It is unfortunate that the average music fan cares nothing about lyrics. It is not difficult to fathom why, and I will agree that many albums are impossible to take seriously after examining their lyrics, but this discussion is about heavy metal, not quality. Music creates a mood all by itself, but it is vague and extremely subjective. By adding lyrics, musicians can make their intentions crystal clear, realize their end goals with the most precision possible, and better guide or even control the listener. If you are attuned to both music and lyrics, the intensity of the listening experience increases immeasurably.
Lyrics are the biggest key to discovering whether a particular band, album, or song can be considered heavy metal.
To not care about lyrics doesn't make one any less a fan of music and it doesn't make one wrong in any way. (Not in an absolute sense anyway; I personally think that's crazy) In fact, it makes one even more of a fan of music than the most die-hard heavy metal fan. But to have this attitude detracts from a listener's ability to identify heavy metal. Malaise and apathy, going with the flow with not a care where it takes you, are not heavy metal qualities.
Musicians who do not care about their lyrics are few and far between. Yes, musicians could consider them secondary to the overall sound, and even make lyrical decisions based on the sound. Yet there will still be a focus to what they are doing. Even musicians who make up their lyrics as a last minute detail while in a recording studio are going to try to achieve a certain atmosphere with them. Many albums feature instrumental songs, yet their song titles still give a focus, a feeling of what the song was supposed to be about. The vast majority of the time they fit right in with the other songs on the album. By context, their meaning is deciphered.
The most heavy metal sounding music can actually not be heavy metal if counteracted by lyrics that are against the principles of heavy metal. The most aggressive double bass, the loudest riffing, the most obnoxious atonal vocals, they can all be incidental in determining if a band is heavy metal or not. Extreme sounds are not the exclusive province of heavy metal. If musicians do not express heavy metal principles in the plainest avenue most available to them, they are not separating their brand of rock and roll from the realm of heavy metal.
The most non-heavy metal sounding music can indeed be heavy metal by espousing and supporting heavy metal virtues of the self. All of these "alternative" sounds that seem to surround the heavy metal scene, all these symphonic and ambient hangers-on to the scene may have a true place after all.
Heavy metal is in the motivation. It isn't in the noise.
Let's examine several common lyrical topics found around the heavy metal scene and see how heavy metal they really are.
Dragons, knights, castles, trolls, chain mail, and kings are not by themselves heavy metal. It is easy to figure out where the connection comes from. The sword and sorcery fiction (chiefly Michael Moorcock's Elric work, JRR Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, and R.E. Howard's Conan stories) really exploded in the 1960s, coinciding with the teenage years of many of the musical icons of the 70s. They rattled around with some of these concepts of individuals challenging, mastering, and changing the strange and harsh worlds around them. They in turn influenced many who started heavy metal bands in the 80s. Add to that inspiration your average heavy metal artist's intelligence and ability to detect and display nuance, and you have the idea that swords and dragons and chain mail and castles and shit are heavy metal all by themselves. It's a striking indictment against heavy metal that people still don't get it decades later.
There is always lots of talk about Dungeons and Dragons and role-playing games in the context of heavy metal fantasy lyrics. Perhaps some of the people writing this crap had a casual encounter with it, but it's safe to say there are very few fantasy lyric writing heavy metal musicians who have a functional understanding of how role-playing games actually work. They've probably just played some computer and video game RPGs and think that is all that RPGs are. Believe me, if they had a real clue, the state of heavy metal fantasy lyric writing would not be as vacuous as it is.
This is not to say one can't make up fantasy stories to sing about and still be heavy metal. The key is having a point to all of it which is itself heavy metal. The artists who show an understanding of why fantasy concepts abound in heavy metal in the first place (Killing the Dragon as a song was so obviously not about a dragon as the album artwork clearly showed, just as Imaginations from the Other Side was not about Peter Pan ) may be the most heavy metal artists of them all. Is it really so difficult to make this distinction?
Yet the idea of fantasy takes in far more than just medieval themes. The issue with the gore bands is that they are just presenting fantasy narratives with their source text being Gray's Anatomy rather than The Two Towers. There's no actual focus, no point, just rattling off acts of violence and interesting things that can happen to a body.
