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Rocking for the lord.

Let’s play a game, what do Rackets and Drapes, Barren Cross, and HB have in common? Try to guess without using Google.

Having trouble? Here are a few of their songs: ‘Baby Killer,’ ‘Dying Day,’ ‘Minä Olen.’

Have you found the answer yet? If you’ve guessed that these are all christian metal bands, congratulations on your astuteness (or your ability to read the title). However, while your guess would be technically correct, it would also be incomplete. All these bands are indeed christian metal bands, but more specifically they are metal bands created as a christian alternative to the more mainstream secular bands they imitate. They are, in fact, often mentioned in online lists offering a christian alternative to mainstream (read heathen) metal bands, such lists beginning to appear around the 80′s, during the satanic panic. Incidentally, that's also when many of these christian rock bands started to appear, as a direct answer to what many outraged parents and preachers saw as a sinful display of moral decay in an egregious attempt to corrupt the youth - or something like that.

I’ve listened to each of the three bands mentioned at the beginning of the post before writing this article, and even I had to admit that these guys were actually pretty good. I’ll even admit that, were it not for the very, very preachy lyrics, I wouldn’t mind listening to them. Barren Cross in particular is a rather decent heavy metal band. However, something ticked me off when I started listening to the second song from Racket’s and Drapes’ album Candyland, ‘Ball and Chain.’ I knew those chords, that beat, that song... That’s Manson’s ‘Beautiful People.’ They didn’t just imitate the band’s visual and musical aesthetics - which would still be reproachable, but at least would be okay if they created something original to go along with it - they straight up plagiarized one of their songs.

I understand how offering a religious alternative to regular band may seem innocuous, but allowing parents to limit their children’s musical library can have truly harmful effects on their children and, consequently, on society at large. Young people need to be faced with views, beliefs and experiences different than their own, different than the ones they are faced with in their everyday lives. Even though critical-thinking should be a skill naturally acquired during their education, the American education system allows for vast discrepancies in school curriculum between states. Music is one of the ways children and teenagers can be exposed to dissenting opinions, and as such can be a way for them to expand their horizons, perhaps even to doubt the parental and religious authorities they have been taught to never doubt nor question, as is often the case in highly religious households. Furthermore, by restraining their options in musical influence, the children may be deprived of the chance to be introduced to subjects they may never learn about in a overly religious environment, such as mental illness and homosexuality which remain somewhat taboo in many religious communities of the U.S. Knowing that they are not alone in the way they feel is often comforting and liberating for young people, and music - and media in general - may even be a way for them to find and reach out to people with similar issues, or going through the same ordeal.

Religion relies on children being indoctrinated from the earliest age, and maintaining control on what they can listen to, on what opinions they can be exposed to, is not only harmful to children, but also deepens the national divide by further isolating them, forcing them to remain in increasingly sectarian communities whose ideologies and values may become incompatible with the rest of the world.

On that joyful note, I wish you all an excellent week-end.        ~ Cheers!

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Grieving music

Back when I was a teenager, I started reading Something Positive, a webcomic by R.K. Milholland. It’s a nice slice-of-life story about Davan and his friends living in Boston, somewhat miserable young adults trying their best to live in a miserable world. During a flashback to Davan’s teenage years, a conversation between him and Scotty - a friend of his that, by the time the comic started, would end up killing himself - struck me. In the flashback, Davan informs Scotty that Kurt Cobain, the singer of Nirvana, had shot himself, and Scotty gets depressed as a result. The reason it struck was that, even though I’d been listening to Nirvana for a few years by then, I didn’t know that the singer was dead. I felt somewhat saddened by the news, but I was not so attached to the band as to feel as distraught as Scotty seemed to be. I could have cared less, but I also could have cared more, and - like Davan - I did not get why Scotty was so upset.

In 2017, I learned that the lead singer of another one of the rock bands that marked my early teens had committed suicide. That one hit me a lot harder. Linkin Park was one of my earliest musical influences. I was introduced to it by a friend in junior high, it was how we connected when I didn’t know anybody there. Later on, I would find myself in the lyrics. There’s a reason there are so many music videos using Linkin Park’s music, it resonated with something that affected a lot of teens in the early 2000′.

