As a metalhead since the age of 13, I’ve been in the scene for quite some time. I made the Metal scene my home and through it forged friendships and an identity. I love Metal music. In its exquisite complexity and transparent aggression, Metal is truly a full body experience. However, all I see now is Metal displayed on the racks of mainstream clothing stores and as staple programming on streaming services, but for all the wrong reasons.

Metal is music, and so to get into it for any other reason is to completely miss the point. Metal is so much more than polemical fodder for absurd News stories, clickbait websites and mini-documentaries. Metal is powerful enough to frighten, revive and unite and yet now few seem to truly understand, value and appreciate the world’s most enigmatic music scene. Within the actual metal scene (Metal Hipsters not included) you have two poles of opposition. On one extreme you have the “Trolling Elite,” who through their websites, positing the evils of modernity, view Metal not as a catalyst for change, but rather an agent of regression. And on the other extreme you have the “Extremeheads” who care not at all for substance or quality, they only care for fast, heavy, “brutal” music. While I do not consider myself the happy medium – I often find myself sympathizing more with the trolls than the airheads – I consider myself a fan who “gets it.”

Metal grew exponentially in the 80s and 90s and created music so ingenious that it still baffles me that you have to qualify yourself as a metalhead and not simply a music lover. To love Metal is to love music, for it is Metal that has taken up the mantle from the once great, now dead, classical composers (Gustav Holst would have most certainly been a metalhead). I’m not a musicologist or musical theorist but I have an ear for quality – I know bullshit when I hear it. And while there is certainly epic amounts of bullshit in the Metal world (Nu-Metal, Metalcore, Technical Metal, Djent) there is a strong vein of genius throughout the entire Metal realm.

From hearing the mind blowing drumming of Les Binks (Judas Priest), to marvelling in a James Murphy (Obituary, Death) solo, to feeling yourself crushed by the weight of Renato Gallina’s (Disembowelment, Trial of the Bow) guitar, to finding yourself running scared while listening to Moëvöt at night. Metal has always been about showmanship, competition and pushing boundaries and while there is indeed some exceptional Metal still being produced, scenes are largely a thing of the past. With this website I hope to unravel the mysteries of Metal from its beginnings to its current state. I will be discussing albums, bands, the scene in general while utilizing my own personal experiences and research. Metal can live again in the hearts of those who once loved it and not just as a home for the lost and the lame, it can be the home for the adventurous and circumspect once again, you just need to start listening.