Most writing about war in a heavy metal context is just like bad Hollywood productions: Concerned with big guns and 'splosions. Even if there is a great big tank on the cover of the album, most heavy metal musicians that use war as a lyrical topic do not make a point with it. It becomes just another fantasy.
Singing about heavy metal is redundant. Is performing on or listening to a heavy metal album not enough for some people? Songs about heavy metal invariably talk about heavy metal as a brotherhood, a movement, or a culture, and how awesome it is and how everyone listening should be part of it. These songs often describe how people who do not like heavy metal are 'the enemy,' and they cast insults at those who "betray" heavy metal by committing the heinous crime of listening to something else. How many musicians who actually address heavy metal in their songs treat it as a state of being and not as some sort of social club? How many heavy metal musicians who address heavy metal in their songs treat it as a negative influence on heavy metal? (I know one! I know one!) Heads up, people. Heavy metal is not The Law. "If you're not into heavy metal then you are not my friend," is nothing but a bunch of people insecure about their individuality wanting to validate their tastes and habits by making sure they have other people to identify with. Very counterproductive. Being heavy metal does not mean being conscious about the musical taste of the people around you. Being heavy metal means you don't fucking care! If you want to be friends with someone who loves Barry Manilow more than life itself, go right ahead. Your life, your decision. Heavy metal would not be heavy metal if you have to limit yourself just to be well, anything.
Just remember to tell them to fuck right off when they tell you to turn your music down.
Musicians whose lyrics deal with history never just deal with history. Well, maybe the outro to The IVth Crusade but there just isn't that much else out there. When musicians are talking history, it's just a smokescreen, a backdrop to flavor their real agenda. Maybe it's politics. Maybe it is historical fiction in which case they're in the fantasy category.
Perhaps it's about national pride. I don't think there are too many examples of non-political songs dealing with national association, but they're not very heavy metal. Nationality, like ethnicity, is something you are born into. Yes, it can be changed, but the celebration of that identity is still identifying with a larger group. Your status as an individual isn't very great if you are primarily identifying yourself first and foremost as an American, or a Finn, or a German, or whatever.
When a band does something like give a Hail To England when they're not even from England, well, uh, I have no clue what to make of it. That's just strange.
Love is absolutely not heavy metal. Love and sex are all about people coming together in all ways physical and/or emotional. It's quite a nice state to be in, but individuality wanes, the will to fight the togetherness disappears, and the possible gains from doing so often don't match the gains from not fighting it. When the heart burns, the heavy metal fades. Sad for us.
Sex isn't quite as bad as love when it comes to retaining individuality, but it's still about people coming together. Musicians writing songs about sex usually aren't trying to express anything about sex to begin with, they're usually trying to score chicks at their live shows. A song with a message of "I stand alone and I'm horny," would be pretty silly.
So we need to think through the broken heart songs. Songs expressing the old "I can't live without this person, I don't know what I'll do now," are still love songs. Use common sense on how to apply this stuff.
Yes, this means that hatred for man and general misanthropy is heavy metal. Throw the horns. And rock out with your cock out somewhere else.
How tree-hugging hippies made their way into the heavy metal scene is a mystery. How they seem to have settled into the most extreme of heavy metal sounds is even more puzzling. It is of no consequence how loud the wind howls, how low the temperature is, or how many feet of snow you had to walk through, uphill, both ways. The weather is not heavy metal. Trees are not heavy metal, even if they are trees in the Cold and Grim Northern Moonforest. Take your bizarre National Geographic special elsewhere. ( and we wondered how folk music got crossed up with these people )
Is racism heavy metal? I have always been pissed off by Nazism and anti-Semitism around the heavy metal scene. I always said there is no place in heavy metal for such things. But one of the trends of modern Western society is towards multiculturalism, with discrimination on the basis of ethnicity, religion, or national origin being discouraged or outlawed. So wouldn't one who disagrees with that, and colors their music through that viewpoint, be an embodiment of heavy metal spirit?
