Disabling of the Senses in ALL Metal?

(I'm not dismissing this idea, I think it's interesting and partially true. I think picking at the ways in which it's not true might illuminate the rest of it.)

I think you're heavily OTM here, and I think I see your point re: venue listening now. The listener makes a conscious choice which level he's going to attune to from one moment to the next.

Sitting at home with MBV's "To Here Knows When," for example (again, metal neophyte, don't really have metal examples I can draw on), you can choose to surrender to the overall symphonic washes of feedback or listen more intently and hear the individual layers. In a venue you're much less capable of making this choice because of the physicality of the sound, it's "slam"-ness.

In a venue you're much less capable -- blah blah -- because "venue" does not equal "studio." Secondarily, "venue" often means shitty sound system and indifferent or incapable sound man.

Clearly. It's why "sheer physicality" is more likely to be a factor in the venue. You're less likely to hear subtlety in the venue for a variety of reasons, namely poor sound systems & engineers and the phenomenon whereby loud sounds raise your threshold for observable subtlety (forget the name).

So ultimately it's up to the listener how disabling the sound is?

Well, yes, but that's the case with any music. When you go see any hip hop act, there's the swaths at the front dancing and moving and lots of people in the back just standing there. There are people who go see DJ sets and don't dance. The folks who sit at the front at punk shows and sing along to the lyrics versus well...you know who. It comes down to a person's own emotional attachment to the music and whether or not they're willing to let down their guard and become part of the "experience" rather than be an objective observer of it, as that is what a concert/show/whatever you wish to call it really is.

Having just seen Om on Saturday, I can say this is very very true. (And you can take cool photos too, thus.)

I disagree with you here because (following the post at Acid Nouveaux) we're talking about acts who use "sound as sheer physical energy." The key word in the sentence you excerpted is "disabling," which I think gets more to the essence of this slam thing than "surrender."

I may be missing the boat on the burgeoning noise-hop scene, but it seems to me that the vast majority of bands/groups who use sound as a physical force for assault (Napalm Death, Earth, etc.) come from metal.

It comes down to a person's own emotional attachment to the music and whether or not they're willing to let down their guard and become part of the "experience" rather than be an objective observer of it, as that is what a concert/show/whatever you wish to call it really is.

I'm starting to think that there's a lack of choice built into the idea of slam, i.e. it's not up to you or dependent on your particular attatchment to a piece of music. The sound is so visceral that, at least for a while, you've no choice but to confront it. Obviously this has some holes ("That concert rocked so hard I was left with no cognitive experience of it whatsoever!" = UH), but maybe it's closer to what's happening with distorted music at high volumes.

Or maybe I'm just a blowhard.

I may be missing the boat on the burgeoning noise-hop scene, but it seems to me that the vast majority of bands/groups who use sound as a physical force for assault (Napalm Death, Earth, etc.) come from metal.

To me, Napalm Death or the 800,000 emergent Earth Clones from the early part of this decade aren't different from any band or musical act. Their aims are to play music, and you react however you'd like to. Certainly, no one is forced to do anything. I would closely compare the sound to that of the deep bass in crunk. Remember how "Never Scared" had a warning label on it because people would totally lose their shit listening to it? The people who were flipping out connected with it in an aggressive fashion, and by playing it, they felt compelled to uncork it, even in person.

Metal, in fact, has a history of bands going solely for "mosh parts", for instance. The bastardized version of hardcore that parades itself as punk these days is basically a rework of SOD/DRI from the mid 80s with downtuned guitars and repetitive chugging slam riffs mixed with the occasional breakdown. Since most of those bands were from New York, they in turn influenced the death metal acts, and that's why Suffocation and Dehumanized sound the way they did. Dying Fetus later followed them. Again, the whole point was to create action in the people viewing the shows by just repeating what people wanted in the slow chugs. Is it similar in a sense to the nature of hip hop producers singling out beats for repetitive play back? Dubstep? Breakbeat? Hell, Deep House? Well, yeah. Its also similar to a million other things too. African tribal music often relies on regularly repeated danceable polyrhythms. Does that mean that they're looking for a "slam" of noise too? Or are they closer in kind to trance? Ugh. This is making my head hurt.

I'm starting to think that there's a lack of choice built into the idea of slam, i.e. it's not up to you or dependent on your particular attatchment to a piece of music. The sound is so visceral that, at least for a while, you've no choice but to confront it. Obviously this has some holes ("That concert rocked so hard I was left with no cognitive experience of it whatsoever!" = UH), but maybe it's closer to what's happening with distorted music at high volumes.

I don't know who these people are who have no cognitive memory of the show, because I've never met one. Well, one that wasn't heavy on various substances at the time. Again, no matter what the show or event is, you're gonna have stragglers who aren't as interested in the group activity of letting the music "take over".

I think the whole concept is a little out there. I think at shows, however, there are participants and onlookers, most definitely. I usually fall into the latter, unless for whatever reason, I wish to be with the crush on the floor. I do think there's definitely a different emotional response though from those down on the floor and those up at the bar. Part of that is just the change in physical activity.