Metal Monday

Confessions of a Metal Head

I'm a metal head. I started in 1987, the first metal album I bought was White Snake, Slide it In. Before that Van Halen's 5150, but I never thought of them as a metal band.

By the the spring of 1988 I was growing my hair long and listening to metal. By the fall of 1989 I had a mop of hair in my face, later a mullet and a black metal T-shirt for everyday of the week. By December though, things were changing.

You see, this cute little blonde said I should get an earring. My parents, sensing a rare opportunity, said if I wanted an earring the hair would have to go. That Xmas the hair duly came off. In the spring my wardrobe changed a lot and by the fall o 1990 I was dressing more like a hippie than a metal head. A lot of ripped jeans, some tie-dye. I actually started to look like the lead singer of a 70's era classic rock band.

By senior year my hair was short and I wore a lot of long sleeve tees. I was a pretty good looking kid if I don't say so myself.

So the metal hasn't always been thriving for me. That said, even when I was looking respectable I was still buying GnR, Metallica. Heck, my soundtrack to 1990 was Led Zeppelin.

When Metal blew up, like everyone else I listened to Grunge. I never liked Nirvana, but man, Pearl Jam was a metalhead's salvation. Same with Sound Garden and Alice in Chains.

When Grunge fell I walked away from rock and 1995 was the last year MTV was important to me. Man was I getting off that train at the right time. I turned to classical, but lo and behold, the classical I liked was heavy, Tchaikovsky, Mendelssohn, etc etc.

In the winter of 2001, when I was looking for some heavy music, Metal was still there. In 2003 I was listening to Zeppelin everyday, and in 2006, just as the Metal revival was really kicking in, I was back. I saw Maiden twice that year, AC/DC three times.

Metal was back and so was I.