Metal has always had a dual nature. Part of it wants to be epic soundtracks that transport us away; part of it wants to be rockin’ party tunes.

Metal is both Ennio Morricone and Spinal Tap. At the same time.

While much of the rock-n-roll influence can be blamed on moron magnets like Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin, or even the doofus metal writers who insist that metal began with The Who and Cream, a lot of the blame needs to fall on Black Sabbath as well, although they almost escaped. When their songs fail, it’s usually because they gave up on creating some kind of mood and went for more warmed-over rock music vapidity.

You can see this thread of rock-n-roll — jaunty, bouncy, offbeat, ironic, pentatonic, simplistic — running all the way through metal. It’s like a congenital trait marring a family line. Among other things, it’s easy to tell because rock-n-roll is exclusively on the surface. It tells you what it’s thinking and what you should think; it may be cryptic, but there’s never another level of interpretation. It’s made for mass consumption.

Metal at its best is more something you absorb, then intuit meaning from. It tends to be chaotic, using chromatic scales as its base for ultimately melodic and rhythmic freedom, but then trades away that freedom when it makes the ongoing narrative of song structure trump all else. It is both anarchistic and the anti-anarchistic in that it insists on reality. It’s not about personal drama, love affairs and how you feel after some trivial event. It’s about the breadth of existence, the big picture, and how interesting life is if we just quit that personal drama.

But the thread of dumb bouncy music remains. What do these have in common?

• Pantera – Far Beyond Driven
• At the Gates – Slaughter of the Soul
• Lamb of God – Ashes of the Wake
• Meshuggah – Chaosphere
• Arch Enemy – Wages of Sin
• Opeth – My Arms, Your Hearse
• Alestorm – Back Through Time
• Gojira – From Marths to Therius
• Mastodon – Leviathan
• The Haunted – Revolver
• Baroness – The Blue Album

All of the above are basially rock albums using metal technique. These don’t expand your mind; they put it into the rock mode of personal drama, bouncy drums, familiar and yet not really exciting pentatonic noodling. Since the music is unexceptional, the aesthetic must be powerful: they trick out their music by playing it at different speeds, adding weird instrumentation, adding weird imagery, and the like. But it’s not really musically different. Baroness is closer to Hootie and the Blowfish and the Dave Matthews band than metal; Gojira is closer to Fugazi and Mudhoney than metal; The Haunted and Pantera are closer to Biohazard and Sick of It All than metal.

Do we ever get bored of this? The audience for it obviously does not, but they pass by so quickly.

The lifetimer metal fan is a better bet if you’re a band. Make seven quality albums and metalheads will buy them for the rest of your life.

It’s better than taking a one-time lump sum by recording your five sold-out metal-flavored rock albums, and being forgotten by your witless fans within two years.

From an unlikely source:

“It is to symbolize the end of the American dream and the beginning of the decline and fall of the American Empire. America is falling apart at the seams for a variety of reasons and so in order to call attention to that, we call attention to what the catalyst was; why people are so self-centered these days and totally in it for themselves. This is how every single empire fell throughout history, when the people get too rich and stuck up and snotty…”
Jello Biafra-The Dead Kennedys (via Folk and Faith)

This perspective is correct, but only a part of the truth needed.

Metal completed the picture: the problem is humanistic morality, which keeps us from looking at the transcendent, as we’re too busy trying not to hurt anyone’s feelings.

Our society is awash in cowardice and pandering to the fearful.

A followup to the much-hated Half a mind…

When people say they detest elitism, it’s easy to show them that this is not the case.

Slocrates: Tell me, Thrashmyasscus, why do you think elitism is wrong?

Thrashmyasscus: Clearly, it prioritizes some people above others.

Slocrates: But were you not opining that Justin Bieber sucked cock earlier?

Thrashmyasscus: Yes, but that’s Bieber. His music is beyond bad.

Slocrates: Ah! So we agree that some music is good, and some music is bad.

Thrashmyasscus: Yes, but —

Slocrates: And so we also fuckin’ agree that it’s just a matter of degree between hating Bieber because he’s a useless talentless faggot, and hating “Radikult” because it’s a moronic Marilyn Manson ripoff fifteen years too late?

Thrashmyasscus: Of course. Both of those are worthless.

Slocrates: So then it is only a matter of degree when I say that Necrophagist, Cannibal Corpse, Cradle of Filth, Pantera, Meshuggah and Craft are douchebag low-IQ trailer-dwelling shit, and that Demigod’s Slumber of Sullen Eyes is a work beyond compare?

Thrashmyasscus: That’s not the point. You’re comparing apples and oranges.

Slocrates: Fine, then. What about if I say that black metal from 1990-1994 produced many great bands, but that since 1994, black metal has produced very few?

Thrashmyasscus: Then I’d say you are being judgmental.

