The metal scene; is it bad? Are we going to Hell?

[Hawk]

I have read several posts about how bad the situation is if you are a metalhead. And the situation is not good. I'll give ya that, but...

Are you the only one at your school that likes metal? You have a hard time finding the cd's you want? And most of the time you can't make it to Wacken, Bang Your Head or whatever festival you want to go?? Yea the situation has never been that bad for metal right?

Wrong! Very wrong. In the late 70s and very early 80s things were a lot worse. If you could not find any good albums, the reason was that they were not there! One good album in two month's was a gift from the evil one down below, praise be! I had to search for hours in several recordshop to even get a particular Deep purple album. There was no demand for it, or so they told me. There were no metal festival's and no metal magazines, worse of all there was no Internet.

So there you were; sitting in your room, listening to your few albums; alone! And if you were lucky you could see one gig in a year. You had NO metal friends. Noone who thought your music was normal, let along even good. Most of the time there were no concerts, except maybe for Rainbow somewhere in bleeding Germany !! And then how were you supposed to know about this Rainbow gig? You would walk into a record store to find a new Riot album totally unexpected. The mainstream media were not going to announce that Riot were recording a new album. When bands disbanded it could take a year or longer before you learned of it. Either because you happen to bump into a metalhead who told you he had heard form some obscure source about it or you heard it waiting inline for a gig from a guy who was "connected". Even then you would not be sure.

My point? It's all relative guy's and girl's!

Count your blessings. We have a strong Internet community, lot's of metal webzines, you can socialize on countless forums. And there's a fucking shitload of good albums being released!! Independent labels having are signing up bands of any style these day's.

That does not mean that it is perfect, I am not saying that. But it is a whole lot better than it's been, believe me! When metal got big in the late 80s that was an aberration. It simply does not happen. Accept reality metal is underground pur sang! The health of metal depends on being underground. remember how it all turned to shiiite when it got popular?

Soooo, get together, start up some bands, metal pub's and magazines. Do what metal fans have been doing since Black Sabbath released their first album. Fuck the trend followers and forget about metal ever being popular. Carve your own nice out in this trendy world and ROCK ON!!

 

[JonnyD]

Hawk you are the man! its gonna take me Days to really reply to this whole thread but Yes awsome

 

[Metal Dog]

You have a hard time finding the cd's you want?

I have no problem finding cds that I want it's just finding the money to afford them

 

[baldyboy]

to be honest hawk,i think its better now than it ever has been.lots of new bands coming through,and a load of the old ones reforming.the internet has been awsome for metal.i would never have spoken to all of you boys and girls for one.
definately a good time for metal.

 

[sixxswine]

The only gripe I have currently is that, hard music is marketed better in Europe, there's all of these killer festivals & you can see
8-10 excellent bands in one day for probably the price that some poor bastid paid to see the KISS cover band or Metallica!

 

[Sinner Rider]

Yeah, it's cool that we have shit like this. But I wish I could go back and see all the shows I miss. Or get my ass to Europe where they take it more serious, and have better shows. But altogether there will always be something better or something to bitch about. So Be happy that were not in Iraq were we can't even listen to music.That is how I'm going to start looking to things, at least I'm not in Iraq or neighboring country.

 

[The saYer]

Well I have lived in san francisco my whole life and there were hella thrash shows here, cheap and great, the only problem was knowing when and where.

And I would also like to reply with the lyrics of metal discharge, that almost says it all.

 

[Greeno]

Nice post Hawk! I've been telling my Non-metal music friends that metal is bigger now than it was in the 80's, more bands, more styles, and a better infrastructure (the net being the biggest part of that). I still like 80's metal better but there is nothing to complain about with todays metal. Out of all of the new music I tend to only like about 10% of it, but that's a good quality 10% so I'm happy.

 

[Wyvern]

Are you the only one at your school that likes metal?

N/A but in a sense yes , I'm almost off Graduate School . Anyway, is not a matter I'm the only one is a matter the rest have to hear it because I'm the only one with a player:hotjump:

You have a hard time finding the cd's you want?

Sometimes. USA is a hard market and I like a lot of European stuff mainly. Still is EASIER than it was when I started > 20 years ago. In my country there was only domestic vinyl releases = no metal and seldom new stuff.

Nowdays online I got not only 2004 stuff but also old stuff (that the usual difficult stuff to track, unless they are reissues).

I had to search for hours in several recordshop to even get a particular Deep purple album. There was no demand for it, or so they told me. There were no metal festival's and no metal magazines, worse of all there was no Internet.

I started later than you, so I had no problem finding Deep Purple or Black Sabbath, but Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Saxon etc was almost impossible (and was the height of NWOBHM). There was a lot of magazines, but again big deal without access to the music.

