Confessions of a lonely metalhead

Graphic: Erick Nelson

Yeah, I listen to a bit of Deadmau5. I’m not opposed to the Grateful Dead. I love Sublime just as much as the next guy, and although I have been repeatedly told that Old Crow Medicine Show has much better songs than “Wagon Wheel,” its still their only track I have on my computer. Animal Collective has always been a bit too schizophrenic for my tastes, but I still think they make excellent music. I have an acceptable amount of Bob Marley, a decent collection of Hendrix, a minimal, yet respectable selection of hip-hop, a great deal of psychedelic trance and electro, assorted tribal chants, and plenty of weird minimal techno that should probably be played at snobby European art shows rather than in my room.

However, there is always one genre, or perhaps a spectrum of genres that I seem to skip over when choosing music to put on when in the company of others. The mildest would be Tool. Definitely a weird band, but so is Phish. Recently, when I have hopped into my friend’s car, a particular Phish show has come on in which there is a break in the music for a couple minutes to allow an epic tale of some possums (maybe woodchucks or hedgehogs, actually) to be told, all in some sort of crazed poetic jargon that I guess you have to be on lots of acid to understand. The crowd goes wild, obviously. 

I guess the main complaint about Tool that my friends have is that it is too “angry.” Well, yes, I suppose it is angry. You got me. But what’s the harm in that? Zach de la Rocha said it, Malcolm X implied it: Anger is a gift. So, when Sarah Palin gets elected, and China and the European Union simultaneously launch a full-scale invasion of the United States, I will most likely stock up on guns and play outrageously loud metal to warn intruders to stay far away from my property. Conversely, Phishheads will undoubtedly end up congregating barefoot at grassy farms across the country, listening to tunes, and end up being sitting ducks. They will all probably be thrown in chains and shipped off to Siberia for hard labor. 

I’ll let you tree-huggers in on a little secret: Tool isn’t actually that heavy. Many metalheads still like Tool even if their personal flavor happens to be heavier bands, which is quite rare in the metal world. In many circles, In Flames, Lamb of God, Opeth, and other bands that would probably make most of CC cry or at the very least uneasy, are referred to as nu-metal trash, in addition to a large amount of more obscene names that are not fit to print. 

I remember when I first listened to Metallica. I remember leaving Metallica for Children of Bodom. I remember when I figured out that Children of Bodom sucks, and that technical bands like Necrophagist and Arsis were much more talented and generally awesome. As one transcends such wimpy bands as Hatebreed, As I Lay Dying, and In Flames, they seem to fall into some sort of magically happy genre of music, oozing with sparkles and overflowing with baby unicorns.

Death Metal. Yep, death metal doesn’t really rock, and it definitely doesn’t jam. It shreds. Shreds your face off. Good death metal is also referred to as Brutal, which is a term I haven’t heard in any positive context since I got here, except perhaps when referring to brutal pow. I have never been in any place (except perhaps church) where death metal is less common than at CC. Out of every student here, I have met many pseudo-metalheads, a few semi-metalheads, and one true metalhead. No; two, and they would both know they were in this article if they read it. I don’t just hang out with those two, smoking cigarettes and cursing the earth, but it is a bit frustrating when friends ask me to turn off that awful metal stuff when I put on a track by the Smashing Pumpkins. 

I’m a lot like a typical CC student in a superficial way; I wear mountain hardware jackets and out of all my possessions am probably most attached to my hiking boots. Yet nobody thinks the fact that there exists a band called “Eyehategod” is as funny as I do, nor do they toy around with the idea of the apocalypse as much, or generally share in my politically incorrect sense of humor. It really is a shame that no metal culture exists at CC, and I say that because I genuinely believe that CC could benefit from one.

Varg Vikernes of the famed Norwegian black metal band Burzum, just got released on parole after serving 16 years for killing his band mate and burning down a couple of historic churches, and generally being a colorful character in the black metal scene, which entails tendencies such as owning massive amounts of highly dangerous weapons, drinking lots of red wine, and harboring an unhealthy obsession with the Lord of the Rings. It is rumored that a dispute between two Norwegian black metal vocalists over whose band was more grim (the black-metal equivalent of brutal) ended up in one lead singer cutting out the heart of the other lead singer, and eating it to prove his point. Stuff gets pretty weird up there in the winters, I guess. 

Even though the list of countries Cannibal Corpse has been banned from is quite large and constantly growing, I’ve never been a follower. It seems to me like their songwriters got medical degrees just so they could better rattle off extensive lists of obscure body parts that got mutilated in a car accident in one of their songs. But one can’t be too quick to separate metal and academics: Lord Worm of Cryptopsy took a few years off from being a death metal vocalist to be a substitute English teacher. He couldn’t resist his true calling though, and went back to eating live worms and screaming on stage in 2003.

Eccentricities aside, death metal musicians are more talented than most. They are more talented than any rock musicians that have been on the radio in the last 8 years, Girl Talk, Pretty lights, and any other silly mash-up artists. They might not be able to make an ecstasy-sweating crowd as happy as STS9 could, but they sure could outplay them. Listen to a single Necrophagist song, and let me know if Radiohead could play it. Travis Barker would cry and soil his pants if he tried to keep up with Suffocation. 

Yeah, death metal’s a bit angry. What has always puzzled me though is that I’m never made angry when I listen to it, nor do I have a desire to put metal on when I feel angry. I just think it shreds. I don’t know why. $#@%ing Brutal, dude. 

Go listen to the Shins, you bunch of weirdos.