You know how you sometimes find that special place on the beach, the perfect spot that you don’t want anyone else to find…? Or if you find a great place – anywhere, that makes you feel good, your own discovery that is yours, and yours only – that you will protect and keep a secret or maybe share with just your closest friends…?

That’s what metal has been to me my whole life. I can’t say that I chose it – it chose me. It was like an epiphany, a religious experience – and because metal wasn’t widely accepted, I felt like I was a part of a small, secret club or something.

It wasn’t on the radio, it wasn’t in the papers, it was just this… underground, rebellious movement in the eyes of a teenager, especially a female teenager, as there were very few female role models in metal in the very early eighties.

Metal was anti-establishment. It was a big fuck-you middle finger in the face of everything that was “adult” or “responsible”…. Parents hated it, religious groups hated it, polititians hated it, media ignored it (except for when Ozzy bit the head of a bat or Alice Cooper decapitated himself onstage or W.A.S.P got banned by PMRC for their lovely song “I Fuck Like A Beast“).

THAT is what metal has been to me, always. A freedom and an escape from everything that you’re supposed to be.

In a way I guess I don’t want to grow up. Metal has been that escape from everything that had to do with normality. But now, I’m beginning to wonder what the hell is happening. Metal is dying.

Two days ago I stayed up all night, watching the streaming online version of ABC’s “Dancing with the stars”. Kiss and Steel Panther had been announced as guests. I had to see what the deal was. I would have been better off if I had never seen that.

My god, what a sad sight. Kiss has never really been “rock’n’roll” in the “rebellious”sense, they would sell their own mother if they could make a buck or two, and that’s nothing new. Still it was disturbing somehow to see them on this family show, this absolutely squeaky clean family entertainment.… It made me sick watching people dancing freaking BALLET to Twisted Sister…! Oh my god, it was so…gay! And I don’t mean that in a homophobic sort of way, but you know what I mean. It was just so fucking WRONG!

Not only that, but all those hard rock anthems had been “cleaned up” and were sung by some…session singers, people who are as far from metal as you can possibly get.

I guess it’s stupid, but it actually made me sad to witness it. To me, this is the armageddon of metal. I see it everywhere. Judas Priest on American Idol – the show that kills music. Call it whatever you want but it doesn’t produce any new music. You have people singing covers and trying to sound like the real deal, like their idols who got famous the old-fashioned way, by working their asses off.

It’s really just a money-making show that’s looking for a product to sell. That means the “product” must be G-rated. No damn TRUE rock’n’roll here! It’s family entertainment for gods sakes.

I’ve realized that by talking to the Croatian guy, the rocker dude who I first saw on “Idol”. His label still hasn’t released any of his music, because he’s a rocker – and rock doesn’t appeal to the little girlies who are the ones buying records. Maybe – if you make it TRENDY. Like if you give Bret Michaels a dating-show for instance…

So, Priest appeared on AI, sold their souls to the devil if you ask me, Kiss on Dancing with the stars, Alice Cooper won’t be performing at any REAL rock-festivals in Sweden this summer, but he WILL be playing at Liseberg…! Liseberg is a family amusement-park! The man who got himself banned everywhere he went back in the day, who was arrested and feared by your parents and your teacher – is now a family entertainer, like a rock-Liberace or something.

And AC/DC sold their music to WalMart, the very same retail corporation that wouldn’t sell albums that the PMRC had labelled with “Parental Advisory”-stickers!

WTF?!?!

Yeah, I’m an idealist, I think it’s sad to watch the death of metal as we know it. It’s not rebellious anymore, it’s not anti-establishment and it’s not my “private island” anymore – or anyone else’s.

Hard rock is business now. You will hear the dorks on Glee singing some washed-up version of an old Pat Benatar-song or something and you will find the kind of r’n’r outfits that you had to look everywhere to find (specialized stores) – at H & M or any other major store. It’s sellable now. Metal sells – and everybody’s buying.

No more underground movement, no more middle fingers… no more rebellion. Metal is now Dancing With The Stars, American Idol, family amusement parks and WalMart. Guess maybe it’s time for me to grow up too…