UN on Music Theory Print

Unblack metal

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Characteristics#

Unblack metal is a genre derived from black metal that focuses on Christian lyrical themes. Unblack metal incorporates black metal’s fast tempos, shrieked vocals, highly distorted guitars, tremolo picking, double-kick drumming, repetition and often unconventional song structure. Garry Sharpe-Young’s 2001 encyclopedia A-Z of Black Metal states that " t opping the lot are Christian ‘Unblack’ acts who for all intents and purposes look like, sound like and employ the imagery of Black Metal whilst hidden in the unpenetrable vocal growls and distortions are the proclamations of Jesus Christ". Some unblack metal artists, such as Horde, write lyrics that explicitly attack Satanism. This remained a dominant theme throughout most of the 1990s. In the late 1990s, groups began to write more philosophical and ideological lyrics. These often include stories of conversion, doubt, salvation, struggles with faith, and the darker side of living a Christian life. Unblack metal bands may justify their use of the black metal style with reasons ranging from genuine appreciation of the musical genre, to evangelization towards the largely anti-Christian black metal scene, i.e. “bringing light into darkness”.

Underground hip-hop

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Etymology#

In 2026, the blog Pigeons & Planes published an article regarding the semantic change of the term “underground rap” in the 2020s online rap scene.

1980s–2000s: Origins#

Although hip-hop originally emerged from New York’s underground music scene during the early 1970s, by the end of the decade, the genre began to gain wider commercial success and mainstream attention through the prominence of disco-rap, which prompted early underground artists to explore more experimental approaches to their work. In 1983, Rammellzee and K-Rob released the single “Beat Bop”, which was produced and arranged by Jean-Michel Basquiat. Though it remained largely underground, the track was later described as a blueprint for the “apocalyptic, witty, and experimental” style of later experimental hip-hop artists such as Antipop Consortium and El-P. By the late 1980s, as hip-hop became more prominent, young artists began to create and release music independently, as many were unable to obtain record deals. The Stretch Armstrong and Bobbito Show, a radio show that was broadcast on WKCR (and later WQHT), which ran from 1990 to 1999, became well known for welcoming unsigned artists on to the show to freestyle a verse, which resulted in wider publicity and possibly even a record deal for that artist. Across the United States, several regional underground hip-hop scenes emerged, most notably on the East and West Coasts, as well as in the South, which included the Houston, Atlanta and Memphis rap scenes. This era saw the emergence styles such as horrorcore and nerdcore. Subsequently, underground hip-hop artists such as Jedi Mind Tricks, Kool Keith, B. Dolan, Diabolic, Immortal Technique, Insane Clown Posse, Del the Funky Homosapien, and Hieroglyphics later emerged, incorporating lo-fi production techniques and conscious lyricism. By the late 1990s, progressive rap acts such as Black Star and Juggaknots became notable in the scene, alongside traditional underground hip-hop artists like Aesop Rock, Artifacts, People Under the Stairs, CunninLynguists, and Rob Sonic. By the early 2000s, artists such as MF Doom, Edan, Clouddead, Dälek and Madlib, gained wider notoriety, which brought the underground scene to wider audiences as well as contributed to the wider proliferation of the sound, style and aesthetics that would become associated with underground hip-hop.

Underground music

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

1960s#

In the 1960s, the term “underground” was associated with the counterculture of that decade, and applied to journalism, comics and film as well as music. Underground music was defined by groups who garnered a following without a successful single or significant radio airplay and were associated with the general underground culture and scene. The Fugs, who formed in 1964, were described as “arguably the first underground rock group of all time”. On the October 12, 1966 issue of British music magazine Record Mirror, writer Norman Jopling describes the early underground “freak-out music” movement which would later be broadly known as psychedelic rock, as an authentic movement that was “not concocted” and was only beginning to be exploited by “big business”: Jopling cites Frank Zappa and the Mothers Of Invention, the Blues Project, the Velvet Underground and the Paul Butterfield Blues Band as “other groups in this category.” Further adding that although the Butterfield Blues Band “play a different kind of music, they are still regarded as an underground group due to their lack of air play”. Additionally, musicians associated with the UK underground, Australian underground and Los Angeles freak scene would also be referred to as “underground music”.