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Very interesting discussion. I'm sure it's annoying to meet teens who think they know everything and try to be "kvlt" and brag about how many gigs they have of obscure metal on their hard drives. This is why, excuse me for being blunt all you youngsters on this site, they are not considered adults. We who are adults should appreciate their lack of maturity and tolerate their childish behaviour. Remember, we were like that when we were the same age.

Discovering metal is nothing to do with "the correct order of things". Even when I started discovering, almost thirty years ago, I heard Oz before I heard Judas Priest, I knew ATC way before I knew Witchfinder General or Angel Witch. I bought Manilla Roads Open the Gates and loved it at 15. Because that's what was available at the time. It's the same for kids today - they shouldn't listen to things just because sour old metalheads tell them to. They should find their own things and consider for themselves whether they like it or not. And if you download stuff, the obscurities may be as available as anything else. Of course, if you have any sense, you'll listen to people who know more than you do, but teenagers aren't always sensible. I know I wasn't at that age.

On the other hand, an attitude where you do not want to check out the bands that influenced the ones you like or are similar in style because those bands aren't kvlt enough means you are not really interested in the music, and that's a different thing altogether. I have little time for such people. Some of the most common and well-known records are actually common and well-known because they are so good.

And do try not to come across like the four men in that old Monty Python sketch going on about how tough it was when they grew up and how easy it is for young people today.

rictusgrin666 wrote:I agree with this - some aspects of metal that I really love aren't instantly appealing. King Diamond and John Cyriss are a couple of my favourite vocalists ever, yet when I was a young Metallica/Slayer-head I couldn't get into high-pitched vocals.

Heh I heard King Diamond's vocals the first time when my friend played me MF's "Come To The Sabbath".. or was it "Doomed By The Living Dead"? Anyway I didn't have any problems with his singing. On the other hand it took a lot of time for me to get into SLAYER and still they're not among my top 3-5 thrash bands. Funny thing is I LOVE Infernäl Mäjesty which was very much influenced by Slayer. I guess that's on topic with the BLACK SABBATH > PENTAGRAM thing.

I'll post some thoughts about the whole subject when I'm back home from work.

Oh fuck, now I got "MASTERS OF METAL! AGENTS OF STEEEEEEEL" playing in my head while working (thank you!).

I got into Infernal Majesty on the first listening too - I don't know if it was their combining giant hairstyles with satanic imagery, their lack of bermuda shorts or whatever but they seemed very catchy and accessible for a thrash band. I am still not very familiar with the works of Slayer - not that I haven't heard their albums (I even have SITA and DI), but my brother had them and I have never bothered buying them. I am sure I will pick up the first four albums sometime though - eventually.

What I find WAAAY more "disturbing" is the fact that all these metalheads of today are completely ignorant towards 80's metal music. "It's gay and old" is the answer you get, while they don't no shit about it.

I'm listening to hard rock/metal for 20 years now and I really don't look down on someone who hasn't followed a natural path and obtained the same knowlegde within one week. As long as their is some kind of honesty and passion in their new hobby I'll be happy to recommend them all kind of bands ranging from Iron maiden to Lord Ryur.

But why bother, as long as music gives you the right feeling there's nothing wrong with it.

You have good people and you have bad people.

Hey! On KIT you told me you were a 'gabber' in the 90s!

tomas wrote:Hey! On KIT you told me you were a 'gabber' in the 90s!

Really I have to be drunk as fuck then, haha, but I used to go parties in the 90's and still do occasionally

I know that a 15 year old kid who raves about Lord Ryür but does not know Accept looks ridiculous, but it's no big deal. The idea of a really obscure and unknown band from several decades back playing music that he enjoys appeals to him at the moment and it's part of his progression. Eventualy he'll get around to listening to Balls to the Wall eventually and chances are good that he will like it. For the time being, let him be a kid and stick to Lord Ryur or Solar Eagle if that keeps him happy. We all develop our musical preferences differently, there is no manual to follow, or at least there shouldn't be.

Psychodad: thanks for the aknowledgment, I was beginning to think nobody read my post, heh.

appolo.ra: that's good to know. I don't think you'd have to listen to the COMPLETE ACCEPT DISCOGRAPHY before moving on to the more obscure and sometimes more potent smaller bands. I certainly haven't listened to all the Accept records either. Neither Judas Priest's. I think I stomached 'Turbo' about half a time.

And yeah, I'll come to Up the Hammers. I don't actually feel extremely familiar with a lot of the bands on the bill but I'd prefer it this way, so I can be pleasantly surprised.

