HEAVEN SHALL BURN ARE A TRENDING TOPIC ON TWITTER
I never pay attention to trending topics on Twitter, because it just never really occurs to me. I guess it is kinda interesting to see what people are talking about (in 140 characters or less at a time), though.
For example, some of the most popular topics currently include Macaulay Culkin (people are alternately very troubled to learn that Mila Kunis just dumped him and very troubled to learn that he’s still alive), Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn (a new edition will apparently remove the “N” word from the text), and… German metalcore outfit Heaven Shall Burn.
The band, recognizing the PR value of a controversy, has released a statement suggesting that the sudden surge in tweetified popularity is due to Christians who are pissed about their name, although that might just be hype, I dunno:
“Us being into the glorification of violence, destruction of the earth and Satanism has been an open secret. Our videos for ‘Combat‘ and ‘Endzeit‘ speak a very clear language regarding what we are about. Finally our message translated – even to religious fanatics!”
(And by the way, it’s worth noting that HSB aren’t actually Satanists. For a beat I was like, “I don’t have to stick that in the article, people will understand the sarcasm of the band’s statement. Then I remembered that this is MetalSucks, not a MENSA meeting, so sometimes we have to yell to the cheap seats. HI, CHEAP SEATS!!!)
Right now this is just kind of a funny story. But in the longterm, it will be interesting to see what effect, if any, this will actually have on the band, their sales, and their popularity. I’m guessing not much.
Why? There are a LOT of people tweeting about this shit right now (as of this writing, there have been over five hundred tweets about the band in the last twenty minutes alone)… but most of them seem to be metalheads talking about how Christians are angry about the band’s name, or people who don’t know who Heaven Shall Burn are but are pissed that it’s “still” trending. (How long has this been going on that people find it so irritating? And besides publicists, who gives it a shit that’s it’s been trending for a certain period of time?), or (a very few) Christians who seem to be either angry-ish (“Shame on you!”) or preachy (“I’ll pray for you!”).
In other words, people who are tweeting about HSB right basically fall into one of two categories: i) they’ve heard of the band before, ii) they’ve never heard of the band before and are not happy to hear about the band now. If they’ve already heard of HSB, they’ve most likely already made up their mind about the band, and will probably not become a fan now; and if they’ve never heard of HSB and are pissed either because Hoo-ray God! or You’re clogging my Twitter!, they will probably not become a fan now.
But who knows. The mainstream media could pick up on the story, and in a week, after everyone has stopped talking about it, my parents could e-mail me the news like they were giving me a bona fide tip. That would mean that HSB were just one fart’s momentum away from opening for Metallica.
And if you really don’t know Heaven Shall Burn, well, uh, welcome to the world of metal! You can watch the band’s aforementioned video of “Combat” above, or “Endzeit” below.
-AR
