Build an Active Foundation for Heavy Metal

Subculture Community Success in

Contemporary Society

A thesis submitted to the Graduate School

of the University of Cincinnati in partial fulfillment

of the requirements for the degree of

Master of Design

in the Myron E. Ullman Jr. School of Design

College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning by

Zixuan Yang

Bachelor of Engineering, Beihang University

Committee Chair: Ashley Kubley

Committee Member: Gerald Michaud

3/27/2019

iv ABSTRACT

Since the first album that Black Sabbath released in 1970, the 50-year-long history of heavy metal music makes it has developed into a diversified but controversial subculture all over the world. Even though several big names, such as Metallica, Iron Maiden or

Judas Priest, have gained commercial success and mainstream exposure, most of the heavy metal bands, fans and communities are still far from a stable status. The market scale is threatened by poor social acceptance and incorrect stereotypes and is too limited to develop an operational model for heavy metal music communities as mature as mainstream music production in this current state. The goal of this thesis is to: 1) explore the core value of heavy metal subculture and design an organizational strategy to strengthen the connection between various roles within the community. The research was divided into three parts. The first part is the quantitative research on the development of heavy metal music in different regions, shows the regional trends of heavy metal subculture. The second part is the qualitative evaluation of heavy metal albums’ covers and lyrics, and documentary films about heavy metal music. The third part is the interviews with record shop owners. The first part Borrowing the CIS (Corporation Identity

System) from the business field, the data collected during the second stage could be categorized into visual identities, communication identities, and behavior identities. The data collected from interviews are organized into a system map to show the current organizational strategy. The conclusion, this thesis proposes a new type of organizational strategy that supports the local heavy metal subculture community, in order to help stabilize the market and strengthen connections of community members through

v participation in it. Furthermore, inspired by the proposed strategy, more universal strategies and guidelines for other types of subculture are discussed.

vi

vii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First of all, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my advisor Prof. Kubley, for her patience, motivation and immense knowledge. Her insightful suggestions and deep understanding of my topic helped me throughout developing this thesis. And she also provided me the remarkable resource to support me testing out ideas. I could never achieve where I am today without her guidance.

Besides my advisor, I would like to thank the other member of my thesis committee: Prof.

Michaud. During the process of writing this thesis, his inspiring comments and encouragement helped me shape my thoughts and study. Also, I appreciate the tough questions he put forward, which incensed me to widen my research from various perspectives.

My sincere thanks also go to my interviewees - 666 Rock Shop (Beijing, China),

Everybody’s Records (Cincinnati, US), Shake-it Records (Cincinnati, US), Hail Dark

Aesthetics – Oddities and Record Store (Covington, US), and Nick Kubley (Passafire,

US). Talking with them was enjoyable and inspiring. Their insights greatly helped me understand the Heavy Metal subculture, its passionate audiences, and talented artists.

Without their selfless support, it would not be possible to acquire a deep understanding of my thesis topic.

Also, I want to thank all the School of Design faculties and MDes classmates at

DAAP,University of Cincinnati, for all the time we spent together and all the fun we have had in the past two years. We are families and we support each other.

viii Last but not least, I would like to thank my family and my lover. Thank you for always being there and supporting me spiritually throughout writing this thesis and my life in general.

ix TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT v

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS viii

TABLE OF CONTENTS x

LIST OF TABLES xii

LIST OF FIGURES xiii

GLOSSARY, LIST OF SYMBOLS AND ABBREVIATIONS xvii

CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION 1

CHAPTER 2. LITERATURE REVIEW 4 2.1 What is Subculture? 4 2.2 Heavy Metal as a Subculture 6 2.3 Corporate Identity 9 2.4 Subcultural Identity 11 2.5 The Internet and Streaming Service’s Impact on Record Sales 12

CHAPTER 3. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK 15

CHAPTER 4. METHODOLOGY 19 4.1 Understand the Context: Data Research 20 4.2 Understand the Heavy Metal Subculture: Subcultural Identity 21 4.3 Understand the Community: Interviews and ERAF Diagram 22

CHAPTER 5. DATA COLLECTION AND RESULTS 25 5.1 Data Research 25 5.1.1 The Popularity of Different Genres of Heavy Metal in Each Country/Region 25 5.1.2 The Preferences of Genres Across Different Countries/Regions33 5.1.3 The Development of Subgenres 35 5.1.4 The Development of Subgenres in Each Country/Region 36 5.2 Media Research 44 5.2.1 Sonic Identity 44 5.2.2 Communication Identity 47 5.2.3 Visual Identity 56 5.2.4 Rhetoric Mix According to Themes 59 5.2.5 Behavior Identity 67 5.2.6 Perception/Opinion 76 5.3 Interviews 80 5.3.1 Basic Business Situation 82

x 5.3.2 Passion-driven Motivation, Vision, and Strategy 84 5.3.3 Connection 86 5.3.4 Differentiation 89

CHAPTER 6. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION 91 6.1 Conclusion 91 6.1.1 Misconception 91 6.1.2 The Significance of Visual Identity in Metal Subculture 92 6.1.3 The Binary Pursuit of Connection and Differentiation 94 6.1.4 Subcultural Adoption and Engagement Map 96 6.2 Proposal 98 6.2.1 New Organizational Strategy 98 6.2.2 Major Activities 100 6.2.3 Business Canvas 110 6.3 Expansion of the Theory 111 6.3.1 Background 112 6.3.2 Engaging Model 113 6.3.3 Curation Strategy Guidelines 114 6.4 Discussion 118 6.4.1 Future Vision 118 6.4.2 Deficiencies During the Research 120 6.4.3 Future Tests and Workshops 121 6.4.4 Personal Concerns 122

REFERENCES 124

APPENDIX A 136

APPENDIX B 138

APPENDIX C 143

xi LIST OF TABLES

Table 1. Top 25 nouns in metal songs investigated ...... 48

Table 2. Top 25 nouns in metal songs investigated ...... 51

Table 3. Top 25 themes in the metal albums investigated ...... 53

Table 4. Top 10 nouns in investigated albums relevant to occultism/mysticism ...... 60

Table 5. Top 10 verbs in investigated albums relevant to occultism/mysticism ...... 61

Table 6. Top 5 icons in investigated album arts relevant to occultism/mysticism ...... 61

Table 7. Top 10 nouns in investigated albums relevant to horror ...... 62

Table 8. Top 10 verbs in investigated albums relevant to horror ...... 63

Table 9. Top 5 icons in investigated album arts relevant to horror ...... 64

Table 10. Top 10 nouns in investigated albums relevant to legend ...... 65

Table 11. Top 10 verbs in investigated albums relevant to legend ...... 66

Table 12. Top 5 icons in investigated album arts relevant to legend ...... 66

Table 13. The activities each shop hosts ...... 86

xii LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1. Kendall Jenner wearing a t-shirt with ACDC’s graphic. Credit: Lenny Abbot /

CRI / Splash News ...... 2

Figure 2. A conceptual model based on Balmer’s affinity audit. Credit: Cees B.M. van

Riel and John M.T. Balmer ...... 10

Figure 3. Thesis development plan ...... 17

Figure 4. An example of a research structure based on Grounded Theory ...... 19

Figure 5. ERAF Diagram ...... 23

Figure 6. The composition of heavy metal genres in America ...... 25

Figure 7. The composition of heavy metal genres in Brazil ...... 26

Figure 8. The composition of heavy metal genres in China ...... 27

Figure 9. The composition of heavy metal genres in Germany ...... 28

Figure 10. The composition of heavy metal genres in Japan ...... 29

Figure 11. The composition of heavy metal genres in Russia ...... 30

Figure 12. The composition of heavy metal genres in Scandinavia ...... 31

Figure 13. The composition of heavy metal genres in the United Kingdom ...... 32

Figure 14. The comparison of the popularity of different genres in different

countries/regions ...... 33

Figure 15. The development of different genres globally...... 35

Figure 16. The development of different genres in America ...... 36

Figure 17. The development of different genres in Brazil ...... 37

Figure 18. The development of different genres in China ...... 38

xiii Figure 19. The development of different genres in Germany ...... 39

Figure 20. The development of different genres in Japan ...... 40

Figure 21. The development of different genres in Russia ...... 41

Figure 22. The development of different genres in Scandinavia ...... 42

Figure 23. The development of different genres in the United Kingdom...... 43

Figure 24. The structure of wording research ...... 48

Figure 25. The portions of various types of words ...... 50

Figure 26. The portions of various meanings among the top 25 nouns extracted ...... 52

Figure 27. The portions of various types of themes among the albums selected ...... 55

Figure 28. The frequency of each icon shown on album arts investigated ...... 56

Figure 29. Some examples of fire and flames in the album arts investigated. Credit:

Judas Priest, Slayer, Black Sabbath, Blind Guardian, Soulfly ...... 57

Figure 30. Some examples of corpse and skull in the album arts investigated. Credit:

Iron Maiden, Megadeth, Galneryus, Dream Spirit ...... 57

Figure 31. Some examples of warrior and witch in the album arts investigated. Credit:

Dream Spirit, Soulfly, Angra, Arkona, Galneryus, Blind Guardian ...... 58

Figure 32. Some examples of the monster in the album arts investigated. Credit:

Mayhem, Slayer, Iron Maiden, Gamma Ray, Helloween, Mechanical Poet ...... 58

Figure 33. Some examples of ethnic elements in the album arts investigated. Credit:

Tang Dynasty, Black Kirlin, Sigh, Burzum, Soulfly, Iron Maiden ...... 59

Figure 34. Some examples of icons in investigated album arts relevant to

occultism/mysticism. Credit: Mayhem, Temnozor, Blind Guardian, Black Sabbath 62

xiv Figure 35. Some examples of icons in investigated album arts relevant to horror. Credit:

Iron Maiden, Angra, Sigh, Mechanical Poet ...... 64

Figure 36. Some examples of icons in investigated album arts relevant to legend.

Credit: Helloween, Soulfly, Tang Dynasty, Blind Guardian ...... 67

Figure 37. The portions of various types of behavior summarized from the

documentaries investigated ...... 68

Figure 38. The chart of the frequency of each type of behavior in the documentaries

investigated ...... 69

Figure 39. Ronnie James Dio making the ‘Devil’s Horn’ gesture. Credit: Sandro

Campardo, AP...... 70

Figure 40. Metal fans making ‘Devil’s Horn’ gesture in a concert. Credit: Sam Dunn ... 71

Figure 41. Band members do headbanging on the stage. Credit: Hervé Girod ...... 71

Figure 42. People dancing pogo and stage diving during a concert. Credit: GothEric .. 72

Figure 43. Ronnie James Dio rises his fist in a concert. Credit: Sam Dunn ...... 73

Figure 44. Metal fans wearing t-shirts during an outdoor festival. Credit: Sam Dunn .... 74

Figure 45. Two metal fans wear ‘battle jacket’. Credit: liftarn ...... 75

Figure 46. Kaiser is imitating Chinese ancient soldier with long hair in the documentary

Global Metal. Credit: Sam Dunn...... 78

Figure 47. Kobi Farhi and Orphaned Land in a concert. Credit: Sam Dunn ...... 79

Figure 48. The Brazilian native figure is shown on the album cover of Root by Sepultura.

Credit: Sepultura ...... 80

Figure 49. The number of customers visited each shop per week...... 82

Figure 50. The number of merchandise in each shop ...... 83

xv Figure 51. The chart of portions of regular customers in each shop ...... 83

Figure 52. The chart of compositions of best-selling goods in each shop ...... 84

Figure 53. The ERAF diagram ...... 88

Figure 54. The adoption and engagement map of the heavy metal subculture ...... 96

Figure 55. The ERAF diagram of the proposal ...... 99

Figure 56. The user journey map for metal fans ...... 100

Figure 57. An example of the invitation through the mobile app ...... 102

Figure 58. An example of the graphic design combining ‘Cincy’ and ‘blade’ ...... 104

Figure 59. An example of the graphic design combing ‘Cincy’ and ‘fire’...... 104

Figure 60. An example of the graphic design of ‘flying pig’ ...... 105

Figure 61. Patch samples and RFID chips embedded ...... 106

Figure 62. The user journey map for metal bands ...... 107

Figure 63. The circulation map ...... 109

Figure 64. The business canvas for the proposal ...... 110

Figure 65. Human resource flow ...... 111

Figure 66. The relationship map of loyalty and popularity for subculture...... 112

Figure 67. The subculture engaging model ...... 113

Figure 68. Examples of data reports for fans, artists and retailers ...... 119

xvi GLOSSARY, LIST OF SYMBOLS AND ABBREVIATIONS

Avant-garde Metal Avant-garde metal (or experimental metal) is a

subgenre of heavy metal music loosely defined by use

of experimentation and innovative, avant-garde

elements, including non-standard and unconventional

sounds, instruments, song structures, playing styles,

and vocal techniques.

Black Metal Black metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal

music born in the early 1980s. Its common features

include fast tempos, a shrieking vocal style, heavily

distorted guitars played with tremolo picking, raw (lo-fi)

recording, unconventional song structures, and an

emphasis on atmosphere. Artists often wear corpse-

like paints. Black metal strives to remain underground,

inaccessible to the mainstream and shows extreme

themes such as Satanism. The representative black

metal bands include Mayhem, Burzum and

Darkthrone.

Capital In economics, capital consists of an asset that can

enhance one's power to perform economically useful

work. In Marxian political economy, capital is money

xvii used to buy something only in order to sell it again to

realize a profit.

Corporate Identity System A corporate identity is a manner which a corporation,

firm or business presents themselves to the public

(such as customers and investors as well as

employees). Corporate identity is a primary goal of

corporate communications, for the purpose to maintain

and build the identity to accord with and facilitate the

corporate business objectives. The corporate identity

is typically visualized by way of branding and the use

of trademarks, but it can also include things like product

design, advertising, public relations etc.

Death Metal Death metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal

music born in mid 1908s. It usually employs heavily

distorted and low-tuned guitars, deep growling vocals,

aggressive, powerful drumming featuring double kick

and frequent time signature changes, and chromatic

chord progressions. The themes of death metal may

invoke violence, religion, occultism, horror, science

fiction, or politics. The representative death metal

bands include Death, Carcass and Cannibal Corp

xviii Doom Metal Doom metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal

music born in the early to mid-1970s, that typically uses

slower tempos, low-tuned guitars, and a much "thicker"

or "heavier" sound. Both the music and the lyrics intend

to evoke a sense of despair, dread, and impending

doom. It greatly influenced by Black Sabbath.

Folk Metal Folk metal is a fusion genre of heavy metal music and

traditional folk music that developed in Europe during

the 1990s. It is characterized by the widespread use of

folk instruments and traditional vocal styles. The music

of folk metal is characterized by its diversity with bands

known to perform different styles of both heavy metal

music and folk music. Lyrics in the genre commonly

deal with fantasy, mythology, paganism, history, and

nature. The representative folk metal bands include

Amon Amarth, Finntroll.

Gothic Metal Gothic metal (or goth metal) is a fusion genre

combining the heaviness of heavy metal with the dark

atmospheres of gothic rock. The music of gothic metal

is diverse with bands known to adopt the gothic

approach to different styles of heavy metal music.

Lyrics are generally dark and introspective with

xix inspiration from gothic fiction as well as personal

experiences. The representative gothic metal bands

include Paradise Lost, HIM.

Grindcore Grindcore is an extreme fusion genre of heavy metal

and hardcore punk that originated in the mid-1980s,

drawing inspiration from abrasive-sounding musical

styles. Grindcore is characterized by a noise-filled

sound that uses heavily distorted, down-tuned guitars,

grinding overdriven bass, high-speed tempo, blast

beats, and vocals which consist of growls and high-

pitched shrieks. Lyrical themes range from a primary

focus on social and political concerns to the gory

subject matter and black humor. The representative

grindcore bands include Napalm Death.

Groove Metal Groove metal (also known as post-thrash or neo-

thrash) is a subgenre of heavy metal music. Music

journalists and fans have used groove metal to

describe Pantera, Exhorder and Machine Head. At its

core, groove metal takes the intensity and sonic

qualities of thrash metal and plays them at mid-tempo,

with most bands making only occasional forays into a

fast tempo.

xx Grounded Theory Grounded theory is a systematic methodology in

the social sciences involving the construction of

theories through methodical gathering and analysis of

data.

Industrial Metal Industrial metal is the fusion of heavy metal music and

industrial music. It was born in the mid-1980s. It

typically employs repeating metal guitar riffs, sampling,

synthesizer or sequencer lines, and distorted vocals.

The representative industrial metal bands include

Ministry, Rammstein, and Nine Inch Nails.

Metalcore Metalcore is a fusion genre combining elements of

extreme metal and hardcore punk. Among other styles

blending metal and hardcore, such as crust punk and

grindcore, metalcore is noted for its use of breakdowns,

which are slow, intense passages conducive to

moshing.

Postmodernism Postmodernism is a broad movement that developed

in the mid- to late 20th century across philosophy, the

arts, architecture, and criticism and that marked a

departure from modernism. The term has also more

generally been applied to the historical era following

modernity and the tendencies of this era. While

xxi encompassing a wide variety of approaches,

postmodernism is generally defined by an attitude of

skepticism, irony, or rejection toward the meta-

narratives and ideologies of modernism, often calling

into question various assumptions of Enlightenment

rationality. Consequently, common targets of

postmodern critique include universalist notions of

objective reality, morality, truth, human nature, reason,

language, and social progress. Postmodern thinkers

frequently call attention to the contingent or socially-

conditioned nature of knowledge claims and value

systems, situating them as products of particular

political, historical, or cultural discourses and

hierarchies.

Power Metal Power metal is a subgenre of heavy metal combining

characteristics of traditional heavy metal with speed

metal, often within symphonic context. Generally,

power metal is characterized by a faster, lighter, and

more uplifting sound. Power metal bands usually have

anthem-like songs with the fantasy-based subject

matter and strong choruses, thus creating a theatrical,

dramatic and emotionally "powerful" sound. The

xxii representative power metal bands include Gamma

Ray, Blind Guardian.

