Ask MetalGF: How to Unite Metal and Non-Metal Friends and Remain Forever Young
Please send real questions to askmetalgf AT metalsucks DOT net. I’m serious and I really want to help you. You can also follow me on Twitter!
Dear MetalGF,
All my friends are metalheads, but the person I just started dating is not. He isn’t opposed to metal, just doesn’t care about it. How do I combine my two worlds?!
Signed,
Newly in love
Thanks for this great question, Newly in Love. Mixing our friends and partners isn’t always easy, but it is important. And, if done well, it can really make life easier, richer, and better. Do your metalhead friends and boyfriend both like eating? Maybe plan a fun dinner out with everyone to give them a chance to get acquainted in a non-metal setting! Do your metal friends and boyfriend both like drinking? How about a night out at a bar or several bars where everyone just has fun with alcohol as a social lubricant! Find something and somewhere where all parties involved can meet on a common ground where they can be comfortable and have a good time.
The truth is, all the people you mention have something huge in common already: YOU. Your metal friends will want to get to know your new partner and your new partner will want to get to know your friends, metal or not, because they all love you. If you arrange the meeting/hang, I suspect the rest will take care of itself. Rare is the person who can’t get along with another person when enjoying cocktails and delicious food on a Friday night. You’ll need to set it up, but the rest should be pretty easy!
Dear MetalGF,
What do I do when I stop liking new metal bands?
Best,
Vintage Victor
This could also be phrased another way: what do you do when you are getting kind of old? I was actually just thinking about this very topic in terms of music, because every December for the last four years, I have made a year-end top ten list for MetalSucks [2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 -Ed.]. What will I do this year? I have been listening to Raffi’s “Fun Food Song” non stop for months (it is DOPE AF by the way). PLUS it came out in 2013! I am fucked, and need to start listening to new shit YESTERDAY. I remember in college and in my 20s, I would get emails all the time from my friends saying things like “you HAVE to hear this album/artist/song.” I feel like all I did was encounter new amazing music that blew my mind! Was there more good music then? Probably not — my friends and I just had the energy and time and youthfulness within us to constantly pursue what was new and fresh and hip and good.
I think metal is probably still great, and new bands are probably still creating great things, and honestly, the issue lies within yourself. As we get older, we becomes more OURSELVES. We like more of what we like, we are more comfortable with what we know and the circle around us (including people, our networks, our tastes) often becomes smaller. Do you think your grandma always ate the same breakfast like she does now? Do you think your dad was maybe a little more experimental with drugs and travel locations fifty years ago? It creeps up on you! This is the pattern of life, and for better or worse, so so few of us are exempt from it, even though in your 20s you feel sure you will be. In my opinion, it is okay to accept this to an extent. You don’t have to force new music on yourself if you don’t like it. But at the same time, you do need to keep an open mind. So many people just give up at a certain age and watch the same sports in the same sweatpants for 40+ years. Learning new things, listening to new music, being on Snapchat, watching the VMAs, trying new foods… these things actually KEEP you young. I bet there is new metal you would truly like, and it would feel so good to like it! You can only listen to the same shit so much before you need to rotate in something produced after 2010. Don’t give up! My advice would be to keep the circle around you as big as possible for as long as possible, because you are only going to get older and the glow and novelty of things that are new will prolong your youth more than anything. It’s more work now that it was, yes, but I think you will find it worth it.
Special thanks to executive producer Maximus Frank.
