[ZGoten]

Oh, I apologize then, but thanks for representing metal on the female front as well.

Well, black metal especially was hard for me to get into, and I am still staying away from the most aggressive stuff. For me, music has to be either melodic, atmospheric or technical. Many black metal bands are neither of those, which is why I've probably come to the end of my journey through more and more extreme stuff. There are definately people who start with fairly accessible genres such as power metal and can slowly ease into the darkest depths of black metal, however, I wouldn't call the genre 'acquired taste', just because it sounds so polite. Lyricswise, there is a lot of crap in black metal and still bands with extreme views or ideologies that are probably not even allowed to be discussed on this forum. In death metal, you don't encounter as many political extreme bands, but just like in black metal, there is quite som trash, that some people think is good, just because it's death metal, but it's not. There are many gems in black/death metal, but to find them, you have to work through a lot of crap. That's at least how I see it. Or you are lucky enough to know sites such as MetalStorm.net that are great places to inform yourself about all kinds of metal. However, there are certainly other people here on Animesuki with more insight on the subject matter, since I, like I implied earlier, am not that deep into death and black metal.

You have to be careful, though. Try to get into it, if you want, but don't force yourself. Some people can appreciate the style more as time passes, and some don't. If you are one of the latter persons, don't try to convince yourself that you like it. There are a lot of elitists stating that death/black metal are the only 'true' metal genres, which is why some people can fall into that trap, that they think they have to listen to that kind of music. I think that's stupid, though. I love some bands of the genres, but I love other bands just as much, and they are just as much 'metal'.