The LGBTQ+ heavy metal podcast explains why a Cynic song spoke to their queer sides, and puts albums from Bizarrekult, Ultar, Ulthar, and Ultha into HCGBs’ jukebox. Plus Matt drools over Leprous. Again.
Hell Bent for Metal this week start the show with another gushing review of a show that one of the hosts recently attended. This time it’s Matt’s turn with one of the pod’s collective favorite bands, Leprous. He fanboys about just how tight of a musical entity they are and their insane live proficiency, and revels over the setlist choices which included a previous Camp Classic on HBFM, ‘On Hold’. (Shout out to support band Kalandra, too. Stunning stuff.)
Into the show proper, and this time around, the Camp Classic comes from queer metal royalty, Cynic. The band members sexuality doesn’t come into discussion though as to why the song speaks to the queer sides of the hosts, instead its lyrical nature comes under the microscope in how it could very well relate to a lot of queer folks’ experience.
Tom brings on two separate reasons why the song got his gay senses tingling, the first being a rather juvenile snigger at a certain lyric (HBFM? Juvenile? It couldn’t be.), with the other being based on a much deeper concept – the older queer talking to their younger, more confused self. There’s talk on how, whilst growing up LGBTQ+ will often be rough and anxious, embracing the fact that your sexuality cannot change, and in turn embracing yourself for who you are, is often the most important thing you can do at that time of your life in the queer path to happiness.
The discussion also takes in the longing and almost nostalgic feelings for the childhood innocence before the confusion of liking the same sex comes to fruition, and how that can be something that, when discovered, sets off a journey that can be painful and challenging but leads eventually to self-love and self-worth and the newfound strength to fully express yourself and love whoever you like. The hosts tell how this particular journey was for them, with one growing up in the Section 28 era with slurs in tabloid newspapers, and the other having a very Christian school upbringing, and how they managed to get to where they are today.
It’s a bumper week at HCGBs here as there are four albums entering the jukebox, the first being Bizarrekult’s Den Tapte Krigen, being followed up by some superb memeage in three completely separate bands called Ultar, Ulthar and Ultha, with their albums At the Gates of Dusk, Anthronomicon, and All That Has Never Been True respectively.
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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