In celebration of the 10th year of Metal Music Studies, we (Ross Hagen and Edward Banchs) are compiling a section of short retrospectives on foundational and important publications for the reviews section. We are aiming for a mix of titles that includes books aimed at general audiences in addition to academic monographs and edited collections. We are looking for short retrospectives of around 1000-1500 words that would address the following threads of inquiry:
- What is the significance of the work?
- What did it contribute to Metal Studies?
- What aspects of the book still seem most relevant today?
- Are there aspects of the book that you are critical of?
The tone of the writing does not need to be rigorously academic; we are looking for more personal sorts of reminisces about these publications.
If you are interested in writing a retrospective, please reply with up to three titles you are interested to write about. We’re operating on a “first-come, first-served” basis so it will be good to have some alternative titles in case your first choice is already spoken for. We would like to have the first drafts by Dec. 1 – it’s a quick turnaround but since these will be short and less academic hopefully that won’t be too much of a discouragement.
We have reviews lined up already for the following:
- Christie, The Sound of the Beast
- Dawes, What are You Doing Here?
- Kahn-Harris, Extreme Metal
- Moynihan, Lords of Chaos
- McNeil, Please Kill Me
- Clifford-Napoleone, Queerness in Heavy Metal Music
- Roccor, Heavy Metal. Die Bands. Die Fans. Die Gegner.
- Hein, Hard Rock, Heavy Metal: Histoire, cultures et pratiquants
We would like to get 5–10 more pieces to round out the section. We’d be particularly interested in reviews of some of the early collections like Scott & von Helden’s Metal Void: The First Gathering (2010) along with other edited collections and special issues of journals.
Please send replies and any questions to both ross.hagen@uvu.edu and edwardbanchs@gmail.com.