It must be some sort of mid-life crisis, or maybe a Metal-life crisis if you will. I have found myself at 36 years old listening to more Heavy Metal music than I have in probably the last 15 years or so. Why is this? The only thing I could do to answer this question was to trace it back to the very beginning. Why did I start listening to it in the first place? As a young boy, it had everything to do with finding myself. It was about finding the music that gave me a sense of inclusion and made me feel like I wasn’t alone. Even though I don’t have that need to feel included or understood, I think I just felt the need to expand my horizons once again. It seems that for the past 10 years or so there was very little variation in my music listening. Don’t get me wrong, I still love and listen to some of my favorite Folk artists, Jam Bands and Roots Rockers but I found myself not really exposing myself to much new stuff. I never base what I like on a genre. If it’s good and I like it, well, I like it. The Jam Band scene stopped turning out good bands sometime around 2000 or so and most of the new Folk music isn’t really Folk music as much as “smooth singer/songwriter” types so because of this, I just listened to the same shit all the time.
Sometime around 2007 or so, I co-hosted a Podcast called The Heavy Metal Lunch with my best friend Jaymz. Basically, him and I found that we had a common love for most things Metal and a few times a week got together and talked about Heavy Metal music over lunch hence the name. This re-opened the once closed portal to Heavy Metal music for me and once again I found myself remembering why I fell in love with this music. As we got more into the Podcast, I found myself digging deep into my Metal past and realizing that while a lot of what I loved back then was pretty crappy stuff that didn’t stand the test of time, there was a lot of stuff that was still great. While the portal was opened up, I found myself dabbling in some current Metal acts and found that there were a few out there that really sparked my interest. Bands like Lacuna Coil, Shadows Fall and Within Temptation presented a type of Heavy Metal that was new and very exciting to my ears. I suddenly remembered what it felt like to hear bands like Iron Maiden, Dio and Metallica for the first time. Hearing these newer bands made me see that not all modern Metal music was that “Nu-Metal” bullshit.
After moving to Atlanta, GA in 2009, I met my good buddy Aaron who introduced me to some amazing current Metal bands that I would’ve never known existed. Aaron was like my friends older brother back in the day. He’d say stuff like, “Man, if you like Pantera, you should check these guys out” and he slips me a copy of Five Finger Death Punch’s “War Is The Answer” album. Goddamn how did I not know these guys even existed? Then off we were on our Metal Friendship as he turned me on to such fantastic artists such as German Symphonic Metal band Avantasia, LA’s In This Moment and Canada’s 3 Inches of Blood. Hearing all these new bands really opened that portal even more for me to let myself be exposed to more new bands. Like with anything, not every band I came across was good or clicked with me. Some left me scratching my head and not really feeling a connection with them.
Rediscovering Heavy Metal has been a great experience for me these days. It has reminded me about what it was like to be an open minded music love and how to make room for some new things in life. I almost feel like I have digressed in age by about 10 years since doing so. Why is that? I think it’s because listening to the same old music all day, every day can age you a bit. Discovering a new band that you really connect with is a breath of life that keeps you excited and pumped about being a music fan. Now I’m not saying I’ve tossed aside the “classics.” It’s more like I’ve given them some new company.
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