Like any good teenage metalhead, I hated rap music. In my early youth, I had enjoyed the pop rap antics of MC Hammer, The Fresh Prince and yes even Vanilla Ice, but once metal came along, that rather embarrassing part of my musical evolution was deliberately buried and left for dead. In high school, I found myself hitching rides on occasion with my friend Jon, an eclectic, down-to-earth dude with a taste for rap in addition to rock and metal. I distinctly remember him saying, “I know you don’t like this shit, but we’re gonna listen to it,” and throwing on some random 2Pac (or was it Too $hort?) album. Even in Iowa, rap music was everywhere in the 1990s; on TV, the radio, magazines, my friend’s cars and parties, there was no escaping it. At some point I finally caved, and although my appreciation of rap never grew to the obsessive levels that my appreciation for heavy metal did, I began to appreciate it nonetheless.
I found myself drawn to gangsta rap, specifically to the West Coast G-Funk sound defined by Dr. Dre’s landmark 1992 album The Chronic. Part Parliament/Funkadelic and part blaxploitation soundtrack, The Chronic was rife with deep, slow beats and high-pitched synth patterns, as well as a combination of samples and live instrumentation; the album seemed like a party until you realized that much of the lyrical content dealt with violence and misogyny. Fueled by Dre’s feud with former NWA (who’s Straight Outta Compton album is arguably gangsta ground zero) bandmate Eazy E, songs such as “Fuck wit’ Dre Day” featured lyrical beatdowns such as:
“Mister Busta, where the fuck you at / Can’t scrap a lick, so I know ya got your gat / Your dick on hard, from fuckin’ your road dogs / The hood you threw up with, n***** you grew up with / Don’t even respect your ass / That’s why it’s time for the doctor, to check your ass, n**** / Used to be my homey, used to be my ace / Now I wanna slap the taste out yo’ mouth / N**** bow down to the row / Fuckin’ me, now I’m fuckin’ you, little hoe / Oh, don’t think I forgot, let you slide, Let me ride / just another homicide”
Pretty brutal shit, especially when one considers that Dre is talking about killing a real-life former friend, not some imaginary victim ala the average Cannibal Corpse song, for instance. While I have little doubt that many of the beefs that defined gangsta rap at the time were embellished and blown out of proportion in order to generate notoriety and sell records, there’s still something chilling about the reality lurking behind those lyrics. Eazy E would eventually succumb to AIDS in 1995, but not before firing off a few dis tracks of his own such as the excellent ”Real Muthaphuckkin’ G’s.”
Even more than The Chronic, the album that defined the era was Snoop Doggy Dogg’s Doggystyle. Snoop was an unknown when Dr. Dre plucked him out of obscurity to rap with him on the theme song for the film Deep Cover and then The Chronic, but his smooth flow, which is somehow both lazy-sounding and nimble at the same time made him an instant star. Although my rap knowledge is severely lacking in comparison to my knowledge of metal, I do know that Doggystyle is one of the greatest debut albums in the history of rap, probably in the history of music in general. It is a perfect companion piece to The Chronic, but in many ways surpasses it; the production is even funkier, the rhymes are more clever and the hooks are hookier. Just like The Chronic though, there are threads of darkness hiding beneath the party atmosphere and “don’t give a fuck” attitude. In “Murder was the Case,” Snoop makes an ill-fated deal with the Devil in exchange for success, while “Serial Killa” features the hook “Suicide, it’s a suicide” and some murderous lyrics from Daz and Kurupt while Snoop damns his fallen enemies to “go down with the Devil” and “roam through the depths of hell.” It’s RBX’s verse that steals the song however, with some uniquely gruesome wordplay and an idiosyncratic flow. RBX comes in at around the 2:25 mark in the video below.
Snoop Dogg wasn’t the only rapper dealing with the Devil though. The D.O.C., a rapper who had written lyrics for NWA was left with a voice that made him sound like a hip hop demon after being involved in a near-fatal car accident, and his music took an apocalyptic turn on 1996′s often overlooked and underrated Helter Skelter. Take a listen to The D.O.C.’s endtime prophesying on “Secret Plan,” which even includes a cameo from Jello Biafra. “Remember, religion is but a tool to control your ass.”
