Ed Gamble reflects on his lifelong love for the genre: it’s baffling, it’s noisy, but – like
comedy – it’s a welcoming community
My name is Ed Gamble, and I love heavy metal. I say it loud, and I say it proud. Ideally, I would scream it from the top of a
volcano while wearing a loincloth and holding a broadsword, but this is tricky logistically. I have been obsessed from the age of 13, ever since I first heard System of a Down, Slipknot and Deftones. They were my gateway drugs, and it wasn’t long before I was scuttling around the genre’s darker alleyways, mainlining Slayer, Pantera and Cradle of Filth.
I know that some people’s reaction to metal is to laugh at it, but this only makes us metal fans stronger. In fact, it is probably part of what attracted me to it. It’s a community. Granted, it’s a community where I once saw a man set
fire to his own pubic hair in the queue for a gig, but you can’t have a 100% hit rate. I have never felt more welcomed and at home than at a metal show; arms round two topless, tattooed men I don’t know, all screaming along to whatever horrible noise is being smashed out from the stage.