It was a pseudo-revival of mid-century folk music. It didn’t last because much of it didn’t have genuine proletarian roots like real folk music. It mimicked the aesthetic and sounds of folk music but none of the content. It never will when it’s just wealthy urbanites cosplaying as poor country bumpkins.
Folk music and related genres (like soul and country and blues) have all suffered for the same reason. Their class character is fake and purely aesthetic today. At least, for the super mainstream bands that make it on the Starbucks Spotify playlist.
There was a megathread a while back about Woody Guthrie. His music lasted because it captured a genuine aspect of working class America in a way that stomp clap hey never can. This Land Is Your Land was a political song. We don’t do that enough anymore, in the name of mass appeal and profit and merchandising. Even Bill Withers, who was merely center-left as far as I know, made music that mattered with lyrics opposing racism and war.
This pattern occurs with leftist/populist expression all the time. It’s heard by many for what it is, but for others it’s merely a catchy tune or a nice painting. I’ve mentioned the Surrealist art movement a few times here, but that’s another example. Salvador Dalí is ostensibly the face of the movement in the average person’s mind, but the Surrealists and he didn’t get along; he ultimately rejected their political message, believing that he could drop the political baggage and just focus on the abstract aesthetics of the movement. While I wouldn’t say his work was necessarily bad (he still applied his paranoiac critical method inspired by Freud) it didn’t have the same significance as Surrealists imo.
Dalí only dropped the leftist politics. He was at least a fascist sympathiser and painted hitler a couple of times. The whole ‘apolitical’ thing was on a spectrum of politically unaware liberalism to cryptofascism to overt fascism in denial.
I used to/still do listen to a lot of folk and folk punk, and people would always be “oh you would like this band!” and it was always this, to quote Futurama, “Vaguely folkish alterna-rock”. I never wanted to be mean and be like “look just because there’s a banjo doesn’t mean I would like it”. but it was always really frustrating.
You would like Bloodywood. They’re an Indian folk metal band that started out doing metal covers of pop and bollywood songs, but now they’re making original music and it’s lefty AF. Their most popular song is called Gaddar, which means Traitor, and it’s about politicians who use religion to stoke hate.
it’s kind of a good sign that booj have to pretend to be proles to seem cool, even if in the process they entirely hollow out genres and render them fake.
It mimicked the aesthetic and sounds of folk music but none of the content.
The whole hipster subculture was a grotesque imitation of working class americana, is it a coincidence that it emerged shortly after the subprime mortgage crisis? no it isn’t, shopping from goodwill became popular out of necessity and then the aesthetics of thrifting emerged as a response because rich people felt alienated from the moment (the moment being the 2008 financial crisis). the saddest thing are fascists today trying to co-opt hipster aesthetics, a coarse imitation of an imitation that only vaguely retains its working class signifiers. a trend so passé that even having hipsters as the butt of the joke feels completely out-of-touch.
A class analysis of the broader metal genre would be really interesting and I don’t think I know enough to answer. I have some hypotheses and hot takes but nothing concrete.
I think metal in general evokes power and importance. Some have interpreted this to mean metal serves to reinforce masculine ideology and hetero norms, which may be true for certain artists. In recent decades though, metal fans have a more even gender split. One could make a contrary argument that metal serves to empower a powerless individual, whether they feel that way due to their class or personal issues like bullying or abuse.
Metal commonly includes themes of fantasy. Is this a form of escapism for an audience that doesn’t want to cope with the material world? Some subgenres focus quite heavily on worldbuilding. I notice that frequently these worlds involve overt evils to fight or evade… is that a reaction to the obscure and abstract exploitation of capitalism? Sometimes these worlds are plainly reminiscent of past times, precapitalist societies with simple social relations. Perhaps these would be the reactionary artists, the ones who want to go back instead of progress forward on a material basis.
I think most novel genres are originally created by and for the working class, but heavy metal has the material constraint that it requires heavily distorted electric guitar, so its history tightly tracks the history of our ability to produce guitar amplifiers, and how affordable they are in various areas of the world at a given time. The bedroom studio revolution is directly responsible for djent among many other subgenres, and the big names in n the first generation of that group are mostly people of color, although their class character is more muddled.
I’d super love someone more knowledgeable about heavy guitar music in the periphery to share some analysis of that.
Fwiw, and I could be wrong about this, I’ve heard the origins of the heavily distorted sound comes from bands having to overvolt smaller amplifiers to try to match the sound of the PA systems some bigger bands were traveling with in the age before a venue could be counted on to have a decent PA system to plug into.
I’ve heard that before. I think there was a long period of experimentation that basically involved breaking amplifiers to see how they sounded as well. Slashing the cones, rubbing dirt on them, etc.
It was a pseudo-revival of mid-century folk music. It didn’t last because much of it didn’t have genuine proletarian roots like real folk music. It mimicked the aesthetic and sounds of folk music but none of the content. It never will when it’s just wealthy urbanites cosplaying as poor country bumpkins.
