It is that activism that makes Metal special. It is not a passive music that provides wallpaper for your life, it is a disruptive force that wants to invigorate change. As said, there is not one dominant view-point or belief system, it is more a case of whatever you believe in or whatever your adhere to, Metal is music for smashing down barriers and challenging those who oppress you.

Dee Snider won’t take it at Bloodstock 2019 so why should we?

And that brings us to our third and final element. Metal is a unifier. It brings people together like no other genre. It is that last gang in town mentality, my enemy’s enemy is my friend. Metal is the music of the oppressed and the loner and it is this that brings us together. “We Are The Others” (to quote Charlotte Wessels for a change) and that feeling of isolation and outsiderness creates a bond like no other. There is no other music where convertees greet each other like old friends. No other music where you bond with strangers over faded t-shirts for bands that split up decades ago. Metal is not just a group of fans, it is a community and a culture. It has become an identity. 

Never too late to swing a sword at Bloodstock 2019.

So we have our three distinct ingredients, Passion, Disruption and Identity. This is what I believe sets our music aside from any other genre. That is what I believe makes it so unique. All genres have songs, but our genre gives us songs with passion, songs that disrupt the norm and songs that gives us an identity. And that is what is so special.

Photography by Johann Wierzbicki