Progressive Metal Progressive metal (sometimes known as prog metal) is

a fusion genre merging heavy metal and progressive

rock that combines the loud "aggression" and amplified

guitar-driven sound of the former with the more

experimental, cerebral or "pseudo-classical"

compositions of the latter. The representative

progressive metal bands include Dream Theater, Tool.

Social Identity Theory Social identity theory was formulated by social

psychologists Henri Tajfel and John Turner in the

1970s and the 1980s. Social Identity is the portion of

an individual's self-concept derived from perceived

membership in a relevant social group. Social identity

theory introduced the concept of a social identity as a

way in which to explain intergroup behavior. It is

described as a theory that predicts certain intergroup

behaviors on the basis of perceived group status

differences, the perceived legitimacy, and stability of

those status differences, and the perceived ability to

move from one group to another.

xxiii Speed Metal Speed metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal

music that originated in the late 1970s from new wave

of British heavy metal (NWOBHM) roots. Speed metal

is usually faster and more aggressive than traditional

heavy metal, also showing more inclination to virtuoso

soloing and featuring short instrumental passages

between couplets. Speed metal songs frequently make

use of highly expressive vocals. The representative

speed metal bands include Anvil, Exciter.

Subculture A subculture is a group of people within a culture that

differentiates itself from the parent culture to which it

belongs, often maintaining some of its founding

principles. Subcultures develop their own norms and

values regarding cultural, political and sexual matters.

Subcultures are part of society while keeping their

specific characteristics intact. Examples of subcultures

include hippies, goths and bikers.

Symphonic Metal Symphonic metal is a subgenre of heavy metal music

which combines the heavy drums and guitars of metal

with different elements of orchestral classical music,

such as symphonic instruments, choirs and sometimes

a full orchestra. Keyboards reminiscent of power metal

xxiv also sometimes featured. The representative

symphonic metal bands include Nightwish, Epica.

Thrash Metal Thrash metal (or simply thrash) is an extreme subgenre

of heavy metal music characterized by its overall

aggression and often fast tempo. The songs usually

use fast percussive beats and low-register guitar riffs,

overlaid with shredding-style lead work. The lyrics

often deal with social issues and criticism of The

Establishment, using direct and denunciatory

language, an approach borrowed from hardcore punk.

The representative thrash metal bands include

Megadeth, Metallica, Sodom.

Trickle Up Theory The trickle-up pattern is the newest of the fashion

movement theories. In this theory the innovation is

initiated from the street, so to speak, and adopted from

lower income groups. The innovation eventually flows

to upper-income groups; thus the movement is from the

bottom up. Examples of the trickle-up theory of fashion

distribution include a very early proponent, Chanel,

who believed fashion ideas originated from the streets

and then was adopted by couture designers. Many of

the ideas she pursued were motivated by her

xxv perception of the needs of women for the functional and comfortable dress. Following World War II the young discovered Army/Navy surplus stores and began to wear pea jackets and khaki pants. Another category of clothing, the T-shirt, initially worn by laborers as a functional and practical undergarment, has since been adopted universally as a casual outer garment and a message board.

xxvi CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

Youth is always active. You could see them skateboarding on the street, doing graffiti on the wall, playing in bands in garages, lining up in front of the little venues, etc. Also, youth is always creative. They are constantly creating cultures that exclusively belong to them as the rebellion towards what they’ve been told by others and as the label of themselves.

Those cultures, located in the marginal area of the contemporary cultural landscape, are called subcultures. It refers to the collection of people sharing the same norms and values while differentiating from the mainstream culture (Hebdige, 2010). Subculture communities are everywhere, as long as there are young people. However, they’re fragile due to the lack of a mature strategy to support and sustain themselves.

Outside the subculture communities, they're easily being falsely stereotyped by those who have a superficial understanding or no experience of the subculture (Sinclair & Dolan,

2015), and those stereotypes could be widely circulated. Inside the subculture communities, due to their rebel values towards the mainstream culture, they either reject or are insensitive about commerce and capitalism. But unfortunately, in contemporary society, the capital seems to be the most dependable source of support and sustainability.

There are few cases of the successful cooperation between capital and subcultures. One of the biggest problems of those failures applying commerce and capitalism is a lack of understanding of subcultures by merchandisers. With the superficial understandings of subculture, the merchandisers reinforce the public stereotypes and subculture communities’ antipathy. As a result, those communities become less likely to embrace

1 commerce, and accordingly, become less capable to sustain and support themselves.

Finally, it causes instability.

Figure 1. Kendall Jenner wearing a t-shirt with ACDC’s graphic. Credit: Lenny Abbot / CRI / Splash News

Why are those subcultural communities so important? And why do they need to be supported? First, subcultures are important sources of future mainstream culture. There are always subcultural elements being merged into mainstream culture. For instance, some symbolic dressing items of Punk, such as Dr. Martens boots and bomber jackets, greatly influenced the mainstream fashion style and were widely applied by people outside Punk culture in the 1980s. Second, subculture communities are the places in

2 which the people feel marginalized could speak out with their voices and develop the identities through all the participants (Hebdige, 2010). Third, the ideology of consumption of the public tends to shift from pursuing the material value to a greater interest in storytelling and cultural identity within subcultures participation. For instance, in the fashion field, the Trickle-up Theory is used to describe the trends originated from the street and lower income groups eventually flow to upper-income groups. Figure 1 is a great example shows Kendall Jenner, together with some other models, started a street fashion trend of band merchandise shirts in 2014. Thus, to help subculture communities sustain themselves is beneficial for future cultural production and consumption.

In this paper, I select the heavy metal subculture community as a case study for research and intervention. Using the concepts and methodologies of identity system from the business field and service design, I extract the authenticity for heavy metal subculture and apply it to generating the organizational strategy of heavy metal subculture communities and relevant products, such as records and artifacts. It provides the reference for the future design in cultural consumption markets.

3 CHAPTER 2. LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 What is Subculture?

Since the term ‘subculture’ was created in the early 20th century, its definition has kept shifting along with the changes in the social and national structure. The literal meaning of

‘subculture’ itself is also obscure. Why is it called ‘sub’? To whom is it ‘sub’? From the general perspective, the concept of subculture is concerned with agency and action belonging to a subset or social group that is distinct from but related to the dominant culture (Blackman, 2005).

There is a distinction between American and British theories of subculture in the early

20th century. In America, the Chicago school began to construct ethnographic maps of the social and cultural territories in the city with its diverse populations in 1913 (Bulmer,

1984). This might be the earliest formal academic study of youth cultures in the 20th century, while the origin of the concept of subculture is still inaccurate.

Later on, from the end of WWII to 1960s, many sociologists defined the concept of subculture from various perspectives. Some of them defined it as a subdivision of national culture, composed of a combination of factorable social situations (Gordon, 1947: 40).

Some of them defined it as ‘cultural variants displayed by certain segments of the population’, the worlds within the larger world of the national culture (Komarovsky and

Sargent, 1949: 143). There was also someone trying to define it from a behavioral perspective- ‘A society contains numerous subgroups, each with its own characteristic ways of thinking and acting’ (Mercer, 1958: 34). In its early stage, the goal of the studies

4 of subculture is to understand social behavior patterns of different ethnic communities and social classes. They were driven by the demand for updating public policy or political activism purposes.

In the United Kingdom, the studies of subculture more focused on psychology and its explanation of the social phenomenon. Among those studies, it’s inevitable to address the ground-breaking achievement made by the Center for Contemporary Cultural Studies

(CCCS) and Dick Hebdige’s book, Subculture: The meaning of style. The CCCS argues that working-class youth through their subcultures attempt to resolve ideological contradictions that remain hidden or unsolved in the parent culture (Blackman, 2005).

And Dick Hebdige says, ‘The meaning of subculture is, then, always in dispute, and style is the area in which the opposing definitions clash with most dramatic force’ (Hebdige,

2010). However, the boundedness of the CCCS and other British theorists is they only pay attention to white working-class youth, who created their own cultures as the expression of anxiety against the cultures from immigrants’ communities. Thus, even though the British theorists addressed the style as the materialization of subcultures, they still hadn’t jumped out of the perspective of social class and social power. They are also both conscious and unconscious in relation to their access to an exercise of power (Jenks,

2004).

Back in 1960, J. Milton Yinger puts that the concept of subculture had seldom been adequately defined, and it refers to certain universal tendencies that seem to occur in all societies. Then, in the 1980s, the development of postmodernism contributed to the critiques against the CCCS and the evolution of the concept of subculture. It was less possible to use the concept of ‘subculture’ since the conflicts between social classes and

5 ethnic communities were less visible. And it could be replaced with new terms such as

‘neo-tribe’ or ‘tribe’ to represent the small groups of people with shared lifestyles or interest (Maffesoli, 1996). Then, there are possibilities for a person who may belong to various groups with various interests or styles (Bennett 1999).

Thus, in this paper, I would regard the concept of subculture more relevant to lifestyle and as the collection of identities, which signifies the difference for outsiders and reinforces the affiliation in the insiders.

2.2 Heavy Metal as a Subculture

One may doubt if heavy metal is a type of subculture, due to the public exposure of some popular heavy metal bands, such as Metallica, in the mainstream music market. Indeed, back in the 1980s, heavy metal music grew enormously in popularity. Some successful musicians like Metallica sold millions of records and performed in large arenas all over

America (Arnett, 1991), and we could see lots of teenagers in America wearing long hairstyles and playing ‘air guitar’ (Dunn, 2005). However, it was the peak of heavy metal as a music genre in the public music market. In the 1990s, since the changing music trends and its declining popularity, the scene of heavy metal music divided into two opposite directions: either series of more extreme and ‘underground’ subgenres or commercially successful ‘mainstream’ heavy metal music (Sinclair & Dolan, 2015). In recent years, if we take a look at the data from online streaming services, such as Spotify.

Heavy metal is not as hot as it was in the 1980s anymore. Among the most streamed genres, Pop, electronic and R&B take up approximately 80%. (Buskirk, 2016). Thus, first of all, we know that heavy metal music currently has nothing to do with mainstream culture.

6 Among the studies of heavy metal music, many scholars regard ‘heavy metal subculture’ as a legitimate subject of discussion without approving its legitimacy. ‘The concept of

“heaviness” is applied by members of the heavy metal subculture to a range of instrumental timbres…’ (Berger & Fales, 2005). ‘The alienated individualism of American adolescents, as displayed in the heavy metal subculture’ (Arnett, 1996). ‘…and that the songs and concerts contribute to notions of community that surround heavy metal subcultures, providing sociality and solidarity.’ (Baker & Brown, 2016). And also, sometimes the term ‘heavy metal’ and ‘subculture’ was directly connected in the title, for instance, ‘Hard and Heavy: Gender and Power in a heavy metal music subculture’

(Krenske & Mckay, 2000), ‘Heavy metal music: A new subculture in American society’

(Gross, 1990), and ‘Heavy Metal: Forces of Unification and Fragmentation within a

Musical Subculture’ (Roccor, 2000). The legitimacy of the term ‘heavy metal subculture’ has been proved through being used directly by so many scholars. What’s more, it can be seen from the chronological range of the cited literature here (1990-2016), it’s still valuable to discuss heavy metal as a subculture.

Theodore Gracyk doubts if heavy metal could be regarded as s subculture with defining subculture as challenge or critique towards mainstream values, and some metal musicians and a lot of rock musicians have already merged into the mainstream culture

(Gracyk, 2016). Back to 1980s and 1990s, heavy metal certainly fitted into that definition,

‘many see heavy metal music and the new youth subculture as a socially and spiritually subversive movement alien to American values and culture’ (Gross, 1990). However, although heavy seems no longer fit the ‘original’ definition of subculture, we couldn’t ignore that the new meaning of subculture from the postmodern perspective. As Deena

7 Weinstein argues, ‘Subcultures are not only contexts of appreciation but also of the creation of a way of life, including a certain style.’ (Weinstein, 2000) And for heavy metal music, it stands for a particular attitude towards life and world which is rarely found in the normal everyday world (Roccor, 2000). The people participating in the heavy metal subculture are not only sharing the music but something beyond the music, a way of looking like the world (Arnett, 1996). Bettina Roccor described the case of long hair and band shirts, which tell outsiders to recognize a person as a metal fan, while the details tell insiders the person’s preferences for a particular style (Roccor, 2000). That also proves heavy metal is the collection of particular identities signifying the difference for outsiders and reinforces the affiliation in the insiders as a subculture

In terms of a musical subculture, Will straw defines it must meet two conditions: 1) a group whose interaction centers to a high degree on sites of musical consumption; 2) there coexists professional or semi-professional involvement in music and relatively loose barriers between roles (Straw, 1984). For the first condition, many scholars have pointed out that heavy metal music is the core holding together the involvement of the heavy metal subculture. ‘The kernel of heavy metal is not a special kind of ideology but rather the music of heavy metal’ (Roccor, 2000). ‘Music is the master emblem of the heavy metal subculture’ (Weinstein, 2000).

When it comes to the second condition, Will Straw admitted heavy metal as a subculture with the rise of independent labels disseminating heavy metal (Straw, 1984). And Jeffery

Arnett addressed that, in research about heavy metal and adolescence, many metal fans envisioned themselves becoming a heavy metal musician and playing on the stage, they

8 would like to practice relevant instruments and be part of a heavy metal band (Arnett,

1991).

In short, heavy metal fits in the postmodern definition of subculture, and it also fits in the definition of musical subculture. Thus, we can be sure that heavy metal is a type of subculture.

2.3 Corporate Identity

For an organization, a clear and intelligible identity system is crucial for participators to obtain the sense of belonging and for outsiders to understand it comprehensively and objectively. In this field, the theory on Corporate Identity System (CIS) has developed for a long history and already achieved several mature conclusions.

Originally, corporate identity was based on graphic design-logos, interior style, and other visual identification. Now it has been assigned to a greater role and its function has shifted from increasing the organization’s exposure and visibility to leading the communication on corporate value (Riel & Balmer, 1997). Based on the work conducted by Olins(1978),

Birkight and Stadler(1986), corporate identity is now understood as the way in which an organization’s identity is revealed through behavior, communications also the visual identification to internal and external audiences. Moreover, as a trend in the future, increasing scholars have acknowledged that a corporate identity also represents the unique characteristics that derived from the behavior of the organization’s participators

(Riel & Balmer, 1997). In short, a corporate identity basically includes the behaviors of organizational members, communication and symbolism.

9 Towards managing the corporate identity, Nigel Markwick and Chris Fill (1997) proposed that what a corporate identity communicates should be the image – the vision of the organization, what stakeholders perceive the organization to be – the reputation, and what’s more important, the personality. To understand corporate identity is necessary to examine two main perspectives of an organization: 1) its mission, strategies, and philosophy; 2) the culture, the core value that collects its members. Thus, before an organization can differentiate itself by showing its unique characteristic, there must be a deep understanding of its personality.

Figure 2. A conceptual model based on Balmer’s affinity audit. Credit: Cees B.M. van Riel and John M.T. Balmer

To understand the corporate identity, John M.T. Balmer(1996) suggests applying the methods ‘Balmer’s affinity audit’ (BAA), which is based on grounded theory (Glaser &

Strauss, 1968). Its conceptual model is shown in Figure 2. It requires the researchers to gain wide access within the organization to reveal the dominant attributes and

10 stakeholders, as well as the core values and beliefs. So that there is a variety of research methods to apply, which includes semi-structured interviews, observation, visual analysis, examination of organizational documentation. To understand an organization’s corporate identity is essential to develop strategies. By utilizing the images held by dominant attributes and stakeholders, strategic development opportunities will arise and allow organizations to improve competitive advantages (Markwick & Fill, 1997).

Researching on CIS is a good source of reference before developing strategies for heavy metal subculture community. First, a subculture community is a type of organization, whose attributes and stakeholders may completely differ from a company. But from the perspective of communicating with internal and external audiences, the corporate identity functions in the same way.

Second, similar to how a corporate identity concretes the connection between stakeholders, as the core gathers enthusiasts within the community, heavy metal, as a type of subculture, greatly forms the personality of the community. Thus, viewing the heavy metal subculture from CIS perspective is necessary for developing organizational strategies for its community.

2.4 Subcultural Identity

Following the subculture’s nature of rebellion, the members within subcultures will construct meaningful identities in contrast to the mainstream (Copes & Williams, 2007).

To articulate the strictness of the contrast, Smith (1998) proposed that social groups construct and maintain the collective identities by drawing symbolic and distinctive boundaries between internal members and relevant external audiences. And this

11 distinction leads to the strength of the group by making members feel ‘embattled’ with the broader culture, which could be measured by the degree how their belief would not be accepted by secular persons. For instance, within Straightedge subculture – a type of subculture originated from hardcore punk whose adherents refrain from using alcohol, tobacco and other recreational drugs (Sutherland,2006) – almost every member affirmed their difference, creating the sense that they were ‘better’ than other peers within mainstream society (Copes & Williams, 2007). And it was revealed by Joshua Gunn (1999) that the contest between the popular representation and subcultural meaning towards an identical item consists of subcultural identity.

But at the same time, the elements from mainstream society also are the inventory for subcultural identities. Just like what Hebdige (2010) suggests, the subculture keeps absorbing elements from mainstream society and giving them new alternative meanings.

Also, Joshua Gunn (1999) argued that collective memory contributes to constructing subcultural identities, in the way that transfigured memory fragments of other social and cultural rhetorics, other histories of influence, to internalize them in the construction of self-identity.

Materializing the subcultural identity is necessary for a type of subculture differentiating with mainstream culture. Just like Holly Kruse (1993) mentioned in his work, even though aware of that they share customers with other stores, people work in alternative record stores won’t regard other shops as competitors since they ‘don’t carry identical merchandise’.

2.5 The Internet and Streaming Service’s Impact on Record Sales

12 In the last decade, the Internet and streaming music services like Spotify have greatly changed the landscape of music consumption. There is an undeniable fact that the physical record sale has declined along with the rise of digital lifestyles. According to the

International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI 2012), the worldwide music record market has been half the size as it was before 2000. Even though digital sales are growing rapidly, the dramatic fall in analog record sales is still irreversible (Nguyen et al.,

2014).

