So I don't know if this has been discussed before but here we are. Everybody - almost - might know at this point the channel called Hipster Black Metal; the insult comedy based channel on YouTube that bashes popular bands.

I will be the first to admit that although I enjoy the shit out of bands like Deafheaven and WITTR I fucking adore this guy's efforts to make these videos. His humor is over the top, incredibly satirical and the way he makes fun of certain artists is flat out hilarious. Like even Ghostbath have responded to him saying that his videos are really cool.

I have watched his Batushka video over 12 times and his videos called "NOW THIS IS WHAT I CALL BASED RIFFS" feature some amazing bands. He even introduced me to the amazing world of Taoist Chinese ambient.

However I think he sometimes exaggerates just for the sake of being edgy. I get the bashing on idiots who think that they can dictate what anyone should listen or not - based on their political beliefs - but calling every RABM band shit and loathing Panopticon - who is not even RABM - takes some of his genuine and spontaneous character away.


Anyway what do you guys think about him? Has anyone listened to his project ? (https://www.metal-archives.com/bands/Parabola/3540402062)

Let me know!

He's not wrong, most RABM bands are fucking awful. I love Panopticon but the rest of the bands that fall under the RABM category are awful.

The video you posted was the opposite of funny though, sorry. I'm currently listening to his band Parabola and it's really mediocre too. There are a ton of better atmoblack bands. On the positive side, at least he's mocking the same stuff he seems to play. His music doesn't really sound that different from the other projects he makes fun of.

When it comes to satire on the ridiculous moments of black metal, HBM is my guy to go to. While I don't agree with everything he says, he generally makes some funny content.

when i saw the thread title, i assumed this was going to be about varg

I thought it was going to be about Razorfist. I mean, he's obnoxious but I didn't think he was THAT controversial.

He sucks. He brigades other people's Youtube videos constantly and relies on ancient, tired 4chan-style humor.



RABM isn't really even a thing, it's a list of black metal bands deemed "safe/acceptable" by some guy's blog and the subreddit that spun off of it. As far as black metal bands with left-wing political leanings, Panopticon is by no means the only good one, I also really like Falls of Rauros, and I think Dawn Ray'd is okay. Neckbeard Deathcamp, Feminazgul, Sankara, etc. are awful though.

I love when people take such extreme and unnuanced stances, because it make it so ridiculously easy to destroy their argument, it's not even funny. For instance, Iskra is an amazing crust black metal band. Their album Bureval is top notch. And in case you're not convinced yet. Dawn Ray'd, Wolves in the Throne Room, and Skagos are also all amazing bands.

Yeah, you "destroyed" me. I said "most", not "all". Besides, WITTR have never displayed any politics in their lyrics and have never been a part of the RABM movement. Iskra are pretty meh, just like most crust black (not a great fan of that sound), Dawn Ray'd are boring as hell and Skagos were always inferior to most of the other "cascadian" black metal bands (Alda and Velnias are miles better). Try harder next time.

I stand by what I said. Most RABM is sadly very amateurish and pretty bad. Even Panopticon stopped having political lyrics and isn't a part of the movement nowadays.

You said all but one band. That's basically all of them, and it's still so deeply wrong, extreme and unnuanced.



Iskra's album Bureval is one of the best, if not the best crust black metal album there is, Anyway, pretty far from being awful, as you said. And if you don't like Skagos and Dawn Ray'd I don't know what to tell you. They are pretty good bands. But I can't make you like them.

And just because Panopticon isn't focusing all of it's lyrics and themes of politics doesn't mean the band isn't part of the RABM movement. That's just bullshit arbitrary rules you're making as you go. Austin Lunn identifies with the movement, so he's part of the movement.

Edit: Removed some of the belligerent stuff from my original post.

I had no idea what that acronym meant, so now I've learned something - not only is 'RABM' not 'Rock Against Black Metal', which would have at least been funny, but RABM has loony subreddits that have already declared the Hipster Black Metal guy a 'fascist', and damned all who sail in her.

A lot of people need to spend a lot of time off their computers

THIS.

And this is why I stay away from NSBM and RABM at all costs.

He's cringe

RABM does, for the most part, suck though

Wasn't aware of this youtuber's existence, and checked out a few clips due to this thread. Dude's not for me.

Sub-genres defined by ideology usually suck*. It's one of the best takes from droneriot. They focus on the message instead of the music. That's why most NSBM sucks as well. Throw Christian metalcore and "unblack metal" in there as well.

*The most striking exception in my mind is Panopticon. Strong political message, still great.

I don't have much to say, you just parroted "I like these bands, you must like them too" like it's somehow going to make me change my mind. Also, do you understand the meaning of "hyperbole"? You should really check what it means.

And it's not an arbitrary rule. Since the only common denominator of all RABM is the political lyrics because it's a dumb made up subgenre, if your music is political it's RABM. If it's not, then it isn't.

Nah, not really.

I know this doesn't add much to the conversation, but a lot of people aren't into watching youtube-doodlers spout off.

