The (badly) aging metaler

[s2bs2]

you love what you love. don't stop 'cuz some says you're fat or bald, and if they do, go Norwegian death metal on them. ;-)

 

[SlugThrower]

These two episodes say it all:

 

[alaskaleftybass]

There is an invisible threshold one crosses concerning age and you don't know it until you cross it. You are still you, your mind still remembers when you were 20-30-something. You still have the spirit of a warrior and the passion. But physical factors start changing your playing habits and capabilities.

I salute those who can still get up and rock and roll into their sixties. Eric Clapton just turned 70 and everyone is begging him to continue touring, although he's retired twice.

Eric Clapton at Madison Square Garden celebrating his 70th birthday tour:

As for "badly aging Metal" here's an example of 60+ metalheads. These guys helped write the book on Metal. This is a 2015 picture by the way:

For those of you glorifying your youthful vigor and proclaiming disdain for "aging" musicians, about 10% of you MIGHT be still playing by that age. Careers, marriage, kids and mortal casualties will take the rest.

There's a lot of living to learn after 40. Heavyjazz, as for the cartoon in your original post, that is a very bad reflection on you. What kind of mind pictures these things?

 

[alaskaleftybass]

He's dressing better. Can't say much for the Eagle Scouts standing behind him.

Then again, this was already done:

God, I forgot how hot that video was! I'd love to have that band as a backup!

 

[twinjet]

Just suit up for jazz, and you're one classy mother...

 

[DwaynieAD]

My take on image is coming from the days of when WASP were doing all kind of crazy stuff with fake saw blades & Ronnie James Dio was sitting on thrones with dragons in the background, so wearing black t-shirts is a far cry from that IMHO.

You are confusing theatrics and stage show with image.

 

[JES]

60 year olds raging at their parents sounds silly. But that's the approach of talk therapy and you pay by the hour.... If people want to rage for free, let them go for it.

This thread also suggests a lot of people who don't listen to metal don't realize the range of lyrical topics covered, or the range of great instrumental work happening now under the banner.

That said, as I get older, I have less patience for dumb lyrics in the bands I'm in, or fake angst. But that doesn't mean I don't want to rock.Metal can also be a totally joyous and comic experience.

As for the narrow range of appearance, if you can't look at people except for those who conform to your narrow standards, I think you've got the issue, not them.

 

[DwaynieAD]

I believe that they dress like their audience -- still living at home in mom's basement, unemployed, no money for clothes, etc.

That crowd "keeps it real".

It's a totally contrived "image".

Yes all of us metal heads with careers, our own homes, families, etc are just figments of someone's imagination.

 

[Son of Wobble]

Everyone remembers Blackie Lawless from the Heavy Metal band WASP, well here he is back in the 80'sView attachment 686323 View attachment 686323

Wow, Dan, I'm seeing my life flash before my eyes with your post.

I remember being all of 16 years old in 1979, and my older, wiser friend (25?) drove us from the 'burbs into Hollywood
to check out a band called Circus Circus at The Starwood. My buddy explained that the band was fronted by one "Blackie Guseman," (presumably an
abandoned alias), and described Blackie as slightly pitiable because he had failed thus far to launch a solvent project (Imagine, already written off at 22 or 23 -- but then, Iggy Pop was likewise considered a has-been at that age).

Circus Circus put on a good show that night, but my older buddy was unimpressed with Blackie's culminating action, shooting a blank from a revolver into a styrofoam wig head. My pal, a longtime Alice fan, thought it derivative, and pronounced that the band would not prove Blackie's champion horse, either: he'd have to try again.

A LONG three years later, Blackie hit with W.A.S.P.

That was 1982.

Now here we sit over three decades later discussing the flipside of the man's career.

Tempus, it sure fugit!

 

[Sixgunn]

I don't know if anyone noticed, but the OP has apparently gone the way of the condor. I'm thinkin'...... troll.

 

[Sixgunn]

Wow, Dan, I'm seeing my life flash before my eyes with your post.

I remember being all of 16 years old in 1979, and my older, wiser friend (25?) drove us from the 'burbs into Hollywood
to check out a band called Circus Circus at The Starwood. My buddy explained that the band was fronted by one "Blackie Guseman," (presumably an
abandoned alias), and described Blackie as slightly pitiable because he had failed thus far to launch a solvent project (Imagine, already written off at 22 or 23 -- but then, Iggy Pop was likewise considered a has-been at that age).

Circus Circus put on a good show that night, but my older buddy was unimpressed with Blackie's culminating action, shooting a blank from a revolver into a styrofoam wig head. My pal, a longtime Alice fan, thought it derivative, and pronounced that the band would not prove Blackie's champion horse, either: he'd have to try again.

