Hear hear! I’m the kind of person who focuses on the negative (which is why I like reading your blog… it balances me out because you’re a positive person), so this entry speaks to me in spades.

I agree with everything, ESPECIALLY the sexist metalheads part. I was reading a old post on MetalSucks yesterday and I honestly developed a fear of ever becoming a “hot metal chick” because of all the sexist remarks made about a fairly attractive girl who appeared to be into metal. Someone ACTUALLY said that attractive girls who go to metal shows are there to be raped. I was so shocked! Not only because that’s disgusting, but also because they were essentially saying they only take ugly metal girls seriously. Attractiveness shouldn’t be a measure of how dedicated you are to something. Grr!

I’m somewhat guilty of 9. I never slam people for liking a certain band (because there’s no such thing as bad music, only music you don’t like!) but I will get extremely annoyed if someone says ‘I’m a metalhead’ then proceed to rattle off a list of bands that barely register as metal. That being said, I’m totally fine with metalheads who listen to those kinds of bands as guilty pleasures, because I also listen to Katy Perry in my downtime and I LOVE IT! Haha.

I think I’ve rambled on enough. Give your husband a high five for the Metallica fanboys addition! :)

Hey Steff!

I totally agree on the genre thing! It’s f*cking anoying that like every band invents their own genre! Mostly because their want to use popular metal-words to describe them. It would not surprise me, if I do find some Band labeling them self as “Epic Melodic Troll Black Death Vinkg Folk Metalcore”!
And the “Genre-Fashism” is the worst. I mean like people worshiping one genre and denying all others.
One of the first qualities of a real metalhead should be to be open minded and to have quite some knowlege about metal. So one of the first tasks of a metalhead is to listen to a lot of music, getting a overview of metal history.
Just to get this right. I dont say that people have to do that. If you listen to metal its allright. But if someone does not have propper knowledge about music history (of metal) he or she shouldn’t be like “I’m the most trve metalhead! You all dont know shiat!”.

And btw: Great Blog!
Gretz,
MrPolek!

Ffffffffffuck hardcore dancing. We mosh n the mosh pit, it’s not a reenactment of The Karate Kid’s training montage.

Crowdsurfers at any show that isn’t a punk band. These arms are staying folded.

When there’s a show at a bar and we aren’t allowed to mosh or windmill. Usually people just do it anyway, but then it’s tougher for bands to book shows there. :\

Great blog, Steff. Definitely agree with a lot of your peeves, particularly 6, 7 and 9.

Is sexism in Metal a big problem? I’m not a chick, and I play in a Metal band with two women in it, so I suppose I’ve never noticed it.

As for #10, I’ve done some digging on this, and it appears that it’s the I Love You sign from American sign language, which is now thrown about all over the place:

http://deafness.about.com/od/expressionandfun/a/iloveyouhand.htm

Keep up the good work

I agree with Emily…Hardcore dancers are a menace that need to be cured by a severe pummeling.

People who think naming a bunch of metal/deathcore or nu-metal bands means they’re into metal. Yeah, I know this goes against metal peeve #9, but most of these nimrods are more interested in being part of a scene then actually care about/enjoy the music.

Old school metalheads who think because they were there at the begining, that it somehow makes them undisputed authorities on metal. They’re the ones who like to back up their arguments with a line about how they’ve seen Sabbath in concert 26 times to bring weight to the debate

Metalheads who cant accept that not all metal music sounds like it did in 1985, it just makes them seem like the entire genre has left them behind

People who call throwing the horns…”throwing the goat”…Im just screwing with ya Steff : D

[...] this article is about what’s annoying about metal. i disagree with her #8 – i love “coming home looking like a crime scene” from getting my ass kicked at a show. i also disagree with her #4 – i like the “long spoken interludes or ‘atmospheric’ tracks that break up albums”. ok here’s my list: [...]

Question steff. Why do you quite often scatter japanese anime pictures throughout your posts for no discernible reason? Do you like your japanimation or is there some kind of hidden theme I am not getting?

