Heavy Metal Deserves Attention Too

Heavy Metal is an odd beast in my mind as it as a genre seems completely silly. As it did not seem to be a very intellectually complex genre of music. Furthermore I never really understood the Gothic imagery either. I viewed the genre known as Punk to be far more important and sophisticated than Heavy Metal. Though according to Steve Waksman in This Ain't No Summer of Love, Metal and Punk “arguably represent the most significant developments in rock music after 1970.” (P.6) Basically both genres are important in how they contribute to music as a whole but elements I had thought of as distinctly belonging to Heavy Metal namely theatrics, also belong to punk as well. I had always disproved of the theatrics which were associated with Heavy Metal. I considered said theatrics to be immature and removed from reality. However as mentioned before theatrics exist in my favorite genre punk as some of the same shocking costumes that Man o war wear exist in punk music this can be seen in what punk songstress Siouxsie Sioux would wear early in her music career as she would occasionally wear Nazi paraphernalia to events.

What all this leads me to believe is that people not only enjoy spectacles they enjoy limited risk or controlled chaos. Hence the need for shocking content be it clothing, violent imagery, Gothic imagery, and or sexual imagery. I came to this conclusion that people like controlled risk while playing a video game that takes place in a combat zone. These warfare games are some of the best selling genres in the games world, who has hasn't heard of Halo or the Call of Duty series?

It occurred to me that the same element of controlled risk isn't just found in music or video games it can be found in almost any type of entertaining medium from written works to film. What all this causes me to ask is why do we as human beings have a need for danger or dangerous themes in our lives? I know that people do enjoy a break in the monotony and conformity that everyday life can place on them. However it leads me to wonder “is life really that boring?” I understand that Heavy Metal is a type of theater I get that. I know that it is a type of fantasy show, though what this makes me wonder is why do we gravitate towards violence and death? I have heard from soldiers having served in Afghanistan and Iraq that they considered themselves lucky that they have never had to deal with any extreme violence. What does this fascination with violence say about people? Are we morbidly curious is this normal or is there a scientific reason for our curiosity in regards to violence?

In conclusion I now view Heavy Metal as an important musical genre that has pushed given rise to new and interesting developments within the musical world, and that music doesn't necessarily need to highly intellectual or focused on real world concerns to be worth listening to. I would also like to apologize for asking too many rhetorical questions as well.