What Makes Heavy Metal Heavy?

A metalhead's quest for meaning. Support 12tone on Patreon to help us keep making cool videos!   / 12tonevideos   Watch this video on Nebula: https://nebula.tv/videos/12tone-what-... As a metalhead, I've been calling things "heavy" for most of my life, but I never really stopped to think about what I meant. It's such an intuitive label to me, with such a clear meaning that neatly translates to the music I'm describing. But these days, stopping to think about what I mean when I talk about music is pretty much my entire job, so I think it's finally time to ask that question: When a metalhead calls a piece of music heavy, what are they actually saying? Merch: http://standard.tv/12tone Discord:   / discord   Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/12tone.nebul... Email: [email protected] Script: https://tinyurl.com/38ju3mt4 Huge thanks to our Elephant Club members: Susan Jones Jill Jones Howard Levine Warren Huart Len Lanphar Ken Arnold William (Bill) Boston Damien Fuller-Sutherland Chris Prentice Jack Carlson Kelly Christoffersen Christopher Lucas Andrew Beals Dov Zazkis Hendrik P Thomas Morley Jacob Helwig Donal Botkin Stephen Cook b-rom Jon Hancock Hendrik Stüwe Dan Bonelli Kevin Boyce Luke Ian Seymour Neil Moore Blake White Dhruv Monga Ken Jones Obadiah Wright Carlos Rendon Kylie McInnes OrionWolfie Laurence T Maloney Michael Mol RAD Donato Oliver Marchand Reiji Kobayashi Catherine Berry Matt Ivaliotes Chris Davis Luke Klima Hikaru Katayamma Fred Kroon Chris Burgess HardScale Chris Piro Matt Robbins Ryan Evans Leigh VanHandel Geoff Aaron Boodman Samuel Ollesh Mikko Koli Jonathan Lonowski DrJRad David Krieger Staal Jay Roman Gopal George Romaka Romain Baugue And thanks as well to Henry Reich, Gene Lushtak, Eugene Bulkin, Oliver, Anna Work, Adam Neely, Dave Mayer, David Bartz, CodenaCrow, Arnas, Caroline Simpson, Michael Alan Dorman, Blake Boyd, Charles Gaskell, Tom Evans, David Conrad, Ducky, Nikolay Semyonov, Chris Connett, Kenneth Kousen, h2g2guy, W. Dennis Sorrell, Andrew Engel, Peter Brinkmann, naomio, Alex Mole, Betsy, Tonya Custis, Dave Shapiro, Walther, Jake Sand, Graeme Lewis, Jim Hayes, Scott Albertine, Evan Satinsky, Conor Stuart Roe, ZagOnEm, Kai, רועי סיני, Kottolett, Brian Miller, Pamela O'Neill, Thomas Morgan, Mark James, Matty Crocker, Adam Ziegenhals, Mark, Amelia Lewis, Justin St John-Brooks, DialMForManning, JD White, Andrew Wyld, Joe Johnston, A Devoted Servant of the Holy Water Bottle, Claymore Alexander, gunnito, Graham Orndorff, Kayla Sparks, Douglas Anderson, Foreign Man in a Foreign Land, Paul Tanenholz, Tom, William Christie, Joyce Orndorff, Stephen Tolputt, Kyle Kinkaid, Isaac Hampton, Mark Mitchell Gloster, Andy Maurer, William Spratley, Don Jennings, Cormag81, Derek Hiemforth, Bryan, Mikeyxote, Milan Durnell, Dan Whitmer, Thel 'Vadam, N Zaph, M3RK Chaos Official Patreon page, Mike Wyer, Marc Testart, Carlfish, Michael Morris, Bill Owens, Martin Romano, George Burgyan, Belinda Reid, Matthew Soddy, Flavor Dave, DraconicDon, John W Campbell, StellarDrift, Jimmy2Guys, Megan Oberfield, morolin, An Oni Moose, Ken Birdwell, Blue 5alamander, Panda, Cliff Hudson, Olivia Herald, Macy Allen, JayneOfCanton, or dahan, Alin Nica, Ethan Savaglio, Robert Bailey, Deirdre Saoirse Moen, juneau, Sina Bahram, Ira Kroll, Patrick Minton, Justin Katz, Roahn Wynar, Chuck Dukhoff of The Stagger Lee Archives, Bob D'Errico, Robert Shaw, Shawn Beshears, David Shlapak, JD, Rennie Allen, Travis Briggs, Donald Murray, Cindy Klenk (Highlands Recording Arts LLC), Jonah C., Greyson Erickson, Matt Deeds, Claire Postlethwaite, Strife, Brian Covey, Miles_Naismith, Jemuel Gardner, Jordan Nordstrom-Young, Jay Harris, Sean Murphy, JasperJackal, Tommy Transplant, Wolfgang Giersche, Autographedcat, ParzivaLore, Alexander Whisnant, Amanda Jones, Olaf, Colleen Chapman, Gil, M. Dodge Mumford, Jon Purdy, Ken Brown, Colin Kennedy, Christopher Bork, Granger Meador, The Mauses, Tom Belknap, christopher porto, Steffan Andrews, and William Wallace! Your support helps make 12tone even better! Also, thanks to Jareth Arnold!