In 1998, DMX unleashed his debut album, It’s Dark and Hell is Hot. Much like Snoop Dogg before him, DMX rapped about selling his soul to the Devil in order to gain the trifecta of wealth, fame and power on the track “Damien.” The interesting thing about “Damien” is that it could also be interpreted as a sort of hip hop Jeckyll and Hyde story; is DMX being preyed upon by a malignant outside force, or is he giving in to his own inner demons? DMX would go on to record various sequels to “Damien” (“Damien II” even featured guest vocals by Marilyn Manson on the hook), but none of them top the original, which can be streamed below.
While the aforementioned albums have dark undertones, none of them can compare to the permanent midnight that is Cypress Hill’s third album, Temples of Boom. Featuring a claustrophobic, drugged-out production scheme from DJ Muggs, this is the rap equivalent of doom metal, fuelled by tales of life on the streets and a shitload of weed. Hell, even the cover of Temples of Boom looks metal as hell.
Not only is Temples of Boom totally heavy and suffocating, it is also oddly psychedelic at times, as demonstrated by “Illusions,” a song that sees the band consumed by a marijuana-induced freak-out; B-Real raps “some people tell me that I need help / some people can fuck off and go to hell,”over a backing track that sounds like it belongs to the Jim Morrison peyote-dream sequence from The Doors. As the album progresses, you can almost feel yourself being taken deeper and deeper into Cypress Hill’s “temple of thieves;” there is no party atmosphere here, only blunted yet menacing beats and paranoid-schizophrenic rhymes, an absolute descent into madness, a madness madder than anything a metal band could ever hope to conjure up. Cypress Hill would go on to experiment with metal on later albums, even collaborating with members of Fear Factory, Deftones and Rage Against the Machine on the Skull & Bones and Stoned Raiders albums, but they would never again trip the dark fantastic the way they did on Temples of Boom, a truly one-of-a-kind hip hop recording that’s yet to be equalled.
Although I sincerely doubt that any of the albums I’ve talked about here will be new to you, I hope that maybe some of the aspects I’ve pointed out will help you to see them in a different light. If nothing else, I hope this little exercise has proven that there’s more to rap music than bitches and hos, and that there might even be something that even the most vehement of hip hop hating metalheads can enjoy. Keep an open mind and it just might win you over.
Further suggested listening:
Wu Tang Clan – Enter the Wu Tang (36 Chambers)
Dr. Octagon – Dr. Octogonecologyst
Busta Rhymes – The Coming
Master P – Ghetto D
Westside Connection – Bow Down
GZA – Liquid Swords
WC – The Shadiest One
2Pac – All Eyez on Me
Digital Underground – Sex Packets
Ice Cube – The Predator
Public Enemy – It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back
Beastie Boys – Check Your Head
Loved Westside Connection’s “Bow Down”. Going to dig it up. I hope I still have it!
Dr. Octagonecologist is maybe the best-produced rap album ever.
A bunch of underground-label (anticon, mush, def jux, rhymesayers) stuff from, like, ’99-’04 is real tight, too
I dabbled in Eminem for about a month, a little over a decade ago. That was plenty enough for me. I still don’t get what people see in this.
Cool to see this post here! NWA, Dr. Octagon, Beastie Boys, Wu-Tang Clan and Public Enemy will never get old to me. Other good stuff metal heads/frequent readers of this site may enjoy: X-Ecutioners, Deltron 3030, Three 6 Mafia, Arsonists and Tricky.
Oh shit, how could I forget Immortal Technique? It’s not 90′s, but it’s the hip-hop equivalent of black metal in my eyes. This song/video is especially haunting: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WgWcI7xKSU
Ice Cube’s Death Certificate. End of story. Considering that 50% of my current music collection is Bach and the other half is black metal and doom, the fact that I still love that album says a lot…
And Ill Communication by the B-Boys. RIP MCA…
@The Blog Less Traveled – unfortunately I no longer own some of these albums and am forced to settle for youtube clips and such… I sold off big chunks of my collection in college when I was poor as shit. Bow Down is on my list to re-purchase. “The gangsta, the killa and the dope dealer!”
@alex crowley – for me is a toss up between Dr. Octagon and Temples of Boom for my favorite production on a rap album… both Automator and Muggs are unfuckwithable on those records in my book.