On the morning following the singer’s death, I felt what Scotty felt. Turns out he wasn’t grieving the death of someone he’d never met and didn’t know personally. He was grieving himself. Silly as it may sound, considering the records still exist, it’s a bit like learning that an estranged childhood friend has died. You didn’t talk anymore, and you weren’t really gonna reconnect with them, yet, when you think back to the times you spent together, it hurts. In a way, the memories aren’t the same anymore. Time caught on. And even though you can still listen to the songs, even though you can still think back to the times you spent with you friend, it won’t be the same either.

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Up above and down bellow

A few of us have already talked a fair bit about separating the work from the artist during the past few months, but what about separating the lyrics from an otherwise enjoyable song?

Two of my favorite bands are Avenged Sevenfold and Hollywood Undead. They don’t have much in common, A7X being a metal band while Hollywood Undead are closer to rap rock, but one thing they do have in common is that, in spite of being associated with musical genres and themes typically antagonistic towards religion, a few of their best songs do mention either god or heaven, or bear a religious undertone, in spite of being usually followed or preceded in the album by songs with rather suggestive or violent themes. A good example of this can be found in A7X’s eponymous album in which the songs ‘Dear God’ and ‘Brompton Cocktail’ share the spotlight with ‘Scream,’ a song about lustful murder, and ‘A Little Piece of Heaven,’ which is actually about a man murdering his girlfriend, keeping the corpse moist for... personal use(s), and about said girlfriend coming back from the dead and exacting revenge on said boyfriend and sending him to hell. They end up getting married. The same thing happens in Hollywood Undead’s Day of the Dead on which you can listen to ‘I’ll Be There,’ loaded with religious themes, along with the lone drinker’s anthem ‘Party by Myself.’

I’ll be honest, this is more of a pet peeve of mine than an actual issue within the music industry. I do tend to get ticked off by religion, that’s why I enjoy the irreverence and profanity of metal so much. At the same time, I’m not sure how to reconcile these seemingly antithetical themes coexisting within the same albums, and being written by the same artists. Don’t get me wrong, I love those songs, all of them. ‘Brompton Cocktail’ is one of my top ten favorites A7X songs  and I enjoy singing it. Yet, I still can’t help but feel somewhat annoyed during the third verse which speaks of absolution and the afterlife... in a song about assisted suicide! Which is currently being viciously lobbied against in the U.S. by religious organizations! Again, religion really rubs me the wrong way. I know it’s not religious propaganda like some artists do, and these are definitely not religious bands, so I don’t get it. I just don’t get it.

Oh, well... Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’mma make myself a cocktail of my own. With nothing but rum in it.        ~ Cheers!

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The Correlation Between the Alternative Music Scene and Suicidal Risks.

Happy Spooktober everyone!

Halloween’s not just about fear, it’s also about fun, so let’s start with a joke:

‘An Emo goes to the library and asks if they have any books on suicide. The librarian replies “Well, we used to, but you guys never bring them back!”’

As I’m sure you’ve guessed from the title and the joke, today we will be talking about suicide in alternative subcultures (i.e. metalheads, goths, emos, etc.)  As I said in previous posts, my project is on the satanic panic, and one of the reasons parents were a little bit on the edge back in the 1980s was the rise in suicide rates among adolescents. Heavy metal was obviously blamed, and Ozzy Osbourne was even taken to court in 1984 after 19 year old John Daniel McCollum killed himself while listening to Ozzy Osbourne song ‘Suicide Solution,’ a song Osbourne claimed was about the struggles of alcoholism.

Moral guardians are always quick to accuse anything they do not like or understand (read: anything that developed after they hit their 30s) of the worst offenses, and I understand why grieving parents would be grasping for any possible explanation for the loss of their child. Are they right though? Is heavy metal responsible for adolescent suicide? The simple answer is no, heavy metal is not responsible for kids killing themselves.

The more complex answer is “Well, it’s complicated...”

Now, let’s make this clear, there is absolutely no evidence that heavy metal is responsible for higher suicide rates in adolescents and young adults. However, if you paid any attention to the title, you will note that I used the word ‘correlation,’ and that’s where things get complicated, because several studies have indeed found that young people who listened to heavy metal (or similar music genres) were at a higher risk of committing suicide, suicidal ideation and self-destructive behavior.

