Audio heritage is a relatively unexplored area within popular music studies from a technical production perspective. This research raises awareness of the importance and challenges of audio preservation and provides insights into archiving practices of record labels and producers. Based on interviews with German metal music producers, the article examines the conflicting artistic, economic and legal forces in the recording industry that often result in the loss of master tapes and multi-track recordings, thus preventing significant remastering for new consumer media such as high-resolution streaming or remixes valuable to artists and their fans alike. The findings suggest that there is no archiving standard amongst record labels. It is often up to record producers to archive and preserve recorded artefacts, which they do voluntarily and at their own expense, either in the hope of future commercial exploitation or to preserve their work. Whilst established record producers who began in the analogue era seem to be reliable archivists, the modern metal music industry, with its shrinking budgets, semi-professional, digitally home-recorded productions and self-releasing artists, puts the genre’s more recent audio heritage at risk.
{"title":"Keeper of the Seven Keys: Audio heritage in metal music production","authors":"Jan Herbst","doi":"10.1386/mms_00063_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms_00063_1","url":null,"abstract":"Audio heritage is a relatively unexplored area within popular music studies from a technical production perspective. This research raises awareness of the importance and challenges of audio preservation and provides insights into archiving practices of record labels and producers. Based\u0000 on interviews with German metal music producers, the article examines the conflicting artistic, economic and legal forces in the recording industry that often result in the loss of master tapes and multi-track recordings, thus preventing significant remastering for new consumer media such\u0000 as high-resolution streaming or remixes valuable to artists and their fans alike. The findings suggest that there is no archiving standard amongst record labels. It is often up to record producers to archive and preserve recorded artefacts, which they do voluntarily and at their own expense,\u0000 either in the hope of future commercial exploitation or to preserve their work. Whilst established record producers who began in the analogue era seem to be reliable archivists, the modern metal music industry, with its shrinking budgets, semi-professional, digitally home-recorded productions\u0000 and self-releasing artists, puts the genre’s more recent audio heritage at risk.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48017094","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A Blaze in the Northern Sky, Ross Hagen (2020)","authors":"Lewis F. Kennedy","doi":"10.1386/mms_00069_5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms_00069_5","url":null,"abstract":"Review of: A Blaze in the Northern Sky, Ross Hagen (2020)New York and London: Bloomsbury Academic, 152 pp.,ISBN 978-1-5013-5433-5, p/bk, £16.99","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45054250","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Consulting the texts of twentieth-century rhetorician Kenneth Burke, this article maps a particular way that funeral doom metal acts as a tool of social communication. The investigation specifically examines how the music sparks contemplation in its listeners. To better understand this rhetoric, this article highlights the role of nonknowledge, negative space and solemnity to show how this musical rhetoric leads listeners into modes of transcendent thinking. Specifically, this examination gestures to several funeral doom artefacts from early 1990s, including albums from Cathedral, Skepticism and Thergothon. The article concludes by celebrating why ‘mystical’ attitudes can be valuable within social communication ‐ and how funeral doom metal can serve that function.
{"title":"Funeral doom metal as the rhetoric of contemplation: A Burkean perspective","authors":"Gavin F. Hurley","doi":"10.1386/mms_00064_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms_00064_1","url":null,"abstract":"Consulting the texts of twentieth-century rhetorician Kenneth Burke, this article maps a particular way that funeral doom metal acts as a tool of social communication. The investigation specifically examines how the music sparks contemplation in its listeners. To better understand this\u0000 rhetoric, this article highlights the role of nonknowledge, negative space and solemnity to show how this musical rhetoric leads listeners into modes of transcendent thinking. Specifically, this examination gestures to several funeral doom artefacts from early 1990s, including albums from\u0000 Cathedral, Skepticism and Thergothon. The article concludes by celebrating why ‘mystical’ attitudes can be valuable within social communication ‐ and how funeral doom metal can serve that function.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42116189","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Review of: Black Metal, Trauma, Subjectivity and Sound: Screaming the Abyss, Jasmine Hazel Shadrack (2021)Emerald Studies in Metal Music & Culture, Bingley: Emerald AcademicPublishing, 256 pp.,ISBN 978-1-78756-926-3, h/bk, £70
Remaining true to its origins, the survival-horror video game film adaption, Resident Evil: The Original Motion Picture released in 2002, retains its core foundational game-like qualities. The film is heavily influenced by the video game franchise and it appears as if the audience is treated the same as the player. This is because the viewers are forced to ‘participate’ from fixed camera angles. As expected, the music contained within the moving image also borrows well-established compositional techniques from horror films and survival-horror video games. The music, therefore, serves to provide information to the viewers and acts as an auditory trigger. This type of music is defined as ‘process music’; music that appears to imitate a process of actions. An additional function of the music is to create immersion. The most prominent soundtrack cues from the film, visually and musically (‘synchronically’ matched), hint at overarching medical, artificial and mechanical themes. This immersive link is achieved through the use of the related music genres of industrial metal and nü-metal. The resultant combination of industrial/nü-metal sounds with horror imagery can effectively be termed ‘nü-horror metal’. In this article the genre label of ‘nü’ takes preference over ‘industrial’. The focus of this article will, therefore, demonstrate how the aforementioned medical, artificial and mechanical themes are effectively portrayed and heightened by the use of industrial/nü-metal music and techniques. This article will also highlight when the music serves a process function. This will be approached by appealing to traditional film music analytical tools engaging specifically with the traditional film music theory of ‘synchrony’ and ‘asynchrony’.
