Don't talk to strangers
In an episode of Metalocalpyse the character William Murderface says "I'd rather chop off my ding dong than admit that [booze ain't food]." His fictional band mate Toki replies "wowee!" Wowee indeed. Murderface is clearly a man of principles. He'd sooner mutilate himself than mis-categorize something precious to him. Its with this in my mind that I must divulge the following anecdote in which I have sinned against the metal gods.
The following only has a chance to be funny or relevant to fans of metal (and even then I'm not sure its funny). You were warned...
I wore an Opeth shirt to the grocery store today. Here I am sporting said shirt with the exact same expression I'm sure I had as I was waiting for the kindly older lady to ring me up.
We had a short but amusing conversation.
her( obviously staring at my shirt): what... is that ?
me (in a friendly manner): it says Opeth
her: what is Opeth?
me: Oh, its a band
her: Are they new?
me (in my head): what?!?!? are they new? yes kindly old lady behind the counter, they MUST be new if YOU haven't heard of them. Actually they were founded in 1990 and have one of the biggest followings of any metal band on earth.
me (out loud): no
her: what kind of music is it?
me: Its Swedish Death Metal
At that point the even older, nicer looking lady behind me in line pipes up... she wants me to repeat it. She probably thought her ears were playing tricks on her. No, nice old lady, you heard correctly.
me (loudly and clearly): Its Swedish Death Metal
At that point there was a little silence. The cash register lady did not comprehend.
her: so is that like HARD ROCK?
I then winced audibly. Hard Rock is the closest thing this woman can grasp to that which is the dark brutality of death metal. (As an aside, musical genres are finicky and people have called them Death Metal, Progressive Death Metal, or Black Metal.) Death metal is exceedingly fast and brutal music. Its not fit for radio. Calling it "hard rock" would make any metal fan cringe because it likens a band like Opeth (or something even more ridiculous like Decapitated) to a band like Nickelback or some other equally tragic pop radio trash. My food is done being rung up however and I don't have time for this.
me: yes
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