I posted this on another forum in response to another user's rant against black metal. His question was "why do Satanists flock to black metal like goth kids to white facepaint?" I seriously doubt my response adequately answered his question, but it is relevant to the general area:

I have always said, if you listen to metal or, indeed ANY form of music for LYRICS, you're listening for the wrong reason. Better to go read some well-written poetry in that case. Some Keats, Byron, Shelley, Swinburne, Baudelaire, etc. Let's not forget that it's about the MUSIC. Lyrics are words, music is sound.

Sure, lyrics can be important. Obviously, one is less likely to be interested in listening to what otherwise sounds like a pretty serious band if they're writing lyrics about farts and rainbows or whatever. The thing is, if you're searching for value in MUSIC based on lyrical content, you'll be disappointed OFTEN.

I am a diehard, hardcore metalhead. But I am also a classically trained musician. I am as eclectic as they come. I absolutely adore art music (what plebeians refer to as "classical", and which covers the entire history of art music, from medieval to present day); I adore BOC, Pink Floyd, King Crimson, Jethro Tull, I love acoustic folk a la Jim Croce, I dig Johnny Cash and Charlie Daniels Band, classic Delta blues like Robert Johnson, I love Argentinian tangos by the master of the genre, Astor Piazzolla, and I could go on but I think you get the picture.

I also happen to adore Black Fucking Metal.

Being largely LaVeyan myself, I could get seriously annoyed with the lyrical content of theist/mystical bands like the aforementioned Deathspell Omega, Nightbringer, or Blut Aus Nord, to name a few. Why do I listen to them? Because their COMPOSITIONAL processes are exquisite, multi-layered, and quite unique in the popular music world. Deathspell's experiments with extreme dissonance make for some very unsettling and highly chaotic (and so very enjoyable) listening experiences. Both Nightbringer's and Blut Aus Nord's textural layering is very much in the vein of art music composition. Take a listen to Nightbringer's "Caput Draconis - Black Saturn" and wait for the second section (not really a chorus) and listen to the droning line while the other lines move around it; also, one guitar provides contrast by stark changes in tessitura (range) by playing harmonies in the high range of the instrument. As for Blut Aus Nord, they also play around with these really strange pitch bends that are achieved through natural means (i.e. no effects processors or anything like that), either through using "pre-bends" (very imprecise and hard to do in the controlled manner they achieve), a slide (also imprecise and hard to control) or, the simplest way, by using fretless guitars. Check out "Choir of the Dead" from the album "The Work Which Transforms God" to see what I mean.

I'll leave you with this. Taking, as an example, the music of composers Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992), Arvo Pärt (b. 1935), Josquin des Prez (c.1440 - 1521) and Gregorio Allegri (1582-1652), all of whom are/were devoutly religious Catholic men, we have an interesting dilemma. All of these men produced largely SACRED music. In other words, music offered up for/to the glory of God and His worship. The texts, or LYRICS, of their vocal works (Josquin, Allegri, and Pärt's sacred motets, and Messiaen's music for voice and other instruments) were mostly of a SACRED nature. Naturally, being opposed to Christianity, one might think it difficult for me to enjoy this music. Oh, wait; I don't care about the words.

If you're hung up on words/text in music and the philosophies behind them, it can get in the way of your enjoyment of some erstwhile fantastic music. Just saying.

/rant

I've always found there's that much music out there now that I can afford to ignore (that is, not buy and listen to heavily) music that disagrees with me because of its lyrical direction or the stance/message of the band, or anything else that pisses me off about them.

Yes, there will be the odd glaring example of a band so good that this doesn't hold, then you put these things to one side.

If I bought everything that sounded good to me every month, I'd be spending £300 pm on CDs.

Good read that was!

I go to black metal because I'm a nihilist.
I lurk around Darkthrone because I'm an optimistic nihilist :p

(Translation: Life may be utterly pointless, our existence may be a genetic mutation, and our world may be an insignificant speck on an infinitely vast and meaningless universe, but that's no excuse not to enjoy yourself :p)

Just do what I do.
If you like it get it.
There are times when I like my bands to be all about mythology, and then I like some planar travel and cosmology, and then I like songs about setting babies on fire and selling dogs to Chinese restaurants...

God, AxCx are the best band ever <3

This is one of those threads where, I feel, it comes down to 'I like what I like because I like it' with a lot of waffle wrapped around it. Filius Luciferi doesn't concern themselves with lyrics, some others do. Yay.

Not to demean the whole thing but do we really need to inspect Wagner and Schubert to realise that some people make amazing music and yet still manage to be total arseholes?

In essence, what makes good music good at the most fundamental level is its compositional integrity, irrespective of what is being conveyed on a textual level.

Translated into metalese = RIFFS OR DEATH!

THE FOLLOWING THINGS ARE RUINING METAL

- CLEVER PEOPLE
- STUPID PEOPLE
- PEOPLE WHO DON'T LIKE SLAYER
- PEOPLE WHO DO LIKE SLAYER
- TOO MANY FUCKING BANDS
- THREADS LIKE THIS
- YOUR MOTHER
- PEOPLE WHO AREN'T FENRIZ
- FENRIZ
- WHY DID I THINK THIS WOULD BE FUNNY, IT'S JUST FUCKING SHIT