People always told me that I liked metal because of the sound. Well — that was true; however, it wasn’t the whole story. I liked the music too. When I got further into the genre, people would bring me the LATEST COOLEST THING EVAR and when I figured out that 99% of those were soulless shallow trash with some nifty quirk or aesthetic tacked on, I started telling people that good music was production-agnostic. You could play it on a kazoo, on a synthesizer, or on a tuba, and good music will still have whatever it was made you like it.

Here in my view is the proof — complex metal classics played on piano, sounding like a progressive rock interpretation of classical music:

• Immolation – Close to a World Below
• Metallica – To Live is To Die
• Black Sabbath – Don’t Stop (Too Late)
• Metallica – Orion

Although Varg Vikernes is normally a bad source for information about reality, he did tell us how he saw his music:

When forced to take a stand I say today that it’s metal music. Metal with roots in classical music. – Interview With Raped Ass of Christ ‘Zine

Metal with roots in classical music. Classical music, most like the Romantic and modernist kind, with its roots in traditional music and transcendental thinking. And you can hear the proof of it when you translate your metal to piano playing.