6 ms·

I'm a bit confused about most death metal, are they trying to appear (as the cockney's say) "hard men" in the way that gangsta rappers are trying to portray str

I'm a bit confused about most death metal, are they trying to appear (as the cockney's say) "hard men" in the way that gangsta rappers are trying to portray street-level gangs?

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nativecoinc 3y ago
You could watch interviews/conversations with them and judge for yourself.
kendalf89 3y ago
It definitely depends on the band. Some of them are while others try to portray themselves as prophets or elevated beings.
- DoItToMe81 3y ago
  Prophets? Which bands, exactly?
twic 3y ago
Death metal is indeed very silly. What I'm not sure of is whether its fans don't realise it's silly, embrace the silliness, or have simply moved beyond such pathetic human dichotomies as serious and silly.
- Semaphor 3y ago
  I’d say most of us do realize it. The whole trveness is IME more a blackmetal thing. Now the question if we embrace it or have moved beyond is more personal ;)
- beezlebroxxxxxx 3y ago
  Most fans are very aware of the silliness. There's kind of an arms-race nature to the genre to see who can come up with the most over-the-top lyrics and ambience. Perhaps the one non-silly element to it is the cathartic feeling of aggression and rage it tries to get across. Few styles of music are as tapped into that dark portion of the human psyche that revels in violence, forbidden feelings, and raw aggression. It's actually a very cathartic genre to listen to; most fans and bands are very relaxed and calm people otherwise.
  - twic 3y ago
    On the latter point, what the Rebel Wizard had to say made a lot of sense to me: https://www.vice.com/en/article/wjkx4b/rebel-wizard-heavy-metal-negativity https://www.vice.com/en/article/wjkx4b/rebel-wizard-heavy-me... Sadly i did not enjoy his music in the least.
- obfuscator 3y ago
  A fantastic example of a man / band that is embracing the silliness is Rainbowdragoneyes. He mixes death metal with chiptune and trash pop voice modulators but still produces very intricate and well designed albums, that tell engaging stories, like this one: https://rainbowdragoneyes.bandcamp.com/album/the-secret-mirror https://rainbowdragoneyes.bandcamp.com/album/the-secret-mirr...
  - spiralx 3y ago
    He'd fit in well at the Bangface Weekender I go to religiously, they've had both plenty of chiptunes artists and Napalm Death play there in the past :) https://www.bangface.com/ https://www.bangface.com/
dagw 3y ago
Maybe a bit back in the 90s. But most of the bands are clearly 'LARPing' and putting on a persona. Off stage they're almost all very chill and aware of the absurdity of the characters they play.
- dagw 3y ago
  Also death metal has been around long enough that it's starting to get self referential. Many 'modern' bands sound, look and act the way they do mainly because that's how the bands loved growing up sounded/looked/acted.
actionfromafar 3y ago
Some really tried hard, with actual murder, arson of 1000 yo church in Norway and rehearsing (not live show) surrounded by sheep heads on spikes while throwing up because of the smell.
- DoItToMe81 3y ago
  That's not death metal.
- camel-cdr 3y ago
  Isn't that mostly black metal? The genre is also sadly quite infested with Nazis, but it seems to be getting better.
  - dagw 3y ago
    Yup. While metal nerds can argue about the exact musical difference between death metal and black metal, from a sub-cultural point of view they come from very different places.
- spiralx 3y ago
  Ah, that's black metal, which is deeply earnest. When I explain to people about my theory of earnestness in music death vs. black metal is a great way to show "not earnest" against "earnest". Can you tell me the story of the band and the sheep heads though please? I've heard a lot of stories from the black metal scene but not that one! Here are some very earnest album covers lol: https://www.decibelmagazine.com/2017/06/13/the-worst-black-metal-album-covers-of-all-time-part-i/ https://www.decibelmagazine.com/2017/06/13/the-worst-black-m...
DoItToMe81 3y ago
It's a line of progression from old metal stuff, which always had social transgression and horror elements as key themes. Because the genre is more extreme musically, the lyrics are adjusted to be more extreme, too. "Death Metal English" is actually not that common. Serial murderers have always been a lyrical topic, for example, and you can see the progression directly if you look for songs about them. From Judas Priest and Iron Maiden writing about them existing, to 80s bands like Slayer writing about them more individually, to death metal bands in the later 80s and 90s very graphically describing their acts.
williamdclt 3y ago
My perception is that there’s 2 schools of what they’re trying to appear like: - lovecraftian cult leaders, talking about esotericism, religion, forbidden knowledge etc etc - narrators of horror stories, talking about gore and violence In both cases, the singer rarely sings about themselves as a person. If they say « I » it’s usually impersonating a character (a murderer, a god, a sorcerer…), not literally them
tetha 3y ago
A lot of the themed metal is knowingly over the top in all regards. It's a show, and most fans to everyone knows it's a show. And if you get into the front rows, you get to be part of the show, whatever mess that entails with some bands. Recently we had people fencing with the frontman dressed as a pirate with blowup swords.
rj_hoff 3y ago
I'd say it's mostly not serious, in the same [kayfabe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kayfabe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kayfabe) tone as "professional wrestling" where it's known to those that are in the know that it's all a show. The website linked in this post (invisibleoranges) is a reference to a hand gesture a lot of metal artists and audiences make when performing/listening that appears to look as though they're holding invisible oranges, tongue firmly in cheek.
YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago
Nah, it has nothing to do with aggression, violence or crime. That's a misconception of outsiders who hear the loud music and growled vocals and assume they are an attempt at intimidation. In truth it's just a very strict art form, and I know it's hard to see it as an art form but that's what it is. It has a certain range of emotions that it chooses to express but it doesn't really have a message, like, go out and eat some babies alive. There's going to be exceptions to the rule of course, but the majority of kids who dig this stuff are nerds. They finish school and go into a STEM field in science or work in the industry as coders. Like, my best friend in high school was into Cannibal Corpse and splatter gore bands like that, and now he's a doctor. And, hey, I was all into Black Metal and now I got a PhD in computer science. Yeah? In fact, for me and my friends at least, being into this stuff was also a way to draw a clean line between us and the kids who wanted to grow up and be rich bimbos like their moms and dads, that sort of thing. Not that my friend who's a doctor is poor, but in my school at least we had lots of the kind of kid who comes in with expensive new clothes and brags about her dad's car or where the family is going skiing this Christmas, and it was fun to flip them the bird every day by coming into school with a Kreator t-shirt with a severed head sinking into blood (albeit very stylised; and Kreator aren't death metal). So for some kids at least there was a bit of that. Nerd solidarity, like.

