An invitation to find out what draws people to metal music and to meet some of the fans saw this reporter at the Hordern Pavilion for Slayer's sell-out show on October 8, the first leg of the 2009 Australia tour.
Thrash Metal's Bad Reputation
The general impression of metal music is of satanic behaviour brought on by dark lyrics, long-haired men thrashing their heads to a thundering bass, eardrum-splitting guitar riffs and incomprehensible verse.
The genre Slayer and Megadeth pioneered, thrash metal, started in the 1980s. It is different to others such as heavy and death metal, which are different genres within the same style of music, but they all tend to be perceived in mainstream society as a dangerous and threatening form of music.
This moral panic is fueled by court cases and events, such as when heavy metal singer Ozzy Osbourne was sued in 1986 for causing 19 year old John McCollum's death with the song 'Suicide Solution', and the spate of church burnings in Norway between 1992 and 1995.
The Typical Fan
But in Sydney the atmosphere was friendly and more like that at a football game. The ground-level wheelchair section at the back of the mosh pit, and the family of mum, dad, an eight year old and two 11 year year olds were the first indicators that thrash metal is not solely for the strong of heart.
Another typical fan who doesn't fit the stereotype is Mandy Tse, 24. She is a pretty, petite Chinese-Australian girl, who arrived stylishly attired in black jeans and jacket, fashion clip in her hair and perfectly made-up.
Miss Tse got into this style of music about five years ago and it was the first time she had seen Slayer in concert. “I love metal, I love Megadeth, I love Slayer,” she said.
Concert-goer Leon Pun, 24, said the reason why he liked Slayer and was because metal music was “all balls”. He was introduced to the music when he was a teenager and said he found it more intense than mainstream music.
“It’s none of this pussy shit that you hear on the radio.”
The Warm Up: Megadeth
By 8:00pm the queue outside the Hordern Pavilion was hundreds of people long but it moved quickly and the minimal police presence had little to worry about.
Inside the gates beers were being bought by an older crowd clad in black or plaid, and the cloying smell of marijuana hung in the air. Occasionally a person wearing a gothic leather-and-buckles outfit would appear but tour t-shirts and dark denim were the uniform du jour.
The large number of grey-frosted shoulder-length heads of hair balanced the mid-thirty-year-old demographic and this created an easygoing and calm atmosphere all night. The male to female ratio was about 20:1, but the few women in the crowd didn’t attract stares and were welcomed rather made to feel uncomfortable.
A wall of merchandise channelled people into the indoor venue, selling everything from t-shirts to men’s and women’s Megadeth-branded underwear for A$25.
Inside the Pavilion, tiered stadium seating encircled a massive standing-room-only floor in between.
Ushers refused to allow standing in the aisles and the seated audience obeyed. Very few people in the stands stood up in their seats and strobe lights flickering over the crowd lit up hundreds of heads bobbing in unison, to the music.
The music itself was surprisingly good. Very Metallica-esque quite easy to listen to, and sometimes even the words could be made out.
Mosh Etiquette
Athletic moshing was the only predictable aspect to the night and by Megadeth’s encore at 9:15pm it was starting to became more and more energetic.
The trick is to brace the legs and bend at the waist, not the neck, to generate the maximum momentum needed to flick waist-length hair over the head.
Veteran head-banger Tom Compagnoni, 35, repeated an old saying about mosh pits: "If they're down, help them up. If they're up, help them down", and this was the rule of the night.
In the writhing body of the crowd, circles would form to allow groups of four or five people to some hardcore moshing and perform exaggerated air guitar moves.
The Main Event: Slayer
Slayer was the band everyone wanted to see and chants of “Slayer, Slayer” filled the silence between bands.
“Once Slayer hits that first chord you’re not going to know what’s hit you…Once they hit that first chord just watch the entire venue go ape shit,” said Richard Guermy, 26.
Mr Guermy has seen Slayer five times. He said the band was consistently good and there was “no such thing as a bad Slayer gig”.
The entire venue remained subdued though throughout the night and there was very little pushing and shoving.
The mosh pit is usually a recipe for squashed toes and getting intimate with your neighbour, but there was plenty of space for those near the front.
Martin Zavan, 26, said he was was about five metres from the stage couldn’t believe it was so calm.
Mr Compagnoni said the gig reminded him of how much metal concerts had changed since he began going to them as a teenager. Back then, "they really did deserve their very scary reputation!"
Ear plugs were the order of the night. The bass caused involuntary physical movements in hair and bodies and screaming guitar riffs, illuminated by flames shooting into the air behind the band, had serious hearing-loss potential.
Slayer refused to do an encore but it was an upbeat and sweaty mass of people who streamed out the doors to the pub across the road for a debrief.
You wouldn't take a second glance at the majority of people enjoying Megadeth and Slayer if you passed them on the street, yet leaving the concert was a young man wearing a black velvet suit and bow tie.
Most thrash metal fans don't fit the any stereotype, let alone the headbanger one.
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