What would you do if you were carpooling with a dude wearing a pink polo on the way to a night of clubbing, and when you ask him to pick a song, he chooses Orphan by Slipknot?

Many emotions might be running through your head, and you might have questions like what the hell? I am not in the mood for this, and why does this guy listen to music like this?

It turns out I’mI’m the guy in the pink polo who chose Slipknot.

Before you say I should have just read the room and choose a song to match the occasion, know that I did afterward, and we had a great time.

The point I’mI’m trying to illustrate is that looks can be deceiving when it comes to guessing what type of music somebody likes.

In my experience, people have become more openly eclectic as the years have gone on, especially with the millennial and gen Z crowd.

But I will say heavy metal music is the hardest genre to introduce people who are not musicians or metalheads already.

Today, I want to highlight some of the reasons anybody and everybody can enjoy heavy metal music, with the disclaimer that there are many sub-genres of metal, some of which I enjoy and some of which I do not.

Emotional Purge

Other genres are great for certain emotional benefits, but there is absolutely nothing like blasting fast, loud, angry, and aggressive drop tune music to get all your angst out.

If you’re really, really angry and you don’t know what to do, throw on some Metallica or disturbed, and I promise what they’re saying will resonate with how you’re feeling.

I can fall asleep to metal music because it can somehow extract my inner feeling and pull it out into space.

I understand that this can be a gray area because Outsiders think metal music is just about death and blood and Satan, but it’s not.

Not all metal is death metal. Turns out; there’s power metal, which focuses on virtues and Adventures; there’s speed metal, which is exactly what it sounds like. It’s just really fast music that gets your heart pounding, and you have melodic metal and neoclassical metal, which tanks classical music theory and applies it to rock music.

DragonForce is a very popular power metal band that most people are familiar with thanks to Guitar Hero. I think they are an exceptionally good introductory band because their lyrics are very upbeat and uplifting while displaying an immense tell amount of musical prowess.

Musically Intriguing

I play guitar, and most of my influences are from The Rock and metal world, but whenever I play with fellow musicians, we always have a good time, regardless of their genre.

The fun part about music is that it’s infinite.

Country, Hip-Hop, rap, rock, blues, indie, and dubstep are all music, and metal brings an intensity and intricacy to Musicianship.

People with symphonic and orchestral backgrounds May enjoy listening to metal because many archetypal progressions are based on classical symphonies.

Bands like Dream Theater, Fates Warning, and Polyphia truly take the discipline of playing an instrument to the next level. These are technically progressive metal bands, which means they utilize weird time signatures, Advanced chord shapes, and just get weird with their music theory.

Get’s the Heart Pumping…..Really Fast

Last and certainly not least, nothing gets me as hype as metal.

Rap and hip-hop are a close second, but I’m listening to Slipknot’s new album, we are not your kind, right now, and it just hits. Different.

This might be a stretch, but I think the reason metal is so energizing is due to its absolute organic nature.

Yes, there is electricity involved with the amplifiers and effects, but somebody needs to be playing the instrument and utilizing their own percussion and technique to make the sounds.

Give it a Try

At the end of the day, I love most music, but I think that people who do not listen to metal music should give it a shot because it’s fun, it’s liberating, and it’s freaking loud.

If you don’t know where to start, try DragonForce, Stone Sour, Slipknot, Avenged Sevenfold, or disturbed.

I think that’s a pretty rounded list for a few of the sub-genres.

I’m also always looking for new bands, so if you have any awesome recommendations, please let me know!