In this article, we unpack the qualities of music, and metal music in particular. We show these qualities and issues related to these qualities in the context of “violence”, “healing” and “ecstasy”. In this context, we try to explain how “metal music”, which is seen as “underground”, affects its listeners by pointing out the ways in which it contains the human tendencies of expression.
First, let’s make a general explanation about music.
The word music is of Greek origin. Music, or mûsıkî in old parlance, comes from the name “mousa’lar”, the nine muses born from the nine-night affair between Zeus and Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory. Hesiodos tells this story at the very beginning of “Theogonia”, translated into Turkish as “the birth of the gods”. Theogonia is composed of the words theos-thea and genesis. Genesis is a word that means formation, birth, creation, coming. Heisodos begins his account of the genesis (birth) of the gods (theoi) by addressing the Mousas; that is, he calls upon the Mousas, the muses, to open this work to him. Then he tells the story that begins with Khaos.
The mother of the Mousas is Mnemosyne. For this reason, music is a word that needs to be analyzed around the concept of memory. Considering music together with the concept of memory requires taking into account the verb “to remember”.
In this respect, Hesiodos’ “theogonia” is of interest.
It should also be noted that the fact that the text in question starts from Khaos is also important in some respects. Chaos is understood as “disorder”. But the word also means “void, abyss and rift”. When considered together with Genesis (birth), Khaos resembles the female vaginal area. So “birth from the cleft”.
In this sense, genesis is also like the opening of a theater. Those who come through the rift, such as the gods, act on the stage, in this sense.
The Mousas are the daughters of Mnemosyne, one of the wives of the famous Zeus, the son of Kronos, who cut off his father’s testicles in this theater of Greek gods. Kronos is also accepted as “khronos” meaning time, both in terms of name similarity and meaning. It is possible to consider that music is essentially a matter of time from this perspective and to illuminate the reading of mythology accordingly.
It should be noted, however, that Greek mythology is in many ways more superficialized than the mythology of other cultures. This point should be noted.
It should be noted that Zeus is related to the Latin word “Deus”, which means god alone, as it has approximate counterparts in many Indo-European languages. We will not elaborate on these points further.
Music is based on the concepts of time, sound formation and harmony. For this reason, the existence of music does not depend on an instrument or an organ in this sense. It is possible to find remnants of the beginnings of music all over the world, dating back to ancient times. However, due to its very nature, music essentially begins in places transcending chronology. We will not elaborate on these points.
In Turkish, the word “semai”, which means “hearing”, is also used instead of music. Those who study music through “semai” and on the basis of “usûl” and makâm”, which essentially constitute Turkish music, can better understand what we mean by transcending chronology. Since something transcendent to chronology appears in a chronological section, it should not be seen as being under the record of that section, that is, as belonging to that time. Unfortunately, we cannot go into these issues, which are related to the concepts of history and time, here. Music, by its very nature, is transcendental to chronology; however, music shows a change of temperament in relation to the name it belongs to; and accordingly, it can become superficial or deep.
One of the deep-rooted musical cultures in the world belongs to the West. However, Western music has lost its musical depth in many respects and has shown a narrowing of its temperament depending on where it belongs. We say this without going into detail. Metal music is a genre born out of this tradition.
The first examples of metal music can be found in the mid-19th century. Similar to the emergence of many recent musical genres, metal music relies on the fundamentals of the tradition that gave rise to it. As such, it is not fundamentally encompassing and “new”.
Metal music usually consists of drums, electronic bass guitar, electronic guitar and vocals as rhythm. This combination is amplified during the performance by using “electronic devices”. This is because instruments such as “electric guitar” and “bass guitar” are not suitable for “acoustic” performance, they are too weak in terms of sound intensity. For this reason, “vocals” and “drums” are usually “miked”. The electric and bass guitar signals are amplified by an “amplifier” and output by a “speaker”.
In some examples, orchestral instruments and electronic keyboards are also heard. Its character is created by the “effect” called “distortion”, which changes the sound of the electronic guitar in particular. “Distortion” literally means “to change the nature of”, “to distort”. In general, “distortion” is used for unwanted “interference” that is “superimposed” on an electronic signal transmitted from one point to another. This “effect”, in a sense, distorts the electronic guitar signal. This distortion adds “timbre” to the “signal”, that is, “harmonic components” other than the instrument’s unique sound.
In some examples, orchestral instruments and electronic keyboards are also heard. Its character is created by the “effect” called “distortion”, which changes the sound of the electronic guitar in particular. “Distortion” literally means “to change the nature of”, “to distort”. In general, “distortion” is used for unwanted “interference” that is “superimposed” on an electronic signal transmitted from one point to another. This “effect”, in a sense, distorts the electronic guitar signal. This distortion adds “timbre” to the “signal”, that is, “harmonic components” other than the instrument’s unique sound.
“Frequency” is the basic element of “sound” and “melody” in the Greek-Latin-Church realm. “Distortion” overlays the “harmonic components” of the “sound” on top of the “fundamental frequency” by means of a so-called “pedal”. In this way, the electric guitar produces a more “violent”, “louder” and in a way “distorted” sound by means of “effects” and “amplifiers”. This is the most fundamental characteristic of metal music.
Since the aforementioned “harmonic components” create “multiplicity of sound”, when the “distortion effect” is in effect, electric guitars usually don’t have too many frets at the same time. Because if the “harmonic components” have “more than one fundamental frequency” at the same time, the “harmonic components” will overlap and “drown” the sound. For this reason, a technique called “power chord” is used, in which the “first (fundamental)” and “fifth (strong)” sounds of the chord are announced. These “power chords” together with the drums and bass make up the “katar” of the “song”.