Never even heard of this channel until now. It's like someone impregnated every single shitty 2007 YT video made on Microsoft movie maker and this was the child.

Seconded.

This all seems very lame.

If you're going to claim that an entire is shit except for one band that you like, you have to expect people to voice their disagreement. Don't be such a wet blanket.

As for RABM being a genre based solely on lyrics, it's a little more complex than that. You're just assuming that based on your limited knowledge of the origins of the genre. RABM, as it is distinctively rooted in politics, is obviously about the lyrical themes, but also about self-identification, and the political stances that the bands take inside but also outside of their music. So black metal bands who take firm stances against racism, imperialism, capitalism, fascism, etc. by making statements or by refusing to be on the same bill as openly fascist bands, are aligning themselves with the movement.

This is beside the point I was trying to make though. If you're going to claim that an entire genre is shit, regardless of the fact that they have basically nothing in common of a vaguely common stance against fascism and in favor of broad left wing ideologies, people are going to call you out on your bullshit generalization (no, it's not an hyperbole to say that every single band except for one band within an entire subgenre are awful. If you're going to say stupid stuff like that, at least own it when people call you on your bs).

Couldn't agree more. I watched some of their videos and while most of it was pretty dumb, there's a couple glints of humor sprinkled throughout. Unfortunately there's a growing number of people that end up shitposting stuff like this and patting each other on the back, on all sides. I have to be honest this is the first time I've ever heard the term RABM and after scrolling through the reddit page I kinda felt bad for those people. It's just tons of stuff like "oh I like band X, are they nazis?" And then someone else will chime in with something along the lines of "yeah dude, the guy's uncle's ex-girlfriend used to babysit a kid whose cousin had a label that liked a facebook post by nazi#9001. It's best that you stop enjoying them and apologize." I can understand being against a certain band or person because they've committed some sort of atrocity, but it just seems absolutely ridiculous that somebody would disown a band that they really enjoy just because there's a picture of one of their members wearing a certain shirt or something equally trivial.

Whilst I definitely don't identify with the "is x-band sketchy" Reddit witchhunts people engage in to make themselves feel warm and fuzzy inside (and especially the trivial overreaching and contradictory logic/reasoning in many cases) and agree with you on that note, I do think you're missing and over-simplifying the point of why people do want to label these genres as such, and don't want to financially support the bands of people who they are against ethically and fundamentally. In this day and age of social-identity political discussion and the hostile climate encouraging people to hate people they don't identify with politically, I don't think it's a stretch or ridiculous that somebody would disown a band due to the reasons mentioned above.

And I'm gonna assume that raumr's comment "Sub-genres defined by ideology usually suck*" is poking fun at the fact that a lot of NSBM and RABM are so fixated on lyrical content that the music aspect generally sucks major balls, and is lacking in both musicality and production compared to their non-pigeonholed counterparts.

Well I cannot express any opinion about RABM; the only band I have heard from the "genre" - if you can it a genre - is Panopticon which are fucking incredible.

Hahahahaha that was a funny one! Though there IS a "genre" that is against something. It is called RAC which is an acronym for "Rock against Communist". Pretty intelligent am I right ???



Yep.

Hahaha I should make a thread about Razorfist some day. I really like his Metal Mythos videos; really meticulously done and with great facts about the bands. He also has a great way of explaining his, somewhat unpopular, opinions. His gaming videos are also interesting.

However I find it really funny that a grown ass man is lamenting and getting frustrated about politics while using verbal jargon in order to sound intelligent and outspoken.

Yep. I would put the shittiest RABM next to hilarious NSBM bands like Granatus or Pagan Warrior 88. There are some NSBM bands though that are really great : Wolfnacht, Absurd (not all of their music), Peste Noire, Ad Hominem, Grand Belial's Key etc.

Panopticon rules man. That is why I think HPM is bolted to some of his opinions. He calls their riffs "metalcore" just because they use elements of the cascadian black metal sound. I think he just wants to appeal to some of his fans who are not very open minded about anything in particular.

Why do you always feel personally attacked when someone doesn't like the same stuff that you do? You honestly need to grow up and stop being so offended every time someone dislikes something that you love. It gets rather annoying having you whine and confront people every time you favourite bands aren't praised. It doesn't make you look passionate or smart and it's rather pathetic. You stormed the thread with guns blazing claiming "it was easy to destroy my argument" yet somehow I'm the "wet blanket".

You also need to stop being a smartass and a condescending prick by saying stuff like "your limited knowledge of the origins of the genre". RABM was born because a Blogspot account tried to link certain bands that had no real common denominator except for their lyrics. That's it. It doesn't have some complex background or anything. Every anti-fascist band isn't labelled as RABM and you know it. "By making statements or by refusing to be on the same bill as openly fascist bands, are aligning themselves with the movement" come on, this is complete bullshit. There's no "movement". RABM means nothing outside of some very small Internet circles and there's plenty of bands out there that refuse to play with NSBM bands and would laugh at your face for calling them "Red and Anarchist Black Metal". This is not some label bands adopted, it's some dumb tag a blog imposed on bands and they don't consider themselves a part of it. The tag has only declined since the 2010s and most people involved with it have already moved on.

