‘From their screaming I found feeling and meaning’

'I was about 11 when I bought my first metal CDs – Guns N' Roses Appetite for Destruction and Nevermind by Nirvana. Yes, I know the gatekeepers will say grunge is not metal, and both would turn out be quite lite when compared to some of the artists and subgenres that my ears would be subjected to in the years and decades that followed. But I remember hearing the opening of 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' and immediately feeling some sort of identification with the anger and frustration that was obvious from the instrumentation before Kurt Cobain had even opened his mouth. 

I was an unhappy child, and later teenager and young adult. Inside the abyss that was my head was a noisy paradox of under and overstimulation. My baseline was self-loathing towards myself, and alienation from others and society. Clinical diagnoses of both depression and generalised anxiety were forthcoming. It might sound clichéd, but I always felt different and not in a positive way. There was something wrong that I could never understand, never mind verbally articulate. Such attempts to explain always sounded far better in my head. I was confused and consequently often reckless. 

An ADHD diagnosis would come in my early 20s, along with other therapeutic aids such as medication, therapy and spirituality. But up until then, and unfortunately for some time after, I turned to substance abuse/misuse and other self-destructive behaviour. All of these apparent 'coping mechanisms' were in fact making things far worse – all except for one, the beautiful art that was and is heavy metal music. 

I would love to say that discovering metal changed my life changed drastically and I lived happily ever after, but this would not be the case. I still had all the same thoughts and feelings, the internal chaos that would so often manifest in the external. But what metal gave me was a reprieve, a safe space to explore and process all the noise and emotion inside of me. And although I was still sure that there was something wrong with me compared to others, from listening to the lyrical themes I deduced that the people writing them mustn't have had all their shit together either; and the other people listening to the same stuff as me mustn't be all enlightened either if they are getting the same catharsis from listening as me.

Metal was my first healthy coping mechanism. I would like to say the gym also, but initially this led to unhealthy behaviours and obsessions, and it wouldn't be until many years later that I would find its mental and emotional benefits. Metal, on the other hand never came with any negative side-effects. Roughly 25 years later it still is one of my main passions and therapeutic tools. As the years and decades have passed, many if not all of the presenting issues of past times in my life have passed, only to be replaced by new ones. Lovers, friends, jobs, specific medications have all come and gone, but metal has been a mainstay… a constant companion in what can sometimes appear to be an all too ruthless and unforgiving world. 

There are still times when I can struggle all too much with verbally articulating my thoughts and feelings, but I guarantee I can play you a metal song that will come far closer to expressing 'me' than I ever personally could. Although it's not a replacement for mental health treatment, metal can definitely play an important role in managing suicidal ideation, through connection to its lyrics and/or instrumentation.

Heavy Metal Therapy

Andy is one of the contributors to Heavy Metal Therapy (HMT), a community psychology project and not-for-profit organisation that aims to support the mental health and well-being of members of the heavy metal music community – mainly fans but also those working within the industry. Over the past six years we have developed online resources such as recovery stories, playlists and blogs, around the wellbeing benefits of engagement with extreme music. We have been running in-person peer support groups for the last year. 

Why heavy metal? Well, there is some evidence that heavy metal fans could be a potentially vulnerable group in terms of mental health. It is no longer thought that listening to extreme music causes mental health problems, but people who have or are at risk of mental health problems may be more drawn to heavy metal (Baker & Bor, 2008). 

There's also a gendered aspect here. Heavy metal music is, generally, quite male dominated in terms of musicians, fans and people working in the industry. We track our following on social media, and across platforms consistently find that we have a roughly even gender split between who identify as male vs female. However, we also see that social media contributions and submissions to the website are significantly weighted to those by men. The popularity of peer networks particularly targeted at men, such as Andy's Man Club, indicates that alternatives to traditional mental health services might provide men with support that is much needed: men are less likely to seek help and more likely to have negative outcomes related to mental health difficulties, not least completed suicide. Many suicide prevention initiatives are considering how we can offer wider community interventions for those most at risk, which includes but is not limited to traditional mental health services. 

Given the known increased prevalence of suicide in men, and lower engagement with mental health services, in a 2018 study Steve Robertson and colleagues used thematic analysis to consider ways of engaging men successfully in mental health promotion. They concluded that partnering with and hosting health promotion activities in 'male spaces' is important, as is language that is positive about masculinity.  

The prospect of engaging men via traditionally more 'male' interests has been explored in relation to contexts such as football teams and barber's shops, where mental health information or support is available in the places where men may be going for other reasons. Our approach is to offer health promotion and resources in heavy metal spaces, both physically and online. We use merch, memes and engagement with extreme music as a health promotion tools for the metal community as creative ways of starting and continuing conversations about mental health.  

Merch, memes and metalcore

Merchandise, or 'merch', is a hallmark of the metal scene, with fans wearing favourite band shirts and patches at concerts, which provide talking points for other metal enthusiasts. Band shirts are described as having high subcultural value in the metal scene (Brown, 2007). HMT uses branded shirts, designed in the style of band merch, in the hope that these provide a similar talking point. We get regular feedback from our volunteers and followers that they are often asked about the project as a result of wearing the merch at concerts or other metal events. Furthermore, where local bands have worn shirts on stage and been photographed for social media, this raises awareness of the project.

HMT started on social media, and as the Covid pandemic happened when the project was in its infancy, initially much of our interaction with members of the metal community was online. As we built a community and peer support began to occur between followers, inevitably, along with sharing stories and playlists, people began to share metal and mental health related memes with each other and with us. There is some evidence that meme-sharing can be beneficial for mental health, such as Lucie Chateau's 2020 paper on the use of ironic depression-based memes. She makes the argument that irony and playfulness have a role in subverting dominant narratives of mental health 'positivity', which is strongly influenced by neoliberal thinking. In this way, the sharing of metal memes, which often contain darker themes, may serve a similar purpose. For us, our 'alternative wellness' approach offers a different way of thinking about wellbeing – as not just about turning towards/striving for positive feelings, but also honouring and working through feelings that may be experienced as more intense or challenging. 

Many of the themes found in the lyrics of 'metalcore' – a fusion of hardcore and metal, increasingly popular on the scene – relate to mental health and the expression of male vulnerability, juxtaposed with the aggression that is also a hallmark of the music. We share metalcore lyrics and tracks related to mental health on social media, such as our weekly 'metalcore Monday' to showcase a new mental health themed metalcore release. Research suggests that connection with extreme music, such as heavy metal and/or metalcore, can help with the processing of emotions such as anger, protect from existential angst, and foster a sense of belonging for community members (see heavymetaltherapy.co.uk/metal-university for a summary). We draw on this via our social media communities, playlists and outreach work.  

A promising population

Suicide remains a significant contributor to global mortality rates (The World Health Organisation, 2021). The National Institute of Mental Health (2021) identifies that suicide prevention programmes should be a prominent focus of service provision and research within mental health. Further research is needed to investigate the potential vulnerabilities within subgroups, and the impact of interventions in response to addressing the risk of suicide, in particular, within the adult male population.  

Numerous innovative programmes have been developed that are either targeted particularly at men, or based around interests that have high numbers of male followers. We believe that the alternative/heavy metal music scene shows promise as a population to target for suicide prevention initiatives, and we look forward to being able to further evaluate the impact of this work.

Key sources

Baker, F. & Bor, W. (2008). Can music preference indicate mental health status in young people? Australasian Psychiatry, 16(4), 284–288. https://doi.org/10.1080/10398560701879589

Brown, A. (2007). Rethinking the subcultural commodity: The case of heavy metal t-shirt culture (s). In Youth Cultures, pp. 73-88. Routledge.

Chateau, L. (2020). "Damn I Didn't Know Y'all Was Sad? I Thought It Was Just Memes": Irony, Memes and Risk in Internet Depression Culture. M/C Journal, 23(3).

Quinn, K. (2021). Heavy Metal Therapy and Anti-Wellness.  Asylum Magazine, 6.

Robertson, S., Gough, B., Hanna, E., Raine, G., Robinson, M., Seims, A. & White, A. (2018). Successful mental health promotion with men: the evidence from 'tacit knowledge'. Health Promotion International, 33(2), 334-344.

World Health Organization (2021). Suicide worldwide in 2019: global health estimates.