2002年上映的生存恐怖电子游戏电影《生化危机：原声电影》（Resident Evil：the Original Motion Picture）忠实于其起源，保留了其核心的游戏般的基本品质。这部电影深受电子游戏系列的影响，看起来观众和玩家一样受到了对待。这是因为观众被迫从固定的摄像机角度“参与”。不出所料，运动图像中包含的音乐也借鉴了恐怖电影和生存恐怖电子游戏中成熟的作曲技术。因此，音乐用于向观众提供信息，并充当听觉触发器。这种类型的音乐被定义为“过程音乐”；模仿动作过程的音乐。音乐的另一个功能是创造沉浸感。电影中最突出的配乐线索，在视觉和音乐上（“同步”匹配），暗示了总体的医疗、人工和机械主题。这种身临其境的联系是通过使用工业金属和nü-metal的相关音乐流派来实现的。工业/nü-金属声音与恐怖图像的结合可以有效地称为“nü恐怖金属”。在这篇文章中，“nü”的类型标签优先于“工业”。因此，本文的重点将展示如何通过使用工业/nü-metal音乐和技术来有效地描绘和强化上述医学、人工和机械主题。这篇文章还将重点介绍音乐何时起到处理作用。这将通过吸引传统的电影音乐分析工具来实现，这些工具专门涉及“同步”和“异步”的传统电影音乐理论。
{"title":"Mechanical and artificial ‘nü-horror metal’: The film music of Resident Evil","authors":"D. Gibson","doi":"10.1386/mms_00062_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms_00062_1","url":null,"abstract":"Remaining true to its origins, the survival-horror video game film adaption, Resident Evil: The Original Motion Picture released in 2002, retains its core foundational game-like qualities. The film is heavily influenced by the video game franchise and it appears as if the audience\u0000 is treated the same as the player. This is because the viewers are forced to ‘participate’ from fixed camera angles. As expected, the music contained within the moving image also borrows well-established compositional techniques from horror films and survival-horror video games.\u0000 The music, therefore, serves to provide information to the viewers and acts as an auditory trigger. This type of music is defined as ‘process music’; music that appears to imitate a process of actions. An additional function of the music is to create immersion. The most prominent\u0000 soundtrack cues from the film, visually and musically (‘synchronically’ matched), hint at overarching medical, artificial and mechanical themes. This immersive link is achieved through the use of the related music genres of industrial metal and nü-metal. The resultant combination\u0000 of industrial/nü-metal sounds with horror imagery can effectively be termed ‘nü-horror metal’. In this article the genre label of ‘nü’ takes preference over ‘industrial’. The focus of this article will, therefore, demonstrate how the aforementioned\u0000 medical, artificial and mechanical themes are effectively portrayed and heightened by the use of industrial/nü-metal music and techniques. This article will also highlight when the music serves a process function. This will be approached by appealing to traditional film music analytical\u0000 tools engaging specifically with the traditional film music theory of ‘synchrony’ and ‘asynchrony’.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49438190","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
N. Varas-Díaz, Brian Hickam, Susana González-Martínez, Mario Castañeda, Fernando Galicia Poblet, Alfredo Nieves Molina, Emiliano Scaricaciottoli
The field of metal music and culture studies is rapidly growing throughout the world. Efforts to document its history and development have emerged via publications in academic journals and edited books. Although this historical documentation of the emergence of an area of study is valuable, it has been geographically laden towards the Global North, and written by English-speaking scholars there. In this article, we aim to inform and balance that history-telling process through an exploration of contributions made from Spanish-speaking scholarly epicentres in the Global South. In doing so, we propose and implement a strategy that (1) surpasses the limitations of universalist approaches towards history by including contributions from epicentres of research in both the Global North and the Global South, (2) engages in a self-critical examination of the field of metal music studies, and asks scholars to examine why, and understand how, the disconnections between metal scholars in the Global North and the Global South come into existence and (3) recognizes that knowledge is developed through many mechanisms that bypass academic journals, monographs and traditional modes of academic writing. In order to understand how these three tenants are manifested in the Spanish-speaking world we present examples from Spain, Puerto Rico, Argentina, México, Guatemala and Perú. We recommend that future efforts to document the histories (in plural) of this area of study take into consideration scholarly efforts outside the Global North as a way to decolonize metal studies.
