El Reeve and Claire Simson are the LGBT+ heavy metal podcast's first guests from a majority-female, majority queer band. The Mountain Caller pair talk about the affirming experience being in a band with other queer folk has been, and why it's such a big part of what they've enjoyed about the band so far.
They also talk about how things have improved for them nowadays, both as members of the LGBT+ community, and as women – although they have some unpleasant truths to tell about their experience of misogyny within metal.
There's also some chat about how certain visual clues that fellow queers may notice and have their gaydar go off are missed by many straight folk, and whether this may affect your experience of homophobia within society – including metal.
Finally, given that the band's album concept includes clear queer representation, they also talk about the importance of not hiding their queerness within their artistic output.
This week's Camp Classic harks back to the late-90s, as Tom talks about how a misunderstanding made Rob Zombie's "Dragula" a source of dread when he was a closeted ball of hormones. This leads to a conversation about whether you run away from, or embrace, things that you worry might be perceived as queer if you're in the closet – and why there's a lot more risk attached to being outed at the age Tom was when he made his error with "Dragula".
There's also discussion of what the hell all this has to do with 'The Matrix'. Because it does (naturally, given the time period the song came out). Also which 1980s one-hit-wonder of camp pop would have loved the track.
Plus it's the day long-term listeners have all been waiting for, as Matt has to talk about Powerwolf, as the new album from the German werewolf-themed power metallers, 'Call Of The Wild', is Tom's pick for the Hate Crew Gaybar jukebox. Not to be outdone, Matt tries to out-Tom Tom's pick, by putting 'Minnewar', the new album from German folk metallers Harpyie in himself. Has he finally found Tom's limit of OTT? Or is that actually just an impossible ask?
It's possibly the campest HBFM yet. Which is really more of a bar to exceed than an end point, obviously.
(There's also some news about the next special, and how you will be able to hear that and all future specials through Knotfest. Coming very, very soon.)
Listen to Hell Bent For Metal on Spotify here, listen on iTunes here, or choose one of the other ways to listen here.