A 2018 review of 12 English-Language papers published in the British Journal Of Clinical Psychology found that several of these papers showed that there was indeed a positive association between suicidal behavior and young people who self-identified as being part of an alternative subculture such as goth, emo, punk, etc. Similar results were found on the relationship between self-harming tendencies and alternative subcultures. However, none of the studies found conclusive evidence that there is a causal relationship between listening to alternative music such as heavy metal and suicide/self-injury. In fact, it is important to note that several of the studies reviewed in the paper found that “participants who identified with alternative subcultures (through self-identification or music preference) also had experiences of adversity, including bullying or victimization, difficult family relationships, and prior emotional and/or behaviour difficulties.” Furthermore, the review also noted that teenagers that were part of these subcultures may suffer from victimization because of their association with these specific subcultures. It is important to note however, that these studies were mainly conducted in western countries (Australia, Canada, Germany, United Kingdom, United States) and that the only two conducted in non-western countries were qualitative studies which relied almost exclusively on internet forums and were found to be of somewhat questionable reliability, as was noted in the review. That fact is especially important as one of the papers (Lacourse et al, 2001) reviewed, a study conducted in a high school in Quebec, noted that schools with lower percentages of immigrants tended to have higher suicidal rates than those with a higher immigrant population. That specific study also found that girls who listened to HM were more likely to express felling of alienation and anomie, and presented a higher suicide risk than their same-sex peers compared to boys who listened to HM, adding that “one possible explanation for these results is that it may be more socially acceptable for boys to listen to HM music and to be attracted to its morbid and aggressive symbolism than it is for girls.”

I think it is important to repeat that none of these studies claimed, or even implied, that metal, or musical preference in general, may be in any ways responsible for a young person’s suicide. What they did find, however, was that there is a correlation between listening to alternative musical genres and suicide risks/self destructive behavior in young people. From that we can conclude that if, instead of stigmatizing heavy metal listeners during moral panics, parents had made the effort to talk to their kids, asked them about their problems, showed them understanding and support, and if the adults around them had stopped that stigmatization instead of fostering it, then perhaps heavy metal could have been used as a way to help these kids, to connect with them, instead of an added problem they had to handle alone.

I’ll end this post with the same quote that I started my first post with:

“- If you were to talk directly to the kids at Columbine and the people in that community, what would you say to them if they were here right now? - I wouldn’t say a single word to them, I would listen to what they have to say and that’s what no one did.”         Marylin Manson answering to Michael Moore in Bowling for Columbine (2002)

Have a nice holiday, and a happy Halloween.

Edit: Links to the sources used below.

Hughes, MA, Knowles, SF, Dhingra, K, Nicholson, HL & Taylor, P 2018, 'This Corrosion: A systematic Review of the Association between Alternative Subcultures and the Risk of Self-Harm and Suicide', British Journal of Clinical Psychology, vol. 57, pp. 491-513. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjc.12179 https://www.research.manchester.ac.uk/portal/en/publications/this-corrosion-a-systematic-review-of-the-association-between-alternative-subcultures-and-the-risk-of-selfharm-and-suicide(8f25577b-9258-4e2a-bdac-0faf3c50baf3).html

https://www.blabbermouth.net/news/young-heavy-metal-fans-are-at-increased-risk-of-suicide-self-harm-study-finds/

https://www.suicideinfo.ca/resource/musicandsuicide/

Lacourse, E., et al. (2001). Heavy metal music and adolescent suicide risk. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 30(3), 321-332.

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Lyrical Dissonance

Trigger Warning: Don’t listen to the song if suicide’s a sensible topic for you.

I’m sure we’ve all been there: you’re listening to a happy tune, the kind of song that’s so cheerful it just makes you wanna dance in the middle of the street. Then you hear it. It may just have been a word that caught your attention, or you may have just had a feeling something wasn’t right while attempting to sing along, but you just realized that those lyrics you weren’t really paying attention to are actually kinda grim. Like “Did he just say he’s about to jump off a roof” grim.

I love this trope in music, combining an upbeat tune to horrific or depressing lyrics in order to create a comedic effect. It’s pretty much the musical equivalent of gallows humor. The trope is actually quite popular among comedians. Bo Burnham’s song “Kill yourself” and “Sad” come to mind. Of course, the opposite is also possible, accompanying silly, lighthearted lyrics with a grave, solemn instrumental background.