Folk music and related genres (like soul and country and blues) have all suffered for the same reason. Their class character is fake and purely aesthetic today. At least, for the super mainstream bands that make it on the Starbucks Spotify playlist.
There was a megathread a while back about Woody Guthrie. His music lasted because it captured a genuine aspect of working class America in a way that stomp clap hey never can. This Land Is Your Land was a political song. We don’t do that enough anymore, in the name of mass appeal and profit and merchandising. Even Bill Withers, who was merely center-left as far as I know, made music that mattered with lyrics opposing racism and war.
This pattern occurs with leftist/populist expression all the time. It’s heard by many for what it is, but for others it’s merely a catchy tune or a nice painting. I’ve mentioned the Surrealist art movement a few times here, but that’s another example. Salvador Dalí is ostensibly the face of the movement in the average person’s mind, but the Surrealists and he didn’t get along; he ultimately rejected their political message, believing that he could drop the political baggage and just focus on the abstract aesthetics of the movement. While I wouldn’t say his work was necessarily bad (he still applied his paranoiac critical method inspired by Freud) it didn’t have the same significance as Surrealists imo.
Dalí only dropped the leftist politics. He was at least a fascist sympathiser and painted hitler a couple of times. The whole ‘apolitical’ thing was on a spectrum of politically unaware liberalism to cryptofascism to overt fascism in denial.
Yeah well that goes without saying. Apoliticism is fascism, everyone knows that.
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Damn all of history really is the history of class struggle or something like that
I used to/still do listen to a lot of folk and folk punk, and people would always be “oh you would like this band!” and it was always this, to quote Futurama, “Vaguely folkish alterna-rock”. I never wanted to be mean and be like “look just because there’s a banjo doesn’t mean I would like it”. but it was always really frustrating.
You would like Bloodywood. They’re an Indian folk metal band that started out doing metal covers of pop and bollywood songs, but now they’re making original music and it’s lefty AF. Their most popular song is called Gaddar, which means Traitor, and it’s about politicians who use religion to stoke hate.
It was good, I just wont find myself listening to it.
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Also one of their tours was called Raj Against The Machine and that’s brilliant
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Become the generation that breaks the camel’s back!
Yes, Mumford & Sons does not a This Bike Is A Pipe Bomb make, or whatever
AHHHHH A WILD THIS BIKE REFERENCE!
I totally forgot about them til scrolling yhrough this post. Mouseteeth is such a banger
it’s kind of a good sign that booj have to pretend to be proles to seem cool, even if in the process they entirely hollow out genres and render them fake.
spoiler
it means they're scareddeleted by creator
The whole hipster subculture was a grotesque imitation of working class americana, is it a coincidence that it emerged shortly after the subprime mortgage crisis? no it isn’t, shopping from goodwill became popular out of necessity and then the aesthetics of thrifting emerged as a response because rich people felt alienated from the moment (the moment being the 2008 financial crisis). the saddest thing are fascists today trying to co-opt hipster aesthetics, a coarse imitation of an imitation that only vaguely retains its working class signifiers. a trend so passé that even having hipsters as the butt of the joke feels completely out-of-touch.
Good post
Like Matt Walsh and that Vice guy
based and material analysis pilled
Death to America
What’s your opinion on folk metal?
A class analysis of the broader metal genre would be really interesting and I don’t think I know enough to answer. I have some hypotheses and hot takes but nothing concrete.
I think metal in general evokes power and importance. Some have interpreted this to mean metal serves to reinforce masculine ideology and hetero norms, which may be true for certain artists. In recent decades though, metal fans have a more even gender split. One could make a contrary argument that metal serves to empower a powerless individual, whether they feel that way due to their class or personal issues like bullying or abuse.
Metal commonly includes themes of fantasy. Is this a form of escapism for an audience that doesn’t want to cope with the material world? Some subgenres focus quite heavily on worldbuilding. I notice that frequently these worlds involve overt evils to fight or evade… is that a reaction to the obscure and abstract exploitation of capitalism? Sometimes these worlds are plainly reminiscent of past times, precapitalist societies with simple social relations. Perhaps these would be the reactionary artists, the ones who want to go back instead of progress forward on a material basis.
I think most novel genres are originally created by and for the working class, but heavy metal has the material constraint that it requires heavily distorted electric guitar, so its history tightly tracks the history of our ability to produce guitar amplifiers, and how affordable they are in various areas of the world at a given time. The bedroom studio revolution is directly responsible for djent among many other subgenres, and the big names in n the first generation of that group are mostly people of color, although their class character is more muddled.
I’d super love someone more knowledgeable about heavy guitar music in the periphery to share some analysis of that.
Fwiw, and I could be wrong about this, I’ve heard the origins of the heavily distorted sound comes from bands having to overvolt smaller amplifiers to try to match the sound of the PA systems some bigger bands were traveling with in the age before a venue could be counted on to have a decent PA system to plug into.
I’ve heard that before. I think there was a long period of experimentation that basically involved breaking amplifiers to see how they sounded as well. Slashing the cones, rubbing dirt on them, etc.
That’s so cool.