The products of metal music not only use the usual “singing” and “vocal” techniques, but also “brutal” and “scream” techniques that evoke “violence”. The word “brutal” has meanings such as “savage” and “cruel”. In this type of technique, mainly “low” notes are heard. In the “Scream” type of vocal, “treble” sounds are used. “Scream” literally means “scream” and sounds like a scream. For those who are not familiar with these techniques, they are extremely disturbing.
In general, “metal music”, with its “melodic” structure, is melodically differentiated from genres such as “rock” and “blues”, which contain “drums”, “bass”, “guitar” and “vocals”, in terms of being the field in which it flourishes. We will express this differentiation as a “narrowing” even if it does not fully fulfill the meaning of the word. However, in terms of the “healing” it offers, it seems to be “more colorful” in terms of emotional intensity than the other genres in question. We will elaborate on “healing” in more detail.
The ensembles that perform metal music use more than one musical instrument to form a “band” in English and a “group” in Turkish. In the songs that these “bands” “write”, the “drums” and “bass guitar” mainly create the rhythm of the song, while the “bass guitar” bridges the “rhythm” and “melody” as it also contains “pitch”. The “electric guitar”, on the other hand, sometimes forms the “melody” of the song and sometimes, similar to the “bass guitar”, provides a “space” for the “vocal” or another “solo” instrument, which is used in the majority of western music with “melody repetitions” called “riffs”.
The subjects of the lyrics of “metal music” can be “death”, “demons”, “brutality”, “neurosis”, “war”, “violence”, “rebellion”, “sex”, or sometimes “politics”, “mythology”, “romance” and “psychology”. The “face” of the music “parallels” the lyrics.
As the connoisseurs are familiar with, at metal music “concerts”, the audience sometimes participates in the music with a “headbang”. A “headbang” is a head movement in accordance with the rhythm of the song being performed. According to the “rhythm” of the song, the participating listeners move their heads up and down, “shaking” them so to speak. In the Turkish-speaking world, this action is also called “headbanging”. “Headbang” can be performed so violently that it “shakes” the performer physically and mentally.
Another action observed among the audience is the “pogo”. “Pogo” begins at an undetermined time of the concert, when the listeners agree among themselves to form an empty space. The listeners, who take up positions around this empty space, suddenly run at each other and collide. The “pogo” does not end immediately after this collision; there is a “pushing and shoving” until the listeners who participate in the “pogo” get tired. This action is, in a way, an imitation of running from the position to the enemy in the wars of the past. In this context, it is possible to analyze the issue in terms of “violence”, “expression” and “healing”.
Among the forms of music that originate in the West, it is possible to clearly identify that metal music differs from jazz, blues, and classical music in terms of listeners, even if its essence and nature are not different. Blues, and especially jazz and classical music, are partly for the “intellectual”, “elite” and “refined taste”. Metal music, unlike its “mother” and “father”, is “rebellious”, “direct”, “destructive”, “uninhibited” and “violent”. In this sense, they “walk arm in arm” with their big brother “rock” music. But again, the “place” that metal music “touches” the listener is closer to their “self” than rock music.
Let us prove this observation. The “melodic structure” of metal music is “stunted” compared to its “mother”, “father” and “sister” genres. For example, “Slayer”, one of the “popular ensembles” performing “thrash metal”, is indisputably weak in terms of “melodic structure”. Examples of this can be seen especially in the “electric guitar solos”. It should be noted that this is not meant as a criticism.
In metal music, a “small” part of the qualities that “seduce” its listeners is its “melody”. The main thing is the “layer” and the “flow” of the “songs”. While “drums” and “bass guitar” constitute the “ground” of this “katar” and “expense”, the “composition” obtained together with “electric guitar riffs” with “distortion” effects can lead an “active listener” who is “headbanging” to a state of “ecstasy”. The “expression” of “repressed violence” can lead to “euphoric” experiences.
With this in mind, it is possible to say that the “concerts” of “metal music ensembles” are an imitation of a “ritual”.
We will deal with the issue of ritual separately elsewhere. But what we mean by this word should be understood by looking at Writing IV of the Anatolian Maya.
This “community” that leads the “ritual” is not aware of the state of the “listeners”. However, what needs to be understood here is that these performances are based on “contact”. For example, these musicians consider themselves “successful musicians” for the number of people they “touch”.
The “rituals” of the Greek-Latin-Church realm are achieved through the “contact” of the “celebrant” with the “participant” in the “ritual”. The “ritual director” is not a “guide”, a “pathfinder”, and is therefore unaware of the “end” of the “path”.
Emotion without knowledge is “blind”. This is precisely why “concerts” are “measured” in “mass” and “quantity” by the number of people who “attend”. In this way, in the realm of the Greek-Latin-Church, “liturgies” provide “blood-healing” to those who “participate”.
Compared to other “related” musical genres, “metal music” is famous for being the most masterful in terms of bringing the “blood-letting cure” to the “center”. It should be noted that it achieves its prowess by enabling the “body” of those who “participate” in the “ritual” to participate in this “ritual”, and that it differs from “related” musical genres in this aspect; the “participant” cannot participate by remaining “motionless”. Let us remind that even those who “observe” “primitive tribal rituals” as “observers” can be “influenced” “physically”.
In this way, we see that “metal music” is not just “music” as we know it.
Let us conclude by stating that we are discussing “metal music” in terms of its “general” forms of performance, and that these findings will not be valid “in every aspect” in every “example” of every “sub-genre”.