When it comes to streaming music services, the audiences are mainly offered two options:

1) listening to tracks for free but with less control on skipping or choosing, and subjected to advertising breaks and lower sound quality; 2) subscribing the service with monthly charged fee, no need to bear with advertisements, and enjoy tracks with higher sound quality, also could choose or skip the tracks as they wish (Borja & Dieringer, 2016). The main idea behind these models is to induce audiences to listen to streaming music on demand. And if audiences are more tolerant for advertisements, the monopolist will benefit more from advertising funding and hence seize more right of speech (Thomes,

2013).

The streaming services’ influence on record sales is still uncertain. In Korea, researchers observed that online streaming services positively impact music record sales (Lee et al.,

2016). While some researchers also suggested that free music streaming has no significant effect on physical record sales. Although it positively affects live music attendance, but only for artists whose works are available on streaming services (Nguyen et al., 2014).

13 Just as it was suggested, the impact of streaming music business on conventional distribution channels, including physical records, should be concerned particularly

(Thomes, 2013). In the streaming music business, monopolists have greater rights to control what major audiences listen to, and their advantage will become increasingly apparent. For those non-mainstream artists, conventional distribution opportunities are decreasing, and their opportunities to be exposed to streaming services’ audiences are still uncertain. It’s a time of challenges and opportunities.

14 CHAPTER 3. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

The theoretical basis of this dissertation is grounded theory. It begins by gathering data which the researcher uses to develop a new theory on a specific issue. To conduct the research based on grounded theory, it requires a strong understanding of various research techniques and cross-disciplinary knowledge of many areas that are directly or indirectly relevant to the topic. (Leedy and Ormrod, 2005) Grounded theory is the best option for transdisciplinary research combing areas have not been studied in great depth before, or do not have clear and definite theories associated with them. And its purpose is to develop a new theory. (Jones et al., 2005)

I chose grounded theory as the theoretical basis mainly according to three reasons. The first reason is the thesis topic is cross-disciplinary. Basically, the goal of this thesis is to find a solution for improving the connection between internal audiences of the heavy metal community by applying design thinking. The heavy metal itself as a subculture is also a concept relevant to multiple fields, such as sociology and anthropology. Its carriers of culture are also not only music but also album arts, images, behaviors, dressing patterns, even movies.

The second reason is that heavy metal subculture is still a field that scholars haven’t evaluated on in greater depth, providing an opportunity for new theories to be declared.

It means lack of references but also means more opportunities for me to develop a new theory. The relationship between popular culture and subculture is binary. Various types of the subculture are constantly absorbing elements from popular culture and alternate their images into subcultural metaphor. Popular culture also keeps articulating the

15 symbolism from various types of subculture such as fashion icons. So the meaning of studies on subculture falls on its reflection on popular culture. To understand and preserve subculture is to cultivate diversity in popular culture in the future.

The other reason is my strong personal understanding of heavy metal. I was 14 when I listened to Metallica for the first time. In the beginning, I just thought it makes me cooler than others. But later I felt that I’m more connected with the music and identity and I just wanted to explore more. I kept searching for heavy metal records, started playing the guitar and formed a band with my friends. It accompanied me throughout my high school life. When I entered the college, I was fortunate enough to join the Metallatem, the organization for college metal fans in China, which offered students discount tickets for live shows, organized events and metal shows for metal fans from colleges. In where I come from, China, heavy metal music is relatively underdeveloped. So it’s more important for fans to contribute to this subcultural community to preserve the atmosphere, knowing we’re not wrong, we’re just different.

Now I’m not a 14-year-old teenager anymore but engaging with heavy metal greatly shaped what I am now, and my passion has never disappeared. But unfortunately, heavy metal is not as popular as it was in the 1980s. Plus, the most engaging parts of heavy metal are when metal fans are gathered in record shops or live venues, but because of the online streaming music services, fewer people will go there. Thus, the whole community is losing support. When I saw this happen, I want to make some difference, at least preserve the environment for other enthusiasts like me. What came into my mind was the tremendous engagement I felt with the Metallatem. Starting from that, I was wondering if the model of Metallatem is replicable, could it be improved or articulated to

16 encourage fans to make more connection and contribute more. So this leads to my research question: how might we improve the connection between members within regional heavy metal subculture communities by better articulating heavy metal’s subcultural identities.

Figure 3. Thesis development plan

Figure 3 shows the overview plan of the research, research result, conclusion and proposal. The research process has been divided into three parts. 1) Conduct data research to understand the trends and find possible opportunities and analyze; 2)

17 Conduct media research on album arts, lyrics, and documentaries to summarize the subcultural identity for heavy metal music and analyze; 3) Interview with stakeholders to understand how internal members interact with each other and analyze.

The result from the data research will help extract the trends and prove the opportunity for the proposal. The result from media research will help understand the subculture identity system and extract noteworthy patterns, then form the strategy accordingly. Also, the visual identity and its relationship between other identities will provide a reference for the design part of the proposal. The result from the interviews will help understand the whole business and community, which will benefit the proposed strategy.

18 CHAPTER 4. METHODOLOGY

The research within the thesis is divided into 3 steps, understand the context, understand the heavy metal subculture, and understand the community.

First, to understand the context is to be aware of the latest changes happening in the world today and how they influence the target industry-music industry, as for the thesis topic. Then form speculations about new situations may be happening on a great scale in the future. This step is beneficial to understand the history and forecast the potential trend. So it helps me identify potential opportunities for innovation and form my direction to explore.

Figure 4. An example of a research structure based on Grounded Theory

19 Second, to understand the heavy metal subculture is to extract the key elements of its subculture. The major subjects are lyrics and album cover arts from heavy metal bands- since the music is essential for the metal subculture, as well as the documentaries, which directly shows the outlooks and opinions of metal artists and musicians. The bands to research are selected according to the result of the first step. This follows one of the features of grounded theory – as the process of data collection continues, the new data should be used for further saturation of the categories. (Muratovski, 2015) It was also shown in Figure 4. The goal of this step is to find out what’s common and what’s different among the heavy metal artists and fans worldwide. This helps me extract the core spiritual value and the identities related to that, which fans are engaged worldwide. Also, it helps to understand the pattern of heavy metal subculture’s adoption worldwide.

Third, to understand the community is to understand the current organizational pattern of various stakeholders within the heavy metal subculture. Find out the personal values and goals they possess, and how they cooperate with each other. This helps me know the current communities’ situation in depth and detect the potential opportunities importing the latest trends.

4.1 Understand the Context: Data Research

A wide range of musical subgenres has emerged as the result of constant fusion with various music genres and ideologies since the 1960s. What’s more, some subgenres show a strong bond with specific regions, some examples, Scandinavian Black Metal,

Bay Area Thrash Metal, or the New Wave of British Heavy Metal. Thus, to reflect the development of heavy metal in different regions, I collected data about the popularity of

20 different subgenres of heavy metal music in different countries/regions. The basic data I extracted is the number of bands filtered by specific regions, genres and periods of the formation. The data is acquired from www.metal-archive.com - the website collecting and documenting the information of almost all the metal bands and labels around the world, including their years of formation, countries/regions, members, records, etc. Its operation model is similar to Wikipedia - fans all over the world will contribute the content, such as new profiles of bands, reviews on albums, or edits on existing profiles, then the administrators will check the content and publish. Till now, it has collected information about 126659 bands. It’s the most comprehensive and authorized database for studying heavy metal music.

4.2 Understand the Heavy Metal Subculture: Subcultural Identity

To understand the heavy metal subculture is to answer two questions, what is heavy metal talking about and how it communicated. Thus, I purpose using subcultural identity system to summarize the data in this phase. The concept of subcultural identity system is transformed from the corporate identity system. Usually, the corporate identity system includes three sections: visual identity, behavior identity and mind identity. For the subcultural identity system, I purpose concluding the data by iconography, literature theme, behavior and merchandise.

The data source of this step includes over a thousand songs written by 25 metal bands from 7 countries and regions, also 2 documentaries about metal music. By comparing their themes and characteristics, the pattern of adoption will be extracted, and the

21 universal and essential aesthetic elements of the heavy metal music will be summarized through a global perspective.

The grounded theory suggests that as the process of data collection continues, the new data should be used for further saturation of the categories. Thus, the bands selected are from the countries and regions studied in the first step, their subgenres or themes also match with the regional preference pattern reflected in the first step. The lyrics of songs from each band will get through the word frequency counting to find out which words are most frequently mentioned. To decrease the inaccuracy, conventional words like ‘the’ and

‘it’ will be ignored, and I will focus on the 15 most mentioned verbs and 15 most mentioned nouns for each band, then extract the top 25 verbs and top 25 nouns for all the bands.

Then, for each band, I selected three albums to conduct visual analysis on their cover arts. One is its earliest, one is its latest and one is in the middle with the highest rate. By analyzing the visual elements, it helps me summarize their artistic themes and what icons they use. Combining the results of these two parts, the identical iconography and themes will be summarized.

The documentaries selected are produced by Sam Dunn, Metal: A Headbanger's Journey

(2005) & Global Metal (2008). Both of them get rated with 8 out 10 on IMDb platform. By coding the scenarios, interviews with fans, musicians and scholars, and metal fans’ behaviors in the documentaries, the identical behaviors and merchandise will be summarized.

4.3 Understand the Community: Interviews and ERAF Diagram

22 In this phase, I will interview with musicians, fans, owners of record shops to acquire insights into their behavioral patterns in the community. To interpret the structure of the community and interactions between stakeholders, I chose the ERAF diagram to visualize the result.

Attributes

Entity

Attributes Attributes Attributes Entity Entity Attributes Attributes

Attributes Attributes

Entity Entity Attributes Attributes Attributes Attributes Attributes

Figure 5. ERAF Diagram

As Figure 5 shows, the ERAF refers to entities, relations, attributes, and flows. Entities are the definable parts of the system (Kumar, 2012), for the community, they are stakeholders such as fans, owners of retail shops. Relations describe how the entities interact with each other. Attributes are definable sections of entities or relations, just like those fans could be divided by different levels of loyalty. Flows are relations with obvious directions, such as retailers directly sell merchandise to fans.

23 To transform the coding result of interview transcriptions into ERAF diagram, first, identify the entities of the community. Second, define the relations and flows among entities. Third, define attributes of entities. Last, refine the diagram, analyze the diagram and extract insights.

24 CHAPTER 5. DATA COLLECTION AND RESULTS

5.1 Data Research

5.1.1 The Popularity of Different Genres of Heavy Metal in Each Country/Region

AMERICA

Thrash Black Metal 18% 16%

Symphonic 1% Speed 2% Progressive 6%

Power Death Metal 5% 26%

Metalcore/Death core Heavy Doom 4% 11% 7% Electronic Grindcore Gothic Avant-gardeFolk 0% 3% 1% 0% 0%

Figure 6. The composition of heavy metal genres in America

As Figure 6 shows, the most popular subgenres of heavy metal in America are 1) death metal (26%); 2) thrash metal (18%); 3) black metal (16%); 4) traditional heavy metal

(11%). The death metal and thrash metal become the top popular ones might because

America is the birthplace of them.

25 BRAZIL

Thrash Black Metal 21% 21% Symphonic 1% Speed 2% Death Metal Progressive 24% 4% Power 5% Metalcore/Deat hcore Heavy 1% 12% Grindcore Gothic Avant-garde Folk Electronic Doom 3% 2% 0% 0% 0% 4%

Figure 7. The composition of heavy metal genres in Brazil

In Brazil, as Figure 7 shows, the most popular subgenres of heavy metal are 1) death metal (24%); 2) thrash metal (21%); 3) black metal (21%); 4) traditional heavy metal

(12%). The popularity of thrash metal (21%) is even greater than in America (18%).

Some thrash metal bands from Brazil, such as Sepultura, have a great reputation among the global metal fans.

26 CHINA

Thrash Symphonic 19% Black Metal 4% 26%

Speed 1% Progressive 2% Power 3% Metalcore/Deat Death Metal hcore Heavy 23% 4% 5% Grindcore 2% Gothic Avant-garde ElectronicFolk Doom 2% 0% 0% 2% 7%

Figure 8. The composition of heavy metal genres in China

In Figure 8, the most popular subgenres of heavy metal in China are: 1) black metal (26%); 2) death metal 23%); 3) thrash metal (19%); 4) folk metal (7%). The top 3 are the same as previous regions, but the popularity of folk metal worths more attention.

In recent years, the Chinese bands who gained great reputation globally are the ones who combine the Chinese mythology culture and ethnic culture with metal music.

27 GERMANY Thrash 16% Black Metal Symphonic 21% 1% Speed 2% Progressive 5% Power 5% Metalcore/De athcore Death Metal 4% Heavy 25% 11% Grindcore 2% Gothic Avant-garde Folk Electronic Doom 3% 0% 1% 0% 4%

Figure 9. The composition of heavy metal genres in Germany

As Figure 9 shows, the most popular subgenres of heavy metal in Germany are 1) death metal (25%); 2) black metal (21%); 3) thrash metal (16%); 4) traditional heavy metal (11%). Besides that, progressive metal and power metal are also popular in

Germany and include several famous German bands such as Gamma Ray.

28 JAPAN Black Metal Thrash 7% Symphonic 15% Death Metal 3% 17% Doom Speed 3% 4% Electronic Progressive 0% 3% Folk 1% Avant-garde Power 0% 17% Gothic 2% Grindcore Metalcore/Deat 3% hcore Heavy 3% 22%

Figure 10. The composition of heavy metal genres in Japan

In Figure 10, the most popular subgenres of heavy metal in Japan are: 1) traditional heavy metal (22%); 2) power metal (17%); 3) death metal (17%); 4) thrash metal (15%).

It’s surprising to find that metal fans in Japan are so passionate about traditional heavy metal and power metal. Because stereotypically, those genres are considered more

‘essential’ or ‘traditional’ and should have the greatest popularity in their original places,

Europe and America.

29 Speed RUSSIA 1% Symphonic Thrash 9% 4% Black Metal Progressive 25% 4% Power 4% Metalcore/D eathcore 2% Heavy 9% Grindcore 2% Death Metal Gothic Avant- garde 24% 4% Folk Electronic 0% Doom 3% 0% 9%

Figure 11. The composition of heavy metal genres in Russia

In Figure 11, the most popular subgenres of heavy metal in Russia are 1) black metal

(25%); 2) death metal (24%); 3) doom metal, thrash metal and traditional heavy metal

(9%). The black metal and death metal have nearly taken half of the metal music in Russia.

30 SCANDINAVIA

Thrash Symphonic 13% 2% Black Metal Speed 24% 1% Progressive 5% Power 4% Metalcore/Deat hcore 1% Heavy 11%

Grindcore Death Metal 1% 26% Gothic 3% Avant- garde Folk Electronic Doom 1% 0% 1% 7%

Figure 12. The composition of heavy metal genres in Scandinavia

In Figure 12, we could see that in Scandinavia, the most popular subgenres of heavy metal are: 1) death metal (26%); 2) black metal (26%); 3) thrash metal (13%); 4) traditional heavy metal (11%). The black metal and death metal take half of the metal music landscape. That’s what Scandinavia is famous for among global metal fans – the numerous and high-quality black/death metal bands.

31 UNITED KINGDOM

Thrash Black Metal 17% 17%

Symphonic 1% Speed 1% Progressive 6% Power Death Metal 3% 24% Metalcore/Death core Heavy 5% 11% Doom Grindcore 10% 3% Gothic Avant-garde Folk Electronic 1% 0% 1% 0%

Figure 13. The composition of heavy metal genres in the United Kingdom

In Figure 13, we could see the most popular subgenres of heavy metal in the United

Kingdom are: 1) death metal (24%); 2) black metal (17%) and thrash metal (17%); 3) traditional heavy metal (11%); 4) doom metal (10%). Besides the black metal, death metal and thrash metal, it worths paying attention to that British metal fans’ passion towards doom metal. I suggest it because the characteristics of doom metal are similar to people’s impression of U.K. – dark, gloomy, mysterious.

32 5.1.2 The Preferences of Genres Across Different Countries/Regions

Global Subgenre Popularity

Thrash

Symphonic

Speed

Progressive

Power

Metalcore/Deathcore

Heavy

Grindcore

Gothic

Avant-garde

Folk

Electronic

Doom

Death Metal

Black Metal

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% Metal Black Death Electr Avant- Grindc core/D Progre Symph Doom Folk Gothic Heavy Power Speed Thrash Metal Metal onic garde ore eathco ssive onic re Scandinavia 23% 21% 7% 0% 2% 1% 3% 2% 12% 2% 7% 4% 1% 4% 11% Russia 25% 24% 8% 0% 3% 0% 4% 2% 9% 2% 4% 4% 1% 4% 9% Japan 7% 17% 3% 0% 0% 0% 2% 3% 22% 3% 17% 3% 4% 3% 14% Germany 21% 25% 4% 0% 1% 0% 3% 2% 11% 4% 5% 5% 2% 1% 16% China 27% 23% 2% 0% 7% 0% 2% 2% 5% 4% 3% 2% 1% 4% 19% Britain 17% 24% 10% 0% 1% 0% 2% 3% 11% 5% 3% 6% 1% 1% 17% Brazil 21% 24% 4% 0% 0% 0% 2% 3% 12% 1% 5% 4% 2% 1% 21% America 16% 26% 7% 0% 0% 0% 1% 3% 11% 4% 5% 6% 2% 1% 18%

Scandinavia Russia Japan Germany China Britain Brazil America

Figure 14. The comparison of the popularity of different genres in different countries/regions

33 In the previous section, some of the results match people’s impression of regions and the metal music they’re famous for, while some of them do not. So, by comparing them, just as Figure 14 does, it’s easy to see where a particular subgenre is more popular than any other country/region.

Here are several findings: Brazilian metal fans are the ones like thrash metal the most;

The proportion of the traditional heavy metal bands and power metal bands in Japan are much higher than any other regions, and also speed metal; Gothic metal is more popular in Russia, Scandinavia, and Germany; Death metal is more popular in America; British fans still like doom metal more than any other country/region; Folk metal is most popular in China; Black metal and death metal in Scandinavia and Russia are more connected.

