Metal produces a veritable cornucopia of well-researched, well-documented mental health benefits: reduced blood pressure, calmer baseline emotions, better adjustment in middle age, and much more.īut where does the misconception of the opposite come from? Where does the belief arise, amongst non-listeners, that metal is a breeding ground for violence, hatred, anger, etc.? Is it simply the sound of high-tempo, double kick-drummed, sometimes growled music? Is it decades-old biases stemming from metal's roots in the countercultural dissatisfaction of punk and "extreme" music in the late 1960s? Is it lyrics such as Cannibal Corpse's "Sawing the neck I am engulfed in fantasy / Chew the esophagus, cannibal delicacy"? Okay, fine, we'll grant you that last one. So what are we to make of metal and its listeners? Is it all about connecting to "primitive" sensations that have driven our species to survive since its earliest days? Is it merely an excuse for some puerile jerks to act like man babies? Anyone who has turned to a favorite song or musician for comfort at a critical juncture in their life should understand the truth. In the same way, the catharsis of music is defined by its transience - it comes and goes, much like glee, or a sunset, or flash-in-the-pan rage. It's lightning in a bottle, like the two-minute climax of a moving film that leaves people crying. It relates the densest complexities and richness of human experience, not its most reduced simplicities. ![]() ![]() Music exists, in part, to express the ineffable, the inscrutable, and the uncapturable by words or other means.
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