@Full Metal Attorney – oh christ, where do I begin? Ok, a couple’a things…
1) Eminem is a fucking terrible place to start for a metalhead trying to appreciate rap music. I’m just going to assume that you have no appreciation for Parliament/Funkadelic, funk music in general, soul or blaxsploitation soundtracks, so the Cali g-funk stuff probably wouldn’t be a great place to start either. I’d stay start with Cypress Hill’s Temples of Boom, the Dr. Octagon album or maybe the first Gravediggaz (whom I egregiously neglected in this article) album… those are the probably the darkest, most twisted rap albums I know of, though there’s probably darker stuff lurking underground.
2) I know from reading your blog and comments on other sites that you don’t give a shit about lyrics (which I find odd and somewhat suspicious coming from someone who likes to write, btw), so I can understand why rap would not appeal to you. For me it’s all about the word-play and use of language, as well as the skill with which rappers construct their verses + the rhythmic qualities and other idiosyncrasies that make a rapper’s flow unique. As a fan of words, language, storytelling and how it all fits together, hip hop can be endlessly fascinating. The other part my interest is with the production/beat-making side of things, it can be very intricate and layered and there is a ton of craftsmanship involved.
@corporatedemon – I love me some Three Six Mafia, and that Deltron album was pretty rad too as I recall… definitely going to have to dig into some Immortal Technique, that track you posted is intriguing as hell.
@Sully – oh yeah Death Certificate is great too. I’ve always been a fan of The Predator because it was the first one I owned, but I like pretty much everything Cube did prior to becoming a star in kid’s movies ‘n’ shit.
In terms of some underground stuff that metalheads could like there’s Necro (who has done metal festivals before) and his brother Ill Bill. When teenagers in NY they were in a band called Injustice and opened for Sepultura and others. Trust me, no rap metal here, just a metal mentality.
Necro at 13 playing guitar and Bill at 17 on vocals. Great stuff. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjTYf79pdpE
And their rap stuff…
Necro – Mutilate The Beat
Bill has 2 groups plus a solo career, all stuff that metalheads could get into.
Ill Bill – War Is My Destiny featuring Max Cavelera and Immortal Technique
And his 2 groups…
La Coka Nostra featuring B-Real of Cypress Hill
Ill Bill and Vinnie Paz – Blood Meridian (Check this one out, even the video is metal. Cover art also done by Away from Voivod)
Anyone who loves really dark rap with complex rhymes should check out Shakespeare science by poetic death that is a fucking masterpiece. Lately I’ve been listening to a lot of old army of the Pharoahs and jmt and mob deep. And Immortal technique of course
People who find out my attitudes toward rap always seem to assume it’s because I haven’t found the right gateway. (I’m somewhat familiar with Cypress Hill, by the way.) And I would posit to you, that maybe you just haven’t found the right polka band yet. The genre simply doesn’t offer anything I’m interested in, while offering plenty I want nothing to do with.
It’s a little bit of an oversimplification to say I don’t give a shit about lyrics. I used to care, when I was first getting into music, and the lyrics of Korn really connected with my adolescent self. As I got older, those lyrics meant less to me, and I became more concerned with music. It was a gradual thing. I found the music more compelling and important than the lyrics, and now here I am. I would prefer not to be able to understand lyrics, regardless of content. If they must be comprehensible, I would at least hope they’re not stupid, and beyond that, that they don’t deeply offend me. I don’t listen for them, though. I find their content to be interesting academically at times, but merely for comparing how philosophy affects the music–e.g., trying to figure out why there are so few good Christian metal bands.
As far as liking words, I prefer to go to the writers for that. And I would hope that writers would stay out of music. Some people could be truly gifted at both, I suppose. I don’t know of any. This is basically my problem with the idea of musical theater. It’s neither good music, nor good theater. And the mashup doesn’t really make any sense, either. It makes about as much sense as a performance chef. Just bring me my sushi, please.
Interesting the discussion about hip hop and lyrics/flow – one of the main reasons I don’t like hip hop is (with me anyhow) you have to give it your full attention to get the benefit. And again this is probably just me, but there is virtually never a time when I’m listening to music when I’m not doing something else (working / reading / surfing the internet etc) and it just gets in the way*,**.
*don’t get me wrong, I love words, if I had to choose between fiction and music, then it’s the book every time.
**Am I wrong and am I not giving music the time it ‘deserves’? I almost felt guilty throwing a new album on and then just getting on with shit whereas Cosmo Lee would be (I imagine) sitting there staring at the album cover and lyric sheet and CONCENTRATING.
@Death to the New World Order – thank you for the numerous recommendations! You’ve given me a lot to chew on here.