Luckily, I think not. Racism is based on group identity, both in oneself and others. A white power pinhead playing white power music identifies himself first and foremost as a white man. He concentrates on a group identity that isn't even something that can be chosen. Not heavy metal. While Nazism extolled the Nietzsche ubermensch concept (itself a very heavy metal ideal), it's even narrower than your average racism because of the political implications in addition to racial requirements. How can you pigeonhole yourself so completely and still claim to have the spirit of heavy metal?
Do keep in mind that while racism is not heavy metal, racial bigotry certain can be. You do know the difference between racism and bigotry, don't you?
Fans commonly state that politics have no place in music, yet albums such as Order of the Leech, Prince of the Poverty Line, No World Order, Dead Heart in a Dead World, and Chaos AD express political views and in some cases the identity of the musician revolves around their political identity. Obviously politics and music, and more to the point politics and heavy metal, do mix. They are mixing. It can't be wished away.
Does the expression of politics in heavy metal indicate a level of non-heavy metal identity? Politics are in heavy metal, but are politics heavy metal?
It depends on the political viewpoint, of course. The very terms I've used to describe the focus and antithesis of heavy metal (individualism and collectivism) are political concepts. But it is not so easy to categorize political affiliation with the identity of heavy metal, as we'll talk about in a bit.
Calls to protest and dissent against a ruling regime are always heavy metal. It does not matter if the ruling party is left or right wing. Merely by being in power it presses down on the population, each side creating its own set of hardships and making its own set of definitions of 'good citizen' and 'criminal.' You'll see far more left-wing presence in music because, let's face it, that's by far the dominant philosophy espoused by artistic people.
Yet there are political philosophies which are intrinsically more heavy metal than others. Communism and socialism are not heavy metal. Any political philosophy where a central authority is responsible for the allocation of resources is not going to mesh well with heavy metal. Political songs calling for government control or regulation, or even government programs which would supposedly help its people is simply strengthening the concept of people being a citizen and ward of the State first and foremost, and not an individual in charge of his own future.
Capitalist political views should tend to be in the heavy metal spirit. The free market, supply and demand, it all implies that an industrious, intelligent person will get ahead, that they will chart their own course through life. Of course the reality is somewhat different. Capitalism seems to always come down to the market share, which means popular appeal, and big business is just as oppressive on the will and aspirations of the individual as any communist regime ever could be. Most musicians that we listen to are signed to record companies so they know all about this. The fascinating thing is when musicians do sing about the 'evils' of capitalism, they seem to focus on the fact that some people get rich while other people end up dirt poor and dead. Funny that they would attack the one point of capitalism that is heavy metal, the potential for individual advancement separate and away from his surroundings.
Libertarian and objectivist political goals seem to be the closest thing to heavy metal ideals. It's all about the individual, all about removing government interference and aid from the everyday lives of people. When musicians talk about rebelling against the 'fascist' Western society, they are dreaming of some hippie commune where everybody has a clean, non-polluting, non-strenuous job and everybody gets free health-care and we all live in peace between whatever protests are scheduled for the day. Maybe they should be labeled under the fantasy lyric section. But when musicians have lyrics supporting drug legalization, when they rail against government corruption, when they hold their little sonic protests against war, oftentimes the overarching concept to everything they are saying is that they want decreased government power and presence. Libertarian ideals. Heavy metal ideals.
Yes, those fucking potheads are heavy metal. Not as heavy metal as I am, because I am drug free and I am alcohol free and that means I am better than you. Being better than you is certainly heavy metal and cheers to anyone who gets the reference I just made.
Going back to difficult questions: Is fascism heavy metal? For those under fascism, certainly not. But if the focus of heavy metal is individual power and the exercise of the individual will against the will of the masses, is not the fascist and the dictator just taking the concept to its final destination? Surely not every expression of heavy metal is nihilistic in that it is doomed to fail in the face of popular opinion and culture. If the oppressed individual rises to power and expresses his will over the people he now has power over, does the same focus and methodology somehow transform from heavy metal to not heavy metal?