{"title":"Toda la sangre formando un río:1 Contributions to the histories of metal music studies from the Spanish-speaking world","authors":"N. Varas-Díaz, Brian Hickam, Susana González-Martínez, Mario Castañeda, Fernando Galicia Poblet, Alfredo Nieves Molina, Emiliano Scaricaciottoli","doi":"10.1386/mms_00067_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms_00067_1","url":null,"abstract":"The field of metal music and culture studies is rapidly growing throughout the world. Efforts to document its history and development have emerged via publications in academic journals and edited books. Although this historical documentation of the emergence of an area of study is valuable,\u0000 it has been geographically laden towards the Global North, and written by English-speaking scholars there. In this article, we aim to inform and balance that history-telling process through an exploration of contributions made from Spanish-speaking scholarly epicentres in the Global South.\u0000 In doing so, we propose and implement a strategy that (1) surpasses the limitations of universalist approaches towards history by including contributions from epicentres of research in both the Global North and the Global South, (2) engages in a self-critical examination of the field of metal\u0000 music studies, and asks scholars to examine why, and understand how, the disconnections between metal scholars in the Global North and the Global South come into existence and (3) recognizes that knowledge is developed through many mechanisms that bypass academic journals, monographs and traditional\u0000 modes of academic writing. In order to understand how these three tenants are manifested in the Spanish-speaking world we present examples from Spain, Puerto Rico, Argentina, México, Guatemala and Perú. We recommend that future efforts to document the histories (in plural) of\u0000 this area of study take into consideration scholarly efforts outside the Global North as a way to decolonize metal studies.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45889013","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article explores the lyrics of the Estonian folk metal band Metsatöll in relation to collective national and cultural trauma focusing on the following themes: the fight against foreign invaders and overlords, land, nature, wolves, kin and family, as well as ancient beliefs. Cultural trauma can be defined as the collective experience of horrendous and traumatic events that leave marks on a group’s consciousness. This article suggests that Metsatöll’s lyrics are a means of processing cultural trauma that has been caused by years of occupation and oppression, the end of singing nationalism of the 1980s and changing values brought on by the fall of the Soviet Union and the subsequent globalization, capitalism and materialism. This trauma is processed through neo-pagan lyrics and the aesthetics of folk metal. Inspiration for the lyrics can be found in maausk (‘earth faith’), mediaeval chronicles, the national narrative of the great battle, Estonian mythology and folk poetry. Christianity and foreign influences are rejected by resorting to authentically Estonian ancient practices. The lyrics are true to the genre of folk metal in general, and metal music is seen in this study as a fitting vehicle for processing cultural trauma. The study also contains a brief analysis of white masculinity in crisis, as well as a critical discussion on ethno-centric nationalism in a postcolonial context.