A LONG three years later, Blackie hit with W.A.S.P.

That was 1982.

Now here we sit over three decades later discussing the flipside of the man's career.

Tempus, it sure fugit!

View attachment 686491

Oh man!! I LOVED The Starwood!!!

 

[JimmyM]

If the "new acts of today" have something to say, they'll make their own space.

Exactly. Nobody owes it to any new act to get out of their way. That's absolute nonsense. Either you're good or you suck, and if an act retires, that doesn't mean you automatically move up one notch. Seriously...get over yourselves!

 

[tedious1]

If you shave, dress up 'nicely' and play metal, it would look more silly.

They may not shave, but the hair is well groomed, welcome to Heavy Nedal music courtesy of Okilly Dokilly.

 

[hintz]

[QUOTE="Kragnorak, post: 17759287, . Has anyone ever seen someone take door #3? Because the only time I see someone learn something new it's a guy like Flea that was already a good musician and later in life he tackles jazz. I've never seen a Sid Vicious/Kerry King type guy knuckle down at age 50 and say "now I'm going to master flamenco music" or something. If there are exceptions PLEASE tell me!
[/LIST][/QUOTE]

Kirk from Metallica studied jazz in the 90's, Alex Skolnick too...I'm sure there are others I'm not aware of or forgetting

 

[Son of Wobble]

Oh man!! I LOVED The Starwood!!!

One of my favorite bassists of that era, and one I saw perform at the Starwood several times, was Diane Chai
of the Alley Cats.

My most abiding memory of Hollywood in the late 70's has got to be the short-shorts and knee socks. And the platform shoes.
There were Elton John and Ringo billboards, and disco was pumping out of cars and all the girls on the sidewalk of Sunset Boulevard were breathtaking.

 

[Kragnorak]

This thread also suggests a lot of people who don't listen to metal don't realize the range of lyrical topics covered, or the range of great instrumental work happening now under the banner.

This is a good point. Regarding the lyrics, why is it socially acceptable for a 60 year old guy to sing about crushing on the girl next door (the lyrical content of many rock, pop and blues tunes) and wrong for the same guy to use music to rail against corruption or violence or hate crimes or whatever socially conscious topic might pop up in metal lyrics? Even when I was in high school I thought the lyrics in love songs were more juvenile.

To me, if there wasn't a nostalgia element, it would be more embarrassing to see Sir Paul McCartney singing "Love, love me do / You know I love you / I'll always be true / So please, love me do" than to see Carcass growling

"Prognathous gears grind
So diligent and serrated they mesh
Toothed cogs chum
So trenchant against soft flesh

Worked to the bone
Up to the hilt, deprecated
Raw materialism
To stoke the furnaces

Toiling, rotting
Life slowly slips away
Consumed, inhumed

In this mechanized corruption line
By mincing machinery industrialized
Pulped and pulverized
Enslaved to the grind

Blood, sweat, toil, tears
Arbeit macht fleisch
Grave to the grind
Blood, sweat, toil, tears
Arbeit macht fleisch

Inimitable gears twist
To chum a living grave
Stainless cogs shredding
Scathing pistons bludgeon and flail

Stripping to the bone
Return mandrels levitate
Just raw material
Your pound of flesh for the suzerain

Toiling, rotting
Life slowly dissipates
Consumed, inhumed

In a corruption line, mechanized
By mincing machinery, industrialized
Crunched and brutalized
Engrave to the blind

Blood, sweat, toil, tears
Arbeit macht fleisch
Blood, sweat, toil, tears
Arbeit macht fleisch"

 

[Kragnorak]

Kirk from Metallica studied jazz in the 90's, Alex Skolnick too...I'm sure there are others I'm not aware of or forgetting

They fall in to the category of people like Flea that had a musician's mindset from early on. I'd be happy to hear examples of people that didn't study music broadly early on and then learned new tricks later.

 

[hintz]

They fall in to the category of people like Flea that had a musician's mindset from early on. I'd be happy to hear examples of people that didn't study music broadly early on and then learned new tricks later.

Good point, ya got me there!!

 

[Killed_by_Death]

You are confusing theatrics and stage show with image.

I'm not talking about their shows. I'm talking about their promo photo shoots.

 

[HeavyJazz]

I spotted the opening cartoon at random which immediately made me think of several obvious examples, but if we were to start a series of "prime vs. today" photo postings it'd just be way to easy to spiral out of control. Entertaining, yes, but...