I got into Infernal Majesty due to the strength of the first song 'Overlord'. The rest of the record (perhaps besides Into the Unknown, also) took a long while because I had to understand Slayer (whom I don't particularily like) better to see what IF were in competition with/trying to one-up. Eventually I got it and I like the whole record. That's the sort of historic appreciation that aids in understanding HM, what came first, who was influenced by who and so on.

However there's something really appealing to me in the abstract of some non-metal dude buying say, Nothingface from Voivod (because of the cool cover) on one of his vinyl excursions, taking it home and listening to it and loving it without having the first idea about how it happened, having never listened to Iron Maiden, Motorhead, Metallica, Slayer. Perhaps just via King Crimson and some Kraut Rock or New Wave he'd understand Voivod quite differently. I'd love to discuss Voivod with this hypothetical person and I wouldn't begrudge him the lack of metal knowledge. At the end of the conversation he'd go home with a list of "Heavy Metal To Hear" by me, that's for sure! And I'd probably go home with a list of 'Kraut Rock and New Wave to Hear" by him as well... isn't that wonderful as a concept? Music as an extension of humanitarian relation. Why not extend the same courtesy to the 'kvlt kiddies'? You might be pleasantly surprised.

Of course I'm playing Devil's Advocate a bit here because I am also annoyed by a relative issue to the one discussed. I don't begrudge anyone their extensive mp3 collection in the abstract. But I find it very far-fetched and on one level annoying because I feel it cheap, to see that every year HM people list best-of lists of 30 or 40 items. I am very skeptical of those because I define someone with accentuated taste by how little of the whole they wholly endorse, not how much. That's just consumerism for me and I have a hard time getting behind treating music as an object of consumption. It's a tangential issue but at the interest of full disclosure I wanted to say that I am not as 'open-minded' as I might come across here.

In the end I think there's also a degree of jealousy towards the 10.000 mp3s kvlt kiddie because an older generation had to suffer for their obscure metal and here you have them, figuratively, having sex with the expensive French whore for free, where we had to write a sonnet to her just to stroke her thigh. O TEMPORA, O MORES!

...but we should be happy. Is it nice to be alone in your corner with your Medieval Steel and your Lord Ryur with nobody to talk to about them? Give the kvlt kids the chance to grow into kvlt adults, heh Heavy Metal will live forever regardless of how older curmudgeons might be annoyed

Also I wanted to express another small point of view that might feel a bit insulting, and I want to apologize in advance. The sort of human being that the oldschool quest for Heavy Metal created is not always one I can get behind of. The ends to which some of us had to go to get some material meant HM soon because a monomania (obsession) that overshadowed other important aspects of personal development. An obsessive person becomes acutely defensive of their obsession, and the fact that HM speaks of PRIDE AND HONOR AND NOT STANDING DOWN is a leathal combination. I've met so many dedicated HM people that have become disconnected from reality, that believe in strange things that I really cannot understand (like Greeks coming from deep space on their primitive spaceships) and generally, they appear a bit broken to me. Well, I am broken too, I think about HM more than a sane person would, of course. But there are degrees. I have other interests that are equally (well... almost!) as deep as HM and it really is a reassuring thing for me to browse the Corrosseum threads about non-metal music, cinema, comics and books and see there's people in here that have excuisite taste there too, not just in HM and HM-related things. But let's admit it, I know, and you know, the "HEAVY METAL OR NOTHING" sort of obsessives whose life consists of spinning oldschool vinyl, complaining about false ones, going to metal clubs every night and socializing with other broken obsessives. The quest of HM sometimes should not be undertaken with that fervor, I'm sorry to say.

So if these kids with easy access to the material that took some of the older, potentially broken people decades to gather (and to waste, perhaps) so they can get to the meat of things without wasting their lives, so be it! That's a good thing for me! They should feel the inspiration from GREAT HEAVY METAL to tackle their life proactively and achieve all they desire. Not just sit at home and listen to more HM. As it was said in an old HVS Metal Invader tape : "[...] we leave you now. Keep listening to Heavy Metal but most importantly, keep being human beings" *they stare into the sunset in their leather jackets*.

Of course I want to say that I've met a lot of older HM people that are well-adjusted and have interesting and full views on reality, many of them in this forum also. With balanced lives and families and whatnot, and that gives me hope. I'm just saying that the archetype EVERYTHING FOR MY OBSCURE HEAVY METAL I SUFFERED FOR THIS!! might not be as a good thing as it initially seems, certainly not a position from which to damn kids from.

@ Helm: I often feel dangerously close to that state of monomania. Not that I put music before my family, I only feel I would like to sometimes (and I have a not so pleasant feeling they think I really do).

