is a subgenre of rock. it chracterized by heavy distored guitar shreding at the speed of light(depends on what subgenre it is) it has a loud thunderous drum( which metal drums are the best drums ever played) and bass( a very underated instrument) section and is topped by a vocalist singing louder than hell. there is actually lots of diffrent types of vocals but the main ones are high octave(classic metal), guttural(death, black) and what i call thrash vocals(basiclly niether high or low just in between speaking/singing. can be very fast or slow depending on what subgenre it is. this genre of music has many subgenres in it which have sub genres of its own, many of the popular subgenres are thrash metal, death, black and power metal. its roots can be traced back to classical music, blues, even jazz, and rock and really kicked off when black sabbath came aorund with their 1970 album black sabbath
the lyrical themes are all over the charts. but some of the common themes are about rebellion, seperation, war and violence, counter culture, history, why mankind does stuff and philosophy, politics and corruption.
fans are often called metalheads, look that up and are all over the place in asia europe south america and america. warning we metalheads are extremely rabid and will defend our music at any cost ANY COST

whether metal is good or bad music depends on you and your opinion and your taste

Contrary to about 400 of the definitions already listed here, Heavy Metal has nothing to do with Marilyn Manson. Heavy Metal is a genre of music inspired by American Blues music, in which people began to exploit the characteristics of the electric guitar to create louder, more discordant sounds. Heavy Metal is characterized by fast tempo, agressive rythm, and grandoise lyrics, often involving such themes as drug abuse, death, or political issues.

A type of music that most people like better than rap, according to thumbs up/down votes in the rap and heavy metal catagory. see for you self

Probably the most controversial of all rock music for its lyrics and image. Its loud, aggressive music and characterized by the electric guitar play the central role in the music backed up with vocals, drumming and base. It branched off of psychedelic music and blues rock in the 60's. The original heavy metal band is no doubt Black Sabbath and it has been going on for 30-35 years.

The idealogy of the music is very romantic which means it is a praise of imagination, emotion and fantasy. Another central theme heavy metal obsessed apon is chaos which involves mental illness, confusion, war, hell demons and what not. Bands go at this theme to find excitement within it or deep personal and emotional involvement or it can be the band reflecting on the human condition from the outside. Finally, the prime reason of its controversy is its anti-Jeudo Christian imagery and themes like Satan, hell and evil. Like written earlier, metal bands make songs about evil because it goes back to chaos. Also, Jeudo-Chrisitanity is the very foundation of Western civilization and making negative (or anti) songs about it means it is the ultimate rebellion. She further explains why they make songs about evil to question society what is really profane. Yes, but there are still bands who use satanic imagery simply as a gimmick to look rebellious or simply just having fun being offensive. There are some themes of hedonism themes (sex, drugs, rock & roll etc) as praise or sometimes negative criticis...

Pretty much everyone who bashed metal here has probably only listened to false bands like Slipknot. Most of the definitions about how metal sucks were extremley biased. Because I'm bored, I'm going to dissect this bullshit definition.

"Can you sing about something else besides Satan?"
Groups like Nuclear Assault and Sacred Reich sang about the government and war. In fact, I don't even think those bands sing any songs that go like "HAIL SATAN!". There's other bands who sing about that too. I've also heard many other metal songs about ancient Egypt, medievel times, etc etc (most notabley with Iron Maiden)

"Can you sing at all?"
Rob Halford can hit a 5th octave. Nuff said. Oh and I also suggest Iron Maiden, Edguy, Dream Theater, Hammerfall, Blind Guardian, Helloween...

"Can you not be such goth fucktards?"
Goth fucktards? Leather, spikes, and chains are hardly gothic. Gothic metal is it's own genre, and I'm not referring to "z0mg im so gawthik" bands like Slipknot and Korn, I'm talking about bands like Type-O-Negative, Paradise Lost, etc.

"Can you focus more on music and maybe write some non-retarded lyrics and maybe get someone who can actually sing to sing them?"
Again, using Iron Maiden as an example, alot of their songs are about history, and they aren't the only ones who do so...and refer to the list of bands above who can actually sing.

"Can you make it a little more normal and a little less like goth vampire shit?"
Refer to what I said about gothi...

gold, lead, platinum, mercury, etc...

An excellent animated movie based on the Magazine. The original far outshines it's sequel, Heavy Metal 2000.

A genre of music that evolved from rock in the late 70s and early 80s.

Is characterized by heavily distorted guitars, giving them a deep, rough sound, which is where the "heavy" part came from; powerful drums, and thick bass. Usually includes very complex guitar work and amazing solos.

Black Sabbath is often considered the original heavy metal band. Bands like Metallica and Iron Maiden are considered the perfectors of the genre, and pioneers of the overall 80s metal scene.

Over the years, it has evolved into several subgenres. The most popular one with metalheads is thrash metal, but there are several others such as power metal, doom metal, black metal, death metal, etc.

The most recent subgenre that's spawned in today's modern scene is nu metal. This subgenre has basically the same characteristics of traditional metal, except for the fact that guitar solos are very rare, if not included at all. This has caused many metalheads to look down upon it as "shit", "poser metal