34 5.1.3 The Development of Subgenres

DEVELOPMENT OF SUBGENRES

Black Metal Death Metal Doom Electronic Folk Avant-garde Gothic Grindcore Heavy Metalcore/Deathcore Power Progressive Speed Symphonic Thrash 10000

9000

8000

7000

6000

5000

4000

3000

2000

1000

0 1961- 1966- 1971- 1976- 1981- 1986- 1991- 1996- 2001- 2006- 2011- 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015

Figure 15. The development of different genres globally

From Figure 15, we could see black metal, death metal, and thrash metal are the ones develop fastest around the world. And when it comes to these subgenres’ features, they are the most extreme ones among heavy metal subgenres, giving them the most commercial potential due to their global population. Also, we could see these subgenres

35 reached the peaks from 2000- 2010, along with the popularity of the Internet. After 2010, when all the subgenres started dropping, doom metal is the only one uprising.

Among the results in the first section, black metal and death metal are always the most popular ones in those countries/regions. However, not all the countries/regions I researched are famous for black metal and death metal. One of the possible causes of this ‘inaccuracy’ may be the formations of black metal bands and death metal bands are more ‘casual’ – sometimes they just have single member and just a few records, even there are also someones personally run several black/death metal bands.

5.1.4 The Development of Subgenres in Each Country/Region

AMERICA

Black Metal Death Metal Doom Electronic Folk Avant-garde Gothic Grindcore Heavy Metalcore/Deathcore Power Progressive Speed Symphonic Thrash 2500

2000

1500

1000

500

0

Figure 16. The development of different genres in America

36 As Figure 16 shows, 1)thrash metal in America has experienced two waves in 1986-1990 and 2001-2005; 2) death metal had significant growth in 2001-2005; 3) doom metal and folk metal were the only genres that raised in 2011-2015.

BRAZIL

Black Metal Death Metal Doom Electronic Folk Avant-garde Gothic Grindcore Heavy Metalcore/Deathcore Power Progressive Speed Symphonic Thrash 450

400

350

300

250

200

150

100

50

0 1961- 1966- 1971- 1976- 1981- 1986- 1991- 1996- 2001- 2006- 2011- 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015

Figure 17. The development of different genres in Brazil

As Figure 16 shows, 1) similar with America, thrash metal and death metal in Brazil has experienced two rises in 1986-1990 and 2001-2005; 2) speed metal and doom metal were the only genres that raised during 2011-2015.

37 CHINA

Black Metal Death Metal Doom Electronic Folk Avant-garde Gothic Grindcore Heavy Metalcore/Deathcore Power Progressive Speed Symphonic Thrash 35

30

25

20

15

10

5

0 1961- 1966- 1971- 1976- 1981- 1986- 1991- 1996- 2001- 2006- 2011- 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015

Figure 18. The development of different genres in China

As Figure 18 shows, 1) metal music in China starts much later than other regions; 2) death metal and black metal had great growth during 2001-2005; 3) thrash metal and metalcore are rising steadily; 4) most of the subgenres raised during 2011-2015.

38 GERMANY

Black Metal Death Metal Doom Electronic Folk Avant-garde Gothic Grindcore Heavy Metalcore/Deathcore Power Progressive Speed Symphonic Thrash 900 800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0 1961- 1966- 1971- 1976- 1981- 1986- 1991- 1996- 2001- 2006- 2011- 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015

Figure 19. The development of different genres in Germany

As Figure 19 shows that in Germany, 1) doom metal was the only genre that kept growing;

2) thrash metal had grown from 1986 until 2010.

39 JAPAN

Black Metal Death Metal Doom Electronic Folk Avant-garde Gothic Grindcore Heavy Metalcore/Deathcore Power Progressive Speed Symphonic Thrash 100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 1961- 1966- 1971- 1976- 1981- 1986- 1991- 1996- 2001- 2006- 2011- 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015

Figure 20. The development of different genres in Japan

As Figure 20 shows, the traces of metal music subgenres in Japan is greatly different with other regions, 1) traditional heavy metal has experienced two significant growth in 1981-

1985 and 1991-2005; 2) black metal is growing steadily, although when other subgenres are falling down; 4) power metal greatly increased in 2001-2005.

40 RUSSIA

Black Metal Death Metal Doom Electronic Folk Avant-garde Gothic Grindcore Heavy Metalcore/Deathcore Power Progressive Speed Symphonic Thrash 350

300

250

200

150

100

50

0 1961- 1966- 1971- 1976- 1981- 1986- 1991- 1996- 2001- 2006- 2011- 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015

Figure 21. The development of different genres in Russia

As Figure 21 shows that in Russia, 1) black metal greatly increased in 1996-2000; 2) death metal greatly increased in 2001-2005.

41 SCANDINAVIA

Black Metal Death Metal Doom Electronic Folk Avant-garde Gothic Grindcore Heavy Metalcore/Deathcore Power Progressive Speed Symphonic Thrash 900 800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0 1961- 1966- 1971- 1976- 1981- 1986- 1991- 1996- 2001- 2006- 2011- 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015

Figure 22. The development of different genres in Scandinavia

As Figure 22 shows that in Scandinavia, 1) death metal and black metal constantly increased during 1981-2005; 2) speed metal was the only one raised during 2011-2015.

42 UNITED KINGDOM

Black Metal Death Metal Doom Electronic Folk Avant-garde Gothic Grindcore Heavy Metalcore/Deathcore Power Progressive Speed Symphonic Thrash 400

350

300

250

200

150

100

50

0 1961- 1966- 1971- 1976- 1981- 1986- 1991- 1996- 2001- 2006- 2011- 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015

Figure 23. The development of different genres in the United Kingdom

As Figure 23 shows that in the United Kingdom, 1) black metal, death metal, and thrash metal greatly increased during 2001-2005; 2) doom metal was the only one raised during

2011-2015.

From the previous figures, we could extract following findings: 1) in all the countries/regions, all the subgenres raised during 2001-2005; 2) after 2010, most of the subgenres are decreasing in all the countries/regions except China. This is close to the development of the Internet and streaming music service. From 2001 to 2005, the popularization of the Internet gave musicians more access to a wider range of metal music

43 and drove them to create new genres. After 2010, when streaming services like Spotify rose up, the general trend in the music market has shifted and all heavy metal genres decreased.

5.2 Media Research

To understand heavy metal subculture by translating corporate identity system, as my hypothesis, I researched on three perspectives: 1) communication; 2) behavior; 3) iconography. Among those three categories, communication refers to the crucial elements of metal music, including sonic feature, wording, and themes. Behavior refers to the things metal fans typically do, such as dressing and body motion. Iconography refers to visual elements and characteristics among materials and merchandise related to heavy metal music.

In the second part, required by the Grounded theory, the data been studied should be constant with the last research. Thus, I picked three representative metal bands from each country/region studied during the data research, to further research about their lyrics, themes, and album arts. This will help me understand the cultural asset of metal music.

On the other aspects, to summarize metal audiences’ identical behaviors, I examined two documentaries from Sam Dunn, which are considered as the most objective and comprehensive documentaries about metal music. From them, I had the opportunity to observe how people interact with metal music and its culture, how they engage with metal music, how they perceive, recreate and contribute to heavy metal subculture.

5.2.1 Sonic Identity

44 Before diving into more detailed results, it should be articulated that the most identifiable element of metal music is its sound. Because even though metal musicians all over the world singing songs in different languages, their music share similar instruments, a similar range of tempos, and similar chords. As audiences, no matter whether you could understand the language songs are singing or not, when the guitar, bass, and drum are played, you will instantly realize that is a metal song.

First of all, what makes Heavy Metal music identical the most is the sound. Everyone who listens to Heavy Metal for the first time will be greatly impressed or shocked by its massive, aggressive and heavily distorted sound. The sound of metal music is not instinctively beautiful, that is probably the biggest reason why the mainstream society doesn’t accept.

But on the other side, for most metal fans, who started to engage with metal music since adolescence, the unique sound matched what they were pursuing, the rebellion.

We can’t deny that most adolescents engage with metal music because listening to metal music makes them look cool. It’s really similar to the case of rollercoaster-we enjoy rollercoaster not because of the sensory stimulation-it’s so aggressive that makes us puke, but the sense of the horror of making it bear with that stimulation. Also, by embracing heavy metal music, that adolescent also shows they are unique and cooler than others- because they could perceive pleasure out of that weird and aggressive stuff, they want to show their uniqueness by celebrating something is sharp and tough.

From the perspective of music theory, the tempo and chord that metal music uses are really different. For the most metal songs, the tempos are over 100 bpm (beats per minute). That is close to the heart rate when people are exercising or after strenuous

45 exercise. Thus it instinctively makes listeners excited. Another technique metal music uses is the ‘tritone’, which is also called the guitar power chord in metal music specifically.

It includes perfect fifth intervals. When power chords are played on the thicker strings at high volumes and with distortion, there will be additional low-frequency sounds are created, which add to the "weight of the sound" and create an effect of "overwhelming power". In the documentary, metal: a headbanger’s journey, the scholar mentioned that the ‘tritone’ used to be banned and called as ‘the devil’s chord’ since it causes excitement with audiences. Other than the perfect fifth intervals, some other form of power chords also exist. Most of them are played with a consistent finger arrangement that can be slid easily up and down the fretboard. So it’s easy to make fluctuating melody.

A typical heavy metal band should include at least three major instruments: electric guitar, electric bass, and drum. The birth of metal music is closely related to the innovation of analog acoustic engineering, especially electric guitars and amplifiers. The electric guitars transformed the acoustic signal into the analog signal, then output it to the amplifier through a cable. In its early stage, amplifiers distorted the sound easily when the volume was over the limit. Some jazz or blues musicians prefer this unique sound so manufacturers started to merge more amplifying circuits with electron tubes to simulate that process, then the heavily distorted sound is produced. After transistors were applied, the size of amplifying circuits greatly reduced and there came the distortion pedal- a box of transistor amplifying circuits that could set on the floor and be controlled by stepping on it. Also, metal music gave birth to many playing skills for electric guitar. For instance, to make a staccato attack, the guitarist could use a palm-muted technique when playing on thicker strings. As one of the most famous metal guitarists, Eddie Van Halen also

46 innovated many skills to play solo, such as tapping, and apply classical music to create amazing phrases.

While the electric guitar covers the high to mid-range, the bass and drum are responsible for mid to bass range. They are usually played together to articulate the beat and rhythm, giving the feeling of ‘heaviness’. Sometimes they are also played for solo parts. For instance, Metallica’s previous bass player, Cliff Burton used to play 4-minute long solo names Pulling Teeth in the album Kill’em All. In metal music, double bass drumming is an identical technique for drummers. It allows a drummer to beat the bass drum with both feet in turn, which gives rapid and aggressive beats. During the intro of Judas Priest’s song, Painkiller, we could find an over-a-minute drum solo combines many techniques.

The vocal style in metal music varies in different subgenres. In the beginning, as the vocalist of Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne was identified by his rough voice, and it greatly influenced many doom metal bands till today. Later on, some other great metal vocalist like Ronnie James Dio, Rob Halford, and Bruce Dickinson started to use high-pitch and opera-like voice, which conveys the massive energy to audiences. After the 1990s, more well-trained female singers joined symphonic metal and gothic metal bands, who brought the elegant and melodic voice, such as Nightwish and Epica. Last but not least, along with more extreme subgenres appear, the vocalists also applied new singing techniques to make screaming and shattered voice, such as Arch Enemy.

5.2.2 Communication Identity

5.2.2.1 Wording

47

Figure 24. The structure of wording research

The insights about wording in metal music were extracted by calculating the frequency of occurrence for each word, using the online tool from wordcounter.net. As Figure 24 shows, for each band, I focus on the nouns and verbs and picked top 15 of each, which will help me observe what the subjects that lyrics depict and what actions that lyrics call upon.

Then collect those nouns and verbs from each band to do another round analysis on frequency. That was how I got those 25 mostly mentioned nouns and 25 mostly mentioned verbs in metal music worldwide.

Table 1. Top 25 nouns in metal songs investigated

Noun Frequency of occurrence come 23 see 21

48 go 19 know 14 look 14 take 13 live 13 call 11 feel 11 burn 11 die 11 dream 10 light 9 fall 8 kill 8 cry 7 hear 6 give 6 open 6 want 6 end 6 make 5 got 5 turn 5 lost 5

49 From the top 25 verbs shown in Table 1, we could find that not all of them are about violence or horror. If we look at the top 10, only the last one, ‘burn’, could potentially relate to violent and destructive actions. Other than ‘burn’, there are ‘come’, ‘see’, ‘go’, ‘know’,

‘look’, ‘take’, ‘live’, ‘call’, ‘feel’. While some of them are frequently used in daily life, such as ‘see’, and ‘go’, some others like ‘call’, ‘live’, ‘come’ are more related to calling upon actions and execution, trying to encourage or engage the audiences.

Wording

20%

52%

28%

Action Personal Feeling Negative

Figure 25. The portions of various types of words

I categorized those words into 3 types. ‘Negative’ refers to the verbs depicting violence, threatening or destructive actions, like ‘kill’, ‘cry’ and ‘die’. ‘Action’ refers to the verbs depicting regular motions which don’t have a negative or positive tendency, for examples,

‘take’, ‘live’ or ‘open’. ‘Personal Feeling’ refers to the verbs depicting perceptual actions related o human sensory, such as ‘see’, ‘know’ and ‘hear’. Figure 25 shows how frequently each category of words shows in metal songs and their comparison to each other. From this chart we could clearly see that actions mentioned in metal songs are

50 primarily about taking actions, executing and personal feeling. Only 20% of them convey

the message of violence, death, or darkness, which is in contrast to our stereotypes. Metal

songs are not necessary to engage violence or aggression, they could encourage people

to be grave, to take actions, also sense their inner spiritual world.

Table 2. Top 25 nouns in metal songs investigated

Verb Frequency of occurrence world 22 life 21 time 21 night 17 soul 16 sky 16 death 13 god 12 blood 11 heart 10 end 9 day 9 mind 9 fear 9 hell 9 dream 9 wind 9 pain 8

51 way 8 war 7 fire 7 light 6 sun 6 dark 5 land 5

For the top 25 nouns shown in Table 2, surprisingly, the words refer to death, violence

and evil are not as frequently mentioned than we imagined. Instead, ‘world’, ‘life’, and

‘time’ are the top 3, which usually related to topics about personal reflection, philosophy

and vast world.

Top Nouns

9% 23% 16%

52%

Negative Natural objects Spiritual Others

Figure 26. The portions of various meanings among the top 25 nouns extracted

Among those top 25 nouns, I divided them into 4 categories. ‘Natural objects’ refers to

the nouns of elements in the objective world, like ‘night’, ‘wind’ and ‘sky’. ‘Negative’ refers

to the nouns like ‘death’, ‘hell’ or ‘pain’. ‘Spiritual’ refers to nouns that related to personal

52 feeling, such as ‘mind’, ‘life’, ‘dream’. While for the rest of them, which could hardly tell a negative or positive tendency, I marked them as ‘Others’. Thus, Figure 26 shows their comparison with each other. The objects that related to evil, violence or death just take up 23%, which also shows that metal songs are not necessary to depict horrifying scenes like killing, destruction or devils from hell. The nouns of ‘Natural objects’ and ‘Spiritual’ take the biggest part, which shows that lyrics in metal music more focus on the connection between the vast material world and the inner spiritual world. The vision that metal songs pursue is neither about boys-meet-girls love stories nor limited by hatred, aggression or killing. They are also trying to express their reflection about philosophy, humanity, and spirit, which is more serious and romantic than we thought.

5.2.2.2 Theme

By reviewing the cover art and title of each selected albums, we could obtain the themes related to each selected album. For a single album, there could be multiples themes communicated at the same time. After having the coding result, by calculating the total times each theme was mentioned, I extracted a list of themes among the metal albums investigated.

Table 3. Top 25 themes in the metal albums investigated

Theme Frequency of occurrence occult 29 horror 21 legend 15 death 14

53 mystic 14 tale 12 history 10 war 10 religion 9 sci-fi 8 myth 8 fantasy 8 spiritual 7 destruction 7 dark 7 dystopia 5 epic 5 battle 5 violence 5 romance 5 dream 4 politics 4 evil 3 annihilation 3 mystery 3

Table 3 shows the top 25 themes in metal music. According to this table, occultism, horror, and death take the top. This result is closer to our stereotypes about metal music. While

54 the other themes like legends, war, history or politics didn’t show a big gap between occultism, horror, and death. To further compare them to each other, I made another chart.

Themes

5% 13% 21%

10%

25%

26%

Occultism/Mystery Legend/epic/history Horror/death/violence War/Religion/Politics Sci-fi/Fantasy Spiritual/Dream

Figure 27. The portions of various types of themes among the albums selected

Roughly, I divided those themes into 6 categories: occultism/mystery, legend/epic/history, horror/death/violence, war/religion/politics, Sci-fi/Fantasy, and spiritual/dream. From

Figure 27, we saw the themes related to death and violence still take up the biggest part.

But themes about legend or history are close, even more than the themes about occultism.

Even though near the half of albums studied convey the message about mystery, horror, and death, the other half shows us that metal songs could also be discussing serious topics like history, civilization, philosophy, society and humanity. This inconsistency with the lyric evaluation is enough to sway our misconceptions of heavy metal – it’s not purely about death, violence, and horror, it could be serious, reflective and romantic. So this also proves that visual identity is critical to how overarching misconceptions about metal we formed.

55 5.2.3 Visual Identity

5.2.3.1 Iconography

Besides the music itself, the icons and symbols included in visual materials related to metal music are also important components of metal subculture. The core of metal subculture is metal music, in a similar way, the major channel that icons and symbols were carried is the cover page of each album. For external audiences don’t accept metal music, their critiques are somehow influenced by visual elements, such as ‘the devil’s music’. On the other hand, for metal fans, graphics on apparels (mostly album arts printed on T-shirts) are typical ways to show their taste and enthusiasm.