I'm a bit confused about most death metal, are they trying to appear (as the cockney's say) "hard men" in the way that gangsta rappers are trying to portray street-level gangs?

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

nativecoinc 3y ago

You could watch interviews/conversations with them and judge for yourself.

kendalf89 3y ago

It definitely depends on the band. Some of them are while others try to portray themselves as prophets or elevated beings.

DoItToMe81 3y ago
Prophets? Which bands, exactly?

twic 3y ago

Death metal is indeed very silly. What I'm not sure of is whether its fans don't realise it's silly, embrace the silliness, or have simply moved beyond such pathetic human dichotomies as serious and silly.

Semaphor 3y ago
I’d say most of us do realize it. The whole trveness is IME more a blackmetal thing. Now the question if we embrace it or have moved beyond is more personal ;)
beezlebroxxxxxx 3y ago
Most fans are very aware of the silliness. There's kind of an arms-race nature to the genre to see who can come up with the most over-the-top lyrics and ambience. Perhaps the one non-silly element to it is the cathartic feeling of aggression and rage it tries to get across. Few styles of music are as tapped into that dark portion of the human psyche that revels in violence, forbidden feelings, and raw aggression. It's actually a very cathartic genre to listen to; most fans and bands are very relaxed and calm people otherwise.
- twic 3y ago
  On the latter point, what the Rebel Wizard had to say made a lot of sense to me: https://www.vice.com/en/article/wjkx4b/rebel-wizard-heavy-metal-negativity https://www.vice.com/en/article/wjkx4b/rebel-wizard-heavy-me... Sadly i did not enjoy his music in the least.
obfuscator 3y ago
A fantastic example of a man / band that is embracing the silliness is Rainbowdragoneyes. He mixes death metal with chiptune and trash pop voice modulators but still produces very intricate and well designed albums, that tell engaging stories, like this one: https://rainbowdragoneyes.bandcamp.com/album/the-secret-mirror https://rainbowdragoneyes.bandcamp.com/album/the-secret-mirr...
- spiralx 3y ago
  He'd fit in well at the Bangface Weekender I go to religiously, they've had both plenty of chiptunes artists and Napalm Death play there in the past :) https://www.bangface.com/ https://www.bangface.com/

dagw 3y ago

Maybe a bit back in the 90s. But most of the bands are clearly 'LARPing' and putting on a persona. Off stage they're almost all very chill and aware of the absurdity of the characters they play.

