Metal shirts

Well, I have managed to drag myself away from GTA IV for long enough to write something before the lecture tomorrow, so fueled with tea, toast and scotch, I bring to you my musings on heavy metal and fashion!

As everyone that knows me is aware, I have a humorously large collection of metal band shirts that I have been wearing for many years now at the exclusion of any other sort of apparel. Over those years, innumerable random people in bars, on the street, at university and various other locations have either expressed encouragement at my open support of a band, or shouted something hurtful about my choice in music taste or hair length.

Just the other day as I strolled down queen street mall, resplendent in my Manowar shirt, a rather alarmingly drunk man in a flannel shirt and jeans sang the first few lines of Kings of Metal at me embarrassingly loudly. Just prior to that, I'd looked at the collection of kids in Slipknot shirts loitering around the Hungry Jacks and thought undignified thoughts about the quality of their taste in metal. Similarly, in the religion elective I'm taking this semester, the Christian youth group guys that seem to make up almost all of my class look at me like I'm a some sort of satanist, with the blood of a goat still on my hands. As such, at the risk of sounding all "nobody understands us because we're different and special", in three entirely different situations, the way in which us metalheads dress has caused immediate assumptions and value judgments to be made by people, who otherwise know nothing about us.

I guess in that sense, especially in the case with the Slipknot fans, metal subculture is fairly obvious filled with ideas of authenticity and of metalheads looking the part. Not only do band members attempt to outdo each other's true metalness, (I'm looking at you Fenriz and Ghaal), us fans also attempt to out perform each other in demonstrating our knowledge and devotion to metal. That's not to say we all sit around arguing about who has the longest hair or the blackest shirts, but there is definitely an element of it. At the same time, as with the Manowar drunk guy, metal clothing also implies a sort of community and bond in which savagely intoxicated strangers can feel comfortable shouting poorly rhyming lyrics at people they don't know. It almost makes me warm and fuzzy just thinking about it.

What I think I'm getting at is that the ubiquitous metal band shirts that almost every fan of the genre owns perform a triple function. They signal to other fans that a common ground can easily be established and provide a base for social interaction, they imply certain things about the wearer to people who aren't fans of metal but may have an opinion on it, and they also signal to what particular subset of metalheads the wearer belongs - a Marduk shirt is a far cry from a Soilwork hoodie.

Finally, to answer a question from last time, THIS is power metal, played by quite clearly the best power metal band ever. Blind Guardian! Be amazed and awed by the silly German dudes singing about the Silmarillion.

Introduction

Hey guys, this is Alex Stevenson, I'm now in the 4th year of my arts degree (I'm lazy and do lots of electives, shine on you crazy diamond), majoring in english and history/ancient history.

Given my hair style and batman-esque wardrobe of metal band shirts, I'd really be cheating myself if I did anything other than metal for this, but to make it a bit more exciting I'm going to try and focus on black metal and power metal.

I've been into metal for years, so this as a piece of assessment is a dream come true for me...It's not often I get to talk at length about it to people who care, even if it is only to mark me :)

Stay true!