Impression, Texture, Structure...Mind, Heart, Body
We are beyond the infantile, are we not? As tunes close in on our heads, infecting our memory-banks, and dictating our thoughts - metalheads of a dedicated nature embrace something real, steeped in the fantastic to make it so. This means we do not appreciate the fact that mass-produced and exploited sounds are geared around money first, hooks only closely second (if not entirely attached to the first), and content somewhere around twentieth...last...or not at all. We can hear NO catch, no snag, no "hook", from something created for cathartic purpose, for therapy, served to medicate the creator; and the tones themselves will draw us. Us metal folk can hear the metal mindset in much that is not even technically "metal". It's just that metal - the kind with integrity and conviction - is the most blatant about the whole picture. Metal has encompassed a new dimension for our minds, hearts, and bodies. Take into consideration what is being said here. When you hear a person of this creed say, "That's METAL."...perhaps you might take it a little less lightly.
The more atmospheric of metals, in which I've been exclusively been indulging lately, has inspired this body of text tonight. Thoughts like, "I bet if (fill in the blank) heard this...they'd think I was nuts" or "I'm so sure that I'll never make (fill in the blank) understand the appeal of this..." came into my chattering head. We all have someone in which the aforementioned blanks could be filled. And why, my metal brothers and sisters, is this so? Are we truly so elite?
Yes and no.
Part of the process of finding so much within what others see as simple and mundanely extreme lies within knowing what nothing is. We have tasted some form of oblivion, been far down, scraped the bottom. We have created entities with our own blood. This means that we have powers of darkness, powers that harness the void and materialize it within a melancholic prison, making a begotten friend from the art of others like ourselves. This is not kingly. This is necromancy. This is transcendence.
So - elite? No. Not in the sense that pertains to social and political success within the microcosms of our meager lives and those that help host it. Exempt? Yes. In this sense, we are the elite (no capitalization), needing nothing but ourselves and our beloved and deified tunes that embody our transcendence. What I'm saying is there's not merely a guitar hammering out parts of a scale and chords in random new ways in our ears. There is the life we give it through aural observation. Classical composers come to mind when thinking this way. And that shit is METAL.
Let's not degrade the existence of "hooks", mind you. A lot of our music has them. We have our classic anthems of our lives. But we see to the heart of them. We might decipher the sadness that originally existed to make a thrash song so furious and, well...not sad. We might hear with our minds the intricate thought-patterns of the musician that created the wall of woven patterns in a technical death metal song, thus making it a kind of relaxation for us. We might hear the desperate cry for LIFE that comes from the grotesquely strangled suicidal and depressive black metal tune. These things are not simple to us, be them based on four chords - or several modes and scales combined in mind-boggling ways. A scream can soothe us with empathetic tones of home. It's where our heart is, afterall.
And so I come to the part where I attempt to justify the more tonal of recording and performances. Much of the music that an in-depth metal fan takes in can be very enjoyably devoid of noticeable structure, key, or even sense at all. No words can be deciphered. The drummer's timing is nearly impossible to find. The studio production of the final mix is "muddy" or "buzzy" (one extreme to the other), taking even the FAN a few listens to be able to enjoy. As mentioned before when describing our lack of care for imperative hooks, it might seem like there is no repeating nuances at all to "hook" us. Where, then, do we find the appeal in some of this...music?
Does not even the simplest of humans find rain upon our rooftops to be soothing? And those that do not, they still have something that fits the criteria of my point here. A fan to hum us to sleep, caressing us gently with it's winds, could be preferred. The clicking of a loved-ones fingers loyally writing their evening email replies from the next room could be someones comfort. And so, we metalheads (the non-casual of us, no less) take this mindset, realizing that there is indefinite control behind the tonal and structural sonic entities that infiltrate our ears through our METAL, add our own lives to them, injecting time-periods, fantastic situations, dreams, desires...and these symphonies of our lives become our comforts.
Never tell me that metalheads are mindless...and Lord help you if you cry accusations of "heartless". We might just cut yours out if you think we need one so badly.
