Week Three: Embryonic Heavy Metal

Since the focus of this week reading surrounded the presence of youth in the metal movement through artists such as The Runaways and The Dictators, I found one quote interesting in Waksman’s argument regarding the presence of youth in the music industry. “It is the moment, in others works, when commerce triumphs over creativity, as the record industry figured out how to appropriate the youthful appeal of the music while excluding those elements that made it a threat to the social order” (p. 111).

First, this argument is intriguing to me in that Waksman states there is no creativity present in the youthful production of metal and punk, which is staunchly incorrect in my opinion due to the fact that The Runaways, for instance, were a group of young girls who all played their instruments and wrote their own lyrics. I believe Waksman himself acknowledges that the lyricist of The Runaways was just 13-years-old when they wrote their first hit song. It’s also a contradicting statement in that both of these artists are seen are trend-setters and revolutionary for the time period. While the producer of The Runaways was searching for an all-female rock group to be overly sexualized, I think it says something about the culture within which these girls lived due to the fact that these girls previously had interests in being rockstars and playing instruments before being introduced to The Runaways and the commercial music industry.

I also believe this was one of the remarkable turns of the music industry from the creative, “for the music” lifestyles, as Waksman explains, to the commercial, all-for profit, less talented rock, pop and rap industry that we see today. This strategy and method have crossed over genres from rock and have reached pop and rap artists whose main role is to entertain audiences and make money. Instead of creating intellectual, thoughtful pieces of work, music is about merchandising, ticket/record sales and who can be the biggest star. I’m not saying that sexualizing young girls and creating a platform for the commercialization of youth through metal was the only turning point in the music industry, however. Clearly arena rock and theatricality play a huge role, as well as the emergence of a focus on recording rather than performances (i.e. The Beatles’ Sgt. Peppers) and the sexualization of young girls to draw in audiences who might not otherwise be interested in a bunch of teenage girls singing about the melodramas.