"It's just a fad you're going through" ......

mc666 wrote:

I had very long hair for quite a while, but not because it was some sort of "metal fashion".

That's similar to me. I didn't grow my hair long because of a metal fashion but rather because I was out of school and no longer had to keep to it short. I wasn't the only one of my classmates to do so.

I kept my hair long through most of university, but eventually got tired of the effort required to look after it and cut it short. It probably wasn't a bad decision to do so before I started looking for a job, but I don't think that was a major consideration at the time.

These days I keep it quite short as I'm starting to thin, so even if I was in a situation where I could grow it long, I don't know how good it would look.

sovdat wrote:

Just curious: how many of you 80s metalheads still maintain the "metal look" today? I.e. long hair etc.

Considering I was born in '83, I think I'm only an "80s metalhead" in the most literal sense... Well, still waiting on that plate in my skull, but we'll assume I have an honorary lump of lead where my brain should be some days.

I wore my hair long as a kid because my Dad had his grown out when I was younger and I just gravitated to the look as a "cool" thing to do. For me, it was much more in that 70s hard rock school of the bearded long-haired guy. I still find it weird that half of those rockers now look like retired real-estate salesmen... I'm looking at YOU, Buck Dharma...

I've sort of waffled with it back and forth, but at 31, it's kind of gotten to the point where I either have to crap or get off the pot with it. I've opted to grow mine out again more or less so I can have the look until (because I consider it a "when," not an "if") my hair starts thinning or receding to the point that I'd be pulling a Devin Townsend to keep it long. Maybe I'll get lucky and have a full head until friggin' 60, but I would rather assume that by 40 I'll be having issues with it and can at least say I sported the look as long as I could.

Hell, I shaved my head last summer and found that at least my skull is reasonably aesthetically pleasing if necessity ever brings me to that look again.   

Long hair still.
Last year in the summertime, it was almost half way down my back, and didn't think anything of it,
until a little girl whispered to her mother "I have never seen hair so long!" and her mother told her to be quiet and not stare.

That made me a little self-conscious, so don't think I will get it that far gone again.
I do NOT like being noticed when I am out in public.
Where I live it's more of a hockey/baseball community I think, and there aren't many longhairs / metalheads from what I've seen,
compared to growing up in Toronto.

On one hand, it's good. The cops around here have seen me enough for years and never hassled me as I stay away from trouble and those that cause it.

One day I will probably shave my head bald again.
It seems most guys have been doing this for the last 10 or 15 years,
and
if I stop wearing metal t-shirts, then nobody would know what I am into.

I think my parents never really cared that much about what music I listened to. If I remember correctly my mom called the metal look a fad, but she was right about that I guess. Can't even remember the last time I wore a bandshirt...

Big Rich wrote:

This may not ring true for the younger metalheads, but back in the 80s I heard this crap all the time.

"IN 25 years, you will look back and laugh at all of this and laugh. Heavy Metal  is just a fad you're going through." "

Well, many of us proved that wrong. Through the decline of the popularity of metal music, we are still here.

Did anybody else ever hear this crap?

Yeah, but never believed it, Rock Music IS Music to me.

Being an African-American male, listening to metal is incredibly awkward for me. And I'm not just talking about mainstream metal that's easily accessible, or alternative rock (which I do like, too). I'm talking about death metal, black metal, industrial metal, and so on. This made me more of a social pariah throughout high school than I already was.

Every black kid that did like the stuff I was into (which was very sparse, mind you) was listening to rock/metal that their white friends were listening to because it was cool. Slipknot, Godsmack, early Megadeth and Metallica (and ONLY early Megadeth and Metallica), Three Days Grace--I mean, it was the easiest shit you could grab at the discount bin at Hot Topic, for Christ's sake.

I lived in a suburban neighborhood just outside Chicago for all my life (was born in '92) that had a population of about 4,000. It was a small niche community whose schools, police station, and one library were all right next to one another. It was quite small and everybody knew everybody. I was well known in my community because my dad was a music producer for local bands and played with bigwigs like Jean Carne, Chaka Khan and so on. I listened to Strapping Young Lad, Burn the Priest/Lamb of God, Lyfthrasyr, Job for a Cowboy, Megadeth, Pantera, Running Wild, Slayer and Skeletonwitch in by the time I was in high school while all my peers, whom I knew as bullies, in the same race pool as me were listening to Lil' Wayne, Yung Joc, Soulja Boi, Drake, Pitbull, and all these rap and modern day R&B artists, stuff that I had largely condemned long before I even hit high school because my tastes in music had long since changed from what I used to listen to with my friends to music that they thought were fitting of my "f*ckin' weird" personality.

