Running with the Devil: Power, Gender, and Madness in Heavy Metal Music

Description

Dismissed by critics and academics, condemned by parents and politicians, and fervently embraced by legions of fans, heavy metal music continues to attract and embody cultural conflicts that are central to society. In Running with the Devil, Robert Walser explores how and why heavy metal works, both musically and socially, and at the same time uses metal to investigate contemporary formations of identity, community, gender, and power. This edition includes a new foreword by Harris M. Berger contextualizing the work and a new afterword by the author. Cover Running with the Devil Title Copyright Contents Foreword to the 2014 Edition Acknowledgments Introduction 1. Metallurgies: Genre, History, and the Construction of Heavy Metal Genre and Commercial Mediation Casting Heavy Metal Heavy Metal in the 1980s Headbangers “Nasty, Brutish, and Short"? Rock Critics and Academics Evaluate Metal 2. Beyond the Vocals: Toward the Analysis of Popular Musical Discourses Genre and Discourse Musicological Analysis Writing about Music Metal as Discourse “Ruinin’ with the Devil” Negotiation and Pleasure 3. Eruptions: Heavy Metal Appropriations of Classical Virtuosity Classical Prestige and Popular Meanings Ritchie Blackmore and the Classical Roots of Metal Edward Van Halen and the New Virtuosity Randy Rhoads: Metal Gets Serious Yngwie Malmsteen: Metal Augmented and Diminished Popular Music as Cultural Dialogue 4. Forging Masculinity: Heavy Metal Sounds and Images of Gender Behind the Screen: Listening to Gender No Girls Allowed: Exscription in Heavy Metal The Kiss of Death: Misogyny and the Male Victim Living on a Prayer: Romance Nothing but a Good Time? Androgyny as a Political Party “Real Men Don’t Wear Makeup" 5. Can I Play with Madness? Mysticism, Horror, and Postmodern Politics Professing Censorship: The PMRC and Its Academic Allies Attack Suicide Solutions Mysticism and Postmodernism in Heavy Metal Horror and History Guns N’ Roses N’ Marx N’ Engels Afterword to the 2014 Edition Appendix 1: Heavy Metal Canons Appendix 2: Heavy Metal Questionnaire Notes Select Discography Select Bibliography Index About the Authors