And if you were lucky you could see one gig in a year. You had NO metal friends.

Again different, I started with metal because of my friends, I was into pop

You would walk into a record store to find a new Riot album totally unexpected.

That happened to me only once with Saxon (1990), but again it was in my country Internet was undeveloped there and magazines were already trendy.

BTW, I just received my copy of Riot - "Rock City" which in this case is new to me

 

[Runehammer]

Awesome post Hawk!

You have a hard time finding the cd's you want? And most of the time you can't make it to Wacken, Bang Your Head or whatever festival you want to go??

Yes - I have to buy 99% of my Cd's online!
Yes - I have to travel to Germany to see some decent bands!

Yea the situation has never been that bad for metal right?

Wrong! Very wrong. In the late 70s and very early 80s things were a lot worse. If you could not find any good albums, the reason was that they were not there! One good album in two month's was a gift from the evil one down below, praise be! I had to search for hours in several recordshop to even get a particular Deep purple album. There was no demand for it, or so they told me. There were no metal festival's and no metal magazines, worse of all there was no Internet.

This is where we diverge a bit:
In the 70's and for much of the 80's, the UK record stores had virtually every metal album you could wish for in stock. We had gigs up and down the country most weeks and regular festivals at Reading, Knebworth and Donington. (Rather like Germany and Scandinavia today).

Nowadays we have bugger all gigs and CD's are way too expensive - not that you'd find many locally. Thank Odin for the internet!

So there you were; sitting in your room, listening to your few albums; alone! And if you were lucky you could see one gig in a year. You had NO metal friends. Noone who thought your music was normal, let along even good. Most of the time there were no concerts, except maybe for Rainbow somewhere in bleeding Germany !! And then how were you supposed to know about this Rainbow gig?

This was pretty much my situation from 1993-2001 (I was late getting the internet ok).

Count your blessings. We have a strong Internet community, lot's of metal webzines, you can socialize on countless forums. And there's a fucking shitload of good albums being released!! Independent labels having are signing up bands of any style these day's.

That does not mean that it is perfect, I am not saying that. But it is a whole lot better than it's been, believe me! When metal got big in the late 80s that was an aberration. It simply does not happen. Accept reality metal is underground pur sang! The health of metal depends on being underground. remember how it all turned to shiiite when it got popular?

Remember that old chestnut of the "Metal Broterhood"? Well the internet made that a reality - sure there are a load of so-called fans that don't subscribe to it but there are at least a handful of metal boards online (like this one and Metal Gospel) where it is evident.
The metal community is leaner and meaner these days but no bugger comes into this for kudos or peer points, they come here because they are passionate.

I do think metal needs to raise its head above the parapet from time to time just to bring in new fans because you can't blame kids for not liking it if they never get to hear it can you? I don't eve want it to get back to the mainstream, where it is open to pollution tho'.

 

[Hawk]

Awesome post Hawk!



Yes - I have to buy 99% of my Cd's online!
Yes - I have to travel to Germany to see some decent bands!



This is where we diverge a bit:
In the 70's and for much of the 80's, the UK record stores had virtually every metal album you could wish for in stock. We had gigs up and down the country most weeks and regular festivals at Reading, Knebworth and Donington. (Rather like Germany and Scandinavia today).

Nowadays we have bugger all gigs and CD's are way too expensive - not that you'd find many locally. Thank Odin for the internet!

The second half of the 70s was a great time to live in the UK. That was the only place were hard rock/metal was getting a market for itself. This was the time when the UK was the center of the metal world. Loads and loads of good bands.

Black Sabbath, Judas Priest, UFO, Budgie, Uriah Heep, Thin Lizzy are just a few bands to name right now. There are more though.

Remember however that the situation was very different when you lived on the European continent or even worse, in the US, were band's like Rex and Detective [remember them?] were supposed to be hard rock

 

[Hawk]

BTW, I just received my copy of Riot - "Rock City" which in this case is new to me

And what a fantastic album that is!!!

I am cruising in overdrive, I've got my hands on your wheel.... Great song!!

 

[JonnyD]

Are you the only one at your school that likes metal? You have a hard time finding the cd's you want? And most of the time you can't make it to Wacken, Bang Your Head or whatever festival you want to go?? Yea the situation has never been that bad for metal right?

Wrong! Very wrong. In the late 70s and very early 80s things were a lot worse. If you could not find any good albums, the reason was that they were not there! One good album in two month's was a gift from the evil one down below, praise be! I had to search for hours in several recordshop to even get a particular Deep purple album. There was no demand for it, or so they told me. There were no metal festival's and no metal magazines, worse of all there was no Internet.