I don't have anything else to say to you, if you're going to keep this rhetoric of attacking people every time they imply something that you enjoy is bad consider yourself blocked because I'm growing really tired of your shit.


I agree RABM is a dumb made up genre and that blog was honestly the worst thing that could have happened to that scene but I still think bands that solely focus on their politics tend to forget you actually have to make good music to back your ideas. Falls of Rauros are OK I guess but there's way better Cascadian stuff that wasn't so overtly political. The sad truth is that as much as I like RABM's ideology the music is usually subpar and doesn't live up to the ideologies they support. As you say, bands like Neckbeard Deathcamp and Feminazgul are a fucking disgrace and do a disservice to left leaning politics by not taking their music seriously and almost feeling like a parody. Something similar happens with Panopticon: Kentucky was his most political album and it's probably his worst. It was a huge disjointed mess that was only praised because of the cool aesthetic and the obviously great anti-capitalist message. He makes better music when he focuses and deals with more personal subjects in my opinion and I think he probably realised that too because he hasn't dealt with political stuff ever since.

It's also worth noting people tend to label every band that isn't openly fascist as RABM and that makes no sense. If you search RABM on Google you'll see bands like Agalloch, Wolves in the Throne Room, Fauna and Ash Borer labelled as such (basically the whole "Cascadian" scene) and that's not true. Those bands have never had a strong political message, they never considered themselves part of any movement and definitely aren't RABM. WITTR even have interviews saying they are not a political band and Agalloch's leader turned out to be an anti-Semitic asshole.


You just quoted me saying I love Panopticon so I'm not sure what your point is... Anyways, Panopticon isn't descriptive of what most of the "subgenre" sounds like. While the lyrics and messages behind the band are usually the only common denominator, it tends to conglomerate crust/black metal bands like Iskra, Leper and a lot of the "Cascadian" black metal scene (at least the most vocal about their politics like Skagos, and usually smaller punkish black metal bands like Ragana, etc).

RABM isn't a codified scene like NSBM is. There aren't dedicated RABM labels, distros, and organizers setting up underground RABM fests out there like there are for NSBM. All the RABM bands, good and bad, sound more like and have more connections to other bands in their local scenes than they do to any kind of movement.

Same. Not sure if I'm disappointed or not at the actual content.


Dude is too much of a little bitch to be genuinely controversial. If you spend more than 3 seconds ranting about Brie Larson's haircut then your opinions on most things can be disregarded.

There actually are a few "RABM" labels, though none are very big. Red Nebula is an example.

For me the best thing guy did was introduce me to Holy Arrow from China. Unreal Epic Black Metal.

Got to check them out! I have always wanted to dive into the Chinese metal scene.

Yeah, I browsed the subreddit and the attitude there is just really alien to me. I understand not wanting to listen to or support far-right bands and labels, but people were talking about boycotting whole distros because they stocked a couple of NSBM records. You can get Burzum records from Amazon and HMV, should we boycott them too? If you're that determined to avoid any tangential contact with "sketchy" musicians you may as well not bother listening to extreme metal in the first place. They were referring to distros and bands they consider safe as "clean" - the whole vibe reminds me McCarthyism or Stalinism.

Edit: An example of the sort of thing I'm talking about, someone actually posted "Any band that is interviewed by Bardo Methodology is blacklisted to me.". It's pathetic. Katatonia and Anathema are blacklisted to them?

Isn't he the douchebag that followed Scott of Xasthur around and was a dickhead for no reason? Scott was even trying to be nice. Thought that was tasteless.

It's utterly bizarre. Half those people admit they dont buy music anyway. It's just a purity test/struggle session to enhance their sense of self-righteousness. I wound up in a FB group doing the same....if you ever want a surreal experience, reading these people discussing your own band surely qualifies.

I think it was some other guy, but it could possibly him. Here's the video in case anyone was curious:

That is a friend of HBM. His name is Navid Farsi. HBM has a lot of videos where this guys basically goes in front of famous bands and trolls them; in other words he behaves in a an extremely awkward and bizarre way. In one of the videos he offers a leave to Deafheaven's singer. In another he goes straight up to a band's tour bus with a canned tuna can and stands in front of them.

There is a whole playlist of videos on YT called "HBM Jackass".
Here it is ->

The strangest thing about it is that Navid died a few years ago so this makes it even more weird...

Makes me wonder how he died since it looks like he died real young and all the weird shit he was doing.

You shouldn’t paint r/RABM with an overly broad brush. We all have our own criteria that we apply to the information in the Sketch threads. Reddit just reinforces circle-jerks with its bullshit voting system. Knowing about nazi affiliations is important to me because I don’t want to listen to human scum.


The fuck?

With all due respect, PETERG, the five NSBM bands you like aren't that good. I only like some of the less racist songs from Absurd and Peste Noire, and I don't even care for Wolfnacht.

I disagree, Ad Hominem and GBK are great. Absurd on the other hand are pure shit