By researching on the covers of albums in different periods from each band, extracting the symbolic elements, and calculating the frequency each symbolic element appeared,

I attained the table of top 20 symbols in the metal subculture.

Icon Frequence 14 15 13 11 10 9 9 10 8 8 8 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 5 5 5 5 5 5

0

Figure 28. The frequency of each icon shown on album arts investigated

56 From Figure 28, we saw fire and flame are the most identical visual elements in metal music. They’re essential in the material world and our interpretations from different perspectives also resonate with metal music’s themes.

Figure 29. Some examples of fire and flames in the album arts investigated. Credit: Judas Priest, Slayer, Black Sabbath, Blind Guardian, Soulfly

For instance, as Figure 29 shows fire and flame could represent the destruction, which closely related to violence, wars or history. Also, lighted candles or bonfires remind people of mystic rituals, which related to occultism or religion.

Figure 30. Some examples of corpse and skull in the album arts investigated. Credit: Iron Maiden, Megadeth, Galneryus, Dream Spirit

57 Figure 30 shows some examples of the human body and corpse, such as blood, skull, and skeleton, directly refer to death, followed by horror or wars.

Figure 31. Some examples of warrior and witch in the album arts investigated. Credit: Dream Spirit, Soulfly, Angra, Arkona, Galneryus, Blind Guardian

As Figure 31 shows, the characters shown in album arts are mostly warrior/soldier or witch/wizard, which suggest several important themes of metal music: occultism, war, and legends. Following the soldier/warrior, the icons related to weapon also become symbolic elements.

Figure 32. Some examples of the monster in the album arts investigated. Credit: Mayhem, Slayer, Iron Maiden, Gamma Ray, Helloween, Mechanical Poet

58 As Figure 32 shows, monsters usually connect with horror and occultism. And most of the monsters I found are human-like, so they are also projections of the dark side of human nature.

Figure 33. Some examples of ethnic elements in the album arts investigated. Credit: Tang Dynasty, Black Kirlin, Sigh, Burzum, Soulfly, Iron Maiden

Another interesting finding is that ethnic symbols and patterns also frequently appear on album arts. Figure 33 shows some examples. On the one hand, those ethnic patterns convey the message of mystery, also a little horror, perhaps to differ from mainstream members who are not authentic. On the other hand, it marks the rising trend in metal music that musicians started to explorer new opportunity interpreting regional culture with metal music.

5.2.4 Rhetoric Mix According to Themes

To further research about how various rhetoric elements are combined to convey messages for metal music, I collected the bands related to top 10 themes according to the previous result, including occultism, horror, legend, death, history, war, religion, Sci-

59 Fi, fantasy, and spirit. Then extracted the lyrics and covers of the three chosen albums of those bands to conduct word frequency calculation and visual element frequency calculation. The results are summarized into sets of the rhetoric mix of each theme, including the 10 most frequently mentioned nouns, the 10 most frequently mentioned verbs and representative iconography. These results make up the reference for the potential intervention of graphic design related to heavy metal music. Here I listed three sets of them.

5.2.4.1 Occultism/mysticism

Table 4. Top 10 nouns in investigated albums relevant to occultism/mysticism

Nouns Frequency of Occurrence time 157 death 156 life 146 world 128 soul 119 sky 113 night 108 light 106

60 dream 101 end 92

Table 4 shows the 10 most frequently mentioned nouns among the albums investigated related to occultism.

Table 5. Top 10 verbs in investigated albums relevant to occultism/mysticism

Verb Frequency of occurrence come 157 go 109 see 106 dead 106 know 90 take 84 die 82 feel 71 look 69 fight 67

Table 5 shows the 10 most frequently mentioned verbs among the albums investigated related to occultism.

Table 6. Top 5 icons in investigated album arts relevant to occultism/mysticism

Icon Frequency of occurrence wizard 7

61 fire 7 forest 6 flame 6 monster 5

Figure 34. Some examples of icons in investigated album arts relevant to occultism/mysticism. Credit: Mayhem, Temnozor, Blind Guardian, Black Sabbath

Table 6 and Figure 34 show the 5 most frequent visual elements among the albums investigated related to occultism.

5.2.4.2 Horror

Table 7. Top 10 nouns in investigated albums relevant to horror

Noun Frequency of occurrence death 121 time 105

62 life 105 dead 86 world 80 soul 73 light 70 dream 68 sky 59 night 51

Table 7 shows the 10 most frequently mentioned nouns among the albums investigated related to horror.

Table 8. Top 10 verbs in investigated albums relevant to horror

Verb Frequency of occurrence come 115 feel 90 see 90 go 77 take 62 end 59 live 57 turn 52 call 46 love 46

63 Table 8 shows the 10 most frequently mentioned verbs among the albums investigated related to horror.

Table 9. Top 5 icons in investigated album arts relevant to horror

Icon Frequency of occurrence flesh 6 skull 5 ethnic 4 dead 4 monster 4

Table 9 shows the 5 most frequent visual elements among the albums investigated related to horror

Figure 35. Some examples of icons in investigated album arts relevant to horror. Credit: Iron Maiden, Angra, Sigh, Mechanical Poet

64 Table 9 and Figure 35 show the 5 most frequent visual elements among the albums investigated related to horror.

5.2.4.3 Legend

Table 10. Top 10 nouns in investigated albums relevant to legend

Noun Frequency of occurrence time 143 world 132 dream 123 life 118 god 115 sky 114 night 104 wind 101 end 98 heart 92

Table 10 shows the 10 most frequently mentioned nouns among the albums investigated related to legend.

65 Table 11. Top 10 verbs in investigated albums relevant to legend

Verbs Frequency of occurrence see 154 come 150 go 145 look 91 know 90 take 80 feel 79 fight 78 fire 76 live 73

Table 11 shows the 10 most frequently mentioned verbs among the albums investigated related to legend.

Table 12. Top 5 icons in investigated album arts relevant to legend

Icon Frequency of occurrence warrior 6 monster 4 ethnic 4 fire 3

66 flag 3

Figure 36. Some examples of icons in investigated album arts relevant to legend. Credit: Helloween, Soulfly, Tang Dynasty, Blind Guardian

Table 12 and Figure 36 show the 5 most frequent visual elements among the albums investigated related to legend.

5.2.5 Behavior Identity

To extract identifiable behaviors for people who engage with metal music, I examined two of Sam Dunn’s documentaries. Both include interviews with metal fans, musicians, organizers, and scholars. And also there are plenty of scenes showing metal fans gathered in shows and music festivals. To qualify the result and make a comparison, I recorded the total times each type of behaviors, including their dressing, gesture and expression, and body motion.

67 Behavior

26%

53%

21%

Dressing Gesture & expression Body motion

Figure 37. The portions of various types of behavior summarized from the documentaries investigated

Figure 37 shows the composition of these three types of behaviors according to the frequency appeared in documentaries. Apparently, the dressing style of metal fans and musicians are the most identifiable behaviors, then the postures and gestures.

68

Figure 38. The chart of the frequency of each type of behavior in the documentaries investigated

To provide more details, here I made the chart in Figure 38 to show the frequency of each detailed behavior. The top 3 are keeping long hair, making the gesture, and headbanging along with the music. Following them, there are also wearing band shirts, leather jackets, and battler jackets, pogo/mosh, and also raising their fists. In short, for metal subculture, there have already been a set of unique behaviors showing their identity through dressing, gesture, and posture. Here I will give more information on each type of them.

5.2.5.1 Gesture

69 In metal subculture, there is one gesture called ‘devil’s horn’ that metal fans and musicians are always showing during the shows or photographing. By stretching your index and pinkie fingers out, hold the rest of your fingers with your thumb and facing the palm outwards, the gesture looks like a goat’s head, which is usually considered as the metaphor of Satan.

Figure 39. Ronnie James Dio making the ‘Devil’s Horn’ gesture. Credit: Sandro Campardo, AP

Figure 39 shows a picture of Ronnie James Dio with ‘Devil’s Horn’ gesture, who was regarded as the inventor of the gesture. However, in the documentary, he clarified that this was from his grandmother. In his childhood, if there is someone staring at them unfriendly, his grandmother would make the gesture towards them since she believed it could help expel viciousness.

70

Figure 40. Metal fans making ‘Devil’s Horn’ gesture in a concert. Credit: Sam Dunn

Afterward, Dio started to make this gesture in his shows as an attempt to connect with fans. It has been spread all over the world together with metal music and became a universal expression for people who engage with metal music. Figure 40 shows some examples of metal fans with ‘Devil’s Horn’ gesture. According to Dio, the gesture could be regarded as a symbol against evil but not with evil.

5.2.5.2 Body motion

Figure 41. Band members do headbanging on the stage. Credit: Hervé Girod

As Figure 41 shows, headbanging is typical behavior for metal fans and musicians when they’re performing or listening to metal music. Even sometimes the metal fans are also

71 called ‘headbangers’. It refers to shaking one’s head intensively along with music’s rapid rhythm. It usually happens during the concerts, where musicians on the stage and audiences in the pool do headbanging together as an important form of interaction between them. The intense movement of headbanging matches with some essential elements in metal music – strong drum beats, aggressive tone, and performers’ rapid and repeated movement. The audiences' engagement to headbanging also reflects the influence of metal music’s characteristics on audiences – energy and impulse.

Figure 42. People dancing pogo and stage diving during a concert. Credit: GothEric

Moshing, also known as slam dancing, refers to a special kind of movement expression fans usually make during the concerts, in which participants push or slam to each other randomly, just as Figure 42 shows. Moshing is originated in the hardcore punk scenes of

California and Washington, D.C and then borrowed by subgenres like thrash metal. It usually happens in the area facing the stage, where audiences could get intensive sensory perception. From a perceptual perspective, the moshing scenes resonate with sonic characteristics of metal music – fast tempo, intensity, enthusiasm, chaos, and aggressiveness. It’s dangerous behavior, but most of the audiences still enjoy it. What’

72 s more, they are even following some unspoken rules (Sinclair, G., & Dolan, 2015). For instance, when someone falls off during a moshing, the audiences around him/her will stop moshing and help him/her stand up. So it’s not so dangerous as people imagine, and it’s positive feedback from audiences and a sign of enjoyment.

Figure 43. Ronnie James Dio rises his fist in a concert. Credit: Sam Dunn

Another behavior that frequently appears on people among heavy metal concerts is rising the fist, shown by Figure 43. It typically happens during the chorus and refrains, in which parts lyrics always calls upon actions or highlights the subjects the song singing about, such ‘breaking the law, breaking the law’ from Judas Priest’s Breaking the law, and

‘Master! Master!’ form Metallica’s Master of puppets. Also, sometimes audiences will wave fists along with the rhythm. On the one hand, the fist itself as a symbol of strength resonates with the intensive sensory perception from metal music. On the other hand, rising up and waving the fist as a typical symbol of rebellion and resistant, suggests that metal fans have the sense of ‘embattled’ projected on their behaviors and resonated with other fans and performers.

5.2.5.3 Dressing

73

Figure 44. Metal fans wearing t-shirts during an outdoor festival. Credit: Sam Dunn

Almost in every single scene within the documentaries investigated, metal fans and musicians always wear t-shirts with metal-related patterns. In most cases, the patterns printed on those t-shirts are either logos of bands or metal album covers, just as Figure

44 shows. And the background color is usually black, as the same as most metal album covers, which makes album arts looks more naturally embedded on fabric without obvious edges. For metal fans, they could wear those shirts both as every-day dressing and especially for attending concerts. For metal bands, t-shirts are also important merchandise sold to fans and gain revenue from. They always sell those shirts during touring at a temporary booth set up at the entrance of venues. Some of the famous bands, such as Iron Maiden, will even produce t-shirts inclusively for touring with specially designed graphics. Thus, besides the graphics reflecting metal fans’ unique taste, those t-shirts also have memorial value.

74

Figure 45. Two metal fans wear ‘battle jacket’. Credit: liftarn

While printed t-shirts usually appear in some other subcultures and other marketing cases, as shown in Figure 45, a denim jacket with patches is a more exclusive identity of metal subculture on the dressing. This type of dressing is called as ‘battle jacket’ or ‘battle-vest’.

The battle jacket is originated from biker subculture and was popular in punk and metal subculture afterward. It’s not massively produced by any band or brand. The essential parts of battle jackets include a denim vest and patches of bands logo or album arts. For each battle jacket, the owner builds it from a plain denim jacket and constantly sew the patches collected from time to time. Thus, those battle jackets become a complication shows their personal tastes on metal music.

According to the documentaries investigated, the fans wearing battle jackets usually show up during the concerts or music festivals instead of in daily life. It suggests that battle jackets have more special meanings for meal fans. The way it was built reflects the do-it- yourself spirit of metal subculture. The time and collection it requires to make the battle jacket a more exclusive identity on dressing for core fans.

75 Other than t-shirts and battle jackets, leather is also an important element within the dressing style of metal music, as shown in Figure 45. During the documentaries investigated, the leather elements are shown in the forms of jackets, trousers, vest, and wristbands. On the one hand, the leather dressing in the metal subculture is greatly influenced by biker subculture, parallel with the influence of a biker song, Born to Be Wild, to the term of ‘heavy metal’. This reflects the rebellious spirit in metal music. On the other hand, the vocalist of Judas Priest, Rob Halford’s dressing style with leather apparels from

BDSM culture reinforce the connection between heavy metal music and leather. This connection resonates with masculinity that metal music conveys.

5.2.6 Perception/Opinion

Among the interviews with scholars, musicians and fans during the documentaries investigated, there are also many interviewees expressed positive understanding towards heavy metal, which is a contrast to negative stereotypes the mainstream public holds.

Here I summarized the noteworthy opinions.

5.2.6.1 Pride

I’m a metalhead and I’m proud

Many fans interviewed by Sam Dunn expressed that they are proud of being metal fans.

They’re proud that they choose to embrace the metal subculture, regard it as their own faith and stick with that. They said ‘I’m a metalhead and I’m proud’, ‘It’s my choice, my statement, and people have to deal with that’, ‘Stay true, never bargain, never negotiate’.

76 These opinions have reflected the great loyalty and engagement of metal fans. Also, influenced by metal music, those fans have shown great perseverance towards their individuality.

5.2.6.2 Sense of belonging

What attracts fans is the tribal attitude

Another important source of engagement for metal fans is the sense of belonging. ‘Heavy metal is not the way to sense your loneliness, but a way to make you feel like a part of the big group’, ‘Heavy metal means a sense of belonging, to a way of life’. Personally, being a metal fan may make someone looks weird comparing with others, be misunderstood by parents or friends, while metal music functions as a bridge between metal fans. ‘You feel wired, but you’re not.’ ‘Heavy metal is not the way to sense your loneliness, but a way to make you feel like a part of the big group’, ‘So HM just gathers all the weird kid in one place’. Those opinions have shown the incredible force of cohesion inside the heavy metal subculture.

5.2.6.3 Relief

It gives us a positive way to release anger and depression

For the metal fans shown in these two documentaries, they seldom expressed the tendency to act violently or negatively, or a serious acceptance of violence or evil. As

Sam Dunn said, ‘I still feel that music is a kind of harmless entertainment’. The most metal

77 fans and musicians regard Heavy Metal as an exit to release their passion, depression, frustration, and inner darkness. Even though most identifiable behaviors of the metal subculture perform violently or aggressively. But there are few people intends to hurt others. The vocalist of Slipknot said, ‘Moshing is better than hurting someone in real life.’

Those opinions have shown that for metal fans, their perception of metal music is not necessarily to be encouraged to conduct violence or evil. Metal music is more of a way to release their negative emotions and be empowered.

5.2.6.4 Interpretation

In the documentary, Global Metal, Sam Dunn discussed with metal musicians and fans in different countries, in which they shared their interpretation of metal music based on their cultural backgrounds.

Figure 46. Kaiser is imitating Chinese ancient soldier with long hair in the documentary Global Metal. Credit: Sam Dunn

78 When he was in China, he interviewed Kaiser Guo, the founder of the Tang Dynasty.

Kaiser connected the figure of long-hair male fans in the metal subculture with the long hair of male soldiers in ancient China, just as Figure 46 shows. ‘Metal looks are suitable for Chinese male, like great warriors in ancient times, long hair means martial power.’ He used it to articulate his resonance with the courage and masculinity conveyed by metal music.

Figure 47. Kobi Farhi and Orphaned Land in a concert. Credit: Sam Dunn

In Israel, he interviewed with Kobi Farhi, the vocalist of Orphaned Land. When it comes to Orphaned Land’s fusion of traditional ethnic instrument and metal music, Kobi explained ‘It’s important for an artist to express his place and culture’. For Jerusalem, the birthplace of the three biggest religions all over the world, this type of fusion will not be considered ridiculous. Just as Kobi said, ‘Israel culture is ancient and mix’. For him, as

Figure 47 shows, metal music is an art form to praise Israel's history and culture by applying traditional instruments.

79

Figure 48. The Brazilian native figure is shown on the album cover of Root by Sepultura. Credit: Sepultura

When Sam interviewed with the founder of Sepultura, Max Cavalera, Sam spoke highly of Sepultura’s experiment in the album Roots, applying folk melody and ethnic patterns from native aborigines to metal music. ‘It surprised me that Sepultura added traditional

Brazilian instruments and music, and it shocked the whole metal community’. In Max’s opinion, there is no rigid standard in metal music, to be outstanding in the metal world is to show their uniqueness. ‘I think we should have our own identity’, he said. By applying ethnic elements, as Figure 48 shows, Sepultura created a novel message of masculinity and became the pride of Brazilian metal fans.

5.3 Interviews

To understand how stakeholders interact with each other within the heavy metal community, I have interviewed three reputational record shops in the Cincinnati area.

