This history project might just be one of my most ambitious ideas yet. Links to subsequent posts will be listed below.

When I initially started pondering how to give back to the metal community, I brainstormed possibilities. My mom suggested that I teach a class on the subject at a community college. She has seen just how passionate and knowledgeable I can be on the subject. So, she said that teaching it for fun could be an interesting possibility. The thought of teaching it has lingered in my head for quite some time. And it may be something that I consider for the future. However, with my schedule at work, I felt that teaching a class would be more of a challenge than I could handle. Well, at least in terms of when everything on my blog was/is happening. 

The entire aim of these posts (and what would’ve been my class) is to explore the aforementioned genres. I wanted to look at each genre’s history and how they evolved into what we know them as today. I think that there is an incredibly rich story to tell here and think it warrants exploration. As such, I think that it would be wise to lay out some ground work early on. I plan to cover quite a lot beyond just music in this series of posts. 

First off, this whole endeavor will venture into other aspects of life beyond music, including political, social, economical, and technological advancements. And some may not like that – but tough shit. For those who may end up saying, “keEp PolItiCs oUt oF RoCk’N’rOlL, mAn”, I’m talking specifically about you. For me to leave factors like political and social movements, economic changes, and technological advancements out of the history of these genres would be myopic.

Those elements of life all play significant roles in shaping the genres of music I want to explore here. They help set the stage for certain events that are paramount to these genres of music. You’d miss an entire side of the story that adds so much more to the overall picture. In my experience, other books on these subjects tend not to go into those areas. I simply cannot justify their exclusion here, especially considering the breadth and depth I’d like to go into.

This will be a series of quite long posts. Admittedly, this may even be a little too ambitious. However, I think that this is an achievable thing. Honestly, this is something I could possibly even consider my magnum opus in a way. I will do my best to accurately and fairly cover as many events in time as possible. I’ll cite my sources where I can, like I usually do. I’ll also try to keep a sort of running bibliography.

Keep in mind though, this post is delving into upwards of and exceeding more than 100 years of history. As such, I’m aiming to not only touch upon the music, but also events that influenced things. I may not touch upon everything, but will try to be as comprehensive as possible. This may also need to split this into multiple different, but linked posts, depending on character limits. If I do, the links to each post will be towards the top of the page.

However, I should mention that I will be skipping over certain aspects of music. Since this entire idea is involved enough as it it, I’m going to leave out certain genres for the sake of brevity. Genres like country, funk, jazz, and pop are all being excluded, if not kept to a minimum. I want this to be a comprehensive history, but focused. Those genres are important in their own right, and arguably warrant their own exploration. But this would take forever if I included them here.

I’d be stretching myself way too thin by covering those on top of what I already plan to discuss. In addition, there may end up being aspects of life that I touch upon, but don’t fully elaborate on. Some of these can make entire books in their own right. Again, I’ll keep those to a minimum for the sake of brevity. I’ll try to make mention of key figures within each genre as we explore these genres.

So keep checking this post for future installments. Links for each instalment can be found below: