They will once you've buried your grandfather's axe in a few of their soft scrawny necks!

touche.

I don't even feel comfortable calling this stuff metal, honestly. I only do it because of social convention. This is like Celine Dion with some (tastefully) distorted electric guitar. No risks have been taken here.

And let me say preemptively that this isn't a gender thing, I'd be psyched it the boys' club bullshit that has mostly excluded women from good metal weren't a thing.

Shit, didn't intend to add stars.

OH OOOOH I don't want to jump to conclusions, but saying that woman are "most excluded from good metal", sounds to me like you're implying that Nightwish et al. aren't good metal, either!

But I guess you have a point re: Apocalyptica not being "metal". Same goes with me towards bands like (middle-period) Therion and TSO. They're good bands (yes they are dammit), but they're "metal" only in the loosest sense; we call them that because they hang out in the scene, but they're metal like Spike is a pony.

Yeah, I'm not a big fan of any of that heavily produced, sequenced, "epic" stuff in general, it just seems really bland to me.

And I will always maintain that that stuff is closer to Meatloaf or Michael Bolton than to anything I would call metal. The "metal" aspect of it is fashion.

Bolt Thrower they aren't.

And I know it always sounds phony when people say "I'm not trying to sexually objectify the stripper, I am impressed with the athleticism", but Jesus, look at what she's doing. This is a case where a father could legitimately brag about his daughter the pole dancer.

Really good pole dancing is as impressive as any mainstream gymnastic I've ever seen, and it's totally totally possible to appreciate the sexual aspects of something that's deliberately sexualized without objectfying the person doing it. It would be kind of weird if you DIDN'T appreciate it on that level even if you're a full blown, dyed-in-the-wool, red-blooded, American homo. Just like there's no reason except for weak-as cultural baggage that a straight dude shouldn't be able to appreciate a well done drag show as a work of art even if it didn't give him a chub personally.