Beyond the Rap Versus Metal Binary

As Matt Karpe puts it in the book, Nu-Metal: A Definitive Guide: “[a] form of alternative metal, the term ‘aggro metal’ was also associated with this intriguing new movement which quickly became known as ‘Nu Metal’. Combining elements of heavy metal, alternative rock, funk, grunge and hip-hop to create a sonic soundscape of raw power and emotion, nu metal was primarily based on guitar riffs where down-tuned and often seven-string guitars became commonplace in an attempt to create a much heavier sound”. In other words, the musical bricks from which nu metal was built include the creations of Black people across numerous genres, such as the powerhouse punk and speed-metal music of the band Bad Brains.

To this day, it is not unusual to come across commentaries about the “crossover” appeal of music that receives interest from groups of people usually deemed to be disparate, often due to their various racial and cultural identities. At times, the concept of “crossover” pushes ideas about music based on simplistic assumptions about race and genres, such as reductive perceptions of who is (not) metal. To return once more to Nu-Metal: A Definitive Guide, Karpe states that “[u]ntil Aerosmith collaborated with Run D.M.C. and Anthrax teamed up with Public Enemy, it was unheard of that hip-hop and heavy music could ever come together”.

Frequently, the impact of not only rap and hip-hop, but of Black creativity, cool, and aesthetics in general, is downplayed in conversations about nu metal and its branches. In fact, there have been many times when hip-hop and rap have been treated as being in opposition to metal and “alt” rock. But both the history of metal and the wider rock sphere that made it tell a different story. Rather than viewing hip-hop and rap as simply peppering the meal that is nu metal, I see them as the blueprint for what would be nu metal’s newness, edginess, and overall appeal. They make the dish, not simply season it.

Re-meme-bering Nu Metal

Digital culture has always been part of nu metal, particularly as this music popped up around the time that opportunities to (i)legally download music began to blow up (Limewire knows). Then again, nu metal is now influenced by many more technologies and the temperaments of algorithms and online users that animate or agitate them. As Jenessa Williams writes in a Museum of Youth Culture piece on “Tracing Music Fandom Practice Through The Internet”: “As the 2000s became the 2010s, a boom in musical social media use continued. Fan-led tastemaking was becoming more prominent in the generation of ‘viral’ hits, but so was artist engagement, able to reply to fan messages or distribute blog posts with more ease and creativity than previously possible”.

Since then, and as Joy White affirms in Like Lockdown Never Happened: Music and Culture During Covid, the internet and music have become even more entwined. This has resulted in a deluge of discussions and descriptions of music that stem from the power of digital remix culture, such as memes, GIFs, and fancam edits. It’s in this digital world that social media profiles and posts about nu metal merge references to and from other digital/pop culture places. So, nu metal might become “very demure, very mindful”, at least for a moment when nu metal fans and sites pick up on the viral media of dynamic content creator Jools Lebron. Put differently, the internet is at the centre of the cultural memory and contemporary representation of nu metal, such as engaging social media posts and overall work by The Nu Metal Agenda.

In the words of Andy Bennett on subcultures and youth, “by the early 1970s, there is clear evidence that youth culture itself was becoming quite consciously self-referential”. More than 50 years later, self-referential expressions of youth culture are the backbone of much digital culture, where a chorus of in-the-know content combines irony, levity, and social commentary connected to experiences of youth – then and now. What’s old is new again, and this includes nu metal.

Having really grown as a genre and subculture at the cusp of the 2000s, nu metal is as well known for its relationship with the noughties as it is known for its beats which connect to music from before. Maybe this makes the crux of nu metal a feeling of Duality (a nod to Slipknot’s 2004 song) – counting down towards a new era while also being impacted by the magnetic pull of the past. So, we witness social media trends such as people comically pairing Linkin Park’s 2007 “What I’ve Done” (the closing music to the 2007 Transformers film) with the final scenes of others, including, in some cases, iconic ones that are canonically Black films.

Essentially, nu metal is a lot less siloed than it once was. Digital culture’s development means that much online content cannot be contained by the conventions of a single generation, music scene, site, or subculture. In this collagelike digital world, new genre labels sprout: cue baddiecore.

Baddiecore and Black Women

In the resonant words of Rosemary Lucy Hill on Gender, Metal and the Media, “[m]usic is a gendered experience”. To once more bring in the pivotal works of Dawes and Mahon, it is a raced experience too. As I’ve reflected on in earlier writing on Black artists in metal and “alt” music, “Black alternative music is undoubtedly part of black history, but the genre [of “alt” music] continues to be associated with whiteness. Black women, in particular, are rarely recognised for their work in this genre, due to the dominance of white and all-male bands in mainstream alternative music scenes”. Despite, or perhaps precisely because of this, recent iterations of metal include the tongue-in-cheek sub-genre descriptor “baddiecore” – spurred on by social media posts, such as a tweet by Stray from the Path’s drummer Craig Reynolds, who namechecks Bad Omens, Sleep Token, and Spiritbox as being among the bands framed as baddiecore.

Often in jest, the term “baddiecore” is intended to describe forms of metalcore that are perceived as having strong sex appeal, or an overall sound and/or aesthetic that is thought of as hypersexualised (aka “thirsty”). As I discuss in more detail in Look, Don’t Touch: Reflections on the Freedom to Feel, co-authored with layla-roxanne hill, baddiecore is a term that typifies parts of the racial, gender, and sexual politics of metal, including its engagement with, and erasure of, the music of Black women.

In practice, the label “baddiecore” is used in response to metalcore that has a sound which calls back to the dulcet tones and demure yet dramatic demeanour of strands of R&B and hip-hop which was previously referred to as “bedroom” music. Basically, “baddiecore” kind of feels like a way of saying “black-ish”metalcore, while overlooking how blackness has shaped rock, metal, and the idea of being a baddie.

The term “baddie” (a derivative of “bad bitch”) is associated with Black American cultural expressions and is especially used in reference to Black women who are perceived as self-possessed and embracing a strong sense of self-regard. The significance of the connection between the term “baddie” and Black women is apparent when recalling that, as Dawes notes, “[e]specially for black women, who are often told from an early age that we have to be more aware of how others perceive us, how we appear in society is often more important than asserting our individuality”. This means the ability to embody being a “baddie” is hard fought for by Black women, who face stifling societal projections of their/our presumed strength and stoicism (as Megan Thee Stallion incisively sings on the track “Anxiety”, “bad bitches have bad days too…”).

When accounting for this, and the fact that the label of “baddiecore” is mainly used in relation to predominantly white and/or male metalcore bands, it makes the very concept of “baddiecore” seem like yet another that symbolises the unacknowledged racial, gender, and sexual politics of metal and “alt” rock. In sum, it signals the ways that Black culture and creativity, especially that of Black women, continues to be both hyper-visible and invisibilised in such music. What is baddiecore without baddies?

As sub-genre labels including “baddiecore” and others keep cropping up, being memed, and are mulled over, continuing to tease out and tackle the politics of all things metal remains crucial. Then again, to hark back to Linkin Park lyrics, and to rephrase them as a closing question: in the end, does it really matter?