Death Metal

Today's post is on the subject most dear to my heart: Music.

More specifically, it's about the worrying trend of stereotypes against my taste in music. Put quite simply, literally every person I know has this wierd impression that the only music I listen to is Death Metal.

Now, I do of course listen to death metal. It's a fantastic genre. But it's far from my favourite genre of music, and I only have one t-shirt by a death metal band; and the majority of people who saw it wouldn't recognise it as death metal.
I'm a big fan of pretty much every kind of metal there is. NWOBHM, thrash metal, speed metal, death metal, black metal, viking metal, technical death metal, progressive metal, doom metal, power metal and just bog-standard heavy metal. Also, I listen to a huge variety of rock music as well. I'm into everything from the beatles to the stones; from pink floyd to rush; from alice cooper to bon jovi!

So why does everybody get this strange idea that all I listen to is death metal?

I have a few theories.
Firstly, and most obviously - nobody who doesn't listen to metal even understands what metal music is all about. The majority of non-metal fans seem to be under the impression that "metal" music is all guttural vocals, with fast, repeated power chords underneath it. I used to hate guttural vocals, and I'd been listening to metal for a good 4-5 years before I could tolerate it, and only then learned to love it. People don't seem to understand at all the massive diversity in metal. For example - let's take a band like Iron Maiden. Very mainstream. Most people will have heard of them, and like them. Characteristic power metal vocals. Classic NWOBHM sound. That's all very well. Then take a band like Kreator. German thrash metal band. Almost no similarity in style to maiden's music. MUCH faster than maiden's music, with the vocals much gruffer. That's just two examples. But each of the genres I listed above has a totally different style of music.

Secondly, non-metal fans seem to be of the belief that most metal songs are about satanism and cutting people up. This is an issue that is a pet hate of mine. Why are people so blind?
Most artists who DO have such themes in their vocals are doing it purely as an act. The classic examples are the american death metal bands of the late 80s and the scandinavian black metal scene of the early 90s. The basic goal there for competing bands was to be "more evil" than the other bands. It's all an act. In fact, most metal artists sing about political issues, love, fantasy ideas, and pretty much everything. The majority of pop songs these days are blatantly about drugs, paedophilia and sex. The majority of "indie" songs these days are just incredibly boring (lyrically) songs about love. So why do people scorn an entire genre of music based solely on lyrics? Lyrics which are, in actuality, far more in depth and interesting to listen to than that of most mainstream music.

The third theory I have is specific to one band, whose t-shirts I wear quite a lot. Megadeth. I have a feeling that people interpret the syllable "deth" in the name of the band to mean "death metal". They couldn't be more wrong. Firstly, the band chose the spelling "deth", omitting the 'a', because they didn't want to be associated with death metal. Secondly, the word "megadeath" is a word that means a million deaths caused by a nuclear bomb. The band's name is meant solely as an anti-nuclear thing. Thirdly, the band don't play anything close to death metal. Their early albums were thrash metal, sometimes bordering on speed metal. And their newer albums are more of a straight heavy metal sound.

In conclusion. Why do people have this ridiculous idea that I only listen to death metal? Is it due to their ignorance of the genre of metal music? Is it because of their stereotypical ideas about the lyrical content of metal music? Is it because they misinterpret something as simple as the name of one of the bands I'm a fan of? Is it something else I haven't even thought of?
I know very few people I know have heard much of the music I like. I realise that most people don't like metal music, which is why I don't force my taste in music on them. But where to they get these ideas about my musical taste from?

Does anybody have any ideas?