Caught in a Mosh

As this year winds down, I might as well add a post to one of my favorite musical finds this year: Babymetal. What follows is also my defense on their behalf.

"If you show true courage, we will show true metal."

I remember the day when I first heard them this past summer. I knew of them before then, but I never got around to actually listening to them. It was just plain old curiosity which made me go to YouTube and check 'em out.

I clicked on "Gimme Chocolate!!", and I couldn't believe just how amusing the concept was: fusing cute J-pop idols with heavy metal riffs. Yet, I think they do pull it off successfully. I'm not one of those metal-fans who moan on about the pureness of metal and how it can't be this and that. Perhaps it's partly because I'm no stranger to J-pop and J-rock, so hearing that element in there didn't sound foreign to my ears. Also, I do like more straightforward metal bands from Japan, like thrash metal band Grief of War. Actually, I'm a huge metal fan in general who likes classic metal from Iron Maiden to more modern extreme deathcore like Oceano. I pretty much have both sides covered, so neither side of Babymetal's formula surprised me. Yet, when they were combined, it did make me notice them. Here was this song which had these bludgeoning riffs, which sounded like they wouldn't be out of place on a Fear Factory or Static-X song, with these sugar-rush vocals stuttering on top of them. Bizarre, fantastic, confounding, awesome.

It's partly this initial mix of feelings and thoughts which, I think, pull people one way or another. Some, like me, just end up saying "whatever, man!" and happily give in to the kawaii metal machine. Others, however, don't feel the power of the dark side, feeling it instead as a disturbance in the force. As an example of the latter, Noisy did a review of Babymetal, "Babymetal vs Bullet Belts: A Metalhead's Review of the Japanese Band's Manic Live Show". While the reviewer does appreciate some aspects of Babymetal, "It's bright, it's flashy, it's manic, it's all over the place and there are fuckin' lasers and it's kind of like an anime came to life during the middle of a Britney Spears show in Vegas", the line which immediately follows says, "I cannot, however, fathom why anyone would ever want to listen to their music."

I think that kind of comment can be partially explained if you recall my earlier remark that I'm a fan of J-pop. Hearing bubbly, catchy, pop-music in a foreign language isn't a new thing to me, so making the transition to liking Babymetal wasn't really a transition at all - I was already there before I heard them. However, some metal fans are hardcore metal fans...and by hardcore I mean "I listen only to metal, and I've written the authoritative dictionary definition of what metal is". In other words, they'd have no idea what a FEMM is (okay, maybe they'd be familiar with those always fresh and inspired person-reacts-to-something YouTube videos). They also probably know how metal should look, what the uniform should be (Manowar, anyone?). "How dare these little girls pretend to be metal!?", cried some viking metal fan wearing furry boots and carrying an axe named Brynhild. Perhaps, it's also because Babymetal is also kinda...fun. And we all know metal isn't fun at all in that alternate world. In that world, M.O.D. didn't do videos like "True Colors", Scatterbrain didn't write songs like "Don't Call Me Dude", and Nuclear Assault didn't do cover songs like "Happy Days". If being fun isn't enough, they don't like how it's also kind of...groovy. Again, maybe they didn't notice Static-X making a style of music they like to call "evil disco". Maybe songs like "Wreckage (Indy Cart Remix)" by Swedish death metal legends Entombed never crossed their musical radar. Hell, they probably don't even know of remix albums by bands like Fear Factory, Prong, and Godflesh. Perhaps the biggest charge is that Babymetal is more-or-less a formula, a "manufactured" band. However, even on that note metal isn't exactly free of that, either, as this NPR article points out: "Deal With It Headbangers - Babymetal Is Here". If being manufactured (whatever that means) discounts you musically, then I'm not sure how The Beatles, Elvis, and even The Sex Pistols got so successful. Anyways, you'll find plenty of reasons why Babymetal aren't metal, blah blah blah, while metal bands are allowed to do the very things Babymetal are often accused of doing.

To wrap it up, they work for me, and they probably do so for many other more die-hard fans out there (I like Babymetal but I'm not off-my-head crazy for them, mind you). They haven't reinvented the metal-wheel, but who needs to reinvent it when you're pretty good at making the whole thing move where you want it to? Musically, I find those metal elements convincing; it's not just some band playing loud distorted guitars thinking that's all there is to metal. I play guitar, and I recognize what's distinctive to metal guitar, e.g. palm-muted power chords, staccato notes, and low-tunings. Babymetal has 'em all! Playing "Gimmie Chocolate!!" isn't too different than playing "Chromatic Death" by Anthrax. Lots of fun! In any case, I'll finish with a video, the excellent "Megitsune". To borrow a lyric from Cathedral, this will have you "groovin' all night!"

End