@Chocolatebattleaxe – I’ll check out that Poetic Death album, thank you for sharing!
@Full Metal Attorney – Why would you prefer that lyrics be incomprehensible? Also re: “I would hope that writers would stay out of music,” why should a person only be allowed/limited to expressing themselves via a single medium? By that philosophy, you must think someone like Henry Rollins is the antichrist.
@steve57 – I think most people are doing other things while they consume music. I am “lucky” to have to take a 40 or so minute bus ride to and from work every day and this is about the only time I get to just listen to music without distractions, either that or when I’m in the car and my wife is driving, if we’re not in the midst of conversation. When I was in college, I would just sit in my room and listen for hours at a time without distraction, but those days are long gone. Maybe that is why I stick with the old hip hop that I already know.
As to preferring incomprehensible lyrics, I find lyrics distract from the music. I prefer music with vocals, but in an incomprehensible style or language. I like the emotional content, but words engage the wrong part of the brain and detract from that pure musical experience.
As to the second part of your question, honestly, I think I’ve already explained that pretty well. I’m not sure where the confusion lies.
My great-grandmother had a respectable polka collection. I’m not sure where it is, but I might be able to hook you up.
@Full Metal Attorney – I’m not confused, I just don’t find your original statement to be particularly satisfying. I mean, not liking musicals doesn’t have shit to do with people who write being involved in music, or people who paint also writing, or rappers painting or whatever. I think there have been enough great polymaths throughout history, whether we’re talking about the arts or science or sports or whatever, from da Vinci and Carl Sagan to Henry Rollins and Bo Jackson, to prove that the idea that a person should limit themselves strictly to one form of expression is just downright silly.
I am somewhat confused as to why you keep bringing up polka though.
I said some people could truly be gifted at both. So there was a miscommunication. Mostly my fault, I suppose, given that the statement to which you refer was intended as hyperbole. I thought context made that clear.
The musicals connection makes perfect sense, though. The vast majority of talented people aren’t really that great at multiple things. When you try to make music and lyrics of equal importance–or worse, to subject the music to the lyrics–then it’s almost always going to make for bad music. King Diamond is just about the only exception I can think of.
I bring up polka as a stand-in for rap (although other genres might do just as well to make the point). Others say I just haven’t found the right rap artist. I say if that’s true, then you just haven’t found the right polka band. You might counter that polka doesn’t have anything to offer you, that nothing about its characteristics appeals to you. I would say, “Exactly.”
@Full Metal Attorney – You act as if lyrics are somehow a separate entity from the whole of the music. Lyrics are no more or less important than what notes the guitarist choses to employ; they are an equal component to the song, another piece of the message the band is trying to convey. Every element of the music should be focused on conveying that message or emotion, whether it be lyrics, riffs, solos, melodies, note choices, tonalities, tempos, drum fills, whatever, creating a unified whole.
Also, musical theater has been around since at least Ancient Greece and continues to flourish after all this time, so on behalf of the majority of civilization, I’ma go ahead and disagree with you.
I guessing you don’t listen to much music outside the metal realm, if any at all.
Oh, and also this…
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYWvi4Y5soU?rel=0&w=420&h=315%5D
“I guessing you don’t listen to much music outside the metal realm, if any at all.”
I was under the impression you still read my blog, at least every now and then. So I was assuming some knowledge on your part that you didn’t have, and I think that may have led to at least some of this misunderstanding.
“You act as if lyrics are somehow a separate entity from the whole of the music. Lyrics are no more or less important than what notes the guitarist choses to employ; they are an equal component to the song”
That’s complete bullshit. Lyrics are different in kind from everything else that makes up music, and to understand them invokes an entirely different part of your brain. (Well, I’m no neuroscientist, but it seems to me it acts on the brain quite differently.)
It’s probably kind of a douchy thing to cite the dictionary in an argument, but here you go:
“1. an art of sound in time that expresses ideas and emotions in significant forms through the elements of rhythm, melody, harmony, and color.
2. the tones or sounds employed, occurring in single line (melody) or multiple lines (harmony), and sounded or to be sounded by one or more voices or instruments, or both.
3. musical work or compositions for singing or playing.
4. the written or printed score of a musical composition.
5. such scores collectively.
6. any sweet, pleasing, or harmonious sounds or sound: the music of the waves.
7. appreciation of or responsiveness to musical sounds or harmonies: Music was in his very soul.