Each of them has a different portion of heavy metal records in their business. Everybody’s

80 Record (shop A) is opened in 1978 and reputational for its vast collection of vinyl, CD, and cassette, also including a wide range of genres. Its strategy is to cater to all types of music fans regardless of their preferences. Shake-it Record (shop B) is opened in 1999, started as a used record shop. The records it sells are filtered by owners’ preferences and market performances. Compared with shop A, shop B reflects the more personal influence on its operational strategy. Hail Dark Aesthetic (shop C) is opened in 2016 and greatly characterized by its owner’s personality. Besides records of metal and rock, shop

C also carries a lot of other categories of merchandise, such as jewelry, pinned insects, or items related to minority religions. By combing those merchandise, it builds a mystery and odd atmosphere for the shop.

The reasons I chose them as interviewees are the following: 1) comparing with other stakeholders, those record shops are more accessible for me; 2) the core of metal subculture is metal music, which is usually carried with records, so the records shops would function as hubs contacting with various stakeholders within heavy metal subculture; 3) the different portions that heavy metal records occupy in the business of each record shops have provided good opportunities to observe how metal music influences their performances at different level. The interviews were conducted face-to- face and the owners were asked the same set of questions to make the result comparable.

The first half of the interviews, the interviewees were required to fill out a short survey to quickly catch the basic information of each shop, such as the number of merchandise categories and weekly customers. During the second half, the interviewees were asked questions about the history, customers, merchandise, events, visions, and cooperation with record labels.

81 5.3.1 Basic Business Situation

Here are charts reflecting the basic business situation of the three shops, extracted from the short survey they filled during the interviews.

Customers per week 800

700

600

500

400

300

200

100

0 shop A shop B shop C

Figure 49. The number of customers visited each shop per week.

Figure 49 shows the total customers amount per week in each shop. The owner of shop

A said there are 500 to 600 customers come to the shop every week. The owner of shop

B said there are 400-1000 customers come to the shop every week. The owner of shop

C said there are 50-100 customers come to the shop every week. To make this chart, I picked the median of these ranges and compare with each other. From the chart, it can be told that shop B has the most customers. Compared with shop A and shop B, shop C has much fewer customers, which might be influenced by its minority style.

82 Merchandise categories 16

14

12

10

8

6

4

2

0 shop A shop B shop C

Figure 50. The number of merchandise in each shop

Figure 50 shows the number of merchandise categories for each shop. It can be told that shop C has the most diversified merchandise categories. According to its owners’ introduction, shop C sells many ‘oddities’ besides metal or rock records. Thus, if the more detailed categories are investigated, the gap shown in the chart between shop C and others might be bigger than the current one.

Regular customers 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% shop A shop B shop C

Figure 51. The chart of portions of regular customers in each shop

83 Figure 51 shows the portion of regular customers for each shop. The owner of shop A said there are 50% to 75% of the customers will come to the shop regularly. The owner of shop B said there are 50% of the customers will come to the shop regularly. The owner of shop C said there are 50% to 75% of the customers will come to the shop regularly. In general, it can be told that those record shops mostly depend on regular customers. It also reflects the close and mutually supportive connection between independent record shops and music fans.

Best-selling goods 6

5

4

3

2

1

0 shop A shop B shop C

Records Non-records

Figure 52. The chart of compositions of best-selling goods in each shop

Figure 52 shows the composition of best-selling merchandise for each shop. During the interviews, the owners were asked to list the 5 merchandise sells best. Then the merchandise listed was divided into records and non-records and then reflected by this chart. It can be told that 3 out of the 5 categories of best-selling merchandise in shop C are non-records, which also suggests the diversified merchandise categories of shop C.

5.3.2 Passion-driven Motivation, Vision, and Strategy

84 According to the result of coded transcripts, one of the most obvious characteristics among the three interviewees is their passion-driven motivation and vision. When they were asked about the reasons to start their business, the owner of shop A said he regards music as his passion, the owner of shop B said collecting records is his hobby, and the owner of shop C said both he and his partner love ‘weird stuff’. Thus, they all started their business since they regard music as what they deeply engage with.

When talked about their visions of the shops, they didn’t show a strong expectation for profits or revenue. Instead, their primary goal is to maintain a long-term business and reach to more audiences passionate about music as they are. The owner of shop A said,

‘we just passed her fortieth want to make it to the fifty years.’ The owner of shop B said,

‘We just want the ability to keep doing what we're doing, fine-tuning. We always have to attract new customers.’ And the owner of shop C said, ‘open up the third spot and then eventually a four spot.’ In short, their visions are also passion-driven. They are more about continuing the business and sharing with more audiences.

Another perspective that reflects their passion for music is their support to local musicians and record labels. As the important channels for those musicians and labels retail their merchandise, these record shops only take a nominal share of the sale profits. For instance, both the owner of shop A and shop B have said they just take ninety-nine cents when helping local musicians and labels sell their merchandise. For instance, if a local record label wants to sell vinyl for ten dollars, then the shop will sell that for ten dollars and ninety-nine cents and give the ten dollars back to the record label afterward. The

85 owner of shop C described this cooperation as a mutually supportive process, ‘they promote my shop. I promote them in the long run’.

In short, passion is the most important factor that influences their motivation, vision, and strategy.

5.3.3 Connection

According to the result of coded transcripts, the connection between various stakeholders is crucial for the community’s vitality. In the previous research result, it has told that those independent record shops mostly rely on regular customers, which takes over 50% of all the customers. Thus, those record shops have become important joints that connect musicians, record labels and audiences. Their operational strategies are also focusing on maintaining this connection.

On the one hand, they utilize the social network to promote the shop. The owner of shop

A said they hold record giveaway on Facebook regularly. The owner of shop C also agrees that social network drives its connection with customers. He said, ‘I get a lot of people (from Instagram)’. He uses Instagram to post new arrivals and expand their reputation. For shop B, the owner also mentioned that social network to reach to new customers.

Table 13. The activities each shop hosts

Interviewee Activities

Shop A Trivia contests, Facebook give away, charity sale

Shop B Band visit, live play, autograph sale

86 Shop C Solo comedy, live play, taxidermy class

On the other hand, they often hold relevant events in stores to attract audiences. Table

13 shows the various events mentioned during the interviews. It can be told that shop A usually holds events based on record sale and production. Shop B plays a greater role in connecting bands and audiences. Although the events that shop C usually holds are more related to personal interest, they have still attracted a lot of audiences since they are cohesive to the unique aesthetic orientation of the shop. ‘They sell it really fast’, he commented. These activities help record shop owners to create more dynamics for customers to visit the shop and reinforce the connection between each other.

Besides the connection between record shops and audiences, another noteworthy phenomenon is the audiences’ engagement with analog records. Generally, it reflects audiences’ expectation to connect with musicians and tangible artifacts. As the owner of shop C said, part of the fun out of playing an analog record comes from reading the information printed on record covers. ‘Obviously, vinyl has a bigger canvas than CD, and that makes it more interesting. Because usually from the liner notes on with the records you can learn more about the artist, who’s the guitar player, or who the producer is’, he explained. On the other hand, playing analog records like vinyl requires more preparation and attention. Instead of complaining about the inconvenience, those music fans romanticized the process and feel more involved with the music. ‘It’s a much more impersonal way of listening’, he said, ‘when people who listen to vinyl, they have to put the record on the turntable, put the needle on, then they see where the sound comes from.’

87 In short, the desire of being connected for audiences is not only reflected by social activities between stakeholders, but also shown through their engagement of tangible merchandise.

5.3.3.1 Mapping the community with ERAF Diagram

Figure 53. The ERAF diagram

Figure 53 summarizes the traditional operation model in non-mainstream music community according to interviews. There are four major flows between stakeholders: 1) artists create musical works and release them to public with the help from record labels;

88 2) manufacturers are commissioned to produce records and other merchandise by record labels; 3) after receiving the merchandise from manufacturers, record labels will distribute them to retailers; 4) fans consume records and merchandise through retailers, including brick-and-mortar shops. For fans, there are also secondary flows shows they follow the artists and record labels through social networks. From this map, it can be told that retailers and record labels function hubs to deliver musicians’ works to audiences. While as the origin of musical works, musicians lack support during the creation process. It presents a dilemma for most of them – if there is not enough fund to make a record, a band will lose its major source of revenue and reputation, then it stagnates, even disintegrates. Just like the owner of shop B said, ‘I'm dissatisfied with that eventually we could we kill by not paying the artists and not supporting them. We are slitting our own throats as a culture. Because eventually there's no way for them to be able to get their music out to the public and they won't make any money.’ Another problem reflected in this chart is the lack of connection for fans. Compared with record labels and retailers, fans only contact with one single major flow. As the foundation of community, there is more potential to encourage fans to connect with other stakeholders and make a contribution to the whole community.

5.3.4 Differentiation

During the interview, the owner of shop B mentioned the limited market scale of music records consumption. ‘Everybody wants a piece of that very small pie that's kind of shrinking all the time’. Also, when it was discussing hard times they’ve experienced, both owners of shop A and shop B highlighted the competition from other retailers and distributors. The owner of shop A called mass retailers like BestBuy or Walmart as ‘loss

89 leader’, who took the customers off traditional record shops by lower prices. The owner of shop B said, ‘Amazon never really sold records, or they weren't very competitive on price in the past. Now they are the number one seller of records.’ While for the owner of shop C, the frustration less came from competitors, but more from being misunderstood by neighborhood. With his words, ‘For each record store, the key is to have your niche’.

To compete with other retailers, the strategy he used was to make the store more

‘aesthetically pleasing’. According to the result reflects metal fans’ opinions, the pursuit of individuality is also an important driving force. This resonates with how differentiated value was provided by the strategy of shop B.

Another perspective that reflects audiences’ pursuit of differentiated value is the reason why younger audiences engage with vinyl again. The owner of shop A observed that ‘Now we see kids in schools or colleges coming in buying vinyl.’ ‘And a lot of them just like to have the collection, like art hanging on the wall.’ So vinyl has been given more value, even than the music itself. While today the mainstream way to consume music is by streaming services like Spotify, those teenagers choose to collect analog records to be identified differently with regular audiences. The owner of shop C described this nostalgia phenomenon as ‘generational cycles’, and this cycle has been romanticized. So through collecting analog records, audiences also convey the message of their individuality.

The audiences’ pursuit of differentiated value was also reflected by the trends of musicians and record labels to change their strategy. As the owner of shop B said, ‘Every band and every record label want to sell directly to their fans. So, they offer them special deals, like differently colored vinyl, limited versions of their records. Or you get a t-shirt or it comes with a book. They want to cut us out. They want to go straight to their fans, to

90 the consumers.’ While this trend originates from musicians’ and labels’ expectation of more revenue, the factor makes it feasible is it matches the pursuit of both connection and differentiation. For those fans directly purchased merchandise from musicians and labels, there is no need to go through retailers to get the latest releases. At the same time, the limited version of merchandise gives them the feeling they are treated differently than other regular audiences.

CHAPTER 6. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION

6.1 Conclusion

6.1.1 Misconception

According to the second part of the research, among the 25 most frequently mentioned verbs, only 20% of them obviously convey the message of violence, death, or darkness, while 52% of them show a dynamic tendency towards taking actions, and 28% of them refer to personal feelings and reflections. Furthermore, when taking a look at specific results, the verb used most by lyrics investigated are ‘come’, and there are also verbs like

‘call’, ‘live’.

When it comes to the 25 most frequently mentioned nouns, the objects related to evil, violence or death just take up 23% of them, while the objects refer to the inner spiritual world and the outer material world take up 68%. The most used nouns by lyrics investigated are ‘world’, ‘life’, ‘time’.

91 What’s more, among the 25 themes most related to metal bands investigated, the top 3 are ‘occultism’, ‘horror’ and ‘legend’. It reflects that what metal musicians and fans pursue through metal music is the differentiated value, to show their individuality.

These results that extracted during the research on communication identity are significant.

They refuse the common misconception of metal music and its culture – metal music is not necessarily about evil, violence, or death. Actually, the themes of metal music could be serious, reflective and romantic. The vision metal music pursue is neither about boy- meets-girl stories nor limited by hatred, aggression or killing. They also bring the existential and spiritual reflection into the metal subculture. The lyrics are actually encouraging audiences to be brave, to take actions also to sense their inner spiritual world.

From those results, we could draw the conclusion: 1) heavy metal music is the core of heavy metal subculture since most of the activities and merchandise are based on the music, such as records and attending concerts; 2) heavy metal music could help audiences release negative emotions and be empowered.

This falsification of common stereotypes also supports the legitimacy of the goal of the thesis. To construct an organizational strategy to improve intensity and sustainability for heavy metal subculture community is not to propagate evil, satanism or violence. I strongly agree with Sam Dunn’s words, ‘I still feel that music (heavy metal) is a kind of harmless entertainment’. It’s an outlet for people to release their passion and frustration.

To support this community is more of reinforcing the communicative atmosphere or conserve the diversity for contemporary cultural diversity.

6.1.2 The Significance of Visual Identity in Metal Subculture

92 While the communication identity of metal music shows it’s not necessarily about evil, violence or death, among the visual identity results from analyzing the selected album arts, the iconography still shows a strong preference to horrific or aggressive symbols.

For instance, the icons related to the monsters and corpses come right after the fire and flames when ordered by frequency. This might explain the popularity of the public’s misconception towards metal music – combing with the massive and shattered tone, the images of monster, devil or corpse shown on the album arts reinforce the stereotypes like

‘the devil’s sound’. While the lyrics usually sang unclearly or screamingly, it’s much less likely for an outside audience to quickly understand what metal music is actually singing about.

However, in the two documentaries examined, the majority of metal fans and musicians interviewed don’t behave aggressively or violently as people stereotyped. They usually speak friendly and thoughtfully, from which it can be told that what they perceive from metal music is more of a positive dynamic. Just like one of the fans said, ‘Heavy metal gives people imagination, through what to understand other things, and inspires people to start playing’.

This conflict reflects the significance of visual identity in the metal subculture from two perspectives. On the one hand, those visual elements are more straightforward for audiences to identify metal subculture. On the other hand, for metal musicians and fans, the visual identity is more important than communication community, so that they will more stick with the occultism, aggressive visual style, other than trying to reflect the dynamic, positive message through album arts. According to Sam Dunn, besides metal music itself, the way fans dress is another important element makes up the heavy metal

93 subculture. And from the summary of dressing style in the metal subculture, the graphics printed on t-shirts are mainly band logos and album arts, which also proves the significance of visual identity in the metal subculture.

6.1.3 The Binary Pursuit of Connection and Differentiation

According to the case study of documentaries and interviews with record shop owners, both connection and differentiation are found as important driving forces for metal fans and musicians.

The pursuit of differentiation is mainly reflected in behavior and motivation at the individual level. For metal fans, engaging with metal music shows their individuality, and they could sense pride and honor for their perseverance on it. They also prefer to collect analog records and tangible merchandise to show their unique taste, while the mainstream way to consume music has been shifted with streaming services. For metal bands worldwide, they are not satisfied with following a unitary aesthetic framework and started to interpret metal music based on their own contexts. For distributors, by applying aesthetic-orient strategies in merchandise and events, they build their reputation and maintain a closer connection to other stakeholders.

On the other hand, the pursuit of differentiation is reflected at both the individual level and collective level. For metal fans, the sense of belonging is a major source of engagement.

They enjoy the feeling of being connected to a bigger family or the vast outer world through metal music. For metal bands, fans’ preference for analog records, t-shirts, and other merchandise shows their desire to connect to music and musicians through getting

94 involved with tangible artifacts. And for distributors, their vision is to reach more audiences.

Also, imagery differs ‘non-authentic’ fans, and connects ‘authentic’ fans.

To draw the conclusion, the pursuit of connection and differentiation co-exist within the heavy metal subculture community. But they do not conflict with each other since they play roles at different levels to motivate stakeholders. For the future design of the organizational strategy, the pursuit of connection should be articulated at the collective level while the pursuit of differentiation should be articulated at the individual level.

95 6.1.4 Subcultural Adoption and Engagement Map

Figure 54. The adoption and engagement map of the heavy metal subculture

Figure 54 shows the overall path of how heavy metal subculture be adopted in different regions and how various stakeholders be engaged.

96 When looking down from the top, according to the result of data research, the different adoption of heavy metal subculture in different regions is reflected by the preferences of different subgenres. Then the subjects created and develop those subgenres are bands.

For those bands, they are originated from regional communities, and the way they differentiate themselves is by interpreting metal music with their context, which includes the social background, historical background, cultural background, technology background, economic background and so on. When those differentiated interpretations are conveyed through their musical works, the influence is reflected by various elements.

Among those aesthetic elements, themes hold the dominant position, and lyrics, sonic features, and visual elements are all built around those themes.

When viewing from metal fans’ perspective, the sonic features of metal music is the most identical elements for metal music. So for fans, their perception firstly comes from the sonic features of the metal music. Then they feel engaged out of that stimulus. Driven by the engagement, fans will further explore cultural content related to metal music and perform identical behaviors influenced by the motivational communication style and energetic sonic feature. As mentioned before, the visual identity plays an important role in heavy metal culture. And its significance is directly reflected by the dominant role that dressing style plays among behavior identities. When it comes to behavior identity, it encourages interaction and connection between fans and musicians, which makes them a part of a bigger family. The sense of belonging become the driving force and reinforces the engagement in return. In this way, it builds the dynamic loop through perception, engagement, and behaviors at the individual level. This explains the unparalleled loyalty those metal fans perform. Also, for the fans come from a specific region, when they

97 perceive the elements reflecting the context of that region, their engagement will be improved indirectly, and these elements usually carried out by the bands come from the same region.

In general, this map illustrates that metal music is becoming a lens that reflects the regional context under the trend of differentiation in the process of globalization. It improves the diversity of metal subculture, creates differentiated value and sense of belonging for fans at both subcultural level and regional level.

When viewing the right half of the map, as it was shown in the research result, a more aesthetic-oriented strategy tends to create more merchandise opportunities for distributors. Combined with the left half of this map, it reveals that there is a potential opportunity to innovate merchandise by combing the aesthetic elements from metal subculture and regional context.

To draw the conclusion, I believe that a new system for global heavy metal subcultural community can be implemented to strengthen the connection between internal stakeholders.

