The International Society for Metal Music Studies

Glocal metal   Didier Goossens    Not long after the first metal music studies, attention arose for its ways of production, distribution and consumption across the globe, with significant attention for non-Anglo American/European contexts. This became theorized as the global metal scene. But that utopic idea steals the thunder of many unique contexts of local metal scenes by depicting a global industry of artists, labels, platforms and fans – while some artists might not even aim for global audiences. This explains the need for a new critical framework, one that attends to the specific contexts of metal music […]

Multilingual Metal   Riitta-Liisa Valijärvi  Heavy metal is often sung in English. This is a global language, the use of which can increase sales and reach wider audiences. Yet, many bands choose to write lyrics and sing in other languages. We explored this choice in an edited volume titled Multilingual Metal Music: Sociocultural, Linguistic and Literary Perspectives on Heavy Metal Lyrics (edited by myself, Charlotte Doesburg and Amanda DiGoia).  Bands may choose to write their […]

BLACK METAL IN TURKEY  Douglas Mattsson  “Black metal? We don’t have that in Turkey.” – The middle aged Turkish academic sitting across from me in a restaurant in Istanbul is not the first to have expressed surprise, even disbelief, when I told him about my topic of research. Although literature on metal music in Muslim majority societies has multiplied during the last decade, black metal, one of metal […]

METAL AND SYNTHESIZERS  Fulya Çelikel    As a metalhead and a metal musician, it has always amazed me that metal research that touches on organology (the musicological term for the study of musical instruments) is mostly on the electric guitar in some way. There is very little in terms of timbres or techniques that are considered “metal” for non-guitar instruments, such as […]

Ethno-journalism in metal research  My research has come about because I could not answer a simple question when I was in graduate school: What did I know about metal in Africa?  Though I was never educated to become a journalist, I have utilized a more journalistic approach in order to properly profile scenes, and their respective […]

Black Metal Ontology: Performing the Witch Dr Jasmine Hazel Shadrack   Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and as terrible as an army with banners? (qtd. in Grey, 2013, p. 14)   Through my performance as Denigrata Herself in the black metal band Denigrata, […]