What’s the deal with metal?

If there is one reaction I get most often, when it comes to music, is the shock and surprise of others when they find out what I listen to.

It isn’t just because I listen to metal. I mean, come on, loads of people listen to something they call metal. Certain aspects of metal are just super mainstream, and so that isn’t surprising.

No, it is more the breadth and depth of my metal love that shocks people.

And that is what I love so much about metal music. There is a type of metal for every mood, for every mindset, for every occasion. There is metal that is calm, quiet, introspective and sedate. There is metal that is stunningly technical, played by people with just insane amounts of skill. There is metal that just wants to take your head and (figuratively) bash it in.

There is metal that is slow, brooding, moody. There is metal that is fast, furious and just insane above and beyond anything most people have heard.

That doesn’t even begin to touch on the lyricism. Sure, there is lyrical crap in metal, as in anything. But it can be deeply personal, it can address mental illness, loss, heartbreak and pain. It can also be fantastical, science fiction, historical. Really, it is all over the place.

And then add in the different tools and instruments, and you have a complete cornucopia of music. Folk instruments, full orchestras, electronics, bag pipes, and so many others have all found their way into amazing metal releases.

And I sort of love it all.

Traditional, progressive, technical, black, death, symphonic, power, doom, thrash, post, sludge, djent, and so forth, I’ll check it all out. You want some blackened symphonic death? I can find that. You want instrumental progressive post-metal? Got that too.

It never gets boring, it never gets old, and it never fails to put a smile on my face. No matter how bad a day is, I can find some metal that either compliments, or lifts my mood. No matter how heavy, how mellow, how fast, or how ponderously slow, there is something for every occasion.

That’s the deal with metal.