Satanism is heavy metal. The idea of being Satanic in this world is a highly iconoclastic stance. With the violent tendencies of the radical Muslim world and the deference to Christian religion shown by the entire world during the coverage of the recent Papal situation, Satan is an outsider.
Freedom of religion is effectively a lie in our world. Just try having a casual conversation in the workplace and letting it out that you're a Satanist, or try getting custody of the kids in a divorce by declaring your Satanic religious faith (strong religious conviction would work to your advantage if you were of almost any other faith). Even being an atheist is difficult because people don't take it seriously, taking offense when an atheist will not participate in even simple "harmless" religious rituals when pressured.
Different sorts of Satanism bring a different focus. Some Satanic cults do not even believe in Satan as a real entity, but more of a philosophical ideal. Even with those who believe Satan to be an actual being, there are those that believe Satan is the hellfire-and-brimstone demon of destruction, and there are those that see him as more of a Promethian figure. But all are concerned either with individual initiative and power (the perspective of LaVey and the Church of Satan), or the fall of the ruling order of religion. "Become a slave to Satan" type of stuff is a possible exception.
Satanism is certainly a cliché within heavy metal, but it would be impossible for it to be any other way.
Christianity and Islam are at their core not heavy metal. Both seek converts and spread through the world like cancer cells either creating more like themselves or doing their best to kill those that won't change. Both feature an all-powerful God that must be obeyed, both give rewards for great sacrifice to that God, and both punish self-determination and the idea that humanity can exist separate from their God. Belief is nothing, worship is necessary. Millions have been killed for real or imagined offense against these religions.
Yet even within the Christian and Muslim mythologies, there are stories which certainly fit into the ideology of heavy metal. Looking at the key Christian myth, Jesus Christ was a very heavy metal individual. His reasons for being so and the goals he sought to achieve were not very heavy metal. But in the context of his environment and the consequences he knew he faced, his actions were the epitome of heavy metal. He knew what he wanted and worked towards that goal at excruciating cost. It just goes to show that even the least heavy metal ideas can be made into true heavy metal topics with the right focus.
I'm afraid I don't know much about other religions so I can't go down a list and list them as heavy metal or not. The point is with religious music, those works that deal with personal conviction and struggle show characteristics of heavy metal, and those works which deal with peace, love, belonging (or submission, servitude, humility, or fealty), and eternal paradise in heaven are certainly not heavy metal.
Lyrics are the biggest key to discovering whether a particular band, album, or song can be considered heavy metal.
To not care about lyrics doesn't make one any less a fan of music and it doesn't make one wrong in any way. (Not in an absolute sense anyway; I personally think that's crazy) In fact, it makes one even more of a fan of music than the most die-hard heavy metal fan. But to have this attitude detracts from a listener's ability to identify heavy metal. Malaise and apathy, going with the flow with not a care where it takes you, are not heavy metal qualities.
Musicians who do not care about their lyrics are few and far between. Yes, musicians could consider them secondary to the overall sound, and even make lyrical decisions based on the sound. Yet there will still be a focus to what they are doing. Even musicians who make up their lyrics as a last minute detail while in a recording studio are going to try to achieve a certain atmosphere with them. Many albums feature instrumental songs, yet their song titles still give a focus, a feeling of what the song was supposed to be about. The vast majority of the time they fit right in with the other songs on the album. By context, their meaning is deciphered.
The most heavy metal sounding music can actually not be heavy metal if counteracted by lyrics that are against the principles of heavy metal. The most aggressive double bass, the loudest riffing, the most obnoxious atonal vocals, they can all be incidental in determining if a band is heavy metal or not. Extreme sounds are not the exclusive province of heavy metal. If musicians do not express heavy metal principles in the plainest avenue most available to them, they are not separating their brand of rock and roll from the realm of heavy metal.
The most non-heavy metal sounding music can indeed be heavy metal by espousing and supporting heavy metal virtues of the self. All of these "alternative" sounds that seem to surround the heavy metal scene, all these symphonic and ambient hangers-on to the scene may have a true place after all.
Heavy metal is in the motivation. It isn't in the noise.
Let's examine several common lyrical topics found around the heavy metal scene and see how heavy metal they really are.
