Doom metal circa 1980s, working class clothes, denim, cheesy tight pants, v neck showing hairy chest, mullets, no intellectual affectations, no attempt to look hip, sophisticated, cool:



Doom metal circa 2000 something. Esoteric necklace, silk scarf, profane/mystical/occult face tattoos, everybody in black, attempt to look profound, stylish, kvlt, artistic, retro and artsy.



I hope that the evidence makes what I am trying to explain more clear.

I didn't say that image is not important to "average" metalheads. I said is is less important (check out the guy with a budweiser t shirt on HM parking lot, Jus Oborn from Electric Wizard wouldn't be caught dead in such pedestrian, ordinary, unsophisticated clothes) and that the values of the doom hipsters are different.

I hafta admit, I laughed out loud when I saw this photo. Marcolin's hair looks like it's eating his head, and he looks so friggin bizarre wearing anything but his robe.

The values in each scene tend to be different, I agree.

I just don't see at all where you figured it is less important. There are definitely uniform looks in "average metalheads" as you call them. It's not random. There's thought put into this. There are standards. It's fashion.

You also seem to be mixing issues by jumping back and forth between band fashion and fan fashion. These are two separate things. It's not like retro bands are doing something that didn't exist before, you know.

COVEN


Black Sabbath


And so on from Alice Cooper to Slayer to Mercyful Fate and blah blah...

You probably didn't realise that pictures like the one posted above are promo shots and the clothes they are wearing are supposed to go along with album artwork/meaning.

Live, for example, Jus almost always just wears a random shirt and his barely sewn on vest.

What others have said (both about the classifications of bands, and about popularity). It is more popular in Europe, but it's still not really "the next big thing" - even here in Sweden, where you can't throw a stone without hitting a Graveyard-esque band.
Honestly, I think it's more labels maniacally signing anything with that "sound", as general as it is, hoping and crossing their fingers that band/sound will catch on. Because it seems more like every band with an "occult rock" or "retro" sound, whether doom influenced or not, is getting scooped up by Nuclear Blast and whoever, whether they're actually good or not.

Is there any occult rock/retro rock/retro doom/whatever you call it out there, worshipping Coven? That would be cool!

I think that imagery is very important both to the bands and the fans. Bands always had a great exposure due to promo shoots, video clips and interviews, but now there's the "social network" phenomenon where even the most underground of the bands can be seen by anyone with a Facebook account. It's only logical then that bands in general take a closer to style, clothings and looks in general. Imagery has always been important even though some 80s and 90s looks may appear to be truer than thou. No one would dispute the fact that corpse paint is a big part of black metal's imagery, or that the so called "third wave" has gone beyond that into a more austere clothing style to gain a different recognition and feel separated from the "second wave", at least in terms of image. Image is immediate, it's like cover art. How many times has one checked a band just because the cover art was awesome?

Now if someone suddenly says that a specific segment of the metal bands, and namely the stoner bands, are adopting a posture of looking sharp instead of sounding good then I'd say I don't bite. Even if they are looking "artsy" if they still sound good I really don't care to be honest. What bugs me however is how the extreme metal look is seen as "truer" in comparison. As someone said above you can pretty much tell what kind of show is at the venue when you see the crowd. Thrashers have a style, deathheads another, blackers another, and so on and so on. It's all "part of the show" and a way to identify themselves with a segment of people that have the same way of thinking, or the same likes and dislikes.

To finalize I restate that imagery has always been a "thing" about metal bands, it's probably due to the wider exposure nowadays that some trends seem to be on the upheaval, but I honestly don't think that's actually true.

What kind of band does this guy play for, then?

Have you read my post? I didn't say anything about bands looking a determinate way on live environments, only on promotional stunts and social networks. The way they appear to the public, or better put the way the public perceives them to look. Live you can dress pretty much anything can't you? What I said about the etiquette on live shows was related to fans, not bands.

Answering your question, how should I know? I've seen the Vile drummer play with a formal look, having a tie and all. Skepticism for instance play all dressed up in suits, as if they were at an opera. So how should I be able to answer your question?

I was being a dick to the entire discussion, really, not you in particular.

Edit: And I'll say that the whole image-obsessed hipsterism is absolutely true about Jex Thoth.

It certainly is...and yet I'd like a new album!

I used to share a practice space with them. It was anything but pleasant!