I'm gonna hit this one section at a time ....... Yeah I was One of 2 metal Dudes in the entire school lol and I recived much ridacule for it ..... But I didnt let that Bother me to much Just cause I knew that the Metal Wasnt *For* them ........ In vermont .... The only *Metal* Bands that come through are well Metallica once Godsmack once Overkill once like 15 years ago .... any concerts I wanna go to Happen Many Fucking Miles away Because Vermont is a conservative Hell "No Loud Music!" Finding shit has only gotten better in the last couple of years thanks to the Wonder of the internet .... But still the only Mags we get here are MetalEdge ( I wish they had a Jerkoff smily) and Festivals HA non exsistant .... tho I did have a thing going for a couple years called ZedFest it was a BackWoods Heavy Metal Hardcore show ..... Basicaly the Local scene is all we have up here.....

 

[MURAI]

Count your blessings. We have a strong Internet community, lot's of metal webzines, you can socialize on countless forums. And there's a fucking shitload of good albums being released!! Independent labels having are signing up bands of any style these day's.

That does not mean that it is perfect, I am not saying that. But it is a whole lot better than it's been, believe me! When metal got big in the late 80s that was an aberration. It simply does not happen. Accept reality metal is underground pur sang! The health of metal depends on being underground. remember how it all turned to shiiite when it got popular?

Soooo, get together, start up some bands, metal pub's and magazines. Do what metal fans have been doing since Black Sabbath released their first album. Fuck the trend followers and forget about metal ever being popular. Carve your own nice out in this trendy world and ROCK ON!!

Yes, sometimes it's lonely being the only metalhead and it gets annoying when it's hard to find actual metal albums in CD stores. I want to make a metal band but the sad thing is most local kids here like fucking emo, pop punk or nu-metal but you made a good point about how the internet is doing a lot of good for metal. We can find so much information about different bands and what not. I disagree with you about how heavy metal should totally stay underground. I don't mind metal getting some media coverage even though it does attract some posers. If nu-metal I wasn't so popular I wont be even listening to metal now so.

 

[Fangface]

Now the only problem is to get those out-of-print albums...
Apart from that, Internet and international distros make it easy to get our stuff!

Boards and festivals are also some nice places to meet cool metalheads :Spin:

 

[JonnyD]

Count your blessings. We have a strong Internet community, lot's of metal webzines, you can socialize on countless forums. And there's a fucking shitload of good albums being released!! Independent labels having are signing up bands of any style these day's.

That does not mean that it is perfect, I am not saying that. But it is a whole lot better than it's been, believe me! When metal got big in the late 80s that was an aberration. It simply does not happen. Accept reality metal is underground pur sang! The health of metal depends on being underground. remember how it all turned to shiiite when it got popular?

I absolutely do ... I have been on this board for 2 years now and I have meet More Killer MetalHeads in these 2 years than I have in my Entire life its a good feeling and I am grateful for it ..... the onlything I do online besides chattin with chicks .... is sitting right here with the coolest bunch on the whole Net ..... Maybe even the whole world .... since this is an international group ... which is another thing I love 10 years ago I didnt know the Metalhead that lives the next town over .... Now I know MetalHeads from all around the globe and I have the Net and UM to thank for that ..... And personally I think a small amount of attention media wise is a good thing .... but not alot ....Heavy Metal is ours it does not belong to the pop-culture masses AKA Sheeple , Metal is in our souls, Its in our Hearts, Its who we are and aint No Mother Fucker ever gonna take that away!

 

[Sinner Rider]

Damn that Century media book, that rapes me of all money. Not to mention Ebay, I'm always searching for shit. When was a freshman I went to a ghetto school, no really bad! I was the only white person in most of my classes. At the time I also had multi colored hair,I just looked right down stupid. But for some odd reason I got along with people, I had 3 people that were into anything close to metal. Almost my sophmore year I moved out to suburbs for a while, I was shocked to find people of my own kind.

Now you all know I was one of those Marilyn Manson kids, everyone hated. Forgive me. Actually I own many of his albums the old are still classic to me. I don't know why in hell I even said all this.

 

[JonnyD]

Soooo, get together, start up some bands, metal pub's and magazines. Do what metal fans have been doing since Black Sabbath released their first album. Fuck the trend followers and forget about metal ever being popular. Carve your own nice out in this trendy world and ROCK ON!!

Hellllll Yeah your Damn right Hawk like I said in that Last Post we do our own shows and Fests up here and advertise them locally for ourselves Nobody has ever had to pay a dime for any of the shows I have put up I just want ppl to see and hear my music and the music of anybody else I can round up .... and actually now that I think about it theres nothing cept Playing live better than setting up a show and having a blast with 200 ppl and some loud bands out in the middle of nowhere so yeah I think I get your point Hawk maybe maybe not hahaha I dont know ... but it was a great thread