{"title":"Subject of the drone","authors":"R. Purves","doi":"10.1386/MMS_00010_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/MMS_00010_1","url":null,"abstract":"The increasingly popular and influential genre known as drone metal is characterized by the interaction of amplified drones with permutational rhythms. Scholarship in the field has, so far, concentrated on distinguishing the work of various drone metal artists through ethnographic analysis\u0000 of the symbols and social bonds that accumulate around the drone; the ways in which drones are conceptualized have been paid more attention than the function of the drone itself. This article follows the drone form from the inception of Minimalist musical practice in the work of La Monte Young,\u0000 to contemporary developments in works incorporating the drone by major artists operating in the experimental wings of popular music. To clarify the relationship or non-relation between the drone and musical meaning, three drone-related works by Joan La Barbara, Eleh and Keiji Haino are discussed\u0000 with respect to their relative proximity to, or distance from, language and/or speech. Although only Haino here could be said to have even a tangential relation to metal, each exemplar extols a primary form that drone metal can be said to elaborate upon: a voice pushed to its limits (La Barbara),\u0000 amplified sound as a physical force (Eleh), monolithic homogeneity at a crawling pace (Haino). Each piece of music is also considered in terms of the subject who listens, leading to some speculative thoughts on the uses made of the drone, an assessment of its potential to resist appropriation\u0000 by the culture industry and reasons for the drone’s remarkable persistence and diversity.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46994581","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Heavy-y-Metal: A través del cristal. Nuevas perspectivas culturales (‘Heavy-and-Metal: Through the looking glass. New cultural perspectives’), Fernando Galicia Poblet (ed.) (2019)","authors":"S. Álvarez, M. Marchioli","doi":"10.1386/mms_00017_5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms_00017_5","url":null,"abstract":"Review of: Heavy-y-Metal: A través del cristal. Nuevas perspectivas culturales (‘Heavy-and-Metal: Through the looking glass. New cultural perspectives’), Fernando Galicia Poblet (ed.) (2019)Madrid: Apache Libros, 284 pp.,ISBN 978-8-41203-453-0, p/bk, €18.95","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43457379","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"From Bach to Helloween: ‘Teutonic’ stereotypes in the history of popular music and heavy metal","authors":"Jan Herbst","doi":"10.1386/MMS_00006_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/MMS_00006_1","url":null,"abstract":"Throughout the centuries, German popular music has caused various foreign reactions from admiration to outright rejection. Sometimes, international audiences perceived it as too ‘Teutonic’; other times, this was exactly the reason for its appeal. This article traces ‘Teutonic’ features in 400 years of German popular music history, seeking to identify the emergence and development of ‘Teutonic’ stereotypes as well as their perception inland and abroad. The metal discourse was analysed based on a corpus of nearly 200,000 pages from magazines such as the British Kerrang! and the German Metal Hammer, Rock Hard and Deaf Forever. Stereotypes such as perfectionism, precision and rigidity seem to stem from historical roots, yet their projection onto ‘Teutonic metal’ is over-simplified and often out of context. History suggests that German metal bands were most successful when they exaggerated Germanness. Occasionally, bands became successful because their German features made them sound unique, even though they did not promote their heritage proactively. More often, though, bands that were unintentionally perceived as typically German were less appealing to a foreign audience. In the magazines, discussion of Teutonic attributes almost vanished in the twenty-first century. Global production practices needing to conform to international expectations of ever faster, tighter and heavier records likely made metal artists around the world adopt qualities that previously defined ‘Teutonic music’. It will therefore be interesting to see if or how German stereotypes in metal music will live on.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42070595","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The experiences of metal fans with mental and developmental disorders in the metal music community","authors":"K. Messick, Blanca E. Aranda, Chris Day","doi":"10.31219/osf.io/tz7gh","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/tz7gh","url":null,"abstract":"A series of interviews were conducted to explore the experience of what it is like to be a member of metal music culture living with mental health conditions and/or developmental disabilities. Ten participants were interviewed, three of which had schizophrenia, four with autism spectrum\u0000 disorder, two had bipolar affective disorder and one had borderline personality disorder. Thematic analysis was utilized to explore the experiences of people living with various types of mental illness and developmental disabilities in the context of metal, which resulted in the development\u0000 of three overarching themes. It was found that participants felt that the metal music community was more welcoming to them due to the broad use of lyrics about mental health topics and the prevalence of metal musicians that have mental health concerns. The broad application of mental health\u0000 topics in metal was seen as having a de-stigmatizing effect towards mental health concerns, but at the cost of accuracy, as topics like schizophrenia are seen as fetishized and inaccurately depicted. Participants reported that the metal community affords its members with mental health conditions\u0000 and developmental disabilities a number of benefits including a sense of belonging, the facilitation of mood maintenance and the management of lesser symptoms. Symptom management appeared to be mitigated by symptom severity and influenced how participants experienced metal music.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46224349","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Distortion, restriction and instability: Violence against the self in depressive suicidal black metal","authors":"O. Coggins","doi":"10.1386/mms.5.3.401_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms.5.3.401_1","url":null,"abstract":"In the underground subgenre of depressive suicidal black metal (DSBM), extremes of violence against the self are presented in combination with a restrictive version of black metal. Album covers feature explicit photographs of self-cutting or drawings of suicide by hanging; vocals are tortured screams expressing extreme suffering, and guitar sounds are so distorted that they begin to approach an ambient atmospheric blur. Given the history of concern about metal and its health implications, I investigate DSBM as a case in which representation of harm in music is overt, explicit and extreme, yet the health impact of the music is undetermined. I discuss how different modalities of distortion and restriction may connect the sound of DSBM to themes of violence against the self, presenting a theoretical framework for approaching DSBM as music which negotiates a complex economy of the staging and control of violence with respect to the self.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41809862","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Heavy metal music and managing mental health: Heavy Metal Therapy","authors":"K. Quinn","doi":"10.1386/mms.5.3.419_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms.5.3.419_1","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43138284","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Joshua Retallick, Niall Scott, Alexander Milas, Tom O’Boyle, S. Barone, Lina Khatib
{"title":"World Metal Congress, Rich Mix, Shoreditch, London, 21‐22 March 20191","authors":"Joshua Retallick, Niall Scott, Alexander Milas, Tom O’Boyle, S. Barone, Lina Khatib","doi":"10.1386/mms.5.3.425_4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms.5.3.425_4","url":null,"abstract":"This work is a critical report on the world metal congress held at Richmix, Shoreditch, London on 21–22 March 2019, reviewing the panel discussions, screenings of Syrian Metal Is War and Songs of Injustice: Heavy Metal in Latin America as well as the live performances at the event.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43800964","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"‘Ancien folklore québécois’: An analysis of the phonographic and identity-based narrative of themétal noir québécoiscommunity","authors":"M. St-Laurent","doi":"10.1386/mms.5.3.379_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms.5.3.379_1","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44082774","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}