The History of Metal and Horror is an extensive dip into a world where two defining genres of audio and visual come together so perfectly it's difficult to imagine one without the other. Music and film have had a long and happy marriage and both play a big parts in each others existence . Rom Coms and pop music, action movies and rock, Tim Burton and Danny Elfman but metal and horror have always had a deeper association and connection then these (except for maybe Burton and Elfman!). Mike Schiff (writer and director) started filming this labour of love back in 2014 and set about interviewing as many horror actors, directors and metal bands as he could to impart their passion and wisdom on what got them into metal and horror. Was it music first and then movies or the other way round? What was their gateway movie or band? Why do they think metal and horror work so well together? and much, much more.
The History of Metal and Horror is a documentary made by fans for fans and with many of these there always seems to be a cool wraparound story going throughout. This wraparound story is set in a post apocalyptic world. In a wasteland, the sole surviving member of the human race finds a stash of U-Matic style video tapes and what looks to be a BC Rich Warlock style guitar and takes them back to his safe house . Christopher (Alex Rafala) proceeds to shuffle through the tapes and attempts to play them. With titles like The History of Gardening not tickling his fancy, he tries to play two tapes at once. One being The History of Horror and the other The History of Metal. Greeted on screen by our host for the feature, none other than Michael Berryman, who introduces us to the chapters of this documentary in his lovely calming and serene tones. Split into a few chapters we get an origins briefing not just in terms of history but how it was for the featured artists. As well as a great segment on artwork which ultimately covers the censorship issues both horror and metal were hit with. Before moving through the decades and talking about how much the two scenes are entwined together, with a brief but affectionate look at horror conventions and metal shows before the wraparound story takes a gruesome turn and you get a great catch up from your everyday horror/metal fan.
The History of Metal and Horror is a veritable smorgasbord of who's who within both industries and as much as I don't want to bore you by just listing all involved I need to mention a few of them. On the horror side of things we have interviews with John Carpenter, Tom Savini, Linnea Quigley, Kane Hodder, Doug Bradley, Bill Moseley, Sara Karloff, Ron Chaney Jnr as well as the late Gunnar Hansen, Sid Haig and Jon Schnep. Rob Zombie is a must for this film as he has a hand in both elements. On the metal side of things we have Alice Cooper, Arthur Brown, Kirk Hammett, Dave Mustane, Dani Filth, George "Corpsegrinder" Fisher, Corey Taylor, Wednesday 13, Doyle, Scott Ian, Phil Anselmo and a masked Tobias Forge as well as many, many others.
Over the years there have been quite a few documentaries made about horror and metal but are usually done separately. Schiff himself was a camera operator for the awesome documentary Smoke and Mirrors: The Story of Tom Savini which featured a lot of horror and metal icons, and I try to watch them all as I learn something new in every one and this is no different. The best thing is hearing the bands and actors talk with huge excitement about their favourite movies and bands and the influence they still have. The section on artwork and soundtracks is particularly interesting to me. I love metal album artwork and horror movie posters so seeing each others influence in these formats was really interesting. No-one from Iron Maiden must have been available for interview but they are still featured heavily and the origin and adaptation of Eddie into their artwork, shows and merchandise is applauded. There are some great insights to bands writing tracks for movies like Ramones and their track for Pet Sematary, Dokken and Dream Warriors for Nightmare On Elm Street III and bands like Goblin that were featured in plenty of zombie movies. The way bands pay tribute to iconic horror movies in their artwork such as Ozzy Osbourne using depictions of himself as Universal Monsters, Ghost's cover for Opus Eponymous. As well as bands like Cannibal Corpse featuring gruesome horror imagery. There are also movies like Hard Rock Zombies, Deathgasm that feature alot of metal and movies like Monster Dog and Trick Or Treat that feature metal artists as actors. Then we have bands like GWAR and Alice Cooper talking about bringing horror to metal shows.
The two hour thirty minute runtime really does fly past and with it being a documentary it is easy to stop and pick up again whenever you want so it's never a drag. It's fast paced and informative with the amount of featured artists and bands being phenomenal but I couldn't helping thinking that a few bands were missing. I did end up having to contact Mike Schiff directly after watching the doc as the absence of Lordi did leave me feeling a little bit miffed. As I suspected though there was no need to panic, they had not been overlooked. Unfortunately, even though they were approached and interested, due to scheduleing issues it never happened which is a real shame. The documentary is very US based and I guess the non American bands featured were over on tour but that meant that quite a few did get left out but again that was probably largely to do with scheduling and availability but with the sheer number of artists featured you certainly can't say the talent was thin on the ground, and I get that somethings no matter how hard you try just don't work out.
The other thing I wanted to note about The History of Metal and Horror is that it is heavily male orientated. Again this could very well be put down to scheduling and availability however, the only females featured on the metal side of things were Heidi Shepherd and Carla Harvey from LA metal act Butcher Babies. I have nothing against these lovely ladies but they can't have been the only female fronted metal band in the States available in the last six years, surely? I do not want to come across as some kind of crazy feminist (but I have been a horror and metal fan for well over 30 years now) and I am well aware that in the business of both mediums it is guys that are very much at the forefront but taking a look at the bigger picture women in horror and metal are up there doing what the men are doing and being just as successful. Female fronted metal bands are out there Arch Enemy, In This Moment, Delain etc (I realise they are not from the US) but what's the betting they love a horror movie?!! Women in horror are not just in front of the camera playing the victim or the final girl but are behind the camera directing films like American Psycho, Tigers Are Not Afraid and The Babadook and they probably have a wide selection of metal on their playlists so lets not rule them out. It's exclusion like this that means us women are challenged by certain types of men to name songs of the bands on the shirts we wear to prove to them that we know who they are or we get weird looks when we go to see the latest horror movie alone (or maybe that's just me?!). It does redeem itself slightly in this case as over the end credits they do a cool thing of interviewing gig goers at metal festivals about their favourite horror movie and horror convention attendees as to their favourite metal bands and they do choose a larger number of female fans to speak out. I don't want this to be a massive downside to the documentary and I don't usually draw this much attention to the fact but the more I thought about it the more it bugged me. Mike Schiff has created a very watchable and engaging documentary. In the six or so years it took to make and finalise he more than likely came across numerous set backs and red tape that he and his crew had to overcome, so perhaps me bitching about the fact that there should be a higher female presence is the last thing he wants to hear and it really shouldn't be that much of an issue given the blood, sweat and tears that went into this.
The History of Metal and Horror is a great insight into the symbiotic relationship these two art forms have together. So if you have a love for Michael Myers and Megadeth, Iron Maiden and Insideous or Slipknot and the Saw franchise then this documentary is definitely for you!
The History of Metal and Horror is available now to rent or buy on Amazon Prime.