@Chris – there are two reasons. 1 – I think they’re pretty, and 2. often, in 5 pages of hopeless pictures on google image search, they’re the closest thing I can find to suit the theme. I wish there was a “Slayer image search” or something where I could find more suitable metal images. Since the last update to the google algorithm I am having more trouble finding pictures I like.

I’d like to see the stereotype dropped that all metal is ‘angry’ and ‘aggressive’. I find most to simply be passionate creativity that can’t be expressed softly.

@Holly – I think we all would. Unfortunately, I think because of the way most metalheads dress, and the pre-conceptions people have about metal, it will probably never change. Metal is outsider music, so it’s bound to always be “feared” by the masses. If it wasn’t, it would be popular, and probably watered down, and no one wants that.

A few thoughts:

It is still possible to have hidden tracks on a CD, but I can only think of a couple CD’s I have that include them (and I don’t mean the “hidden” tracks that are at the very end, those are more like “unlisted”) – and it doesn’t always work, depending on what you’re playing the CD on. Just another thing that gets lost with digital downloads.

I will agree 90% about the mass of genres and sub-genres, but I do think we need some distinctions. Just saying it’s all metal is a disservice. While George Jones’ comments regarding country may have seemed a bit bitter (I thought so), there’s so much in that field that isn’t really country anymore, just a derivative of country fused with rock. Country’s become too much of an umbrella term, just as power and progressive metal in our chosen form of music. Or death metal. Or black metal. There’s more depth to it, but we don’t really need to classify every variation.

Some of the atmospheric tracks or spoken passages that make their way on an album actually do work. Note, I said some. They are still overused, that much I’ll agree on. They aren’t just for concept albums, but either way, not everyone can pull it off. On a related note, I do get tired of intros and outros, particularly if they have nothing in common with the rest of the album – or even worse sound like a different band.

Misogyny is indeed alive and doing well in metal. Unfortunately, it’ll likely remain that way for a long time, but the attitude towards women has improved over the years, due in part to more women being involved. What I don’t get is how a woman like Angela Gossow gets mostly respect, yet most any other frontman (I’m not going to go PC here!) who is a woman is subject to the typical knuckle dragging. Okay, some of it’s the protection of typing on a keyboard instead of being in person, but still… Perhaps when more women emerge on guitars or drums instead of singing, keyboards or the occasional female bassist, things will start to improve. To be honest, I am surprised that the sexist remarks far outweigh racist remarks, although I’m sure that eventually, the latter will reach the levels the former is at today.

Agreed about selling out. The vast majority of bands want to be successful enough to keep playing music, and not just for themselves and any unwilling neighbors. It’s not so easy to do that if you’re a stubborn ass and insist on doing the exact same thing, the exact same way, critics, suggestions and fans be damned. If you want an audience, you have to work for an audience.

One addition to the pet-peeve list (other than the use of intros and outros) that bugs the fuck out of me is the re-releases and other cash ins. Some labels and bands do it far more often. Yes, there are legitimate reasons for it (MS recently had an article about it, regarding some of Earache’s re-issues), but a lot of the time, it’s absurd. I don’t like getting ripped off, and when an album I buy comes out again later with extra material (sometimes within a few months) and costs the same, I feel cheated. I don’t mind offering multiple editions upon release – I’ve bought deluxe/limited/collector’s versions of albums before and will still do so. But these weren’t replaced later on by another version with more that cost the same, or less.

Moving on, I hate this exclusive shit – bands offering different material at different stores. Just make all the extra songs available to everyone if they get something besides the ‘standard’ edition. Why spread bonus content across three or four different locations (if not more)? Yes, some might actually go out and get them all, while others will just wait for the tracks that aren’t in their version to get put online somewhere.

Oh, since I’m still typing, I have one final piss-me-the-fuck-off entry. FLAC-holes. Yes, FLAC is lossless, MP3 is lossy. So. Fucking. What. I don’t have a sound system that cost over a grand, and even if I did, I probably couldn’t tell the difference, so long as the MP3 was of a decent bitrate. It’s similar to the vinyl vs. CD debate; is there really an audible difference, or is it merely bias, misinformation and what you’re using for playback?

*sigh*

Okay, I’m done now.

Arrogant rich people.