Metal - lifestyle, phase or something else?

I wouldn't say they are 'casual', they are quite heavily into whatever they like, they just haven't got very far into metal to hear anything beyond a few specific songs. I haven't gone very far into pop music either, I'm just sensible enough to know that just because the majority I hear is about love/sex doesn't mean it all is.

(I did find it somewhat odd the other day to hear a pop song with the lyrics basically being "I'm unfaithful on my partner and it hurts him, but I can't help it cos it feels good", especially as the girl who put it on considered it to be 'her song' and was proud of it...)

Night Prowler said:
My main grip with non-metal-rock music is that it's basically fake. By fake I mean, majority of it is recorded on computers, with no real instruments and with ultra-simplistic lyrics. Oh yeah, and most of popular artists are scandal-rich spoiled celebrities which is also off-putting even if it doesn't have anything to do with music itself.
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That is one area I would say that I am possibly 'against' other genres, one thing I like about metal/rock bands is that they generally write their own music AND perform it, instruments and vocals. Whilst there are some pop artists who write their own music not all do, and certainly the majority do not perform anything beyond vocals - yet they get far more recognition out of it. Whilst I know that it is all down to the demand for the music and so not exactly their fault, I do still feel it is somewhat unfair.

Not even going to go into how many of the artists in the charts have got there via TV-shows rather than hard work ^^
 
The Flash said:
I disagree with the notion that people of other genres get just as offended as metal and classical fans. Almost absolutely certain about that claim.

A lot of people any genre can "hate" another genre. But being "offended" is a completely different thing. The genre has to have a complete subculture to have its people get offended. Metal has it. Classical has it. Punk rock has it. And make no mistake, I hate the conservative classical fans and conservative punk fans just as much as I hate conservative metal fans.
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You edited your post after I replied so I'll just reply to the rest here.

I can't tell you how many times I've told a hip hop fan I like metal and was met with a response like "oh that devil worship music?" Or a pop fan that I like jazz and get "I hate jazz, it's so wanky". I'm not sure what makes you think this is something exclusive to Metal. By the way, again these are exceptions and not the rule.
And yea, offended in itself is a pretty strong word.Dunno if I'd use that.

Classical, same thing. I don't know if you've been around many classical fans but from visiting symphonies/conservatories, getting lectures from professionals at school, and other things like that, I can only think of one time I've come across a classical listener who acted that way.
 
There are conservative/close minded/rejecting (you name it) fans in any genre, of course. I just think metal and classic have a bigger crowd of those people. Maybe it's just me. Personal experience + Internet observation gives me this idea, really.

Do think that my initial post is just an answer to NP's question in regards to what I find annoying about metal or its culture. Metal and classical thing is just an observation, my bigger beef with metal fans is the "back to basics" thing as I tried to stress in the original post.

Night Prowler said:
Well in your posts you said "metal fans", not "conservative fans". As a metal fan, I felt mentioned in your remark :p
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I did try to avoid generalizations, though. Sorry if I missed one.
 
Can't say I've ever been offended by ANY genre, if I don't like it I don't listen to it, simple as. I have heard songs and gone "WTF, This is meant to be music!?" before (one instance that stuck in mind was being in a clothes store once and the song playing was basically 5 minutes of the words 'I wanna fuck you, but you already know...' on repeat). I've met plenty who consider Metal offensive because they think it is purely aggression, with lyrics about killing.

'The decline of western civilization' documentaries are about rock/metal cultures and how it is bad - yet I've never seen such a thing about any other genre? No they get reality TV shows to promote new artists, whereas metal gets documentaries about how BAD it is for the world. So, I would argue that there is far more intolerance TOWARDS metal subculture than BY metal subculture. Let's not forget protests and banning of bands due to the belief that they are a bad influence on children, including lawsuits about 'backwards messages' etc. It quite possibly happens about artists from other genres, but no where near on the same scale.

I don't think metal fans are any more intolerant than any others.

EDIT: Didn't realise there was a 3rd decline docu, so adjusted that.
 
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The calling of rock/metal as devil's work or just something bad hardly has anything to do with the music itself, though. It's more about religious, political or social concerns. They don't get offended by it because they're a jazz fan or something. They get offended because they're "devout Christians" etc. :D
 
Crimson Idol said:
I don't think metal fans are any more intolerant than any others.
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I'd even go as far as to say they are the most tolerant. There's a bigger chance of a casual music fan calling a metalhead a satanist than a metalhead saying something bad to the other person.
 
Crimson Idol said:
'The decline of western civilization', parts one and two, are about rock/metal cultures and how it is bad - yet I've never seen such a thing about any other genre? No they get reality TV shows to promote new artists, whereas metal gets documentaries about how BAD it is for the world. So, I would argue that there is far more intolerance TOWARDS metal subculture than BY metal subculture. Let's not forget protests and banning of bands due to the belief that they are a bad influence on children, including lawsuits about 'backwards messages' etc. It quite possibly happens about artists from other genres, but no where near on the same scale.
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This is a great point. It could be that metal fans might come off as louder about certain things because of the backlash they get. When a genre gets pushed around the way Metal does, you can't blame people when they decide to push back.