It completed the "freak" image they prescribed upon me.

My dad never told me, nor did he ever penalize me for liking the music I liked. He just, like any other parent, found it weird when he brought someone over to the studio and I was blasting "Regular People (Conceit)" by Pantera from my room.

Most regular people would say
It's hard
Any streetwise son-of-a-bitch knows
Don't F*ck with this!

Yeah, not something a parent wants to hear. Dad didn't really care all that much and I could tell that he didn't. Not that it bothered me because it didn't. I think he gave me room to grow, knowing I was getting old enough to make certain decisions, like selecting the music I wanted to hear on a regular basis, on my own. Mom, on the other hand, cares more about my musical choices and thought I was going to Hell for liking bands like Deicide, Superjoint Ritual, and a bunch of band that I won't list because I know she hates them all, anyway. She still thinks so. She doesn't say it's a fad and I don't think she ever will say that, but with me being 22 years old, having a full-time job and trying to get back in school, I think that would fall along the lines of personal disdain and condemnation for someone having tastes that's different than their own.

I know it's not a fad for a number of reasons. I'm getting a deluxe pre-order of Goatwhore's newest album soon, which has a one-size-fits-all back patch, a 2-color poster to put on my wall, a 2-sided, 2-color gatefold vinyl, a band tee, and the CD itself. As well, I have band shirts of Megadeth, Behemoth (which I got when they were here in Charlotte with Inquisition, 1349, Black Crown Initiate, and Goatwhore) and AILD. On top of that, I have two concerts I'm planning on going to this fall: one to see Slayer and another to see Skeletonwitch, both at the Fillmore.

If a friend or a family member tells me that it's a fad, I'll readily prove them wrong because it's not a fad. It's something I love. I used to listen to metal just to be different because I was very self-conscious about myself, but I wanted to stand out. Now I don't have all this metal stuff because it's cool to be different anymore. I have it because it's who I am.

With rock/metal music, the only "phase" I went in and out of was with power metal. It was very exciting when I first discovered it in the mid-2000's. At that time, lyrical content was an issue for me, so bands like Nightwish and Epica were easier to justify listening to than the hair metal bands I've always loved. These days I hardly listen to any power metal though.

With other genres it has just been a matter of intensity. There was a period where I was an absolute Zeppelin fanatic, and spent countless hours arranging snail mail bootleg trades; whereas now I'm not anywhere near as obsessed but still listen to them.

But hair/glam/sleaze metal has always remained my favorite. I don't anticipate that changing any time soon.

Lyrical content was a biggie for me, as I got into my later teens I just didn't want to be associated with some of the lyrics and imagery that goes with metal and I guess that image was important to me back then. Nowadays I can take a lot of it with a pinch of salt and just enjoy what I enjoy from it without thinking that the music reflects on me as a 'metalhead' because I'm not one.

I remember clear as day walking into a record store and seeing the cover to Carcass Reek of Putrification and thinking that I wanted no part of it, or oily men in furry pants or corpse painted buffoons and their invisible oranges, or any of the many albums that had semi naked women in degrading poses (I have nothing against naked women you understand, just not like that!   )

So for all of those reasons I got into other stuff that did have something to say to me. It's just that as I have gotten older, i realise that I threw away some great music on these prejudices so now I'm much more likely to just roll my eyes at a stupid cover or crappy lyric and enjoy the music.

Boris2008 wrote:

Lyrical content was a biggie for me, as I got into my later teens I just didn't want to be associated with some of the lyrics and imagery that goes with metal and I guess that image was important to me back then. Nowadays I can take a lot of it with a pinch of salt and just enjoy what I enjoy from it without thinking that the music reflects on me as a 'metalhead' because I'm not one.

Pretty much this. I remember going into music stores and delving through the catacombs of the Internet and seeing stuff by bands like Deicide, Possessed, Behemoth, and other bands like that and thinking, "Oh, God, I'll never get into that! Listen to what they talk about! I like metal, but not THAT!!!" At the time, I considered myself a Christian to some degree. Even though I, myself, listened to Dave Mustaine rattle on in his early days about witchcraft and Satanism and I heard Running Wild go balls to the wall on their first two LPs, it's like you said--couldn't want to be associated with that image of death metal and Satan and whores and killing and all that in such powerful extremes.

Now I'm pretty much free to listen to what I want without being held down by my own petty convictions about what's all good and pretty and sunshine and flowers.   

SAHB Healer wrote:

Look, my parents were in a nursing home most of the past  decade, they were in their 90's. Big Bands and Lawrence Welk were the musak that they played to keep the troops of the greatest gen docile.. Eventually there were a lot of relatively younger patients, in their 60's & 70's (mostly diabetic or cardio). During that time, and during my many hours sitting at  my parents  bedsides, I couldn't help but be bemused by the influx of Elvis and Roy Orbison into the musak that they piped in for the "younger" geezers. The inevitable conclusion had to be that in my day (soon enough!!) The musak will be Zep and Purple (let's hope so anyway!)
You guys? You are gonna be laying in bed with your oxygen tubes, being force fed Nirvana and Pearl Jam. Mark my words! I been there. Load up your I pods now with Slayer or Trouble  or Stryper or whatever you want to die to, and list it in your living will to strap that baby on after you have your stroke. I ain't lying.

ps. I'm amending my last wishes to stipulate right now to make sure that my last days are metal. To die listening to Beetles is kind of like a long intro to hell,IMO.
Metal wasn't just a phase, no.

Just wanted to say that I love this. It's hilarious, yet sadly true. I don't even want to know what music my generation is going to be playing by the time we get put in a home...

Dave the Boss wrote:

I think my parents never really cared that much about what music I listened to. If I remember correctly my mom called the metal look a fad, but she was right about that I guess. Can't even remember the last time I wore a bandshirt...

I think the clothing aspect is very much a fad. i dont look 'metal' at all - and never had. just because I like the music never meant i have to dress or look a certain way.

I like band shirts, but I've never had the "look". I had an unrelated long hair phase in the early-mid 90's, but that was just preference. I've messed with facial hair, but again, just preference. I look like a middle-aged dork, usually.

I want to make something clear, I don't have long hair, band t-shirts, leather clothes, boots, etc. because I feel I have to to fit some preconceived notion of what a metal fan should look like. I actually love the look, which is why I dress like that. Sometimes, I even like wearing the kind of stuff Dream Theater wore with Images And Words (large button up shirt with first few buttons undone with a necklace & pendant, etc.), though I haven't dressed like that in a few years. As for the hair and beard, I like the way I look with that. Short hair and clean shaved is easier to deal with, but I hate the way I look with short hair and clean shaved. I also love headbanging and playing air guitar and it is not embarassing in the least to be seen doing it, and the long hair flying around feels good to me (with short hair it just doesn't feel right). I also like the feel of my beard flying in the wind too.

I don't feel that metal fans have to look like me. As a matter of fact, the look should only be worn by those who love it. If it's not your thing or you think it looks ridiculous, there is no reason you should feel obligated to sport it. However, for me, I love it and as long as I can look like that, I will continue to do so. I really don't do fads anyways. Nothing I've ever done or enjoyed since high school has been a fad.

I still long hair, not as long as it was when I was teens up to my 30's, but still shoulder length

manny wrote:

I still long hair, not as long as it was when I was teens up to my 30's, but still shoulder length

Me too, although I still don't look metal.

I don't look metal at all   but I still wear band T shirts almost daily. I have non band T shirts but they just aren't as cool haha. I had long hair at one point but it looked terrible. My hair was too wavy and I was overweight at the time so it looked even worse I don't know what I was thinking haha. I used to be in a band so I thought it looked cool, until I saw the pictures we took. Besides our female singer I was the only one with dirty blonde long hair all the other guys were Greek so they all had black hair haha.

Yea I've had people tell me I'll grow out of listening to metal, my wife laughs at everything I listen to too but I will never stop listening to it because its fun. Its what I enjoy and makes me happy. Yea I listen to a lot of other rock genres but I'll always listen to metal no matter what. As long as the bands I like are still around and putting out good albums I'll still be listening.

