Running with the Devil: Power, Gender and Madness in Heavy Metal Music (Music/Culture) - Softcover

"Walser belongs to a small but influential group of academics trying to reconcile 'high theory' with a streetwise sense of culture . . . an excellent book." --Rolling Stone "Making surprising connections to classical forms and debunking stereotypes of metal's musical crudity, Walser delves enthusiastically into guitar conventions and rituals."--Washington Post "Walser is truly gifted at doing what few critics before him have done: analyzing the music . . . In virtuoso readings of metal music that forge persuasive links between metal and particular classical music traditions, Walser reveals the ways that musical structures themselves are social texts." --The Nation "Running with the Devil takes musicology where it has never gone before; I once saw the chapter on metal guitarists and the classical tradition performed live in a lecture hall, but even on paper it smokes."--SF Weekly Rolling Stone" Washington Post" The Nation" SF Weekly"

A Choice Outstanding Academic Book. A musicologist and cultural critic as well as a professional musician, Robert Walser offers a comprehensive musical, social, and cultural analysis of heavy metal in Running with the Devil. Dismissed by critics and academics, condemned by parents and politicians, fervently embraced by legions of fans, heavy metal music attracts and embodies cultural conflicts that are central to our society. Walser explores how and why heavy metal works, both musically and socially, and at the same time uses metal to investigate contemporary formations of identity, community, gender, and power.