Night Prowler said:
I'd even go as far as to say they are the most tolerant. There's a bigger chance of a casual music fan calling a metalhead a satanist than a metalhead saying something bad to the other person.
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:yes:

And it absolutely has to do with the music. Certain themes pop up in Metal a lot. It's not like the satanic accusations came from nowhere. Not to mention the heavy and sometimes deliberately evil sounding tone. It's ridiculous but it stems from the music.
The same way a person might write off hip hop music because they can't relate to the street life/culture that fills the subject matter of a lot of that.
 
This has gotten completely out of hand. I was talking solely about music. Satanism remarks are completely about religious, political and social concerns. Has nothing to do with music genre fandom. Noone calls metalheads satanists because they like jazz. They do because they hear violent lyrics or stuff that they feel like attack their religion.
 
Night Prowler said:
I'd even go as far as to say they are the most tolerant. There's a bigger chance of a casual music fan calling a metalhead a satanist than a metalhead saying something bad to the other person.
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Metalheads may bash other genres, but I rarely hear them bash the listeners themselves. However most people who bash metal, bash the culture and fans equally as much as the music.
 
Night Prowler said:
:wtf:
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Yeah, exactly my point. Nobody does that.

Mosh said:
And it absolutely has to do with the music. Certain themes pop up in Metal a lot. It's not like the satanic accusations came from nowhere. Not to mention the heavy and sometimes deliberately evil sounding tone. It's ridiculous but it stems from the music.
The same way a person might write off hip hop music because they can't relate to the street life/culture that fills the subject matter of a lot of that.
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The hatred stems from religious/political/social concerns. Not music concerns. Of course they get offended by the music, there's no other thing in music than...music.

If you think a blues fan calls metalheads satanists because their music doesn't sound like blues, then I've got nothing to say. They do it because they think it's evil.
 
Ok, but there are just as many people bashing metal for being "noise". Is that a social concern?
 
Metal does get its share of bashing. But that's not my initial point. The vast majority of the ones who call metal "noise" aren't extremely passionate about music.

We're talking about fanbases and their cultures here. Not a general dislike towards a genre by every other genre.
 
Holy fuck, @The Flash, can you read your posts a couple of times before posting them cause you edit every single one like 3 times per minute after posting.

The Flash said:
The hatred stems from religious/political/social concerns. Not music concerns. Of course they get offended by the music, there's no other thing in music than...music.
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Most hated thing about metal are lyrics. Lyrics are important part of music, so of course the hatred comes from musical concerns too. If metal bands sang about fluffy rabbits, Jesus and hamburgers, it wouldn't get 90% of hate it gets. And the fanbase itself would also be smaller. It's all connected.
 
The Flash said:
Metal does get its share of bashing. But that's not my initial point. The vast majority of the ones who call metal "noise" aren't extremely passionate about music.

We're talking about fanbases and their cultures here. Not a general dislike towards a genre by every other genre.
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Well then that's unfair. The reason you notice it more with Metal is that it has its own culture surrounding it that is arguably larger than any other music subculture.
 
Night Prowler said:
Most hated thing about metal are lyrics. Lyrics are important part of music, so of course the hatred comes from musical concerns too. If metal bands sang about fluffy rabbits, Jesus and hamburgers, it wouldn't get 90% of hate it gets. And the fanbase itself would also be smaller. It's all connected.
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You missed the mark completely there. Yes, it's the lyrics and music. But people don't call those guys satanists because of their musical preferences. They do it because they think it's evil. Something not related to the fanbase discussion. We can have cultural look on metal debate some other time (we'd be on the same side on that one, though).

Mosh said:
Well then that's unfair. The reason you notice it more with Metal is that it has its own culture surrounding it that is arguably larger than any other music subculture.
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There you have it, the essence of it. The discussion is about how we feel about styles and cultures. And I dislike the metal culture. That's my original point. I don't dislike the people (obviously), but I dislike its culture.

Axl Rose, back when they were touring with Maiden, tried to express the same opinion as me in an interview but couldn't phrase it properly. He said their band feels like a political thing because of their fanbase and that he doesn't like that. Same applies to me. It's just music. I don't those subcultures musical styles bring along. Goes for metal, goes for punk, goes for classical, goes for rap.
 
But you're acting like this is something exclusive to metal culture and that it's even a large facet of metal culture. But it isn't.
You're judging an entire culture based on a vocal minority. In my opinion, that's just as bad as people who bash metal culture on grounds that it's satanic or filled with deadbeats.
 
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