Week Nine: Politics & Identity

Sam Sunn’s documentary on global metal was both entertaining and educational regarding the different themes and beliefs of musicians from different countries and cultures. I think one of the moth commonly disregarded things about metal is the fact that it spreads worldwide and is present in culture far different from our own. While many of the people in Dunn’s film explained metal as a Western form of music, we can see that it has permeated other countries efficiently and has become the identity of countries including Brazil and Norway.

In the case of Norwegian black metal, Dunn emphasized the anti-Christian backgrounds that composes much of extreme metal, according to Kahn-Harris. As we discussed in class, I think the church as a whole is an easy target for various forms of extreme metal to oppose because it has historically been a very demanding and oppressing institution that tells its people what to believe, and in a culture that valorizes individualism, religion becomes virtually invisible. Other scenes, including Swedish extreme metal and black metal in particular shares with other Scandinavian forms of extreme metal a tendency to draw on notions of Viking heritage (p. 106). This restoration to past generations, particularly that of the vikings, is an interesting route when it comes to producing metal music. While these bands emphasize their commitment to their Viking heritage, it’s somewhat unprecedented to our Western eyes to see metal embrace something about oneself rather than abolish everything that has been created before. Another way of looking at this is that these artists are going back to basics and embracing the things their ancestors believed to be important, including becoming the best person you could be individually. This is something that we see, however, throughout foreign cultures and their own metal music. In order to create their own form of metal that deviated from the model of Western music and what we’re used to hearing in the United States, these globally spread music artists incorporate their own personal experiences, histories, and traditions in order to create their own personal musical experience when it comes to metal.