Lyrical dissonance is, of course, more frequently used within the rock, metal and emo genres, since the audience they tend to appeal to are more likely to appreciate that kind of dark, cynical sense of humor. That being said, the trope is present across all musical genres. even classical opera.

TV Tropes actually has a list of songs with lyrical dissonance, which you can find below.

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LyricalDissonance

I love black comedy, and I think it combines two of the best ways to connect with people, comedy and music.

So come on, sing it with me!

“I wish that I could fly, way up in the sky, like a bird so high, oh I might just try, I might just try.”

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The Satanic Panic

Happy Spooktober everyone!

The season of the witch continues my friends, and I have elected to do this week's article on the subject of the Satanic Panic that plagued the United States during the 1980's and 90's.

All hail our lord Baphomet!!!

I am of course going to focus on the musical aspect of the satanic panic but make no mistake, music was by no means the only scapegoat the religious zealots of the times found guilty of corrupting the youths. Any sign of generational independence, any evidence of imagination or critical thinking, such as Dungeons and Dragons and the emergence of video games, were portrayed by religious fundamentalists as oozing with the devil's temptation.

Let's begin with some context: The year is 1980 and a Catholic "psychiatrist" by the name of Lawrence Pazder publishes the book Michelle Remembers, and parents throughout America go wild. It goes without saying that no single event can be entirely blamed for the Satanic Panic, considering that numerous factors were necessary for the moral panic to erupt, but Michelle Remembers was definitely the catalyst that ignited the powder keg.

I have chosen the Satanic Panic as my theme for the project, and I will thus cover the subject more extensively in the project itself. However, this blog is focused on popular music. As such, I will end this article with a quick overview of the PMRC’s campaign against artistic freedom and freedom of expression in the name of 'good morals.’

Founded in 1985 by the wives of prominent members of the D.C. political landscape, the Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC) was an American lobbying group formed following Tipper Gore’s (Al Gore’s wife and one of the founding members) outrage after listening to Prince’s ‘Darling Nikki’ with her 11-year-old daughter. According to her, both her and her daughter were embarrassed by the lyrics, and Ms. Gore quickly went from shocked to outraged.

Shortly after its formation, the PMRC compiled the Filthy Fifteen, a list of 15 songs which the committee judged to be the most offensive. ‘Darling Nikki' was, of course, at the head of the list, followed by Sheena Easton’s ‘Sugar Walls’, published the same year. Of course, both songs were about masturbation, or more precisely female masturbation, because what else could warrant such vitriol from religious parents than a young woman's sexuality and bodily autonomy. How dreadful. Sexuality, however, was not the only target; lyrics mentioning the occult, violence and drug and alcohol abuse were also present on the list, but sex remained the main point of objection the PMRC found with the songs it nominated to the Morally Abhorrent Awards. As such, heavy metal bands were also highly targeted.

On September 19th 1985, a Senate hearing took place during which three musicians - Dee Snider, Frank Zappa and John Denver - defended themselves against the PMRC’s accusations that their music were corrupting young people and driving them to depravity, and to argue against the addition of a "Parental Guidance: Explicit Lyrics" label on albums deemed unsuitable for young listeners. Of note is the fact that among the Senate committee appointed to hear the three singers sat no other than the then-senator Al Gore, the husband of one of the heads of the PMRC. Conflict of interest, anyone?

Their pleas fell on mostly-deaf ears however, and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) agreed to stick a “Parental Advisory” label on albums they deemed inappropriate, thus granting publishing companies even more power over musicians. The label also ended up being a lot less specific as to what was deemed inappropriate than was originally intended by Tipper Gore, but some stores still ended up restricting or outright refusing to sell records bearing the PMRC’s Stamp of Disapproval.

I have made little effort in hiding how absurd I find the whole debacle to be. The entire debate was nothing more than a thinly-veiled attempt by religious fundamentalists to censor those who dared upset their fragile sensibilities and impose their subjective morals upon others. And in their success they trampled the First Amendment which guarantees the separation of church and state. But what’s new? Still, the ending to this story is not as grim as it seems. After all, though successful in getting their label stuck on music albums, no evidence was found that they succeeded in affecting music sales, nor was it ever proven that profane music caused kids to fall into depravity. Hell, heavy metal sales actually increased following the application of the label. and I’ll admit I learned pretty quickly as a teen that any album bearing that “Parental Advisory” black mark would be a blast to listen to.

