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The Magical Thread Of Made-Up Metal Subgenres

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I know. This belongs on the serious topic discussion subforum, as befits the sober sincerity of Metal Archive.com's "MTLZ R SRZ BZN" stance, but I felt posting it here was the more democratic and inclusive thing to do... :3

 

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Does anybody else other than me get an indescribably peculiar pleasure in conjuring-up imaginary subgenres for metal? As a genre it is undeniably both renowned and reviled for multitudinous mutant strains of itself, and the many sub-sub-genres within those strains. One can't swing a cacodaemon in the genres cramped quarters for all the veritable varieties. If one takes black metal as a notable example, for most fans of the field a pure and quite easily definable subgenre if there ever was one, then you'll find a whole fleet of attendant microgenres within - bestial BM, raw BM, depressive/suicidal BM, dodgy neo-nazi BM, christian BM (who would've guessed! sometimes it is rather hilariously labeled "unblack metal"), anticosmic BM, ambient BM, vedic BM, Tolkien inspired BM, and far too many more to go into here.

 

The purpose and intended response to this thread, I hope, isn't to bemoan or defend metal's apparent sublime-diversity-bordering-on-novel-absurdity. I'm really just proposing that the thread is a place to exercise your imaginative muscles and come up with some potential subgenres within the spectrum of the titular genre. You can take the thread as seriously or sarcastically as you please, I'm open to both humourous and sober proposals. I only ask you don't derail the topic by pouring scorn upon or actively promoting the phenomena of microtrends and multiplicity in music, metal or otherwise. I intend to post an irregular series of proposals for subgenres, both sublime and silly (probably both simultaneously if I'm honest) in which I wonder how such a style would sound and develop, to which anyone can wade in on or ignore entirely and post their own proposals if it so pleases them.

 

I'm something of a lapsed metalhead, and I get the impression that many of you here are full-fat metal fans or otherwise share metal sympathetic leanings. Ross Scott is also apparently a particularly impressive species of metalhead, which lead me to my first proposal for a subgenre - and hopefully one we can all contribute to...

 

Ross Scott Metal

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^ Ross is clearly very thrilled by the prospect of actually becoming a subgenre.

 

If Tolkien can have a whole slew of symphonic black metal bands dressed in sparkly cloaks and unconvincing prosthetics in his honour, then I don't see why our beloved Ross can't damnit! I'm thinking that Ross Scott Metal (RSM) would draw heavily on the more unpretentious elements of death metal, some of the no-frills but actually memorable traditional songwriting of thrash metal and NWOBHM. Given Ross's avowed love of the game Quarantine and of epic classically-inflected soundtracks, there might even be subtle hints to punk and symphonic electronica in the styles sound too. Thematically RSM songs and records tell somewhat neurotic yet extremely insightful stories based on the perspectives of video game protagonists, often resulting in entire concept albums centred on the plot of specific games, typically told through the angry outbursts and poor life decisions made by the main characters. RSM singers are notorious for deliberately aping Mr. Scott's accent and vocal delivery, sometimes to degree of actually speaking rather than singing or screaming as is usually de rigueur. RSM drummers are often regarded as being overwhelmingly incompetent by their bandmates and are regularly beaten into contributing to the band's efforts.

 

Final Note: I apologize if you guys find this thread a bit weird and unfathomable. I occasionally have a need to made something concrete of my many strange thoughts.

When close friends speak ill of close friends

they pass their abuse from ear to ear

in dying whispers -

even now, when prayers are no longer prayed.

What sounds like violent coughing

turns out to be laughter.

Shuntarō Tanikawa

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Nazi Black Metal

 

Basically a metal genre whose lyrical subject is all about the exploits and ideologies of Nazi Germany. Kinda like how black metal is a lifestyle, Nazi Black Metal is an even more hardcore lifestyle.

 

Oh wait. It already exists.

 

 

How about Marxist Black Metal, then?

 

Basically a subgenre of metal that celebrates the glory of socialism?

 

Wait. That exists too.

Actually Yngwie of Haus Malmsteen, feefty eenches of pure Svwedish beef.

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How about Groucho-Marxist Black Metal then?

