Death Metal Underground’s wise founder Brett Stevens posted a thoughtful article last weekend about the duality of exterior and interior being.  It describes how in these modern times we’re seeing an illusion of non-conformity that masks the conformity of thought and nature within.  This is an effective tactic of those in power be they media, silicon valley, deep state, or (in the case of metal) record executives and journalists:  get people to look different, but think the same.  This also masterfully articulates why metal is at its lowest creative point in the entire history of its existence: fans and musicians alike have accepted conformity of thought and sound through satisfaction with mere non-conformist aesthetics and culture.  And the only way to escape this rut is to violently rebel against everything we have been conditioned to believe is “metal” and “metal culture.”

Brett quotes a Telegraph Magazine article that features some insight on this (particularly on the oh-so-metal tattoo front) by invoking Ozzy Osbourne who, despite being a burnt out mess of his former self, was able to conjure enough brain cells to produce a moment of clarity as the author notes:

In my attempt to feel young, free and nonconformist, couldn’t I just have dyed my hair magenta, spent the weekend at Glastonbury in a tepee, or taken up with a toyboy? After all, even Ozzy Osbourne, who is no stranger to the tattoo parlour, reckons: “If you want to be —-ing individual, don’t get a tattoo. Every —-er’s got one these days.”

Rejecting tattoos are a good step, but on their own aren’t enough to take back metal from the corporate conformist conglomerate it has become.  No, only through a merciless adversity to everything that is marketed as metal will metal become good again.  Unfortunately this will be too hard for most of the current generations of metal fans, whose minds have become too conditioned to what metal is “supposed to be” and supposed to look like to have any chance of perceiving what will come next.  It’s why NWOBHM fans and musicians couldn’t grasp (and ultimately resisted) death metal when the perverting guttural vocal style was introduced and labels started pushing it.  They were conditioned to what was their metal and their rebellion, and not the one that was occurring to the world they assumed when they became “the man.”  By grasping this logic we can understand that what will come from gen-Z will be an inversion of all of the campy shit we’re currently clinging to in a desperate attempt to find belonging and purpose.  When this destruction comes, most of “the metal scene” will be destroyed by it.

Born to the parents of two lost generations (millennial and, to a lesser extent, gen-X) Generation Z is coming into a western world where hyper-individualism and extreme-liberal rule were tried and failed.  A world where we disbanded our communities and churches and replaced them with isolation and infinite mental illness.  A world that got so wise in our godless logic and philosophy that we started chopping the dicks off our children.  A world where, into our “advanced society,” we’ve welcomed school shootings, Facebook-streamed suicides, and the sexualization of pre-teens.  Men are unfortunately shitty gods and this has been well established under individualistic/liberal rule.

Metal too, has embraced liberalism and self-serving individualism to the point of near-hopelessness.  We yelled “anti authority, fuck commercialism!” long after the authorities commercialized it.  We ran with a “satanism as a lifestyle” lie that was ultimately debunked by the time YouTube came around but it was still kept as a theme by roughly half our active death/black metal bands.  We did misogynistic lyrics only to have the loony left try to recently flip this theme on men.  And the death metal pioneers that allegedly worshiped death are now fighting it tooth and nail as they try to keep their music going well into their 50s.  But what’s worst of all, is that despite the light of truth exposing the fraudulence of all of these things in a globalized world, everyone is desperately clinging to commercialized metal culture like a child to their teddy bear.

Gen-Z’s rebellion will be against all of the above.  Seeing the depression and hopelessness that has befallen those before them, they will embrace collectivism as a necessary component of human survival.  They will attempt to restore communities in the efforts to avoid the isolation of the social media lifestyle.  They will champion Abrahamic religion as atheism and occultism have been proven to be unfulfilling and gay.  They will be clean in appearance and shower daily.  They will oppose amorality with venomous hatred and wage thematic death and destruction of the tattooed trans-mutants oppressing them!

Will metal lyrics and themes still be dark and violent?  Of course!  Will metal be rebellious?  Oh yes!  Will metal aesthetic be a Western romanticism?  Absolutely!  The true spirit of metal is timeless and will endure through the ages.  But the majority of the metal package you’ve been buying will (rightfully) be spat on and obliterated.  Embrace the winds of change- or be destroyed by them!

Tags: brett stevens, conformity, death, death metal, destruction, Deus Vult, future of metal, Gen-Z, Generation Z, hessian, metal, metal culture, non-conformity, ozzy osbourne, rebellion, Romanticism, tattoos, Templar, Western Culture