Music calms the savage beast
They say music calms the savage beast, and what beast needs more calming than a vampire? Last week I talked about music and playlists that authors write their stories to, and a little about the music that shows up in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series. What I didn’t talk about was what music I think is actually vampire worthy music.
There are genres of music that are dark and violent and mesh perfectly with the original vampire mythos. The deadly creature who stalks the night, looking for victims to drink from and possibly turn into vampires as well. I have never really found any of that kind of music in playlists of authors who write the pop-vampire stories. I guess I understand why. Death metal, black metal, none of it is pretty music and it certainly isn’t mainstream so most people wouldn’t stumble across it by accident, but it certainly fits the writing of many stories of monsters creeping into your bedroom at night.
How did I find this music? I’ve always loved heavy metal, since before I was a teenager. I loved Judas Priest and WASP, Iron Maiden. Metallica was my favorite band for a long time. My mom just shook her head at the “noise” that she couldn’t understand the words to, but I understood the words and I listened to that music a lot, even more than I listened to pop on the radio. And you know how teenage girls love pop radio. Metal then was very edgy, but holy shit, it has nothing on the metal of today.
Enter entire sub-genres of metal – death metal, black metal, doom metal, metalcore, horrorcore, thrash metal – these have emerged and they are so much louder and more violent than anything my mother could have imagined me listening to. I doubt this is anything I would have considered putting into my ears, but I have two teenage sons and they listen to a lot of this stuff. And since I was born singing (if you read my last post, you’ll get the reference), I couldn’t help but be drawn to the sounds of the music and since I don’t dismiss anything out of hand, I came to enjoy a lot of what they listen to.
Trust me when I say this music is not for the faint of heart. It’s ugly music, meant to invoke images of violence and pain. If you listen to the subgenres, the first thing you notice is they all sound very much alike. There isn’t a lot of singing. There is lots of growling, and there is at least one female singer who sounds just like the males. In fact, I had no idea it was a female until my son told me. My first thought was “Oh, her mom must be so proud”, then I realized that a female voice in this genre wouldn’t really fit. I describe the sound as the cookie monster
There is a lot of fear surrounding this music. It’s violent and bloody and there is a lot of death in it. Many of the performers of this music are accused of inciting violence in teens, blamed for the rise in school shootings and teen violence against their families. Let me call bullshit on this. Music doesn’t make a person do something they wouldn’t otherwise do. My boys aren’t going to go insane and shoot up our family because they’re listening to Insane Clown Posse or Cradle of Filth (two very different genres of music, by the way). The music might egg on kids already prone to violence, but in my thought process, that is a serious parenting issue. Parents should have some idea of what their children’s moods and thoughts are, and if those thoughts are violent and dangerous, the kids need help. But don’t blame the music.
I like listening to violent music because it calms me. ICP plays on my iPod every single day. When I’m angry and need release, listening to music that allows me to imagine in my head the violence that might otherwise be real gives me an outlet for my aggression. And nobody should be surprised that I’ve got aggressive feelings in me. It’s not really a secret that I like violence. My son and my daughter both laugh at the music with me. If you take it as it’s intended, it’s really funny, at least if you find scenes like you see in slasher movies to be funny. This music obviously doesn’t fit all the books in the genre we love so much, but there are books for which it would fit very well.
I think it would be apropos for Cradle of Filth or Kung Fu Vampire to be part of a Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter book, but not the YA stories that are less about violence and sex and more about teen angst and redemption. The same goes for the Vampire de Sade series. The violent imagery of horrorcore or death metal would be perfect for those stories that are about blood and gore and sex. For other series, especially the teen books, I think the emo music that is popular with kids is really good music to go with those story lines. But there is no way Muse meshes with a violent story, so we need harder, edgier music to go with the many less palatable vampire books. I think I found it.
Most of the metal I listen to doesn’t fall into “heavy” anymore. It’s in other categories. Rob Zombie and Marilyn Manson are sissies compared to much of the stuff my sons listen to, and even a lot of the stuff I find myself listening to these days. But I listen to so much more. Taylor Swift is one of my favorites. Miranda Lambert, ICP, Breaking Benjamin.
I took my kids to a Linkin Park concert when the boys were 11 and 12. The guard came up to warn me that it was going to be a mosh pit where we were standing and that it might scare my kids. I just laughed at him. He didn’t know my kids at all. Wild concert. Really wild. Lots of fun. Gods, I was 3 months pregnant with my youngest then and I danced my ass off. It was so much fun. Good band. They don’t swear in their songs much, but their concerts are filled with all sorts of foul language.
I find it funny that a lot of vamp stuff now is so emo. Not about death and blood and gore, but about longing and angst and love.
Most adults don’t bother to listen to music they don’t understand. I have found many favorite songs by not making my kids turn down the CD player. It’s good to have expanding musical tastes! Thanks for commenting.
Music is a huge part of my life. My poor ipod gets at least an eight hour work five days a week and sometimes several hours on the weekend as well. Now, my muscial tastes pretty much runs the gamut with the exception of much of the hardcore metal you desribed above. For me it stems back to my upbringing. I went to a serious Southern Baptist High School where even dancing was considered a sin – ala Footloose, and this wasn’t even in a small town. Rather just a lot of small minded people. Anyway, every week we had mandatory chapel and each “session” was all about the sins were subjected to every day. We were told that all the metal groups, the hair bands, the pop bands…bascially all music that didn’t stem from a hymnal was the work of the devil. KISS stood for Knights in Satan’s Service. Judas Priest was paying homage to Judas Iscariot betraying Jesus in the bible. Ozzy Osbourne and Alice Cooper were definitely devil worshippers trying to lure our innocent souls to the dark side. Hair bands and pop groups were just trying to get us to spread our legs and fornicate. Did I mention how many girls in our school got knocked up before gradution by teachers? Um, yeah. Great examples there. Clearly practicing the “do as I say not as I do” rule. *eye roll*
As a teenager, I realized these preachings were just the scared spoutings of people that wanted to live in a perfect little world that doesn’t truly exist. They wanted everything outside the doors of their church to be evil, and I recognized it for what it was. I loved my hair bands, my “soft” metal, and even what I considered harder metal like Metallica. When I got married (at 20) my musical tastes expanded again as my husband loved alternative music. It was hard for me to listen to at first as a lot of alternative just sounded like a bunch of screaming to me, but I didn’t reject it out of hand. I gave it a chance. In the last several years, I’ve discovered that I like Linkin’ Park, Three Days Grace, and Ozzy. I even like other harder bands if I can hear the words and understand them. Angry music has it’s place and it is a great outlet for those aggressive feelings we all experience. I’m right there with you that music has nothing to do with the kids that go on killing rampages. Parents are supposed to pay attention to their kids and too many expect the teachers to do that. Teachers aren’t babysitters, nor are they therapists.
I will admit that Marilyn Manson and Rob Zombie scare the shit out of me. I still can’t go there. I’ve tried and at least that’s more than I would’ve done ten, fifteen, twenty years ago.
As for story playlists: I have a playlist for each of my chapters. In fact, (and my beta thinks this is so weird) I can’t even start writing the chapter until the playlist is set. It sets the mood for me, it helps pull those brainstorm clouds together to form a cohesive scene. The music helps the story unfold for me. I don’t know if its that way for everyone, but I do know that my musical tastes are expanding all the time. :)
Great article. Thanks for writing it.
~Lisa