With very witty and sarcastic lyrics, basically making fun of itself, but still being really good Black Metal, so that fans just ignore the lyrics, causing the bands to make them even more sarcastic, eventually ending similarly to the "Sarcastaball" episode of South Park.

 

I'd listen to that.

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Jazz Death Fusion Metal.

 

Pianos and dark lyrics go hand in hand.

"FUCK YOU REALITY!!YOU'RE FULL OF SHIT!!!"

"Hark! Dost thou hear with thine ears what I hear with mine? Interloper! No quarter shall be shown hither, fiend! Anon! Show thyself, churl!"

http://myanimelist.net/profile/MantisDude

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Nazi Black Metal

 

Basically a metal genre whose lyrical subject is all about the exploits and ideologies of Nazi Germany. Kinda like how black metal is a lifestyle, Nazi Black Metal is an even more hardcore lifestyle.

 

Oh wait. It already exists.

 

 

How about Marxist Black Metal, then?

 

Basically a subgenre of metal that celebrates the glory of socialism?

 

Wait. That exists too.

I did mention "dodgy neo-nazi BM" in my opening post. Also, the nazi losers are so HRDKRE that they'll usually try to argue that national socialism is totally rad and bravely defend their opinions by refusing to give interviews and wearing balaclavas. I was hoping not to dwell too much on metal politics.

When close friends speak ill of close friends

they pass their abuse from ear to ear

in dying whispers -

even now, when prayers are no longer prayed.

What sounds like violent coughing

turns out to be laughter.

Shuntarō Tanikawa

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I only listen to neo-grunge punk, any other genre is for wimps.

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I only listen to neo-grunge punk, any other genre is for wimps.

Pfft. Only someone who doesn't listen to hypnagogic doom crunk would say that.

When close friends speak ill of close friends

they pass their abuse from ear to ear

in dying whispers -

even now, when prayers are no longer prayed.

What sounds like violent coughing

turns out to be laughter.

Shuntarō Tanikawa

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Pink Metal

Pink%20Striborg_zpsk7ssp6tn.jpg

^ I don't see why black metal musicians don't find contrasting backgrounds more often in their promotional photographs more. Just have corpse-painted Norwegian bandmates standing in Subway or next to a bouncy castle.

 

A subgenre that would both anticipate and subvert the macho and suspiciously heterosexual expectations of many metalheads. The tag Pink Metal might sound like a either a desperately ironic tribute to a much more sincere strain of metal, or else some cynical ploy imagined by a feverish marketing executive to push metal onto a decidedly un-metal demographic. But does it inadvertently have to be like that? What if someone took the camp, garish, historical and abstract qualities of "pinkness" to heart? Beyond the binary attachments to the colour shackling pinkness to a mainstream and painfully limited notion of femininity? Could it not be something equal in extremity and uniqueness that Black Metal has evolved into?

Pinkness isn't entirely alien to Black Metal. There are rare LP copies of Venom's record Black Metal pressed onto hot pink vinyl, and if we take pinkness as an inevitable (though sometimes unwelcome) symbol of queer culture, I could think of a few underground French BM acts that embrace the harsher and subversive elements of that counter-culture. Pink Metal could be an equal but antithetical answer to the less liberal more masculinist tone of Black Metal, like queercore did for the slow burning crisis that left punk to fend off appropriation by NS losers and general manly boneheads.

Sub-Pink Metal Genres: Magenta Metal, Puce Metal, Pastel Post-Pink Metal

When close friends speak ill of close friends

they pass their abuse from ear to ear

in dying whispers -

even now, when prayers are no longer prayed.

What sounds like violent coughing

turns out to be laughter.

Shuntarō Tanikawa

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Hippy Doom Metal

 

Deep, brooding heavy sounds and dark lyrics about there being, like, beauty in death, man.

Retired Forum Moderator

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Hippy Doom Metal

 

Deep, brooding heavy sounds and dark lyrics about there being, like, beauty in death, man.

New age death metal, headed up by Yanni the Damned.

You know, doom metal with an overwhelmingly positive vibe would be pretty dope. Enlightenment Metal? Saṃsāra Metal?

When close friends speak ill of close friends

they pass their abuse from ear to ear

in dying whispers -

even now, when prayers are no longer prayed.