Slocrates: And yet when we pointed out that Cannibal Corpse was whale dreck, and Bieber was shit, and yet praised Demigod, you did not mind?

Thrashmyasscus: Slocrates, these are night and day differences. You’re splitting hairs.

Slocrates: To someone who disliked all metal, the differences might not appear so great.

Thrashmyasscus: Well, that’s true, but the point is that elitists are too discerning.

Slocrates: In your view, elitists are not wrong because they choose good music over bad, but because they raise the bar too much?

Thrashmyasscus: That’s not what I mean at all, — but I take your point. Music is subjective, Slocrates. You can’t judge it.

Slocrates: It seems we are having a different debate. If music is subjective, why are any bands at all popular?

Thrashmyasscus: It’s purely random.

Slocrates: And yet both of us agree that Justin Bieber is a cock-horfing turd of a musician. How do we know this?

Thrashmyasscus: The simplistic songs… the moronic lyrics… his wailing voice… I must rape…

Slocrates: As you say, it’s then a matter of degree. Much as from a distance a man and a dog appear closer in height, from a distance “Radikult” and “Chapel of Ghouls” appear closer in quality. Then what you think is wrong with the elitist is that he is too close to the music at hand.

Thrashmyasscus: Fuck you!

They have no idea why they detest elitism. At first, it just seems unfair; next, the standards are too high; finally, they accuse you of being an elitist so you sound cool to the kids at school. They will probably do this while holding an Opeth or Obscura record, which they will just have finished beating about the heads of their friend group, telling them how enlightened and musically proficient it is in contrast to whatever crap those morons are listening to.

I have a different supposition: they hate elitism because it says participation alone is not enough.

The participation alone people want to believe that all music is basically the same, and if you learn to play guitar and make some songs, then record them, you’re part of the club.

Elitists say “not so fast” and demand instead that you do all of the above, and also make quality music.

For an elitist, the focus is on the music; it’s on the end results. Who cares about the rest?

The problem with this of course is that it means participation is not enough. One has to get good. That requires that one have certain innate talents, and apply oneself.

Naturally, this isn’t popular with the Crowd. They’d rather hear that you can get out there with a guitar, record whatever sloppy and incoherent crap runs through your mind, and then be part of the club. Everyone else then owes it to you to support you, because you tried. Everyone is equal on the level of participation.

What irks such people is that to history, and any sane observers, participation is nothing. Achievement is all. And not all can achieve, and this upsets them to learn, because they came to metal to get away from the achievement-requiring standards of (life|school|social groups above 105 average IQ|the Dayton-Hudson Corporation employee handbook).

Metal is their escape, and you’re ruining it for them.

But if you don’t, they’ll ruin your metal by inundating the scene with low quality music.

When that happens, no one will find the good stuff, and good musicians will go elsewhere. Why work hard to make good music so a bunch of participation-is-everything fans can blow it off?

Participation is nothing; the end result is all.

If you were playing basketball, you wouldn’t want a guy on your team who thought “trying” to get the ball in the hoop was enough. No; you want the guy who gets it in there.

When someone fixes your roof, you don’t want some guy who “tries” to do it right. You want someone who succeeds.

Music is no different, and it’s a secret hidden in plain sight that this is true, because there are so many participants (who have nothing else in life but a job making sandwiches, a dingy apartment and a string of failed relationships) who want to force us all to believe that participation is equal to achievement.

It sounds like they have a mental health problem, doesn’t it?

You could be dicking around with:

• Faux old school death metal
• Metalcore
• Necrophagist style random “tech death” that is metalcore
• Deathcore
• “Open minded” black metal that sounds like REM on a banjo

Or, this track from Sorcier des Glaces’ re-envisioning of their aetheric black metal opus, “Snowland.”

Some new reading for y’all:

• Beherit – At the Devil’s Studio 1990: more like the later EPs, a sonically-experimental take on these songs that were more Blasphemy like on The Oath of Black Blood but gained some power in their austere, minimal, aloof presentation on the second album.
• Cianide – Gods of Death: A big improvement over Hell’s Rebirth; a more self-conscious album, this one deliberately merges their Motorhead, Celtic Frost and Master origins in a new, streamlined form of the oldest of old school.
• Ejacula radio on KPFT 90.1: for those of you in Houston and awake from 3 am – 6 am on Friday mornings, this is the dark and shadowy metal show that has stalked this realm for 19 years.

These made it to Examiner to keep that source alive; despite having terrible software, distant editors and mostly celebrity content, Examiner is a great place to promote metal and make it into mainstream news.