What I will say is that practicing in Nico's basement was much more pleasant and he was never a wiener.

You are doing something incorrect here. An incorrect comparison.

Sabbath and Coven are proper 70s bands. What EW and the current stoner hipster scene does is go back to the 70s in another context, it's the RETRO element. It's not the same thing as the original bands dressing up psychedelic and esoteric in the 1970s. It's being done in a new context in which the RETRO tag brings a whole new dimension to the thing. EW is a part of the defined doom, stoner and even extreme metal sub scenes. These things didn't even exist in the 70s when real hippies and rockers were dressing that way.

In the same way that hipsters wear things from the 80s in a ironic sense, dressing up as if you were in the 70s in 2000 and playing brutally distorted doom metal is not the same as if you actually were in 1974 playing classic rock wearing these clothes.

So your comparison is false.

Wearing a PAC MAN t-shirt in 1984 is one thing. Wearing it now is another thing.

It doesn't really matter if Oborn dressed up for the photoshoot or not. It is the image the hipster stoners want to convey after all. That type of affectation didn't exist in metal until very recently. That's my point.

My whole problem with hipster metal is this:

The image is more important than anything else. Than to be creative. To be a part of a cool "scene" is the most important aim. And even the MUSIC itself must be tailored to be cool. Hence the safeness of the "retro" gimmick, or the "post metal avant garde" thing as well.

These bands are all carefully tailored to look, and sound, as either stoner retro, or maybe sometimes avant-garde cool (Isis and Sunn for instance). The creativity and spontaneous spirit of a few years back is gone.

Banda like Death with Human, Pestilence with Spheres, Gorguts with Obscura, Entombed with Wolverine Blues, Morgoth with Odium and many others created innovative albums without having this obsession with attaching themselves with a sub sub-sub-sub group and a cool, stylish sub trend. They were "metal" guys for sure, a part of the youth culture package, which is made to sell records and clothes since Elvis Presley, but the concern was with the music.

Nowadays things are much more niche and image oriented. With even the music serving as a base for the image, in my view.

This is the HUMAN line up for Death. Maybe Paul Masvidal's blue shorts don't look the sharpest, but surely that's one impressive death metal album which, I believe, changed a lot for the genre:



Bands nowadays are much more image obsessed. To the point, as I have stressed, that the music is written as a source for the band to be in a niche and within an image.

Guys, it's called marketing. It existed before, but now seems to be more prominent since the huge number of bands and the return/cycle of certain fashion trends. I'm positive that Ghost or Electric Wizard would have never made it that big without the image support.

About fashion, back then that kind of clothes were the current mode and they used it. Now it feels unrealistic/dishonest cause those fashion trends don't represent our time and also the music done by the retro bands it's not like the old one either; it's just a modern try for an old aesthetic/vibe, which will never be the same. I guess we can say the same about music.

What I think it was well done was the retro OSDM thing tho, since it was more a musical movement than an aesthetic trend.

Coven had ONE GOOD SONG, that's it. BTW, it could be a trend but it's not selling for shit or Argus (the best of them IMO) would be very rich right now.

There were always metal bands dressing up for shows and photoshoots.

I think you're really stuck on how this particular crop is dressing up, as if this was an entirely different phenomenon. I disagree that it is and don't understand what you are trying to say.

What is so wrong with this particular type of uniform? I guess that's what I'm not seeing.

His point is that this image is "retro" and that the "retro" image is new in metal, but I'm not sure that is 100% correct. From the early days, a large amount of metal has been interested in older music. A lot of the first wave/proto metal guys were primarily into blues and medieval music, and the thrash guys dug NWOBHM, not the current glam trend (granted, NWOBHM wasn't THAT old at the time, but it was still a step before the current). There has always been an interest in looking back, although perhaps it has become more prominent more recently, with the thrash revival a few years ago and the retro-doom thing that has been going on for a few years now, and he is comparing that to the almost obsession with vintage/retro just for the sheer sake it is vintage/retro that is popular in hipsters circles. It is the placing of value on something just because it is old that he is noticing, and pointing out bands expressing that through their image. At least, that is what I'm getting out of it - I'm not trying to speak for him, and I'm probably wrong.

If I'm right, though, I'd argue that the image thing is just part and parcel with the music being old school. These guys want to play vintage style doom (Don't reeeaallly know why Electric Wizard is being lumped in with the others, but anyway...), and are attracted to a multitude of elements from it - in the same way a vast majority (it would seem) of metalheads latch on to the denim-and-leather thing in general. In that way, things haven't changed at all.