What sounds like violent coughing

turns out to be laughter.

Shuntarō Tanikawa

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Hippy Doom Metal

 

Deep, brooding heavy sounds and dark lyrics about there being, like, beauty in death, man.

New age death metal, headed up by Yanni the Damned.

You know, doom metal with an overwhelmingly positive vibe would be pretty dope. Enlightenment Metal? Saṃsāra Metal?

I already mentioned one... Christian Death Metal.

Don't insult me. I have trained professionals to do that.

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I already mentioned one... Christian Death Metal.

I was thinking more positive in the cosmic-meditative sense rather than in the Abrahamic sense. That being said, given the potential of nuerous epic themes and mythology to draw from, Abrahamic Metal could potentially be awesome. A progressively heavy style with doom/melodic influences and Judeo-Christian-Islamic themes. Not necessarily in a creepily optimistic fundamentalist tone (this needn't be "conversion" music) but more terms of the innumerable figures and stories the faiths are associated with.

When close friends speak ill of close friends

they pass their abuse from ear to ear

in dying whispers -

even now, when prayers are no longer prayed.

What sounds like violent coughing

turns out to be laughter.

Shuntarō Tanikawa

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Actual Metal

 

Self explanatory

Really difficult to listen to if you haven't got anything to hit it with.

When close friends speak ill of close friends

they pass their abuse from ear to ear

in dying whispers -

even now, when prayers are no longer prayed.

What sounds like violent coughing

turns out to be laughter.

Shuntarō Tanikawa

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Dejected Metal

Sad%20Disco%20Metal_zpszqrtkwpd.png

^ "Disco Stu doesn't want to do this anymore".

Comparing my own taste in disparate but melancholy genres, a recent track entitled

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbx8qRg6tPE I stumbled across by the sad disco-inflected synth pop band called Chromatics sparked the seed for this imaginary sub-genre in my brain. The actual song structure, and with particular emphasis the percussion and bass, would be in more in keeping with the washed-out shoegazer-cum-low tempo pop standard in the vein of the aforementioned Chromatics, Tropic Of Cancer and Colombey. Despite that, the most notable link to metal would be in the distorted black metal guitar work and extreme vocals. That being said, I think this style would call for an overwhelmingly less macho approach and would likely engender a more ubiquitous approach to singing, something that be both guttural and fragile, rough but ethereal, and not afraid to express its vulnerability despite its obvious black/doom/death lineage. I'm imagining something like a three-way hybrid of the snarling gobbiness of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVl2QOCz0-4 (I'd forgotten how utterly insane Nigel Lewis sounded live), the croaking whisper of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDIbH99zLQg and the tensile quality of Antony and The Johnsons Hope There's Someone.

I'll admit that Dejected Metal probably isn't the best name I've ever come up with, but I wanted to distinguish the idea from other kinds of depressive and less abrasive strains of metal - this stuff isn't supposed to be funeral doom or DSBM... :P

 

Gnostic Metal

Gnostic%20Metal_zpsab4f5wkq.png

^ No, I didn't learn everything I know about gnosticism and other cultures in general from Broken Sword 5, and I resent the implication!

In much the same way that the persecuted faith of Gnosticism (think Cathars, rather than the modern somewhat vaguer and more collective idea of "gnosticism") emphasized the dual nature of god (Jehovah/Lucifer, creativity/destruction, will/duty, etc) Gnostic Metal would embrace both extremes of metal stylization betwixt the technical and melodic strains and the more raw and brutalistic styles. You might think that this would simply result in what a lot of metal and hardcore bands already do, i.e. veering wildly between tempo and tone in a chaotic and often rather complicated manner. What I had in mind was a more traditional approach to metal song-writing, namely in the form of riff-centric death and black anthems that attempt to reconcile the elements of lo-fi and high-production values, hopefully in order to create something new that hovers uneasily (though successfully) between the punishingly heavy and sublimely melodious.

When close friends speak ill of close friends

they pass their abuse from ear to ear

in dying whispers -

even now, when prayers are no longer prayed.

What sounds like violent coughing

turns out to be laughter.

Shuntarō Tanikawa

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I already mentioned one... Christian Death Metal.

you know that actually exists, right?

the name's riley

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