The LGBT+ heavy metal podcast explains why it’s so important for queer folk within metal to stand up against racism in our scene, and especially Nazi metal bands. Then to cheer themselves up, they explain why Ensiferum’s ‘Two Of Spades’ is a Camp Classic, and put albums from Rivers Of Nihil, Unto Others, and The Answer Lies In The Black Void in the HCGB jukebox.
Sick of finding racist or even Nazi bands within our scene, Hell Bent For Metal explains exactly why it’s especially important the LGBT+ community, and our podcast in particular, stand against racism and the rise of the far right in metal.
There’s a growing pile of bands who one of the podcast hosts has heard an album by and thought it was cool, considered bringing it onto the show for HCGBs, and only then discovered that one or all of the musicians involved had a sideproject with racist or overtly Nazi lyrics. There has also been a big ruckus over a sizeable metal festival booking completely normal bands, and tacking a load of overt NSBM onto the bill as well. Heavy metal’s problem with racist bands is not going away.
The hosts have hinted in the past that this podcast stands against that in every way, but this week, the show makes this explicitly clear, as this wen on the arse of metal gets discussed. The hosts talk about their evolution on the issue, how metal has got to this point, and why this is such a problem for the scene.
From the LGBT+ perspective, there’s also plenty of points made. For one, they make the point that solidarity makes us all stronger; for another, they point out that racism and anti-LGBT+ prejudice frequently go hand in hand; and for another, they explain that it’s simply the right thing to do to stand against this bilge.
After that horrible topic, there’s a much more fun time to be had in this week’s Camp Classic, as the hosts explain why Ensiferum’s folk metal/disco/country song “Two Of Spades” spoke to them as queer folk. That is at least, after Tom realises he owes Matt an apology he last week said he wasn’t going to make, and also explaining why he thinks Ensiferum are wicked.
This inevitably leads to some disagreement about The BeeGees, as one host likes them rather a lot more than the other, and there’s also talk about whether there might be something slightly gay about a subgenre of metal which involves male musicians wearing make-up, dressing up, and performing while not wearing as many clothes as normal in front of lots of men. And there’s also some hot takes on ‘Saturday Night Fever’, ‘Grease’ and – most controversially of all – ‘Grease 2’. Standard HBFM.
The Hate Crew Gaybar jukebox has three new additions this week. First up us ‘The Work’ by Rivers Of Nihil, a band Tom remembers doing some work on back when they were a fairly straight-up technical death metal band, and who now don’t seem to want too operate in only one genre of music.
The second pick is ‘Strength’ by Unto Others, the gothy metal band who seem all set to get stupidly and ridiculously massive, and who Matt definitely thinks will deserve to – but he’s a bit nervous about whether Tom agrees or not.
And finally, ‘Forlorn’ by The Answer Lies In The Black Void is the third entry this week, which is the debut album from a new doom metal project by members of Thy Catafalque and Celestial Season. Expect heavy.
Listen to Hell Bent For Metal on Spotify here, listen on iTunes here, or choose one of the other ways to listen here.
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