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Saturday, December 29, 2007

Metal-A Headanger's Journey


Long hair, Goatee, lots of leather and metal. Connect?
Metalheads, you don’t see them often but go to any rock concert in your city and you’ll find them in plenty. They come in many flavours the moshers, the head bangers, the ones who stand in a corner with folded arms alternately waving their heads and of course the wannabes.
But what’s common between all of them is their love for heavy metal, the most extreme of all genres of music.
Call them weirdoes, wasted fags anything you want but they are the biggest sub-culture in the world transcending the boundaries of race, religion and region;a huge family in the words of James Dio.
Ever wondered why they are the way they are?
Metal-A HeadBanger’s journey tell you exactly that.
Metal follows the journey of narrator and director Sam Dunn a Canadian anthropologist as he travels across the world. His mission-to try and figure out why metal is consistently stereotyped, dismissed and condemned, even while the people who love it stubbornly hold there grounds-spreading the word, keeping the faith and adopting the styles and attitudes that go way beyond the music. Part social document, part celebration of a misunderstood art form,this documentary is the first of its kind;a chance for metal fans to speak out and a window into the culture that’s far more complex than it appears.
The documentary is made considering both sides the power chord hungry die hard fan as well as the horn-saluting neophyte. Its lay enough even for the ‘pop’ers to enjoy at the same time is inside enough to the devil-horns salute from the most die hard fans.
The film is strong enough to make believers out of non-believers. I’d like to quote the review by CTV-"After taking the Headbanger’s journey; the unitiated will know that there’s more than evil at work. There is a lot of sex, history and music too.”
And ofcourse as expected it features a kickass soundtrack including the giants of metal such as Black Sabbath,Metallica, Iron Maiden, Slayer, Sepultura, Arch Enemy etc.
It also features exclusive interviews from the likes of Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden, Tom Morello of Audioslave, Rage Against the machine, Kerry King and Tom Araya of Slayer, Korn, Slipknot to name some.
My verdict-By the end of the film I realized that I just saw the best music documentary ever and the most definite on heavy metal. It’s a major step in clearing some of the most long standing and controversial questions in the history of music let alone heavy metal.
Metal is a way of life, a religion you either love it or you don’t, if the music doesn’t make the hair stand behind your back or give you that exhilarating surge of energy you never will enjoy or appreciate it. So, all you metalheads out there next time you feel like headbanging to the your favourite song in the most awkward of places never mind the people around, there are a million just like you having the same urge.

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