Dragons, knights, castles, trolls, chain mail, and kings are not by themselves heavy metal. It is easy to figure out where the connection comes from. The sword and sorcery fiction (chiefly Michael Moorcock's Elric work, JRR Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, and R.E. Howard's Conan stories) really exploded in the 1960s, coinciding with the teenage years of many of the musical icons of the 70s. They rattled around with some of these concepts of individuals challenging, mastering, and changing the strange and harsh worlds around them. They in turn influenced many who started heavy metal bands in the 80s. Add to that inspiration your average heavy metal artist's intelligence and ability to detect and display nuance, and you have the idea that swords and dragons and chain mail and castles and shit are heavy metal all by themselves. It's a striking indictment against heavy metal that people still don't get it decades later.
There is always lots of talk about Dungeons and Dragons and role-playing games in the context of heavy metal fantasy lyrics. Perhaps some of the people writing this crap had a casual encounter with it, but it's safe to say there are very few fantasy lyric writing heavy metal musicians who have a functional understanding of how role-playing games actually work. They've probably just played some computer and video game RPGs and think that is all that RPGs are. Believe me, if they had a real clue, the state of heavy metal fantasy lyric writing would not be as vacuous as it is.
This is not to say one can't make up fantasy stories to sing about and still be heavy metal. The key is having a point to all of it which is itself heavy metal. The artists who show an understanding of why fantasy concepts abound in heavy metal in the first place (Killing the Dragon as a song was so obviously not about a dragon as the album artwork clearly showed, just as Imaginations from the Other Side was not about Peter Pan ) may be the most heavy metal artists of them all. Is it really so difficult to make this distinction?
Yet the idea of fantasy takes in far more than just medieval themes. The issue with the gore bands is that they are just presenting fantasy narratives with their source text being Gray's Anatomy rather than The Two Towers. There's no actual focus, no point, just rattling off acts of violence and interesting things that can happen to a body.
Most writing about war in a heavy metal context is just like bad Hollywood productions: Concerned with big guns and 'splosions. Even if there is a great big tank on the cover of the album, most heavy metal musicians that use war as a lyrical topic do not make a point with it. It becomes just another fantasy.
Singing about heavy metal is redundant. Is performing on or listening to a heavy metal album not enough for some people? Songs about heavy metal invariably talk about heavy metal as a brotherhood, a movement, or a culture, and how awesome it is and how everyone listening should be part of it. These songs often describe how people who do not like heavy metal are 'the enemy,' and they cast insults at those who "betray" heavy metal by committing the heinous crime of listening to something else. How many musicians who actually address heavy metal in their songs treat it as a state of being and not as some sort of social club? How many heavy metal musicians who address heavy metal in their songs treat it as a negative influence on heavy metal? (I know one! I know one!) Heads up, people. Heavy metal is not The Law. "If you're not into heavy metal then you are not my friend," is nothing but a bunch of people insecure about their individuality wanting to validate their tastes and habits by making sure they have other people to identify with. Very counterproductive. Being heavy metal does not mean being conscious about the musical taste of the people around you. Being heavy metal means you don't fucking care! If you want to be friends with someone who loves Barry Manilow more than life itself, go right ahead. Your life, your decision. Heavy metal would not be heavy metal if you have to limit yourself just to be well, anything.
Just remember to tell them to fuck right off when they tell you to turn your music down.
Musicians whose lyrics deal with history never just deal with history. Well, maybe the outro to The IVth Crusade but there just isn't that much else out there. When musicians are talking history, it's just a smokescreen, a backdrop to flavor their real agenda. Maybe it's politics. Maybe it is historical fiction in which case they're in the fantasy category.
Perhaps it's about national pride. I don't think there are too many examples of non-political songs dealing with national association, but they're not very heavy metal. Nationality, like ethnicity, is something you are born into. Yes, it can be changed, but the celebration of that identity is still identifying with a larger group. Your status as an individual isn't very great if you are primarily identifying yourself first and foremost as an American, or a Finn, or a German, or whatever.
When a band does something like give a Hail To England when they're not even from England, well, uh, I have no clue what to make of it. That's just strange.
