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’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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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?

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.

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.”

I am somewhat confused as to why you keep bringing up polka though.

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.

@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.

*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.

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.

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)