{"title":"Cultural trauma in the lyrics of the Estonian folk metal band Metsatöll","authors":"R. Valijärvi","doi":"10.1386/mms_00066_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms_00066_1","url":null,"abstract":"This article explores the lyrics of the Estonian folk metal band Metsatöll in relation to collective national and cultural trauma focusing on the following themes: the fight against foreign invaders and overlords, land, nature, wolves, kin and family, as well as ancient beliefs.\u0000 Cultural trauma can be defined as the collective experience of horrendous and traumatic events that leave marks on a group’s consciousness. This article suggests that Metsatöll’s lyrics are a means of processing cultural trauma that has been caused by years of occupation and\u0000 oppression, the end of singing nationalism of the 1980s and changing values brought on by the fall of the Soviet Union and the subsequent globalization, capitalism and materialism. This trauma is processed through neo-pagan lyrics and the aesthetics of folk metal. Inspiration for the lyrics\u0000 can be found in maausk (‘earth faith’), mediaeval chronicles, the national narrative of the great battle, Estonian mythology and folk poetry. Christianity and foreign influences are rejected by resorting to authentically Estonian ancient practices. The lyrics are true to\u0000 the genre of folk metal in general, and metal music is seen in this study as a fitting vehicle for processing cultural trauma. The study also contains a brief analysis of white masculinity in crisis, as well as a critical discussion on ethno-centric nationalism in a postcolonial context.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47152086","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Gabber is a hardcore electronic dance music genre, typified by extreme speed and overdrive, which developed in the Netherlands, with Rotterdam as its epicentre, during the early 1990s, when house music-inspired dance events dominated. The use of distorted noise and references to popular body horror, such as Hellraiser, dominated its scene, and soon gabber was commented on as ‘the metal of house music’, a statement that this article aims to investigate. Applying a genealogical discographic approach, the research found that the electronic noise music aesthetic of industrial music was crucial for the formation of the sound of gabber. The hardcore electronic dance music that developed from this is at once ironically nihilistic, a contrary critique, and a populist safety valve. The digital machine noise of hardcore seems to offer an immersive means to process the experience of (emasculating) fluidity within post-human accelerated technoculture, itself propelled by rapid digital capital and information technologies.
{"title":"Gabber: Raising hell in technoculture1","authors":"Hillegonda C. Rietveld, Alexei Monroe","doi":"10.1386/MMS_00057_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/MMS_00057_1","url":null,"abstract":"Gabber is a hardcore electronic dance music genre, typified by extreme speed and overdrive, which developed in the Netherlands, with Rotterdam as its epicentre, during the early 1990s, when house music-inspired dance events dominated. The use of distorted noise and references to popular body horror, such as Hellraiser, dominated its scene, and soon gabber was commented on as ‘the metal of house music’, a statement that this article aims to investigate. Applying a genealogical discographic approach, the research found that the electronic noise music aesthetic of industrial music was crucial for the formation of the sound of gabber. The hardcore electronic dance music that developed from this is at once ironically nihilistic, a contrary critique, and a populist safety valve. The digital machine noise of hardcore seems to offer an immersive means to process the experience of (emasculating) fluidity within post-human accelerated technoculture, itself propelled by rapid digital capital and information technologies.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45191983","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Contemporary music technology affords limitless potential and has changed the way record producers need to work with metal music, often employing a far more fragmented approach. This article explores technology’s influence on producing metal records through the lived experiences of seven renowned metal music producers, and it is argued that what can be perceived as traditional production processes are production processes that favour capturing performances, embracing the potential of technology. In contrast, the construction of recorded performances through anticipated uses of technology often embodies innovative production methodologies. There are tensions caused by the anticipated use of technology and the participants highlight that commercial and artistic pressures have informed prescriptive and homogenous production methodologies under the guise of innovation.
{"title":"Innovation and tradition in metal music production","authors":"Niall Thomas","doi":"10.1386/mms_00058_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms_00058_1","url":null,"abstract":"Contemporary music technology affords limitless potential and has changed the way record producers need to work with metal music, often employing a far more fragmented approach. This article explores technology’s influence on producing metal records through the lived experiences of seven renowned metal music producers, and it is argued that what can be perceived as traditional production processes are production processes that favour capturing performances, embracing the potential of technology. In contrast, the construction of recorded performances through anticipated uses of technology often embodies innovative production methodologies. There are tensions caused by the anticipated use of technology and the participants highlight that commercial and artistic pressures have informed prescriptive and homogenous production methodologies under the guise of innovation.","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42998855","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Metal music studies at the intersection of theory and practice","authors":"Jan Herbst, K. Spracklen","doi":"10.1386/mms_00054_2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/mms_00054_2","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":36868,"journal":{"name":"Metal Music Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46283329","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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