Perhaps I should thank the PMRC... Naaaah!

That’s all for tonight, have a nice weekend... and don’t let the dead bite.

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Baby, It’s Cold Outside

Happy Spooktober everyone! Let’s talk about Christmas.

I love Christmas songs. I mean, I love everything about Christmas - except the frigid cold, of course - but I especially like the songs. "All I Want for Christmas is You," "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas," "Let It Snow," "Jingle Bells Rock" and ... "Baby It's Cold Outside."

I know the song's controversial, and I get why. The lyrics are awkward, especially today, 75 years after it was written. We live in a completely different era from when the song was first performed, an era with completely different values, and I'll admit that some of the lines in "Baby It's Cold Outside," along with the behavior of the typically male "wolf" - the character attempting to get the usually female "mouse" to stay with him - do not fit well with today's culture, when consent has become such a sensible issue.

The song wasn't really written with such an issue in mind, since it was initially performed in 1944 by the writer, Frank Loesser, and his wife at their  housewarming party as guest were getting ready to leave. A playful, cheeky duet between two people already in love. My favorite cover of the song is the duet between Idina Menzel and Michael Bublé for the album Holiday Wishes and the performance is, I think, one of the best ways to portray the song, with both characters sharing an obvious interest in each other, the mouse's excuses to leave only part of unspoken game between the two.

Some covers of the song have actually made use of role-reversal for comedic effect, such as in Neptune's Daughter, the first movie to use the song, the "wolf" is portrayed by Betty Garrett and the "mouse" is played by Red Skelton. Though, I'll admit it is one of those less savory rendering which really fail to care for consent. Don't get me wrong, Betty Garrett's singing is great, she's energetic and it's a fun scene to watch, but Red's character is definitely portrayed as not wanting to be there. Again, another era...

I think that, for this kind of controversial song, the way it is performed is key to fixing the uncomfortableness of the song. Ultimately, the tone and the chemistry between the two singers are what will decide whether the scene is suited for a romantic comedy or a psychological thriller.

I'll still listen to Menzel and Bublé's version of "Baby It's Cold Outside." And I'll still whistle the song when I'm walking outside in the frigid cold of Strasbourg's winter. Mostly because the song's a damn earworm, but also because it cheers me up and warms my heart. And baby, it's cold outside.

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"- If you were to talk directly to the kids at Columbine and the people in that community, what would you say to them if they were here right now? - I wouldn't say a single word to them, I would listen to what they have to say and that's what no one did."         Marylin Manson answering to Michael Moore in Bowling for Columbine (2002) Marylin Manson was one of the first musicians that made my adolescent self into a bona fide music listener. The band - and the singer - defined me as a teen, as a teenage metal listener (must I say consumer,) yet I came rather late in Manson's musical stages, at least as compared to what some may call the Mansonian purists.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kQMDSw3Aqo

The first time I listened to Marylin Manson was when I borrowed The Golden Age of Grotesque from the local media library at the behest of my friend Fabien. This is the New Sh*t is one of the first Marylin Manson songs I heard.

I could not, and will never be able to, thank Fabien enough for what would end up being my introduction to existential nihilism and a mostly pessimistic philosophy when it comes to the future of the human species.

Most would name one of Manson’s first albums as their introduction - and favorite album - to his work, but I would never recoil in shame at the mention of what some may consider the beginnings of his fall from grace. Though I love Antichrist Superstar (1996), Mechanical Animal (1998), and Holy Wood (2000), The Golden Age of Grotesque, released in 2003, will always hold a special place in my heart.

Indeed, it is The Golden Age of Grotesque that made me love Marylin Manson, it’s his introduction to the dark side of fame and celebrity, the “Crap, I’ve reached the top, now what?”  GAoG came out in 2003, barely a year after Manson’s first interview following the Columbine High School massacre which he was predominantly - and unjustly - blamed for, and his words resonated in the hearts of a young generation which felt mostly ignored by its predecessors. It sure as hell resonated within me, especially later in my teens when one of the only ways to distinguish myself from my peers was through music... and I will not go into the other ways I found to make myself stand out from the crowd.