8. Fox Hunting . the cry of the hounds. ”
Nothing about words in there. I’ve read a handful of other definitions, as well as the Wikipedia article on the “Definition of music” (even more douchy), and there’s nothing about words (well, in the Wiki article there is, but only insofar as it’s speaking about different words for music, not about words in music).
There was a time in my life when I had time to do nothing but listen, and then I would pay more attention; the time when I had that luxury is long over. Now I have to engage the words and logic part of my brain elsewhere while I listen. As I think I was making clear, I don’t completely reject words in music, but it’s a totally different experience when I listen to music that focuses on lyrics, e.g., Johnny Cash. But it takes a very special voice or delivery to force me to care about lyrics; his is just about the only one, although the upcoming Panopticon record has its moments. Even when I listen to folk/alt-country, I still don’t pay attention to lyrics all that much. Steve Von Till’s voice catches my ear with a lyric now and again, whereas Scott Kelly’s very similar voice doesn’t. David Eugene Edwards does much of the time, but it’s usually abstract enough that it doesn’t matter. But I appreciate them for the music. If the lyrics force themselves on me, then so be it. I can appreciate them if they’re very good. Chances are, lyrics don’t help.
Now, to get to the real kicker for this whole thing, if you have to look at a lyric sheet to understand the words, then your argument completely falls apart. There’s no way around that. Also, if I can listen to music and enjoy it my way, who are you to disagree?
Oh yeah, also: I used to really like Weird Al. Now he’s something I could take or leave.
“3. musical work or compositions for singing or playing.”
People typically sing words, which in turn form lyrics. So there you go.
But honestly textbook definitions of art are utterly worthless. You can’t confine art to some bullshit definition no matter what your art history teacher or music teacher might have you believe. Expression cannot be contained or put in such simplistic black and white terms. Actually, my art history teacher specifically told us not to buy the textbook.
Why does having to look at a lyric sheet make my argument fall apart? Is it really so difficult or cumbersome to have to read a set of lyrics? Understanding the lyrics can only enhance and enrich the listening experience, in addition to being a fundamental component of understanding what the band is trying to convey. But hey, if you’re too lazy to read lyrics or would prefer to remain blissfully ignorant as to the actual intent of the art you consume, that’s your thing, go with it.
I suppose next you’re going to tell me that when you read comic books, you only look at the pictures, or watch foreign films without the subtitles, or only look at the bottom half of the Mona Lisa.
BTW, I do stop by your blog periodically, at least, enough to know that I fundamentally disagree with most of what you have to say. And there’s nothing wrong with that, people are wired differently.
Not utterly worthless, but a good place to start, I would say.
In contrast to your comparisons, it’s not like watching a foreign film without subtitles. Not at all. Needing a lyric sheet to understand the lyrics is like having to explain a joke.
Here we are again at that “what the band is trying to convey” thing. Honestly I have no idea why that’s important. You’re going to let someone else dictate how you enjoy something? So everyone who watches “Plan 9 from Outer Space” to make fun of it is, somehow, doing it wrong?
I’m sorry, but you’re wrong on this. Not that the way you appreciate it is wrong. But your assertion that music must be consumed a particular way is so very incredibly and completely wrong.
You’re so obsessed with right and wrong. Must be that whole lawyer thing.
Anyway, now I see why we’re speaking different languages here. It appears that your only interest in art is to be entertained. My interest is not only to be entertained, but also to understand. Art is a form of expression, so of course I want to understand what the artist is attempting to express. I don’t want to just listen to a band and say well “well golly gee, that sure is a nice riff.” I want to immerse myself in the world the artist is creating, the story they’re trying to tell, what it is they’re trying to communicate and hopefully take something from that that I can identify and connect with. At the end of the day that’s what all art is to me (regardless of whatever Wikipedia and the Dictionary say) a form of communication, and while part of the reason I listen to metal is because I want to headbang and listen to awesome riffage, that for me is only scratching the surface, exerting the bare minimum of effort.
I’m not saying your way is wrong. I have no interest in such absolutes when it comes to art. What I am saying is that I find your way to be lazy, ignorant and ultimately incomplete. Again not wrong, just half-assed.
I’m not the one who injected right and wrong into this discussion, even if I was the first to use that terminology. Ignorant, half-assed, lazy–these are just a particular kind of wrong.