I'm not quite sure how big the trend is seeing as none of these bands come anywhere near Australia, but I'd say it's more of a minor scene within metal than anything that's going to get mainstream success and start defining heavy metal from the outside.

As for their forgettability, I think most of what I've heard is quite great and hardly forced or derivitive. It may not be remembered 20 years down the track, because they're not really doing anything new or groundbreaking, just doing old-stuff well with a fresh twist.

I made a list of all the occult rock (and related retro-doom etc) bands I could find. http://www.reddit.com/r/Metal/comments/ ... ghost_jex/

I have been loving JATAO, Witch Mountain, Jex Thoth, Blood Ceremony and a lot more. I've got Venomous Maximus and Orcus Chylde on order. Orcus Chylde and Year of the Goat seem quite similar to JATAO to me, being that kind of layered progressive organ-y style. Kadavar, Witchcraft, Graveyard and others are a bit of a different sound, being a kind of dry hard rock with not much psych/prog/occult/Sabbath.

I wish the new trend was blackened power metal like Satan's Host.

No. It's not. It may have been like four years ago, with the rise of Southern Lord and the Sword copy-cats. But now? No fucking way.

Also, metalheads are the worst when criticizing "hipster fashion". You all pride yourselves on being removed from pop culture, yet claim to have these weird introspective visions on what hipsters like, who are by default, inherent to the flow of pop culture. So, it's really goddamn annoying when you all claim to know what these so called "hipsters" like, or what they look like, or how they act.

Where's fucking Noktorn when you need him...

Some of us know about hipsters. I'm a bartender and have to deal with them pretty much all day, every day.

Being a bartender in a hipster bar makes you a hipster, I'm afraid.

erotic hard rock



When i saw circle takes the square the drummer was wearing something with black metal patches all over it. The point is people like to reference stuff that they like very much and are influenced by.

I dress metal because i like the look. It just fits me. When i go to gigs and see other people dressing like me i think thats a cool thing. Other people with tastes similar as mine.

And yeah Electric Wizard seems kind of detached from their hipster/internet stoner image. They worship old music and have said that they only like metal till up to about 1990. They are dressing the way they because of this. They like their influences which vary from the occult to classic hard rock and traditional doom to movies and they like many people in music incorporate this in how they dress. It makes sense and is natural.

Roadburn is a festival filled mostly with people like me. Their tastes are maybe a bit broader than the average metalhead but these people in the end are the same people who will go see Grave Desecrater or Nasum.

This is a pretty awesome song actually. Quite catchy. If these guys would be a serious act I'd get into this. Is this a one-in-a-kind sort of band? Or are there more playing this stuff?

Yes, it's growing on me, too, for sure. I am still hesitant to acknowledge any merits of this band and their music; but it's entertaining, stupid fun that packs quite a punch and can withstand repeated listens without becoming stale (which can't be said about most of the so-called retro-doom bands, in my opinion).

The first demo tape - where the sample song is from and which was originally limited to 99 copies - will soon be re-released in 7" EP format (no label certain as of yet, but I believe it'll be Darker Than Black recs.), and it seems like Black Magick SS will continue as a full-fledged band.

As for other bands playing in this particular style, I can't say.

They should do a song about how Britain tried to use Aleister Crowley as an operative against the Nazis.

I've never found retro doom being the next trend, at least not here.
It seems black metal, noise and crust are really popular with the bearded hipsters from what I've seen.



I have to disagree with you there, this circa 1980's photo is far more trendier than the 2000's one, that's not to say I don't love Candlemass.

They are all wearing popular fashions of the time with the tight jeans, Adidas high tops and mullets were one of the most popular hairstyles of the time.
Look wise, they wouldn't have been classed as really cool but they are certainly taking on the trend fashion of the time.

Right. These bands were from the 80's, and it was just the way bands looked at the time. Wearing flouncy Stevie Nicks shit in 2012 and self-consciously making your music sound "old" comes across as trying too hard.