TTSNSN - 7-23-13
We are beyond the infantile, are we not? As tunes close in on our heads, infecting our memory-banks, and dictating our thoughts - metalheads of a dedicated nature embrace something real, steeped in the fantastic to make it so. This means we do not appreciate the fact that mass-produced and exploited sounds are geared around money first, hooks only closely second (if not entirely attached to the first), and content somewhere around twentieth...last...or not at all. We can hear NO catch, no snag, no "hook", from something created for cathartic purpose, for therapy, served to medicate the creator; and the tones themselves will draw us. Us metal folk can hear the metal mindset in much that is not even technically "metal". It's just that metal - the kind with integrity and conviction - is the most blatant about the whole picture. Metal has encompassed a new dimension for our minds, hearts, and bodies. Take into consideration what is being said here. When you hear a person of this creed say, "That's METAL."...perhaps you might take it a little less lightly.
The more atmospheric of metals, in which I've been exclusively been indulging lately, has inspired this body of text tonight. Thoughts like, "I bet if (fill in the blank) heard this...they'd think I was nuts" or "I'm so sure that I'll never make (fill in the blank) understand the appeal of this..." came into my chattering head. We all have someone in which the aforementioned blanks could be filled. And why, my metal brothers and sisters, is this so? Are we truly so elite?
Yes and no.
Part of the process of finding so much within what others see as simple and mundanely extreme lies within knowing what nothing is. We have tasted some form of oblivion, been far down, scraped the bottom. We have created entities with our own blood. This means that we have powers of darkness, powers that harness the void and materialize it within a melancholic prison, making a begotten friend from the art of others like ourselves. This is not kingly. This is necromancy. This is transcendence.
So - elite? No. Not in the sense that pertains to social and political success within the microcosms of our meager lives and those that help host it. Exempt? Yes. In this sense, we are the elite (no capitalization), needing nothing but ourselves and our beloved and deified tunes that embody our transcendence. What I'm saying is there's not merely a guitar hammering out parts of a scale and chords in random new ways in our ears. There is the life we give it through aural observation. Classical composers come to mind when thinking this way. And that shit is METAL.
Let's not degrade the existence of "hooks", mind you. A lot of our music has them. We have our classic anthems of our lives. But we see to the heart of them. We might decipher the sadness that originally existed to make a thrash song so furious and, well...not sad. We might hear with our minds the intricate thought-patterns of the musician that created the wall of woven patterns in a technical death metal song, thus making it a kind of relaxation for us. We might hear the desperate cry for LIFE that comes from the grotesquely strangled suicidal and depressive black metal tune. These things are not simple to us, be them based on four chords - or several modes and scales combined in mind-boggling ways. A scream can soothe us with empathetic tones of home. It's where our heart is, afterall.
And so I come to the part where I attempt to justify the more tonal of recording and performances. Much of the music that an in-depth metal fan takes in can be very enjoyably devoid of noticeable structure, key, or even sense at all. No words can be deciphered. The drummer's timing is nearly impossible to find. The studio production of the final mix is "muddy" or "buzzy" (one extreme to the other), taking even the FAN a few listens to be able to enjoy. As mentioned before when describing our lack of care for imperative hooks, it might seem like there is no repeating nuances at all to "hook" us. Where, then, do we find the appeal in some of this...music?
Does not even the simplest of humans find rain upon our rooftops to be soothing? And those that do not, they still have something that fits the criteria of my point here. A fan to hum us to sleep, caressing us gently with it's winds, could be preferred. The clicking of a loved-ones fingers loyally writing their evening email replies from the next room could be someones comfort. And so, we metalheads (the non-casual of us, no less) take this mindset, realizing that there is indefinite control behind the tonal and structural sonic entities that infiltrate our ears through our METAL, add our own lives to them, injecting time-periods, fantastic situations, dreams, desires...and these symphonies of our lives become our comforts.
Never tell me that metalheads are mindless...and Lord help you if you cry accusations of "heartless". We might just cut yours out if you think we need one so badly.
TTSNSN - 7-23-13