I didn’t bring up the dictionary and Wikipedia as some kind of final authority. I brought them up only to prove the point that lyrics are not necessarily of equal importance to the music.
Admittedly, my way of consumption is not as immersive as a method which eliminates outside distractions. I would love to have time to listen to music without having to do anything else. But I still wouldn’t read the lyric sheets. You can immerse yourself in art and get a lot out of it without lyrics. Great art can be interpreted in many ways.
To bring up one of my favorite topics, it’s like Tolkien’s attitudes on metaphor vs. allegory. Allegory is heavy-handed and can only be understood one way, but metaphor is more open. Reading lyrics makes the experience more like allegory than metaphor. That feels incomplete and unsatisfying to me. It’s heavy-handed and one-sided, whereas I think my way is more interactive between myself and the music. Some of my reviews will throw out the images the music brings to my mind, which gives insight into the way I think.
If the musicians really thought they were that important, they wouldn’t make it so hard to understand. They’d deliver them more like Akerfeldt, whom you can actually understand when he’s growling. My way is not half-assed. Another way to look at viewing the lyric sheet is like watching a movie with director’s commentary. You wouldn’t call that essential to the art.
My sense is that lyrics have always been of minor importance in metal. There are many stories of musicians finally putting the lyrics together just before recording, and the entire genre of death metal is full of lyrics that are pure pulp. I’ve read countless interviews where, when lyrics come up, I get the impression that the artist doesn’t really care about them, or their lyrical approach is just a joke. Like that Nazi band you covered the other day; there’s no way they meant to be taken seriously when they dressed up like that.
Finally, I still haven’t heard any compelling reason why the artist’s intent matters. I’m going to appeal to the entire history of art criticism to back me up. Yes, they often speculate about the artist’s intent. But there’s a lot more meaning to be gleaned than what the artist intended.
I hope this will allow you to understand. If it doesn’t, then we’ll just have to agree to disagree, because I don’t think I can explain it any better.
As an afterthought, I should mention that I think I’m beginning to feel compelled to read the lyrics for Panopticon’s Kentucky, because what I have understood has really intrigued me. But that is a rarity. I think the last time I looked up lyrics was for some Gojira back in ’08.
And this is why we will never agree. You see lyrics as the musical equivalent of director’s commentary. I see lyrics as the dialogue. Director’s commentary is a “bonus feature” that may or may not provide insight, while dialogue is utterly essential to the work. I prefer to experience art in its totality, you make a conscious decision to treat an aspect of it that doesn’t interest you as peripheral.
I’ve seen plenty of stories about lyrics being put together just before recording, but I don’t think that necessarily means they’re an afterthought. In fact, I think there is a lot to be said for that kind of spontaneous creativity. Genres such as metal and punk often have an immediacy to them that suits that kind of approach. As far as the “pulp” aspect is concerned, HP Lovecraft was considered pulp fiction while he was alive, and I have nothing but the highest admiration for his work. I also enjoy the work that Chris Barnes put into his early Cannibal Corpse lyrics; totally repulsive and extreme, yet somehow totally enthralling, and having to read the booklet to know what he’s saying takes nothing away from that experience; I can flip back and forth between his words and Vincent Locke’s artwork while listening, and that’s definitely an enhancement, not a distraction. If Nyogthaeblisz’s intention with their get-ups isn’t to be taken seriously, than what is it? Are they a comedy band? Perhaps, but in taking in their overall aesthetic I find that tough to believe.
Can we always totally immerse ourselves in music? Of course not. But if I’m going to write about something, I’m damn sure going to make every effort to do so. I feel that it’s my job as a journalist and critic, even if I do this shit for free. I’m not trying to write a “buyer’s guide” here. I’m trying to make some sense of my thoughts, impressions and interpretations. If others dig it and go buy a record, great. I hope people identify with and appreciate what I have to say, but if not, that’s cool too.
I do agree with your point that “there’s a lot more meaning to be gleaned than what the artist intended.” Part of what we’re doing is filtering art through our own lens and relating it to our own lives and perspectives. For me personally, that is difficult to do without having the complete picture. I find it frustrating when bands don’t include lyrics, maybe this supports your point that lyrics are unimportant to them, perhaps they want people to have no basis for their interpretation. I also don’t enjoy when I’m unable to find translations of lyrics in other languages. I don’t think the artist is obligated to provide translations, but I do feel like I am missing a piece of the puzzle, regardless.