Can't say much about the look of the bands, but it seems to me that good/serious/dedicated musicians make their music sound the way it does because that sound is what they like to hear. I have heard many definitions of "hipster", and the one I think people want to apply is that these people don't take anything seriously and are trying to adopt a lifestyle with which they have no experience or dedication, as though it were nothing more than a style of clothing. It seems to me you meet people like that in most spheres, and if they aren't dedicated enough they'll be gone in a short time anyway. I can't speak for anybody else, but I know the Blood Ceremony guys take their stuff very seriously, and the principal people behind the band are honestly fanatical about vintage movies, music, literature and so on. It's something I can identify with, too; I feel the same way in many aspects, and I don't see anything wrong with making your music sound as though it were recorded in the early 70s, if you can...there were some amazing sounds back then.

It was just the way bands looked at the time because that's how they wanted to look. It's not by accident. That's fashion.

As for the sound... once again I don't understand. All bands (at least those worth a shit) pay attention to how they sound. Whether they want to sound machine-like and futuristic, current, low-fi black or retro 70s. It's a creative choice. One that we may like or not.

I don't know. It still looks to me like a bunch of people on this thread are trying to justify their dislike of retro by inventing new rules and not applying them to the rest of the music world.

Retro bands dress retro and sound retro? Holy fuck! How shocking!

I agree with Riffs...

Although I think the tag "retro band" is a bit of a disservice, since I don't think the idea behind the good bands is so much, "wow, weren't the 70s (when we weren't even born) a cool time? Let's go back there!"--rather, it's probably more along the lines of "the stuff I've found from back then is really amazing and unique, and there should be more, so rather than wallowing completely in passive nostalgia, let's make some."

The only thing I learned from this thread is how stupid I was not to check out Mourning Beloveth until now.

I have to agree, especially in regards to a bnad like Blood Ceremony - I don't know them or anything, but I picked up the first record on a whim when it came out and there is nothing but pure conviction behind that record, they know what they are doing, and clearly love it honestly.

I'm just not seeing that much of a difference between the way doom bands dress and the rest of the metal crowd. I guess there have always been minor staples in fashion like grindcore or death metal bands wearing huge slacky camo pants or whatever, but really, a metal fashion has always existed and whether or not you want to accept it, there have always been loads of people willing to adopt this fashion or even try to shape up to it. There were a lot of horrible ideas and a lot of great ideas in metal style from since it began, all the way up to today. Sure there are lots of people who don't care so much about their appearance and just wear a t-shirt and jeans everywhere they go. But if a significant number of people didn't follow trends, then a significant number of people also would not be going through all of the trouble and expenses to maintain their hair, buy band patches, dark clothing, jackets, studded stuff, hats, sunglasses, get tattoos and all these other "metal" staples of appearance. It doesn't necessarily make them shallow, it's just their way of communicating with people their musical or cultural taste right off the bat. Appearing or sounding "retro" is no exception.

It's Madison, Wisconsin. Every bar is a hipster bar.

I don't care if you take your stuff seriously if your main goal is to "seem" like something more than actually creating interesting, new music/art. Hipsters are defined predominantly as a group of people whose interest is exactly in trying to look like something. They want to be perceived, above all, as cool, intellectual, detached, etc, etc. Choose the hipster sub-genre you want. The thing is the look. They are the posers of today. So wanting to desperately "look" and "sound" 70s is pretty lame to me. I'd much rather have a band whose main concern is trying different things with the music, attempting new art, not to make a cosplay/live RPG/reenacting game of the 1970s.

You could replace retro 70s with any other genre and write the same kind of diatribe.

much
like
your
POSTING!!
*throws the hipster horns (thumb out, ofc) and gallops off to the soundtrack of... true metal??? we were the hipsters all along...*

I'm sorry I just can't take people seriously when they whine about hipsters, and in the year of our lord 2013 too. The sheer arrogance in claiming knowledge of peoples' likes and tastes, especially when you've not even met them, is just mind boggling. Add that to the fact that the definition of hipster seems to change depending on who you want to sling mud at, and there's really no substance to it at all.

Thing is, people make the music they want to make for butt-loads of different reasons. Some people like the sound, some people want to portray a particular image, some want to roll around in cocaine and hookers. All of these motives are valid, and can produce different results. What, do you think Black Sabbath made a very pop-ish song like "Paranoid" purely out of integrity alone? There's also a good deal of mainstream sensibility in the writing of songs like that, and an image to play up to as well, not too different from the modern "retro" bands nowadays.

Maybe the songwriting with some modern bands can be a bit limp, but that's a completely different discussion.