Love is absolutely not heavy metal. Love and sex are all about people coming together in all ways physical and/or emotional. It's quite a nice state to be in, but individuality wanes, the will to fight the togetherness disappears, and the possible gains from doing so often don't match the gains from not fighting it. When the heart burns, the heavy metal fades. Sad for us.
Sex isn't quite as bad as love when it comes to retaining individuality, but it's still about people coming together. Musicians writing songs about sex usually aren't trying to express anything about sex to begin with, they're usually trying to score chicks at their live shows. A song with a message of "I stand alone and I'm horny," would be pretty silly.
So we need to think through the broken heart songs. Songs expressing the old "I can't live without this person, I don't know what I'll do now," are still love songs. Use common sense on how to apply this stuff.
Yes, this means that hatred for man and general misanthropy is heavy metal. Throw the horns. And rock out with your cock out somewhere else.
How tree-hugging hippies made their way into the heavy metal scene is a mystery. How they seem to have settled into the most extreme of heavy metal sounds is even more puzzling. It is of no consequence how loud the wind howls, how low the temperature is, or how many feet of snow you had to walk through, uphill, both ways. The weather is not heavy metal. Trees are not heavy metal, even if they are trees in the Cold and Grim Northern Moonforest. Take your bizarre National Geographic special elsewhere. ( and we wondered how folk music got crossed up with these people )
Is racism heavy metal? I have always been pissed off by Nazism and anti-Semitism around the heavy metal scene. I always said there is no place in heavy metal for such things. But one of the trends of modern Western society is towards multiculturalism, with discrimination on the basis of ethnicity, religion, or national origin being discouraged or outlawed. So wouldn't one who disagrees with that, and colors their music through that viewpoint, be an embodiment of heavy metal spirit?
Luckily, I think not. Racism is based on group identity, both in oneself and others. A white power pinhead playing white power music identifies himself first and foremost as a white man. He concentrates on a group identity that isn't even something that can be chosen. Not heavy metal. While Nazism extolled the Nietzsche ubermensch concept (itself a very heavy metal ideal), it's even narrower than your average racism because of the political implications in addition to racial requirements. How can you pigeonhole yourself so completely and still claim to have the spirit of heavy metal?
Do keep in mind that while racism is not heavy metal, racial bigotry certain can be. You do know the difference between racism and bigotry, don't you?
Fans commonly state that politics have no place in music, yet albums such as Order of the Leech, Prince of the Poverty Line, No World Order, Dead Heart in a Dead World, and Chaos AD express political views and in some cases the identity of the musician revolves around their political identity. Obviously politics and music, and more to the point politics and heavy metal, do mix. They are mixing. It can't be wished away.
Does the expression of politics in heavy metal indicate a level of non-heavy metal identity? Politics are in heavy metal, but are politics heavy metal?
It depends on the political viewpoint, of course. The very terms I've used to describe the focus and antithesis of heavy metal (individualism and collectivism) are political concepts. But it is not so easy to categorize political affiliation with the identity of heavy metal, as we'll talk about in a bit.
Calls to protest and dissent against a ruling regime are always heavy metal. It does not matter if the ruling party is left or right wing. Merely by being in power it presses down on the population, each side creating its own set of hardships and making its own set of definitions of 'good citizen' and 'criminal.' You'll see far more left-wing presence in music because, let's face it, that's by far the dominant philosophy espoused by artistic people.
Yet there are political philosophies which are intrinsically more heavy metal than others. Communism and socialism are not heavy metal. Any political philosophy where a central authority is responsible for the allocation of resources is not going to mesh well with heavy metal. Political songs calling for government control or regulation, or even government programs which would supposedly help its people is simply strengthening the concept of people being a citizen and ward of the State first and foremost, and not an individual in charge of his own future.
