An Ode to Metal Heads

I love metal heads.

They have to be the most endearing bunch of fans and music makers you could ever come across. Even metal God’s such as Metallica are sweet puddings underneath all those leather vests and whisky sweats. Take their “Some Kind of Monster” documentary of last year. Instead of the boozing, blaspheming, groupie banging fest of nastiness you’d expect of a band with such delightful song titles as “Ain’t My Bitch”, “Die, Die My Darling” and “Am I Evil?”, you get four be-jumpered dads going through therapy because they can’t do anything without a row.

I love that metal-heads are generally lumbering social misfits who have side-stepped their lack of rhythm by inventing a whole new way of getting down to the groove by simply nodding their heads up and down.

I love that regardless of quality or quantity, if they’re under forty the hair is long, long, long. And that post forty it’s the mullet/goatee combo a’la Jon Bon Jovi/James Hetfield all the way.

I love that they wear rings that are large skull heads. I love that they wear leather jackets – even in August – and that under the jacket is a t-shirt with the arms ripped off so you can see all of the armpit hair and some of the torso. I love that they are able to fix my computer when it breaks and neither of us will mention the fact that he’s wearing black nail varnish on his little finger.

I love that metal isn’t just metal. You have death metal, doom metal, grind core and, my personal favourite, hair metal.

That the big guns get away with names like Megadeth, Mr Big and Dangerous Toys. That local metal heads make local metal bands and call them Embalmed Alive, Bird Flesh and Bathtub Shitter. And that these doting dads and studious students write songs about committing mass murder and drinking too much and eating someone’s heart for breakfast. That they don’t sing, they roar like angry lions. That they know four chords each but can play a twenty minute guitar solo that will blow your mind.

And I love that metal heads are like one big family who, when they see a fellow metaler they will exchange a cow horn of recognition. I mean, come on.

Metal heads are the most perfect example of the best type of music fan – they are loyal, they are committed and they are passionate. When was the last time you saw a 50 year old man cry when five other men, clad in too little ran onto a stage screaming that they were going to fuck your sister when she was dead?

Long live metal heads, may you reign in satanic glory forever.