6.2 Proposal

6.2.1 New Organizational Strategy

98 Film Apparle Brands Instrument Entertainment Agencies & Beer & Liquor Lifestyle Brands Non-profit Local Bands Local Influencers National Record Lables International International

Professional

Online Shops The Record Shops Retailers Organization Botique Shops

Local moderate

Fans Newcomer External Audiences Bar Live venues Live Theater Shows Stadium Local Enthusiasts Outdoor Festival

Merchandise Manufacturers

Records

Figure 55. The ERAF diagram of the proposal

Figure 55 illustrates my proposal for the new organizational strategy for the heavy metal subcultural community with the form of ERAF diagram. Comparing with the traditional interactions between stakeholders (marked by grey), it proposes a new role besides record labels or retailers to mainly serve fans and bands. The three major flows marked by yellow, red and orange illustrate the major activities within the new system design. The red lines show this new role will support bands with production, distribution and create more performances opportunities to improve their exposure. The yellow lines show this new role will provide loyalty program for fans, from which those fans could receive offers when they’re consuming at live venues and record shops. In this way, fans are encouraged to consume merchandise at brick-and-mortar shops or attend to live performances. Then there will be more potential to make new connections between other fans musicians in real life. The orange lines show this new role will become a joint for external culture agencies to reach to metal fans for marketing purposes, such as

99 mainstream record labels, entertainment agencies or lifestyle brands. This creates more opportunities for the new role to make a profit and support the community in return.

Among those three major activities, the services provided for bands and fans are more passion-driven than profit-driven. The goal is to curate the musicians and improve the intensity within the community. The introduction of the marketing channel function is a balancing act to improve the sustainability of the entire model. Those major activities will be further elaborated in the following sections.

6.2.2 Major Activities

6.2.2.1 The Loyalty Program for Fans

Figure 56. The user journey map for metal fans

100 Figure 56 illustrates the user journey of fans participates in the loyalty program. Generally, it was divided into 3 steps, register, consume and contribute.

In the register phase, there are two ways to ensure the users are loyal fans of metal music or have some knowledge about metal music. One of them is to ask users to take a short test and only who pass the test could be registered. The other way is to acquire an invitation code from other registered users, or by purchasing specific merchandise released by the local musicians or record labels. And after registration, the fans will receive a patch as the identification of a registered member. There are also two channels to register. One is to register online, where the users could customize the design of the patch. The other one is to register in brick-and-mortar shops, where the users only could get the patch with the standard design. This is designed to function as a complementary channel to online registration. Just in case if someone is aware of the loyalty program when consuming in shops, he/she could finish the registration right away.

In the consume phase, the patches will function as membership cards with inserted RFID chips. They will transform the amount users consumed into credits accumulated in their profiles. For retailers, I divided them into two categories according to how often fans consume at these venues and how close these venues connected to metal subculture.

The internal ones include record shops and live venues, where registered users will be offered notification of new arrivals, invitations to special events and discounted merchandise or drinks. The external ones include apparel shops, instrument shops, and other lifestyle shops, where registered users will be offered mainly discounted merchandise and invitations to events. The reason why I divided retailers into 2 categories and applied different strategy, is that for internal retailers, they mainly depend on regular

101 customers. If those customers are offered discounts on records or show tickets, which they will still purchase without considering the discount, it will result in the incline on sale.

In this case, the owners of venues are more likely to reject the proposal. So for these internal retailers, the major strategy is to provide differentiated value for registered users with inclusive services. For those external venues, it’s good to have more customers outside their original target consumer groups. There is also more room for profit. So they will be more willing to attract metal fans with discounts through the loyalty program.

Figure 57. An example of the invitation through the mobile app

In the contribute phase, due to the motivational communication identity of the metal subculture, metal fans often show spontaneity in creating or distributing cultural content.

For instance, core metal fans will be inspired to play, to make fanzines and independent

102 radio programs. To articulate this characteristic, I propose to set up a mechanism to invite active community members to participate in organizational works. After a registered user achieved the given credit standard, he/she will receive an invitation to become a local facilitator, just like Figure 57 shows. This role requires to help organize events, explore local bands, and contact with local retailers and venues. The reward is the free passes for shows, higher discount rates, and some cash bonus. This phase will give hardcore fans an opportunity to make a contribution back to the community and reinforce their sense of belonging.

6.2.2.2 Specially Designed Patch

Through the user journey for metal fans, a specially designed patch will function as the alternative of membership card. This was inspired by metal fans’ fondness on tangible, collectible merchandise and dressing styles. I chose to use a patch instead of a t-shirt because the patch is more representative and exclusive for metal subculture. These days, according to my observance, since some fast fashion brands, like H&M, have started t- shirts with rock or metal bands graphics and make them popular. The T-shirt's identification value for heavy metal subculture has been influenced. Thus, a patch is actually more representative for one’s collection and passion for heavy metal subculture.

What’s more, other than being sewed on denim vests, a patch also has other ways to be carried for daily scenarios, such as being made into a key ring.

103

Figure 58. An example of the graphic design combining ‘Cincy’ and ‘blade’

Figure 59. An example of the graphic design combing ‘Cincy’ and ‘fire’

The graphic design of the patch should reflect both regional representative objects and identical heavy metal visual language. This came from the adoption pattern suggested in the conclusion. Figure 58 and Figure 59 show the examples that interpret the nickname of Cincinnati, ‘Cincy’, with typical visual languages in heavy metal subculture as suggested before – fire and blade.

104

Figure 60. An example of the graphic design of ‘flying pig’

Figure 60 shows a more advanced example of graphic design for the patch, which transforms the mascot of Cincinnati, flying pig, with typical visual elements in heavy metal subculture – skull and soldier/warrior (shown by the pilot goggle).

By interpreting the local identities, such as landmarks and mascots, with the heavy metal visual language, the graphics will create differentiated value for local fans through improving the sense of belonging on both their context and subcultural community. The fact that some famous bands nowadays will design special tour posters based on their tour destinations also proves the feasibility of this strategy.

105

Figure 61. Patch samples and RFID chips embedded

To make the patch possible for personal identification and data tracking, I chose to apply

RFID chips to carry identification information and communicate with users’ profiles, as

Figure 61 shows. Comparing with other communication technology, the RFID chip has competitive edges that it doesn’t require an internal electric source, it’s affordable, it’s possible to be heatproof and waterproof, and it’s possible for non-contact transmission.

So RFID chips could make those patches still washable, dryable, durable and also provide seamless shopping experience. In this way, the patches are turned into both collectible and functional accessories.

106 6.2.2.3 The Supportive Service for Bands

Figure 62. The user journey map for metal bands

Figure 62 shows the user journey of how the new organization supports bands. For bands,

I divide their development process into four steps, compose samples, seek for the fund, compose and record, then finally release. In each step, the new organization could provide support in different ways. In the first phase, the new organization will organize regular live shows, gathering bands in their infancy, trying to help them get more exposure.

107 In the second phase, when a band finished the demo, they could contact local facilitators or other agents worked for the organization. Then the organization will hold a crowdfunding event. Besides the fund collected from fans, the organization will make up the shortfall. The band then need to sign the contract to clarify the share of founders. And those participants of the crowdfunding will get opportunities to directly communicate with the band during the third phase, provide their inspiration and have band members share their activities during the rehearsal and recording works. In the fourth phase, after all the recording works done, the organization could help contact manufactures to produce merchandise, release merchandise to retailers, organize live tours and get the share of the sale, then reward the crowdfunding participants.

Comparing with the traditional record labels or producers, the new organization focus more on how to support bands during the early stages. To organize complication live shows is to give bands more opportunities to be exposed, practice their skills and incubate their reputation. The crowdfunding is another new method applied since it could release the financial pressure for the organization and have audiences participate in the producing process. For those participants, being able to communicate with bands directly also provide them differentiated value.

6.2.2.4 The Cooperation with External Culture Agencies

108

Figure 63. The circulation map

After gathering those metal fans, the organization itself will become a channel for external culture agencies or lifestyle brands to reach this group of people accurately. Figure 63 shows the potential opportunities for culture agencies and lifestyle brands to circulate through the metal subculture, musicians, fans and regional communities. Currently, there have already been some cases of commercial cooperation in the metal music field. For instance, excellent musicians will endorse for instrument manufactures, or write theme songs for movies. On the other hand, ss a type of subculture, there are many objects were borrowed from other cultural fields and have been given alternative meaning, such as denim jackets or leather trousers on dressing styles, or album art style influenced by horror film or Sci-fi posters in the 80s. Musicians introducing those cultural agencies or lifestyle brands into their musical works and performances, then fans will follow up and

109 finally, they will become a part of the metal subculture. For small boutique brands, they reflect the characteristics of a region and engage with local residents. There are also opportunities for them to participate in the metal subculture, such as the local brewery could promote their craft beer to local metal fans, or local artisans promote their jewelry works.

6.2.3 Business Canvas

The Business Model Canvas

Ket Partners Key Activities Value Propositions Customer Relationships Customer Segments Local record shops Membership program offers Gives local fans the sense of Collect audiences and help Local fans events and discounts, belonging, connection with them connect to each other Local live venues encourgaing fans to shop in others, relevant information, (organizer) Local bands localvenues discount, more performances. Local style shops Trust and cultivate local Mainstream entertainment Sign contracts with local bands, Help local bands grow, bands (producer) and lifestyle brands Mainstream entertainment provide fund and show earn more exposure. and lifestyle brands opportunities. Help relevant brands or culture Provide relevant mainstream to communicate with local fans. Local influencers Help mainstream brands to brands (e.g. horror films, famous (distributor) reach this group of fans for bands, dressing brands) the marketing. channels for marketing.

Key Resources Channels Partnership with local bands Online homepage and forum (Music is always the core) Social network Connection with local metal fans Offline events - shops, venues Networking with shops, venues and studios (Space for saving cost)

Initial Fund

Cost Structure Revenue Streams Funds for bands Record sale

Cost for organizaing shows Merchandise sale

Cost for music production Shows sale

Cost for merchandise production Comission from mainstream brands

Human resources

Figure 64. The business canvas for the proposal

Figure 64 explains the new organizational strategy in more details. Generally, there are two main differences between the proposed strategy and others. One is the whole strategy is less profit-driven but more passion-driven. This is reflected from three

110 perspectives, customer segments, key activities, and value propositions. The major customers are metal fans and musicians, which is a relatively minor group in society. The key activities focus on giving support. And the value propositions are mainly establishing the connections. It plays the role of a curator inside the community.

Core Staff

Local Facilitators

Fans

Figure 65. Human resource flow

The other difference is reflected by its human resource composition. This chart illustrates the ideal structure of the organization. As Figure 59 shows, for metal fans, the new organization gives the most loyal ones opportunities to become a part of the organization and make a contribution. It doesn’t only satisfy their motivation and desire to contribute, but also release the financial burden on human resources, which allows the organization to have more funds spent on curating and organizing.

6.3 Expansion of the Theory

111 6.3.1 Background

Figure 66. The relationship map of loyalty and popularity for subculture

For all types of subculture, what essentially defines them is the notion of ‘sub’, being minor, being out of the mainstream and being in small groups. Thus, when the most subcultural community members firstly were engaged, they pursued showing their individuality through being a part of the subculture community. On the one hand, it’s a way to differentiate with other ordinary people. On the other hand, since there are fewer people within the community, the connection usually is tighter and more engaging, then the members will cherish the connection between each other more. At the individual level, this sense of belonging is reflected by the great loyalty and the will to contribute. Thus, as Figure 66 shows, when a type of subculture is less popular, the members in its community will show greater loyalty, and the passion-driven visions will play a more dominant role.

112 6.3.2 Engaging Model

Core cultural content

Visual Communication identity identity

Collective Behavior Individual identity

Sense of belonging

Engagement Perception

Figure 67. The subculture engaging model

From the adoption and engagement map I summarized about heavy metal subculture previously, I extracted this map to illustrate how the various elements within a subculture community perceive and engaged by audiences. As Figure 67 shows, the source of all the flows starts with the core cultural content. It refers to the essential object a type of subculture develops based on. For instance, the heavy metal subculture is developed based on heavy metal music, so the heavy metal music is the core cultural content for heavy metal subculture. The biker subculture is developed based on customized motorcycles, thus the core cultural content of biker subculture is the behavior of customizing the motorcycle.

113 As claimed in the literature review, the contemporary definition of subculture is more relevant to lifestyle and as the collection of identities. To categorize those identities and get acquire a deeper understanding of subculture, the division within the Corporate

Identity Theory was applied. So there are three major types of identities developed from the core cultural content – communication identity, visual identity, and behavior identity.

At the individual level, for each internal audience, the flow starts at the perception out of communication identities. Then the resonance with communication identity will generate the engagement in audiences’ mind. When audiences are engaged, they tend to behave following the patterns identifiable for that specific subculture or engage with the representative visual elements. When audiences interact with each other through behavior identities, the tribal sense will reinforce their perception. Thus, the audiences’ perception, engagement and behavior identity will make up a dynamic loop that boosted by the sense of belonging. Which also loops back to the great loyalty and passion-driven visions mentioned in the previous section.

6.3.3 Curation Strategy Guidelines

Based on the engaging model shown previously, and some findings from the research result, here I list 5 guidelines for curators within a subculture community.

6.3.3.1 Define the Core Cultural Content and Support the Creator

As it shows in Figure 67, the core cultural content with good quality is the foundation for an intensive and successful subcultural community. Otherwise, fewer people will engage with the subculture, and needless to say the performance of the subcultural community.

For instance, the core of the heavy metal subcultural community is heavy metal music. In

114 the 1980s, we had many classical heavy metal songs released, and the youth then were much more passionate about heavy metal music and its subculture, showed the greatest loyalty and engagement. In contrast, if the core cultural content is of poor quality, audiences couldn’t either sincerely resonate with it or obtain enjoyment out of it. Even though sometimes a type of subculture based on relative nonsense can spread out rapidly, most audiences are just to hunt for novelty, and this phenomenon won’t last long, such as the phenomenon of ‘Gangnam Style’.

The core cultural content of high quality is the prerequisite for a long-last subculture community. To ensure that, the creators of it should be supported. Just as mentioned during the interviews with record shop owners, if musicians can’t make enough money from their music, can’t obtain what they deserve, they will stop making music sooner or later. When those creators get supported, they could take more effort into creating more content or improving their skills, instead of concerning about financial issue or doing a part-time job for income to keep going.

6.3.3.2 Articulate Subcultural Anchor

The subcultural anchor refers to the object that exclusively represents a type of subculture.

In heavy metal subculture, the subcultural anchor is the patch. In punk subculture, the subcultural anchor could be pins or piercing accessories. Those subcultural anchors are crucial to differentiate internal audiences from external audiences and reinforce the connection between internal audiences.

To articulate the subcultural anchors, here are several tips:

115 1) The subcultural anchor should be as exclusive as possible. The reason why I chose

the patch as the subcultural anchor for heavy metal subculture instead of t-shirts, is

because the t-shirts nowadays are less effective to identify a person as a metal fan

since H&M and other fashion brands are selling them to public consumers. But

patches are more of merchandise that only enthusiastic metal fans will purchase;

2) The subcultural anchor should be tangible objects. From the interviews with record

shop owners, we saw the trend that vinyl and other analog records are being popular

again. That reflects that while digital interfaces are taking an increasing portion of our

life, the affection value of tangible objects is more cherished. For audiences,

purchasing and displaying a tangible object is the way to visualize their loyalty and

pride.

3) The subcultural anchor should be visually appealing. The visual identity of a type of

subculture is more straightforward for audiences to perceive. When making it more

visually appealing, the enthusiastic audiences are more willing to display the

subcultural anchor, and there are opportunities to inspire external audiences and

potentially invite them into the subculture community.

4) The subcultural anchor should convey a sense of community. It could be regional

landmarks, mascots, or other identifiable elements. So that when two anchor holders

meet, the subcultural anchor will function as an icebreaker, naturally spark a

conversation and more networking opportunities;

5) If possible, apply connected features, such as data transmit, or connect to the mobile

app. Since nowadays information technology has greatly changed our daily routine,

116 those connected features will give holders more reasons to wear, display or use. It will

indirectly increase the exposure of those subcultural anchors.

6.3.3.3 Encourage the Role Transformation for Audiences

Within the subculture communities, the division is more blurred between artists and audiences. Unlike the mainstream fields where celebrities and ordinary people are divided by the huge gap between social and economic status, inside the subcultural communities the role of audiences, distributors and artists could be transformed due to passion-driven visions. To encourage this transformation is beneficial to engage the spontaneity, keep the independence, and also decrease the human resource cost.

6.3.3.4 Increase Intensity for Retailers

Retailers make up another crucial bridge between audiences and core cultural content.

Currently, the owners of traditional brick-and-mortar shops are struggling competing with online shopping channels and mass retailers. To bring more customers to those independent shops and create more networking opportunities, a curator could help organize special events, especially during bottom periods. This will help retailers transform into subcultural experience providers, increasing the intensity, eventually increase the reputation and reach out to more customers.

6.3.3.5 Open to Corporate with Major Brands, but Selectively

Sometimes the members within subcultural communities are against mainstream commercialism or not willing to talk about revenue, profit. But for an organization, solely relies on members’ donation is not a long-term solution. From a marketing point of view,

117 those subcultural communities accurately gather the group of people of specific characteristics, so that it could become an effective channel for branding. So as the curator, to provide these channels is a potential way to balance the cost of supporting creators and retailers. However, the cooperation opportunities should be selected to match with the characteristic of a particular subculture. For instance, for heavy metal music subculture, the opportunity could be branding for an instrument manufacturer whose products are suitable for playing metal music, or for a fashion brand that some reputational metal musicians prefer. For biker subculture, the opportunity could be working with famous motorcycle parts manufactures, etc.

6.3.3.6 Lower the Expectation for Revenue

Last but not least, reluctantly, you are less likely to make a great profit being a curator for subculture. Since subculture is still a business desert that lacks mature commerce strategy, the revenue of curating subculture is unknown. Thus the greatest reward as a curator might be the sense of achievement. This is the idealistic side of the strategies presented here.