Correction: I see lyric sheets (and everything else you might find in the booklet) as the equivalent of director’s commentary or credits at the end of the film. Sometimes, but not often, I do watch bonus features.
Comparing two different kinds of art in this way is always a little bit of a stretch, but I think the above is pretty fair. On the contrary, to say that lyrics are like the dialogue of a movie is completely unfair. A movie is about a story, and dialogue is absolutely essential (in most cases) to tell that story. (On the other hand, some truly great films could be enjoyed just fine without.) Music is quite different. You don’t have to read or hear the sonnets that accompany “The Four Seasons” to appreciate it.
Insofar as I may treat some aspect of the work as peripheral by conscious choice, that is no different from your decision to treat it as essential. However, to go outside the work itself–to the lyric sheet–is, I think, more of a conscious choice, if that makes sense.
Pulp can be very good. I won’t deny that. Everything Tarantino has directed has been pulp, but the way it’s done is superb, elevating it to the status of “art.” Not all pulp is, though. Nyogthaeblisz’s intention appears to be to cause shock, not unlike Venom or Kiss or countless others, and what I got out of it was that there was a barely perceptible wink-and-nudge.
I’ve discussed the “buyer’s guide” versus in-depth essay thing before, in other places, and I think they both have their place. I have nothing but deep respect for your reviews. And considering the format of reviews you do, I would be inclined to agree that reading the lyrics or at least doing more thorough research about the band would be essential. Essential, that is, to discussing it in the way you do. But again, there’s another way, and another purpose to the shorter format. If you have no respect for the format, that’s fine, but many people (myself included) find it useful. I only dig deeper into a very small handful of releases, the ones that end up in my top 5 or top 10 of the year. But that usually does not entail reading the lyrics.
I should clarify what I mean by “dig[ging] deeper.” I mean listening to it many times. Most records only get 4 to 6 real listens from me, a handful get only 3, while an even smaller handful gets closer to a dozen in a year. Digging deeper may also include looking into a band’s prior work, or its members prior work, in an effort to get new perspective. It can also mean researching their history or reading interviews. It’s exceedingly rare that it involves reading the lyrics, and then only if my interest in them is already piqued.
“to say that lyrics are like the dialogue of a movie is completely unfair. A movie is about a story, and dialogue is absolutely essential (in most cases) to tell that story”
So, songs don’t tell stories? Interesting. Let’s put that to the test, shall we? Here are a portion of the lyrics to “Followed Home Then Killed” by Cannibal Corpse.
“Silently I enter through the broken basement window now to wait
It’s twelve o’clock the time has come ascend the staircase to the hunted one
Make way to the second floor right outside your open bedroom door
One last time to sleep in peace unaware of brutal things that
Will be done
To you after you awake
Enter slow
Machete leads the way
Eerie calm
Death is in the air
Savage thrust
Death is everywhere”
Hey look at that, a narrative! Some might even call it a story! Ok, let’s make sure this isn’t a fluke and try another one. Here’s a chunk of the lyrics to one we all know and love, Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man.”
“He was turned to steel
in the great magnetic field
When he travelled time
for the future of mankind
Nobody wants him
He just stares at the world
Planning his vengeance
that he will soon unfold
Now the time is here
for Iron Man to spread fear
Vengeance from the grave
Kills the people he once saved”
Yep, pretty sure there’s a story there too. Ozzy is telling the tale of the song’s titular Iron Man, via some simple and direct yet potent lyrics by Geezer Butler, and you don’t even need a lyric sheet to follow along.
We can look beyond metal for songs that tell stories, because they’re everywhere… it’s a common thread that goes back the earliest and most primitive of musical traditions, on up to folk, blues, hip hop, rock and yes, even heavy metal. I reckon whether or not those stories are important to you is a personal choice, but one cannot deny that there are stories aplenty in music.
RE: the “buyer’s guide vs. essay debate,” it isn’t so much that I don’t respect the buyer’s guide style of reviewing, I just find it outmoded. I can find an album online or at the very least sample tracks and make a decision for myself in less than half the time it takes me to read even a brief review. I’m sure there are old fashioned folk that still rely on those types of reviews, but in my eyes they’re getting more and more obsolete all the time.
And with that said, I’m closing the comments on this post for a couple reasons. 1) I tire of this ridiculous debate and 2) This is THKD and I’m God here (or Satan whatever) and that means I get the final word.