Metal militia behind the Iron Curtain: Scene formation in 1980s East Germany

The article offers results from a three-year Ph.D. research about the East German metal scene in the 1980s. Due to the political circumstances of a divided Germany, two separate German metal scenes arose. In focus will be aspects of politics and cultural transfer and flow as well as practices of the metal scene in socialist East Germany. The socialist state understood metal as a threatening western youth culture, though it quickly became one of the most popular youth cultures during the 1980s. The article explains how the scene developed partly unofficial and illegal ways of scene formation with domestic gigging bands, supra-regional trade-off networks and correspondence system, prospering black markets, and DIY practices. Therefore, the article further points out to the ambiguity of the 1980s East German socialism with the argument that simple concepts of confrontation and conflict between the state and youth culture are too simplistic.