6.4 Discussion

6.4.1 Future Vision

In my opinion, the one element worth exploring in depth is transforming patches into an alternative form of membership card. On the one hand, it utilizes the visual identity and behavior identity of the metal subculture, creates the unique value different from both

118 ordinary membership card and patch. So that the sense of belonging will be reinforced in metal fans’ mind.

Figure 68. Examples of data reports for fans, artists and retailers

On the other hand, it makes it possible to track the activities of each fan, collect data out of them, and those data will become the valuable preference for bands and other organizers to adjust their strategy. In this way, the organization could function as a platform to conduct data analysis as Figure 68 shows. For instance, when a band is planning the tour, they could review their best-selling locations to plan the entire route.

As a type of subculture with an over-50-year history, to apply internet and data operations thinking is an innovative attempt. But since the major audiences of the subculture are always young generations. And for young generations today, information technology are

119 life necessities. So by combining the patches with information communication technology, it helps the metal subculture better adapt to the lifestyle in the digital age while still retaining its aesthetic features. Whether such an approach is feasible or how much it can change the subcultural communities is a question worth exploring further.

Last but not least, through this thesis, I proposed a new organizational strategy for heavy metal subculture community. And it has the potential to benefit a lot of other types of subcultural communities that share similar passion-driven motivation and tribal sense, such as punk communities, or skateboard communities.

6.4.2 Deficiencies During the Research

Although some encouraging results were extracted from the research, there are still several points could be improved.

In the first phase, the data research, using the year of formation and the number of bands to describing the development of subgenres in different regions will cause some errors.

Since sometimes a band changed its style in the middle of their history, but the year of formation will not be changed. So there will be some mismatches like a band is of a subgenre which was born much later than the band’s year of formation. The other point is that there usually are cases a single musician runs several solo bands at the same time, especially for a lot of black metal bands/projects. So it may cause the number of bands can’t 100% accurately reflect how popular or reputational a subgenre is in a specific region. From the results came out of data research, it can be told that black metal, death metal, and thrash metal are still dominant globally. So how much influence those newly born subgenres could make still need further observation. But I don’ think it will disprove

120 the inevitability that metal music will keep being deconstructed and constructed differently in different regions.

In the second phase, media research, it lacks more objective criteria to reflect the reputation or achievement of a band. So, there may be some bias when selecting the bands to be investigated. When selecting the albums to be investigated, some of the bands have less than 3 full-length albums, so I added some other bands to be investigated, trying to make sure there is even number of albums investigated from each region. Also, when analyzing the album arts, it lacks a more systematic method to deconstruct the iconography or summarize the themes. Those deficiencies reflected there are still many obstacles when researching about minor, newly-born society fields.

In the third phase, interviews, it would be better if there are more interviewees from more perspectives other than retailers, such as musicians, founders of record labels or owners of apparel shops. If I had more time available and more access to those stakeholders, I believe those stakeholders will provide more insights to make my conclusion and proposal more comprehensive. Even though through examining documentaries I also have the opportunity to listen to them, but those documentaries are made about ten years ago. So if I interview them by myself, I will have fresher results.

6.4.3 Future Tests and Workshops

As the crucial physical product within my proposal, the specialized graphic design of the patch worths further develops and tests. It would be better if I could have some samples ready and show them to other metal fans to examine how they like the idea and if they will accept that or not. Also, in the future, I really want to host several workshops to invite

121 various stakeholders reviewing my proposal and providing their insights. Then assess the feasibility and do the necessary adjustment.

6.4.4 Personal Concerns

Since I’ve been in different roles in the heavy metal subcultural community back in China, based on my own observance, there are many complex and nonnegligible factors among internal members. Here I list some of them.

First, should I be against consumerism or learns from commerce/business? Most of the subcultural groups are opposed to consumerism and stick with their own value criteria.

Few creators or distributors are considering about profit or expense. Their passion-driven motivation contributes to the warm, intimate atmosphere within those subcultural communities, but it also limits their vision to learn from commerce or business fields. The minor market scale also gives them hard times to keep their business going. However, one of the prerequisites for keeping a subcultural community alive is sufficient financial support. And it requires more funds to develop a subcultural community into higher levels.

Personally, I think it’s necessary to learn from mainstream commerce and business fields.

Only in this way those subcultures could be continued and provide ways for young people to express their passion.

Second, should it be popular or always ‘underground’? Most of the people were attracted by subcultures at the beginning since it could help them look unique. In this case, the more popular a subcultural group is, potentially, the less attractive it would be for outsiders.

Since subculture is a concept with relativity, I don’t have a firm answer for now.

122 Third, should it pursue the greater quantity or the better quality of audiences? One of the aspects contributing to the intensity of those subcultural communities is the amount of the participants. However, inevitably, when the amount is increasing, it will be more possible that participants with little or incorrect understanding of the subculture will be included.

For instance, many metal fans critiqued some fast fashion brands for their releasing t- shirts with metal band logos or album covers. Because there are more people without any knowledge of metal music wearing those t-shirts, more ‘posers’ on the street, with their words. But I don’t think it’s totally negative. At least those ‘poser’ t-shirts could also inspire people to check the band and possibly start listening to metal music.

Fourth, should internal audiences be keeping serious and exclusive or trying to cultivate?

Indeed, participants with serious attitudes and understandings are beneficial for a subcultural group to create higher value. At the same time, it will also make a subcultural group unfriendly or exclusive for newcomers. To gather more participants, a subcultural group need to make effort to cultivate, raise public awareness and social acceptance, which in return, increases the potential of meeting the previous problem. But I doubt how great the potential is.

Overall, I hope there will be more people studying on subculture, more resources and more comprehensive databases. Being minor doesn’t mean there’s no need to research.

Especially for contemporary society, the postmodernism is popular among young groups.

Thus, studying those subcultures has its unique value for understanding the development of youth culture.

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135 APPENDIX A

136

137 APPENDIX B

The list of albums studied:

Angra. (1993). Angels Cry.

Angra. (2004). Temple of Shadows.

Angra. (2018). Omni.

Arkona. (2004). Возрождение.

Arkona. (2009). Goi, Rode, goi!.

Arkona. (2018). Khram.

Black Kirin. (2015). National Trauma.

Black Kirin. (2017). Jinling Funeral.

Black Sabbath. (1970). Black Sabbath.

Black Sabbath. (1980). Heaven & Hell.

Black Sabbath. (2013). 13.

Blind Guardian. (1988). Battalions of Fear.

Blind Guardian. (1992). Somewhere Far Beyond.

Blind Guardian. (2015). Beyond the Red Mirror.

138 Burzum. (1992). Burzum.

Burzum. (1996). Filosofem.

Burzum.(2014). The Ways of Yore.

Darkthrone. (1991). Soulside Journey.

Darkthrone. (1999). Ravishing Grimness.

Darkthrone. (2016). Arctic Thunder.

Dream Spirit. (2014). River & Mountain.

Dream Spirit. (2017). The General.

Frosty Eve. (2009). Polar Night.

Frosty Eve. (2014). Domain of Imago.

Galneryus. (2003). The Flag of Punishment.

Galneryus. (2012). Angel of Salvation.

Galneryus. (2017). Ultimate Sacrifice.

Gamma Ray. (1990). Heading for Tomorrow.

Gamma Ray. (2001). No World Order.

Gamma Ray. (2014). Empire of the Undead.

Helloween. (1985). Walls of Jericho.

139 Helloween. (1996). The Time of the Oath.

Helloween. (2015). My God-given Right.

Iron Maiden. (1980). Iron Maiden.

Iron Maiden. (1986). Somewhere in Time.

Iron Maiden. (2015). The Book of Souls.

Judas Priest. (1974). Rocka Rolla.

Judas Priest. (1980). British Steel.

Judas Priest. (2018). Firepower.

Loudness. (1981). The Birthday Eve.

Loudness. (1992). Loudness.

Loudness. (2018). Rise to Glory.

Mayhem. (1994). De Mysteris Dom Sathanas.

Mayhem. (2004). Chimera.

Mayhem. (2014). Esoteric Warfare.

Mechanical Poet. (2004). Woodland Pratters.

Mechanical Poet. (2007). Creepy Tales for Freaky Children.

Mechanical Poet. (2008). Eidoline: The Arrakeen Code.

140 Megadeth. (1985). Killing Is My Business…And Business Is Good.

Megadeth. (1986). Peace Sells…But Who’s Buying?.

Megadeth. (2016). Dystopia.

Metallica. (1983). Kill’em All.

Metallica. (1986). Master of Puppets.

Metallica. (2016). Hardwired…to self-destruct.

Sepultura. (1986). Morbid Visions.

Sepultura. (1993). Chaos A.D..

Sepultura. (2013). The Mediator Between Head and Hands Must Be the Heart.

Sigh. (1993). Scorn Defeat.

Sigh. (2001). Imaginary Sonicscape.

Sigh. (2018). Heir to Despair.

Slayer. (1983). Show No Mercy.

Slayer. (1986). Reign in Blood.

Slayer. (2015). Relentless.

Soulfly. (1998). Soulfly.

Soulfly. (2004). Prophecy.

141 Soulfly. (2018). Ritual.

Tang Dynasty. (1992). A Dream Back to Tang Dynasty.

Tang Dynasty. (1998). Historical Romance.

Tang Dynasty. (2008). Romantic Knight.

Temnozor. (2003). Горизонты....

Temnozor. (2005). Вольницей в просинь ночей.

Temnozor. (2010). Урочища снов.

142 APPENDIX C

The result of the visual analysis of selected albums

Album Artist Nation Title Year Iconography Theme

occultism, witch, the wizard, mysticism, abandoned Black Sabbath UK Black Sabbath 1970 death, house, dead, annihilation, tree, twig horror, darkness

rebellion, Black Sabbath UK Heaven & Hell 1980 angel, cigarette fantasy, religion

horror, dead, tree, twig, occultism, Black Sabbath UK 13 2013 fire, flame, doom mysticism, fantasy

horror, death, flesh, skull, Iron Maiden UK Iron Maiden 1980 murder, street, view violence, killing

weapon, horror, sci-fi, machine, vehicle, Somewhere in dystopia, Iron Maiden UK 1986 helmet, armor, Time cyberpunk, war, high-tech, flesh, violence, hostility skeleton, metal

horror, ethnic, pattern, occultism, Iron Maiden UK The Book of Souls 2015 flesh, skull, mysticism, ethnic, character anger, hostility, death

143 metal, sharp, Judas Priest UK Rocka Rolla 1974 shiny, water, rock, pleasure drops

darkness, hand, metal, occultism, shiny, sharp, Judas Priest UK British Steel 1980 weapon, item, blade, violence, leather & pin hostility, horror

monster, warrior, armor, machine, fire, flame, energy, war, Judas Priest UK Firepower 2018 speed, violence, sci-fi streamline, blade, weapon

shadow, hand, death, murder, Metallica US Kill’em All 1983 hammer, blood horror

hand, control, death, Metallica US Master of Puppets 1986 sunset, grave, destruction, war, tomb politics

Hardwired…to scream, face, spiritual, inner Metallica US 2016 self-destruct gnash struggle, horror

fire, flame, sword, blade, pentagon, occultism, evil, Slayer US Show No Mercy 1983 goat, devil, Satan warrior

144 goat, devil, horror, politics, Slayer US Reign in Blood 1986 twisted, face, suffering, dream, flesh, blood, fire occultism

pentagon, wizard, religion, Slayer US Relentless 2015 Jesus, fire, flame, destruction, evil, cross, blood Satan

Killing Is My chain, skull, horror, Megadeth US Business…And 1985 mask, weapon, occultism, death, Business Is Good blade, sharp violence

war, violence, war, politics, Peace Sells…But ruin, destroyed, Megadeth US 1986 death, Who’s Buying? building, jet destruction fighter, skeleton

weapon, blade, sharp, ruin, destroyed sci-fi, Megadeth US Dystopia 2016 building, skull, destruction, head, the Liberty politics, dystopia Statue, robot, machine

angel, rose, grace, romance, Angra Brazil Angels Cry 1993 wheat, fire, flame fantasy, religion

spear, weapon, ancient, warrior, horse, Temple of mythology, Angra Brazil 2004 geometric Shadows legend, battle, pattern, unknown bravery, religion characters

145 UFO, earth, sci-fi, occultism, Angra Brazil Omni 2018 circuits, skeleton, mysticism nerve, vessel

self, spiritual, Soulfly Brazil Soulfly 1998 people, ocean peace, the inner struggle

crown, flag, lion, religion, history, Soulfly Brazil Prophecy 2004 book legend

destroyed, war, mythology, building, ethnic, Soulfly Brazil Ritual 2018 legend, grace, mask, flesh, ruin, history warrior, weapon

evil, Satan, devil, fire, flame, death, religion, Sepultura Brazil Morbid Visions 1986 soul, dead hell, suffering, bodies, flesh pain

sci-fi, machine, rust, destruction, Sepultura Brazil Chaos A.D. 1993 hands, dead dystopia, bodies, flesh cyberpunk

The Mediator darkness, Between Head vessels, wires, Sepultura Brazil 2013 dream, spiritual, and Hands Must hand, skeleton suffering pain Be the Heart

146 De Mysteris Dom Mayhem Scandinavia 1994 chapel occultism Sathanas

Mayhem Scandinavia Chimera 2004 monster occultism

monster, Mayhem Scandinavia Esoteric Warfare 2014 occultism machine

machine, human Darkthrone Scandinavia Soulside Journey 1991 sci-fi, occultism being, desert

Ravishing Darkthrone Scandinavia 1999 forest, misty face occultism, horror Grimness

Darkthrone Scandinavia Arctic Thunder 2016 forest, fire, flame occultism

wizard, dead Burzum Scandinavia Burzum 1992 horror, occultism tree, shadow

147 forest, longhorn, mysticism, Burzum Scandinavia Filosofem 1996 woman occultism

occultism, old&young, fire, Burzum Scandinavia The Ways of Yore 2014 mysticism, flame, care annihilation, tale

occultism, warrior, prince, Arkona Russia Возрождение 2004 legend, tale, dead twig, tree darkness

ritual, dark ritual, dark cloud, Arkona Russia Goi, Rode, goi! 2009 cloud, mist, mist, ocean, god ocean, god

wizard, mist, occultism, Arkona Russia Khram 2018 forest religion, horror

Mechanical Woodland Russia 2004 twisted visions fantasy Poet Pratters

Mechanical Creepy Tales for monster, blade, Russia 2007 tale, horror Poet Freaky Children moon, children

148 Mechanical Eidoline: The weapon, youth, Russia 2008 fantasy, battle Poet Arrakeen Code monster, blood

Temnozor Russia Горизонты... 2003 forest, ice, snow tale, mysticism

Вольницей в ice, ocean, ship, Temnozor Russia 2005 legend, epic просинь ночей storm

forest, tale, Temnozor Russia Урочища снов 2010 occultism, horror wizard, mist

warrior, dead tale, mythology, The Flag of Galneryus Japan 2003 body, flesh, battle, horror, Punishment blood, monster death

religion, epic, angel, weapon, Galneryus Japan Angel of Salvation 2012 legend, spear mythology

epic, darkness, knights, dark mysticism, Galneryus Japan Ultimate Sacrifice 2017 cloud, mist, occultism, war, mountain legend

149 baby, fetus, occultism, Loudness Japan The Birthday Eve 1981 crystal, flower, mysticism, life, ware horror

fire, flame, spiritual, inner Loudness Japan Loudness 1992 architecture, struggle, tale, flesh, blood legend

war, battle, lightning, destruction, tale, Loudness Japan Rise to Glory 2018 thunder, city, history, building, smoke mythology

ethnic, monster, Sigh Japan Scorn Defeat 1993 tale, horror fire, flame

Imaginary ethnic pattern, Sigh Japan 2001 horror, occultism Sonicscape monster, head

a housewife with Sigh Japan Heir to Despair 2018 life a smiley face

Heading for rock, life, Gamma Ray Germany 1990 men Tomorrow spiritual

150 skull, wizard, pyramid, thunder, sci-fi, occultism, Gamma Ray Germany No World Order 2001 machine, dystopia, fantasy futuristic building

Empire of the Gamma Ray Germany 2014 skull horror, occultism Undead

fantasy, broken wall, skull, Helloween Germany Walls of Jericho 1985 mythology, giant, desert mystery

wizard, The Time of the mysterious icons, mysticism, Helloween Germany 1996 Oath monster, fire, occultism flame

robot, machine, My God-given crowds, the disaster, politics, Helloween Germany 2015 Right Liberty Statue, sci-fi, dystopia snow, ice

monster, wizard, mysticism, Blind Guardian Germany Battalions of Fear 1988 warrior, fighter occultism

tale, legend, forest, moon, mythology, Somewhere Far ghost, monster, Blind Guardian Germany 1992 J.R.R. Tolkien, Beyond elf, warrior, Mid-earth wizard Fantasy

151 Beyond the Red devil, wind, gate, tale, legend, Blind Guardian Germany 2015 Mirror ghost mythology, epic

oriental culture, A Dream Back to flag, ethnic legend, history, Tang Dynasty China 1992 Tang Dynasty pattern mystery, romance

flag, guardian, mystery, history, Historical Tang Dynasty China 1998 ethnic, religious religion, legend, Romance pattern romance

desert, puppet, Tang Dynasty China Romantic Knight 2008 spiritual, dream sky

cloud, ancient mysticism, epic, Frosty Eve China Polar Night 2009 building, frost, ice annihilation

mysticism, Frosty Eve China Domain of Imago 2014 ice, snow, blood spiritual, dream

death, legend, desert, horse, Dream Spirit China River & Mountain 2014 history, war, arrow, warrior romance

152 sharp, horn, history, legend, Dream Spirit China The General 2017 helmet, blood war, death

soul, mist, history, tale, abandoned mysticism, Black Kirin China National Trauma 2015 ancient building, occultism, ruin darkness

cross, fire, flame, war, history, Black Kirin China Jinling Funeral 2017 ruin death

153