I have long been fascinated, as a fan and as a writer, with what it means to be a Jew within metal scenes. In this theme you can find my writings on this subject. In addition, for some years I wrote a blog called Metal Jew which focused on the intersection between Jewishness and Metalness. You can find the archive of the blog here.
What do you do when you are drawn to the bad guys, but the baddest guys around are just too bad?
Publication Date: October 7, 2020
Theme: Jews and Metal, Jews, Judaism and Jewishness, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Journalism and essays
How metal’s Christian apocalyptic sensibility can ground hope for a Jewish new year of renewal.
Publication Date: September 21, 2020
Theme: Jews and Metal, Jews, Judaism and Jewishness, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Journalism and essays
While genocide, killing and transgressive acts of violence are common themes in metal, there is a relative absence of metal lyrics and other ways of engaging with the Nazi Holocaust of the Jews as a theme. This stands in contrast to premodern genocides that are often the subject of fascination. Even when the Holocaust is apparently ‘celebrated’ by neo-Nazi metal acts, some of the specificities of the genocide, together with its applicability to Jews today, may be elided and effaced. When the Holocaust is engaged with in non-neo-Nazi metal lyrics, it is usually with great care and the victims themselves are rarely mentioned. The Holocaust constitutes a ‘problem’ in metal that makes silence and absence a preferable option to engagement. The reasons for this lie in part in metal’s self-conscious avoidance of ‘politics’, the lack of salience of Jews and antisemitism, and the excessive nature of the Holocaust itself.
Publication Date: September 1, 2020
Theme: Antisemitism, Racism, Hate, Jews and Metal, Jews, Judaism and Jewishness, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Journal articles
Special issue co-edited with Dominic Williams
Publication Date: September 1, 2020
Theme: Jews and Metal, Jews, Judaism and Jewishness, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Edited issues and publications
The band fuse Jewish and Arab music with heavier sounds, but they can't escape the contraditions at the heart of their homeland.
Publication Date: March 5, 2018
Theme: Israel/Palestine, Jews and Metal, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Journalism and essays, Music reviews
A series of posts from 2013 to 2014 in which I outline what 'Metal Beyond Metal' could look like.
Publication Date: January 17, 2014
Theme: Jews and Metal, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Journalism and essays
Keith Kahn-Harris über seinen Blog und warum er auch Neonazi-Musiker gern hört
Publication Date: August 21, 2012
Theme: Jews and Metal
Category: Interviews
Publication Date: April 20, 2011
Theme: Jews and Metal, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Journalism and essays, Music reviews
Publication Date: November 1, 2010
Theme: Jews and Metal, Jews, Judaism and Jewishness, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Book chapters
Date: March 2, 2010
Theme: Jews and Metal, Personal/Memoire
Category: Other talks (selected)
Article on Israeli metal band Orphaned Land, featuring interview with vocalist Kobi Farhi
Publication Date: January 27, 2010
Theme: Israel/Palestine, Jews and Metal, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Journalism and essays
Includes interview about the film 'Anvil! The Story of Anvil'
Date: April 6, 2009
Theme: Jews and Metal
Category: Podcasts
Inside every seven stone nebbish of a diaspora Jew, there is a mighty rock god waiting to be liberated by heavy metal music
Publication Date: April 6, 2009
Theme: Jews and Metal
Category: Journalism and essays
Publication Date: March 17, 2009
Theme: Jews and Metal, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Journalism and essays, Music reviews
Publication Date: January 1, 2002
Theme: Israel/Palestine, Jews and Metal, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Journal articles
German translation: ‘Ein Verwaistes Land? Israel und die Extreme Metal-Szene’ in Testcard 9, 2001
Publication Date: November 1, 1999
Theme: Israel/Palestine, Jews and Metal, Jews, Judaism and Jewishness, Metal Music and Culture
Category: Book chapters
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