You have to admit it - metal caused problems in some households -
my parents were super cool about things - even got a band together -
they were shocked at the High School Talent show - how many kids were cheering us -
so glad they went to it - to see what was up - even my dad " that's my boy "
Played 'Let there be rock" - Peter Gunn Theme and ' just wanna have something to do'
this video really - brought me back -

AutumnShantel wrote:

SAHB Healer wrote:

Look, my parents were in a nursing home most of the past  decade, they were in their 90's. Big Bands and Lawrence Welk were the musak that they played to keep the troops of the greatest gen docile.. Eventually there were a lot of relatively younger patients, in their 60's & 70's (mostly diabetic or cardio). During that time, and during my many hours sitting at  my parents  bedsides, I couldn't help but be bemused by the influx of Elvis and Roy Orbison into the musak that they piped in for the "younger" geezers. The inevitable conclusion had to be that in my day (soon enough!!) The musak will be Zep and Purple (let's hope so anyway!)
You guys? You are gonna be laying in bed with your oxygen tubes, being force fed Nirvana and Pearl Jam. Mark my words! I been there. Load up your I pods now with Slayer or Trouble  or Stryper or whatever you want to die to, and list it in your living will to strap that baby on after you have your stroke. I ain't lying.

ps. I'm amending my last wishes to stipulate right now to make sure that my last days are metal. To die listening to Beetles is kind of like a long intro to hell,IMO.
Metal wasn't just a phase, no.

Just wanted to say that I love this. It's hilarious, yet sadly true. I don't even want to know what music my generation is going to be playing by the time we get put in a home...

Yeah, SAHB makes a good point. 

That's actually a great idea.  I totally agree with you; if I stroked out and were force-fed a steady diet of Beatles music because my "caregivers" assumed that's the music I liked, I'd try like hell to tell them to just pull the plug already.

Long blonde god-of-thunder hair.

I always thought long hair was cool. I dyed it jet black at some point, now maybe that was a bit silly looking.

The closest I got to long hair was dreadlocks.

And they didn't even grew out all that much before I had to cut them off. XD

My aesthetic idol growing up was Rachel Bolan. Wanted to look just like him. The hair, clothes, and that f*cking nose chain. f*ckin' anarchy, man.

I've never had long hair. I've been told that I don't look they type of guy they would expect to be a metal fan before. But that was when someone at my workplace found out I was a metal fan; on days I don't work, I almost always wear metal band shirts.

tohostudios wrote:

AutumnShantel wrote:

SAHB Healer wrote:

Look, my parents were in a nursing home most of the past  decade, they were in their 90's. Big Bands and Lawrence Welk were the musak that they played to keep the troops of the greatest gen docile.. Eventually there were a lot of relatively younger patients, in their 60's & 70's (mostly diabetic or cardio). During that time, and during my many hours sitting at  my parents  bedsides, I couldn't help but be bemused by the influx of Elvis and Roy Orbison into the musak that they piped in for the "younger" geezers. The inevitable conclusion had to be that in my day (soon enough!!) The musak will be Zep and Purple (let's hope so anyway!)
You guys? You are gonna be laying in bed with your oxygen tubes, being force fed Nirvana and Pearl Jam. Mark my words! I been there. Load up your I pods now with Slayer or Trouble  or Stryper or whatever you want to die to, and list it in your living will to strap that baby on after you have your stroke. I ain't lying.

ps. I'm amending my last wishes to stipulate right now to make sure that my last days are metal. To die listening to Beetles is kind of like a long intro to hell,IMO.
Metal wasn't just a phase, no.

Just wanted to say that I love this. It's hilarious, yet sadly true. I don't even want to know what music my generation is going to be playing by the time we get put in a home...

Yeah, SAHB makes a good point. 

That's actually a great idea.  I totally agree with you; if I stroked out and were force-fed a steady diet of Beatles music because my "caregivers" assumed that's the music I liked, I'd try like hell to tell them to just pull the plug already.

Or maybe that would force you to get up out of bed and walk right out the door,totally healing you !

I rocked the mullet back in the day. Always wore a jean jacket and the occasional metal t-shirts,mainly ones bought at the shows I went to, plus my left ear is pierced. Although it probably has closed up by now.

I say it's time for pics.