Capitalist political views should tend to be in the heavy metal spirit. The free market, supply and demand, it all implies that an industrious, intelligent person will get ahead, that they will chart their own course through life. Of course the reality is somewhat different. Capitalism seems to always come down to the market share, which means popular appeal, and big business is just as oppressive on the will and aspirations of the individual as any communist regime ever could be. Most musicians that we listen to are signed to record companies so they know all about this. The fascinating thing is when musicians do sing about the 'evils' of capitalism, they seem to focus on the fact that some people get rich while other people end up dirt poor and dead. Funny that they would attack the one point of capitalism that is heavy metal, the potential for individual advancement separate and away from his surroundings.
Libertarian and objectivist political goals seem to be the closest thing to heavy metal ideals. It's all about the individual, all about removing government interference and aid from the everyday lives of people. When musicians talk about rebelling against the 'fascist' Western society, they are dreaming of some hippie commune where everybody has a clean, non-polluting, non-strenuous job and everybody gets free health-care and we all live in peace between whatever protests are scheduled for the day. Maybe they should be labeled under the fantasy lyric section. But when musicians have lyrics supporting drug legalization, when they rail against government corruption, when they hold their little sonic protests against war, oftentimes the overarching concept to everything they are saying is that they want decreased government power and presence. Libertarian ideals. Heavy metal ideals.
Yes, those fucking potheads are heavy metal. Not as heavy metal as I am, because I am drug free and I am alcohol free and that means I am better than you. Being better than you is certainly heavy metal and cheers to anyone who gets the reference I just made.
Going back to difficult questions: Is fascism heavy metal? For those under fascism, certainly not. But if the focus of heavy metal is individual power and the exercise of the individual will against the will of the masses, is not the fascist and the dictator just taking the concept to its final destination? Surely not every expression of heavy metal is nihilistic in that it is doomed to fail in the face of popular opinion and culture. If the oppressed individual rises to power and expresses his will over the people he now has power over, does the same focus and methodology somehow transform from heavy metal to not heavy metal?
Satanism is heavy metal. The idea of being Satanic in this world is a highly iconoclastic stance. With the violent tendencies of the radical Muslim world and the deference to Christian religion shown by the entire world during the coverage of the recent Papal situation, Satan is an outsider.
Freedom of religion is effectively a lie in our world. Just try having a casual conversation in the workplace and letting it out that you're a Satanist, or try getting custody of the kids in a divorce by declaring your Satanic religious faith (strong religious conviction would work to your advantage if you were of almost any other faith). Even being an atheist is difficult because people don't take it seriously, taking offense when an atheist will not participate in even simple "harmless" religious rituals when pressured.
Different sorts of Satanism bring a different focus. Some Satanic cults do not even believe in Satan as a real entity, but more of a philosophical ideal. Even with those who believe Satan to be an actual being, there are those that believe Satan is the hellfire-and-brimstone demon of destruction, and there are those that see him as more of a Promethian figure. But all are concerned either with individual initiative and power (the perspective of LaVey and the Church of Satan), or the fall of the ruling order of religion. "Become a slave to Satan" type of stuff is a possible exception.
Satanism is certainly a cliché within heavy metal, but it would be impossible for it to be any other way.
Christianity and Islam are at their core not heavy metal. Both seek converts and spread through the world like cancer cells either creating more like themselves or doing their best to kill those that won't change. Both feature an all-powerful God that must be obeyed, both give rewards for great sacrifice to that God, and both punish self-determination and the idea that humanity can exist separate from their God. Belief is nothing, worship is necessary. Millions have been killed for real or imagined offense against these religions.
Yet even within the Christian and Muslim mythologies, there are stories which certainly fit into the ideology of heavy metal. Looking at the key Christian myth, Jesus Christ was a very heavy metal individual. His reasons for being so and the goals he sought to achieve were not very heavy metal. But in the context of his environment and the consequences he knew he faced, his actions were the epitome of heavy metal. He knew what he wanted and worked towards that goal at excruciating cost. It just goes to show that even the least heavy metal ideas can be made into true heavy metal topics with the right focus.
I'm afraid I don't know much about other religions so I can't go down a list and list them as heavy metal or not. The point is with religious music, those works that deal with personal conviction and struggle show characteristics of heavy metal, and those works which deal with peace, love, belonging (or submission, servitude, humility, or fealty), and eternal paradise in heaven are certainly not heavy metal.