If you needed confirmation the proles are running the show:

Like a stunning, stylized nightmare, Mike Hill’s first ground-rattling growl on Path of Totality is “CHAOS REIGNS.” It’s enough to conjure that memorable scene from Lars Von Trier’s controversial film, Antichrist, in which a self-disemboweling fox cryptically and prophetically utters these two words to Willem Defoe’s character. If anything, it sets the tone for a dark, fully absorbing listen on Tombs’ second album.

With Path of Totality, out June 7, the Brooklyn metal trio takes its disparate influences and distills an expansive palette using thick, controlled brushstrokes. The industrial sledgehammer of Godflesh meets the blast-beated darkness of early Darkthrone in “To Cross the Land,” while “Vermillion” intones a sinister psychedelic swirl over an impressive rhythm section preparing for war. The atmospheric Goth-rock of The Cure presides over “Passageways” and “Black Heaven,” as the dead-eyed stare of Swans — the members of Tombs are admittedly huge fans — lurks in unlit corridors. But while the band’s wide-ranging music libraries are on display, Path of Totality functions as something new, mostly because its extremity is tempered by a dynamic push and pull, accentuated by the spacious production of John Congleton, whose diverse clientele includes Explosions in the Sky, Baroness, Modest Mouse and St. Vincent. – National People’s Radio

Wow, look it has lots of different stuff in it. Translation: no direction.

Looks like a big-name indie producer made it. Translation: “post-metal” means indie with slow drums and distortion.

It’s on NPR. Translation: it’s OK by government and industry, thus as far from underground as you can get, no matter how underground it pretends to be.

Journalist Nathan Birk went in investigation of the Blasphemy phenomenon, and was able to wrest an interview from these guys 20+ years past their original works of hateful, apostatic skinhead black metal/grindcore crossover. Excerpts from the interview are published on the Zero Tolerance blog. Some insights:

Both Blasphemy albums are equally classic in my opinion, but why do you think Fallen Angel Of Doom resounds so powerfully with so many people over a number of generations?

DeathLord: Blasphemy were focused only on Blasphemy during the Fallen Angel Of Doom era. Soon after that, even as early as the Gods Of War era, their energies were spread to other interests.

Black Winds: Let me put it to you this way – I wrote the song ‘Blood Upon The Altar’ from Gods Of War after a bottle and a half of tequila!

Maybe… because Fallen Angel of Doom is the far better album.

While Blasphemy have certainly wielded a global influence on new generations of black/death metal, it seems the biggest pockets of influence are situated in the US, Canada, Australia, and parts of South America and South East Asia – to what do you attribute this to? That Blasphemy wield influence on countries that are…well, less purely ‘white’?

DeathLord: Where do you get this information?! I can find you 25 Burzum clones from Brazil and another 10 from Australia! Also, Burzum record sales are better than Blasphemy record sales in every country you mentioned, so explain why these “less purely white” people are into that style? All metal, all genres, is a worldwide phenomenon. You are obviously speaking about Europe in this question, yet we get the most requests to bring our live ritual out there and I get the most orders for Blasphemy merchandise from there, too. And to add to this, it doesn’t get more ‘white’ than Finland, yet I hear Beherit, Satanic Evil, early Impaled Nazarene, Archgoat, and newer bands like OfDoom and Black Feast, etc, that have a distinct bestial sound with a Blasphemy influence. Blasphemy are indeed “global” and equally listened to, per capita, in all regions of the world. I know this firsthand through my distro and contacts.

Black Winds: The South Americans are probably the biggest black metallers in the world. If we played a show down there with Mystifier or Impurity or someone, there would be thousands there! Traditional Sodomizer’s band Tyrants Blood just played down there, and it was crazy! We don’t notice skin colour, only how black metal people are.

He ducked the question with a false comparison.

So, how would you address charges of Blasphemy ‘resting on your laurels’? Meaning, playing those reunion shows but without any new material in almost two decades…?

Black Winds: Tough. If you don’t like it, don’t come and see it.

DeathLord: Have you ever noticed that people go crazy at a show when the band plays their old songs and are bored to tears when they do a set of newer material? Well, we don’t only hype up the crowd with a few old tunes, we play them ALL! They are eaten up with total frenzy for the entire duration of the live ritual! But, to answer your question, we’re Blasphemy and we do whatever the fuck we want! We don’t answer to any “charges” against us.

Well, it’s sensible. If you’re not going to be able to write newer material that’s better than the old stuff, you should just play the old stuff.

Interesting how bands like BEHERIT continued improving, BURZUM sold out worse than Metallica after peaking late, and ENSLAVED have become something entirely different, namely a hard rock/jam band. BLASPHEMY have stayed true to their roots, even if their answers in this interview aren’t entirely logical. Birk asks the right questions; he could ask all the old stuff, but instead he asked them about their place in the metal canon, and got some intriguing answers.

Read the interview here: Crime (and Powerlifting) Pays — An Interview with Blasphemy