On a more positive note: I reckon the mass of mp3's spread around the world is a pretty good method of securing the future of old Heavy Metal. When most CD's are oxidized (?) and unplayable and with the vinyl slowly turning to dust these copies will keep being copied and transferred into other formats onto servers and hard drives (or what else there is to come) and in some respects serving as a gigant archive, I guess. Structured or not - stuff may be saved for generations to come. The more copies - greater the chance for immortality. Would you mind a place like Metal Archives (let's leave the politics out!) serving as a giant jukebox as well as a database including music, artwork, articles, reviews, press releases etc. for future musicologists, journalists, researchers and mere lovers of music to dive into? I would not.

I certainly wouldn't. Music is to be listened to and appreciated, not suffered for.

As usual, I've read through a thread very slowly and hate to comment with an echo of a reply. I think everyone has made some really great points here. I personally don't know anyone in real life who takes heavy metal as a serious art besides my one close friend in the area(who has an account on here but hasn't logged on in awhile). I've never met any 15 year old metal masters but I can easily imagine how some bragging,namedropping but unlearned youngsters might be annoying(especially to the "old guard"). Keeping a huge collection of mp3's might seem almost unappreciative in a way. I can imagine a young kid hearing one or two songs and excitedly downloading an entire band's discography to then listen to it in shuffle. However, out of the majority of kids who might do this, there are undoubtedly a handful who will listen to each album in full and,if not fully understanding why they love it so deeply,know that it's struck a chord deep within them and many of them will pursue and buy their favorite albums. The world of heavy metal is quite huge and a lot of kids,enthusiastic to hear it all,will obviously become a mp3 vacuum if given the opportunity. I myself am 'guilty' of downloading but if I refused to download Gotham City or Danger Zone I'd quite frankly be missing out on some amazing metal music. I would love to hold "Black Writs" in my hands or the original "Moottorilinnut" LP but I am in absolutely no position to spend that kind of money at this time in my life(especially entering into what looks to be an economically grim 2009). It's also far more important to me to own something from a new band,as I can support them with my purchase. Owning classic easy to find albums,newer albums and reissues makes my vinyl collection pretty unexciting and it's not at all a braggable testimony to my greatness. However that's not what heavy metal is about for me. The fundamental concepts in heavy metal(also contained in a lot of classic swords & sorcery,fantasy literature) are essential to me..because of who I am as a human being. It wasn't a lack of identity that propelled me into reading certain books or listening to certain things,thus finding my 'niche'..It was a realization that so many of the things I've always loved are best summed up and championed in swords & sorcery,fantasy,space operas and heavy metal. I think in growing older I've understood this better but I believe that a 15 year old can come to a basic conclusion like this. I'm sure it's less thought out due to the surge of passionate excitement. The desire to know every bit of information,every lyric, and scream a band's name at the top of their lungs outside of a club while waiting in line probably taking up some introspection time..but that's kind of wonderful. I wish I had experienced a childhood like that but I was quite sheltered and I developed a love for heavy metal in slightly depressing solitude..and it was very gradual and slow moving for awhile. As for the multitudes of 5 billion album downloading kids that don't actually LISTEN to heavy metal..fuck 'em. They will be collecting and "listening" to something else next year anyways and people like that usually don't appreciate music as anything other than entertainment.

my favourite bit here in this great discussion was the post about searching for a tape that had twenty minutes on the end so you could stick an ep on it! Brilliant! On a slightly off-key note, I remembered that I used to tape these albums off a neighbour of mine who got (bootleg) tapes from Lybia from his dad. The track orders were all wrong though so for years I thought Reign in Blood started off with Postmortem. Anyway, that was how I learned Metal, from tapes I made from friends' record collections and buying tapes when I had money. But I knew Assassin before I knew Queensryche and Painkiller before I heard Stained Class. And I had given up completely on Accept until someone on this very forum put me straight and now their first album is one of my favourites! So I honestly think that there is no way to learn Metal. Nobody born in the late eighties will ever be able to look at a mullet or cut-off denim the same way as someone born in the early seventies and no-one born in the late eighties can listen to Killers (my very first Metal album) the same way as someone from before that time! It's somewhat like saying that someone's reading of Keruac can only be validated if he or she reads Steinbeck first. Sure, a knowledge of the history is very helpful and can heighten the enjoyment but that can happen retrospectively too! And if someone is intersted then they are interested and if not they will leave, grow out of it.

Helm wrote: In the end I think there's also a degree of jealousy towards the 10.000 mp3s kvlt kiddie because an older generation had to suffer for their obscure metal and here you have them, figuratively, having sex with the expensive French whore for free, where we had to write a sonnet to her just to stroke her thigh. O TEMPORA, O MORES!

I think it's more like this: "Kvlt kiddies masturbating while looking at pictures of expensive French whores, where we had...."

Music is to be listened to and appreciated, not suffered for.

Well, if you are out to get the spirit of Rock'n'Roll, suffer you must.