Abstract: Historians have long overlooked and misunderstood the Parents Music Resource Center, an activist group formed in 1985 to correct perceived excesses in heavy metal music. Scholars have focused their analyses almost exclusively on the First Amendment implications of the group’s actions, largely dismissing the PMRC in the process. This thesis argues that by expanding the historical analysis of the group to include the social and political climate of previous generations and of the 1980s, the self-stated goals of the PMRC, and a musicological discussion of heavy metal and why the group specifically targeted this genre, we can see that the PMRC was in fact an incredibly influential sociopolitical activist group that is representative of the political shift in the United States in the 1980s.

Abstract: Randy Rhoads was an influential rock guitarist whose synthesis of musical influences had an impact on heavy metal. He developed a classically influenced guitar style that inspired new developments in the guitar’s virtuosic technique and harmonic and melodic language. The sound of heavy metal can be traced directly to his guitar style. Yet no definitive studies have been conducted on his guitar voice, synthesis of musical influences, or contribution to heavy metal music. This thesis is the first study to define the musical influences that make up Rhoads’s innovative guitar voice and playing style. It examines his early childhood, formal training, and influences, honing his skills in Quiet Riot, mastering his skills on Blizzard of Ozz , and mastering his skills on Diary of a Madman . It provides a look at his guitar voice through his adaptation, synthesis, and implementation of musical influences by conducting a detailed musical analysis of the formal, harmonic, rhythmic, and melodic aspects of the songs on Blizzard of Ozz and Diary of a Madman.
The examination of his guitar voice and playing style is provided by the following materials: CDs, DVDs, books, scholarly journals, master’s theses and doctoral dissertations, and transcriptions of songs on Blizzard of Ozz and Diary of a Madman. The aim of this thesis is to demonstrate that Rhoads’s guitar voice and playing style are classically influenced and a synthesis of different musical styles. It advocates that his playing style pushed the hard rock music envelope create a new approach to guitar playing that led to a more refined version of the music. It suggests that Rhoads’s musical approach and mindset in the 1980s: classical-style virtuosity, harmony and melody, and acoustic guitar was important to the development of the heavy metal sound, therefore placing him in the historical annals of popular music.

Abstract: This thesis discusses the nature of music’s impact on identity, subjectivity, and the self. To better understand music’s role in promoting hope and resilience, I pinpoint how heavy, intense, and highly emotive music applied over distinct listening practices impacts the regulation of affect and self-destructive impulses in individuals who suffer from trauma, mental illness, or self-destructive behavior. This research also investigates the characteristic of intensity often found in heavy music that seems (despite intuition) to ease negative or painful emotions, circumvent impulses to self-harm, and propel one to positive action.
Of particular interest to this project are the ways both heavy and non-genre specific music listeners use various listening strategies in the regulation and modulation of negative affect and emotion. Specifically highlighted are the three strategies defined by Saarikallio (2008) in the Music in Mood Regulation (MMR) scale of using music to cope with negative mood states: Diversion, where music is used to distract from negative thoughts and feelings, Solace, where music is used for comfort, acceptance, and understanding when feeling sad or troubled, and Discharge, where anger or sadness are released through music.
Through review and analysis of existing literature, qualitative research, and in-depth case studies, this thesis illuminates the ways musically-afforded emotion-regulation strategies allow subjects to meet, shape, and transform their difficult experiences by establishing hope and resilience that strengthens one’s ontological security and sense of self.

Abstract: "Extreme Metal is a form of dark tourism and leisure activity whose artistic radicalism and underground scenes invoke intense debates from musicians as well as audiences. Traditional cultural studies have assumed that its disenfranchised and transgressive music expressions are an ideological resistance to increasing homogeneities of industrialized society. As such, considering the nature of festivals as a mechanism where culture is created and transmitted, the operations and promotions of Extreme Metal festivals are inevitably engaged in the wider cultural politics of Extreme Metal. The roles of festival producers thus must be emphasized, who act as powerful agents in engaging artists, developing audiences, arranging programs, and so forth. Indeed, no festivals can be simply described as improvised events – they are carefully programmed, planned, and constructed for audiences to hear and see. With this in mind, this study serves to explore the experiential predicament of these culturally embedded event producers.
In particular, the identities of the festival producers compose the focus of investigation for this research. That is, considering the contested contexts that are at play in shaping the very existence of Extreme Metal, the producers are constantly acting as intermediaries between these contexts. The discursive practice by which they give meaning to their festival production practices, contain profound dissonance between 'what they imagine their selves to be' and 'what they actually are’ as related to their turbulent ‘referential world’ of Extreme Metal festival production.
With this in mind, this study employs the theoretical framework of narrative identity in the examination of the ‘referential world’ by which identities are related. Narrative identity is considered as an approach to understand how people resolve themselves, life events, actions, and other forces in their life. Considering that a self, in narrative, is given meaning through the narrator’s relation of the self to their referential world, analyzing the narrative moments where conflicting contexts are at play provides a sensitization to the struggle of Extreme Metal cultural transgression within festival production. Specifically, it is learned how this tourism is considered ‘dark’. In doing so, three main research questions are asked: 1). How can we understand the festival producers’ identities as negotiated and emerged from the interview narratives? 2). In regards to the festival producers’ identities, what socio-cultural forces in relation to the apparatus of Extreme Metal are involved? 3). How do such findings illuminate the makings of tourism festivals at large?"
(Source: ProQuest Dissertations Publishing)

Abstract: This study looks at female musicians performing in subcultural rock genres commonly considered non-gender-conforming, such as punk rock, heavy metal, noise, and experimental. Twenty-four interviews were conducted with female musicians who reflected on their experiences as musicians. Themes emerged on women’s patterns of entry into music, barriers they negotiated while playing, and forces that may push them out of the music scene. Once women gained a musician identity, their gender functioned as a master status. They negotiated sexism when people questioned their abilities, assumed men played better, expected them to fail, held them to conventional gender roles, and sexually objectified them. Normative expectations of women as primary caregivers for children, internalization of criticism, and high personal expectations are considered as factors that contribute to women’s exit from musical careers. This research closes with suggestions for how more women and girls can be socialized into rock music.