Can heavy metal still scare/shock you?

We all remember the feeling of discovering a band that scared the crap out of you. Some metalheads broke themselves in pretty quickly, but others went through the long process of desensitizing themselves bit by bit. I remember the first song that scared me: KISS' "Unholy" (I know...it's no Cannibal Corpse). Now, though, while I have many bands to discover, it seems that I have already heard the heaviest, fastest, and darkest.

Once we get to the extreme genres, do we become so desensitized that nothing shocks us anymore?

I was scared with a KISS song too when i listen to it for the first time when i was very young, it was I LOVE IT LOUD from their CREATURES OF THE NIGHT album. I put the lp on my turntable, it was dark outside and cold and it was scary when GENE SIMMONS shouted I LOVE IT. Also it was scary to listen to the first minute of the song IN LEAGUE WITH SATAN by VENOM for the first times when i was 14. I never heard nothing like that before. Also the first DECIDE album was scary for me and when i listen for the first time to ABIGAIL by KING DIAMOND when i was 14. Anyway, thats what i remembered about it right now. Now nothing scares me anymore or even shock me.

The video for I Love It Loud actually kind of scared me at the time. Freaked me out when the phone melted.

I also got creeped out some by the whole subliminal message/back-masking hysteria.

Today, I don't know that anything would shock me and if it could I'd probably have no interest in hearing it.

Scared? Maybe some shock value but music never scared me. Aliens abducting me for anal probes scares me, not music.

the opening of "Radioactive" on Gene Simmons' solo album used to scare the hell out of me.

If you've heard it, you'll know.

When I was an impressionable 12 year old, the "In The Beginning" intro on Motley Crue's "Shout At The Devil" LP scared the poop outta me... and the inside sleeve said "this album may contain backwards messages!" WOOOO, SCARY!!

A few years later, Mercyful Fate's "The Oath" did the same...but it felt more authentic to me... like "these guys are the real deal!"

I remember when my bro first brought home Possessed's SEVEN CHURCHES album... I couldn't bring myself to look directly at it for the longest time... I used to p*ss him off by turning the record cover upside down (so that the upside down cross in their logo was right side up) when he wasn't looking!!

Nowadays I've heard and seen so much that I doubt anything can shock me anymore. I've seen a few CD covers here and there where I just go "Woo, that's disgusting" but I wouldn't say I was "shocked" by any of them.

I remember first hearing Vengeance Rising (favorate band) and was scared and amazed that a white metal band could be so brutal but so christian at the same time. Another of the same expirience was listening to Mortification's Scrolls of the Megiloth.

Lyrics don't really scare me, but some music might scare me a little or make me feel uneasy I guess.

i've never been scared or shocked by any song. band photos perhaps (like the back cover of Celtic Frost's Cold Lake), but not the music.

Scarred, not at all. Although I did get a creepy feeling when listening to Abigail for the first time. It was dark in my room and stormy outside and it was like watching a creepy/scarry movie. I always remember that day when I listen to that album (wasn't able to recpture that feeling with "Them" but I came close with the two closing tracks with Grandma's voice).

DB's great pumpkin avatar scares me.

emptytomb1 wrote:

Scared? Maybe some shock value but music never scared me. Aliens abducting me for anal probes scares me, not music.

Yeah, never been scared over a song. Although, the "it's a hard knocks life" part in that Annie movie kind of sounds evil to me. Those kids ain't right.

emptytomb1 wrote:

DB's great pumpkin avatar scares me.

That's because you have not yet found the most sincere pumpkin patch ever.

DallasBlack wrote:

Scarred, not at all. Although I did get a creepy feeling when listening to Abigail for the first time. It was dark in my room and stormy outside and it was like watching a creepy/scarry movie. I always remember that day when I listen to that album (wasn't able to recpture that feeling with "Them" but I came close with the two closing tracks with Grandma's voice).

Yes. I can't relate to the Abigail example but for some songs I feel more "creeped" then "scared."

There are some effects on Kiss' "Music From (The Elder)" that scared me back then. The rumour was that the devil was on the album!! Pretty scary when you're 7!!

Only if it really stinks.

I'M THE SCARY ONE.

Seeing as I'm younger than you guys, my first 'heavy metal scares' will be entirely different.

At around 12 I first discovered Mr. Marilyn Manson - just faced with this disturbingly dressed creepy guy, with rumours of Satanic priesthood and the burning of bibles onstage, coupled with an eerie musical mix of electronic sounds and gothic elements and the harshest vocal approach I had heard up until that point.

Slipknot, about two years after (I wasn't yet a fan of Manson, but I had actually discovered his works). Just this image of 9 madmen dressed in matching factory suits with deranged masks, each apparently representing the individual beneath. It was scary but drew me in nonetheless. Their music to me, at the time, represented insanity. I had never heard anything like it. It was totally oppressive yet at the same time scaringly inviting. I was terrified of it and loved it both at the same time.

Cradle of Filth. I have always had a fascination with horror/macabre/vampires, but finding that a band actually dressed that way and used it as an actual ideaology (I was only familiar with their early material) was damn scary (I was a christian during all of this) and very appealing at the same time. I was mindblown when I heard their music. I'm not sure what it was, but it made me imagine a huge clocktower ticking slowly. The music felt both conceptual and non-conceptual at the same time - rather than representing a 'line' it was respresenting a 'space', so to speak. It added a new dimension. Then I heard Venus in Fears, and got so freaked out I had to turn it off.

Dimmu Borgir, when I was just getting into metal I borrowed a book about metal from the library, and was faced with an old picture of Dimmu feasting on the carcass of a young woman. It freaked me out, and my friends didn't even want to be assossiated with it (they're still christians to this day) but it made me very excited, deep down, even though it scared me too. I listen to a sample on amazon and again, felt so multidimensional. No idea what the song was, but it made me think of Iron Maiden x 10. The epicness of Maiden (a band I had only been listening to for a few months) but extended, far past rock and roll into deathly dimensions beyond my imagination. I loved it.

At the time, I never dreamed that I would be such a big fan of any of these though. And to answer the threadstarter's question, at the age of 18 and having listened to metal about 5 years I don't find much shocking or scary anymore.

I remember getting Queensryche's Empire back in High School and listening to it on cassette in front of my house while me and my buddies threw a football around in the street. That night, I decided to listen to it again on my headset as I drifted off to sleep. Well, as most of you know, the last song (Anybody listening?) has a long ending with waves crashing a beach. Little Sentinel was just drifting off to sleep at the end of that song and then...the freaking alarm clock at the end scared the crap out of me. Seriously, I had to turn on the light and check my shorts.

The singing munchkins (The lollipop guild) in The Wizard of Oz scares me to this day.

Rexorcist wrote:

The singing munchkins (The lollipop guild) in The Wizard of Oz scares me to this day.

Amen brother. Actually midgets little people in general scare the crap out of me. But I still think I could be friends with ult.

spectrefate wrote:

Rexorcist wrote:

The singing munchkins (The lollipop guild) in The Wizard of Oz scares me to this day.

Amen brother. Actually midgets little people in general scare the crap out of me. But I still think I could be friends with ult.

He's the one on the right, correct?

My mom told me that Alice Cooper used to scare me when I was like 5 or 6. And now I want to meet him. But I don't think metal really scares me. Some of the black metal stuff makes me feel uneasy but I'm not shocked by it.

i was scared when i've heard / Type O Negative - Black Sabbath / ... completely chills on my spine ...
and Alice Cooper execution is always perfect as in 70s (Hanging or Gilotine)