I know what you are thinking - "LOLZ but Jared, you are the biggest metal to evar metal! What gives! LOL?" Well it's true, and it maybe more than a little hypocritical, but to be fair, without hypocrisy, this blog would be even less useless and certainly less entertaining. I suppose I should clarify - I hate metal scenesters, which is still basically 98% of people who identify as metalheads. I can prove this by breaking them down into a few totally contrived but eerily accurate archetypes, thus:
The Show Whore - This guy, or gal (ha!) is the biggest fan of the next touring act to come though town. Literally as soon as dates are announced in a sports venue or crack den bar near you, they are telling you all about this band's back catalog, and linking you to Youtube videos of all their seminal achievements in musicdom, and probably some interviews too. Their dedication to being the know-it-all of the now makes their unswerving and timely allegiance almost believable; that is if I hadn't myself skimmed through many a wikipedia article in under a minute looking for that golden tidbit of information meant to be the verbal equivalent of a baseball game to some pseudo-intellectual's pointless and utterly erroneous jerk-off session of self-assured conjecture. That is to say these guys are better data miners than the love child of Mark Zuckerberg, google, and any 10 professional Chinese national spam artists you can name.
They will be at EVERY metal show - and it will always be one of the best shows they've seen - note that shows in the suburbs are the exception because no scenester can be bothered to spend 15 minutes in rapid transit just to listen to MUSIC -. And if you thought they wouldn't stop telling YOU about the band of the minute, heaven help you if you are in the band and you dare to mingle with the crowd afterwards.
The Fashionista - Fucks, this guys is so metal. Just looks at all the spikes he has. Looks at alls the patches he's wearings. Looks hows longs his hairs is. Looks how manys powder-free bullets he has arounds his waist. Looks ats how manys tattoos he has. LOOK! NO, DON'T FUCKIN TALK TO ME! There's a pretty decent chance this guy is in a band. There's an even better chance that he's the bass player. Has a closet full of Iron Maiden shirts. Can't name his favorite Maiden album.
The Musician - Does he listen to x band? Sure, they just love to play in D minor, but they move to the 4th interval for the bridge every time. If you approach him in the smoke pit or between sets, he's more likely to talk about Jaco Pastorius or Eric Johnson than a metal act. Sure, they'll talk about metal, just don't expect to hold their attention talking about any band that doesn't use musical palindromes, multiple time signatures in every movement, or a cleverly concealed homages to Miles Davis in between a technically brilliant but aesthetically unlistenable singers pretentious ramblings about string theory. Is in a band nobody listens to, and if he's not from Quebec, he wishes he was.
The Alcoholic - Aka the Metal Party Person - doesn't give a fuck who's playing or who's showing up as long as there's beer. And whiskey. And Fuckin Jagerbombs. They will be well into alcoholic catatonia and walking around as if their left leg was six inches shorter than their right. They will have purchased two drinks and hit on your girlfriend twice in the time it takes you to get one beer from the bar. They are a spinning vortex of alcohol and drugs, which is to say either are inexorably and rapidly drawn into them, never to be seen again save through the shameful yet entertaining actions of said vortex. The idea that they will remember what band they are watching in a weeks time is something of a joke, the thought that they know any of their songs by name is completely Fucking laughable. Is likely to be in a band, as this archetype provides 90% of all drummers.
The Jock - Has 3 metal albums, and they are by Drowning Pool and Avenged Sevenfold. If a portion of every dollar they spend on clothes doesn't go to pay for endorsment deals for Brock Lesnar or Georges St Pierre, then the Queen of England wears a Hello Kitty thong. They go to metal shows for one reason - to try and dominate the mosh pit. In one of fate's more humorous and lubricated ironies, they seem to think they will have no problem throwing around a few greasy metalheads, even though the bitter and clammy truth is that in their own utter cluelessness when it comes to 'slam dancing' causes them them to remove their shirts in a regretteably peacockish display, the render themselves the bipedal equivalent of a 200 pound egg yolk covered in bacon grease kept in slightly warmer than room temperature environs. That is to say they become a large sweat soaked nuisance that can't help being a nuisance to everyone within 10 meters of the stage (4 at a bar). People avoid them, they plow right through any cluster of people in their way, but not for the reasons they like to think. If you had ten of these orangutans, strapped them to a turbine in a circular formation and threw them in to a mosh pit, BAM, Fuckin perpetual motion, I just provided the world with unlimited energy. You're welcome.
These people, however, are never welcome. Never.
I think there's more, I just don't give a Fuck right now