dagw 3y ago
Also death metal has been around long enough that it's starting to get self referential. Many 'modern' bands sound, look and act the way they do mainly because that's how the bands loved growing up sounded/looked/acted.

actionfromafar 3y ago

Some really tried hard, with actual murder, arson of 1000 yo church in Norway and rehearsing (not live show) surrounded by sheep heads on spikes while throwing up because of the smell.

DoItToMe81 3y ago
That's not death metal.
camel-cdr 3y ago
Isn't that mostly black metal? The genre is also sadly quite infested with Nazis, but it seems to be getting better.
- dagw 3y ago
  Yup. While metal nerds can argue about the exact musical difference between death metal and black metal, from a sub-cultural point of view they come from very different places.
spiralx 3y ago
Ah, that's black metal, which is deeply earnest. When I explain to people about my theory of earnestness in music death vs. black metal is a great way to show "not earnest" against "earnest". Can you tell me the story of the band and the sheep heads though please? I've heard a lot of stories from the black metal scene but not that one! Here are some very earnest album covers lol: https://www.decibelmagazine.com/2017/06/13/the-worst-black-metal-album-covers-of-all-time-part-i/ https://www.decibelmagazine.com/2017/06/13/the-worst-black-m...

DoItToMe81 3y ago

It's a line of progression from old metal stuff, which always had social transgression and horror elements as key themes. Because the genre is more extreme musically, the lyrics are adjusted to be more extreme, too. "Death Metal English" is actually not that common. Serial murderers have always been a lyrical topic, for example, and you can see the progression directly if you look for songs about them. From Judas Priest and Iron Maiden writing about them existing, to 80s bands like Slayer writing about them more individually, to death metal bands in the later 80s and 90s very graphically describing their acts.

williamdclt 3y ago

My perception is that there’s 2 schools of what they’re trying to appear like: - lovecraftian cult leaders, talking about esotericism, religion, forbidden knowledge etc etc - narrators of horror stories, talking about gore and violence In both cases, the singer rarely sings about themselves as a person. If they say « I » it’s usually impersonating a character (a murderer, a god, a sorcerer…), not literally them

tetha 3y ago

A lot of the themed metal is knowingly over the top in all regards. It's a show, and most fans to everyone knows it's a show. And if you get into the front rows, you get to be part of the show, whatever mess that entails with some bands. Recently we had people fencing with the frontman dressed as a pirate with blowup swords.

rj_hoff 3y ago

I'd say it's mostly not serious, in the same [kayfabe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kayfabe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kayfabe) tone as "professional wrestling" where it's known to those that are in the know that it's all a show. The website linked in this post (invisibleoranges) is a reference to a hand gesture a lot of metal artists and audiences make when performing/listening that appears to look as though they're holding invisible oranges, tongue firmly in cheek.

YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago

Nah, it has nothing to do with aggression, violence or crime. That's a misconception of outsiders who hear the loud music and growled vocals and assume they are an attempt at intimidation. In truth it's just a very strict art form, and I know it's hard to see it as an art form but that's what it is. It has a certain range of emotions that it chooses to express but it doesn't really have a message, like, go out and eat some babies alive. There's going to be exceptions to the rule of course, but the majority of kids who dig this stuff are nerds. They finish school and go into a STEM field in science or work in the industry as coders. Like, my best friend in high school was into Cannibal Corpse and splatter gore bands like that, and now he's a doctor. And, hey, I was all into Black Metal and now I got a PhD in computer science. Yeah? In fact, for me and my friends at least, being into this stuff was also a way to draw a clean line between us and the kids who wanted to grow up and be rich bimbos like their moms and dads, that sort of thing. Not that my friend who's a doctor is poor, but in my school at least we had lots of the kind of kid who comes in with expensive new clothes and brags about her dad's car or where the family is going skiing this Christmas, and it was fun to flip them the bird every day by coming into school with a Kreator t-shirt with a severed head sinking into blood (albeit very stylised; and Kreator aren't death metal). So for some kids at least there was a bit of that. Nerd solidarity, like.