In a Metal Mood| Revisionist History podcast with Malcolm Gladwell E8/S4 (Transcript)

In a Metal Mood

Episode 8| Season 4| Revisionist History
Length: 40 mins | Released: August 8, 2019

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This episode contains explicit language.

Malcolm Gladwell: [music playing] You're listening to the smooth stylings of Patrick Charles Eugene, Pat Boone, pop star of the 1950s, host of the Pat Boone Chevy Showroom, maybe the Whitest, squarest rock musician of all time. In 1997, Pat Boone put out an album covering, among others, Judas Priest, Metallica, Ozzy Osborne, Led Zeppelin, and Deep Purple.

[Pat Boone singing] Well, we came down Montreaux on the late Geneva show

Malcolm Gladwell: On the front of the album, Pat Boone looks up maniacally, or at least as maniacally as he can, wearing only a black leather vest.

[Pat Boone singing] Frank Zappa and the mother were at the hippest place around

Malcolm Gladwell: You can find the whole thing on YouTube. In A Metal Mood, No More Mr. Nice Guy.

Dave Hill: I mean, all great songs that he has chosen, impeccable. [Pat Boone singing]

Malcolm Gladwell: Pat Boone performed an act of cultural appropriation, outrageous cultural appropriation. A square, White guy, a middle-aged crooner, walked in and shamelessly appropriated the heavy metal canon. Here's my question: what should we make of that fact? How should we feel about In A Metal Mood?

Malcolm Gladwell: So I asked my friend Dave Hill. Dave is a metal aficionado, lead guitarist for Valley Lodge and Witchtaint, maybe the most metal band name ever. If you root around the Internet, you can find some videos we've done together over the years, which have literally hundreds of likes. We go to the same coffee shop. Say hello to Dave.

Dave Hill: Well, the Devil's Interval is the beginning of metal, basically. It's the flat [?] [guitar playing]

Malcolm Gladwell: I assigned Dave In A Metal Mood as homework. Listen to it, break it down, report back to me. That's how this whole thing began.

Malcolm Gladwell: At the time he puts this out, he's 63, he's been a croonerÔøΩ He's an evangelical Christian, he's been a crooner for 40 years, he's best known for sporting like V-neck sweaters and khakis and top siders.

Dave Hill: Yeah.

Malcolm Gladwell: Or not even top siders, those shoes, those white bucks, that's what he does.

Dave Hill: I like a nice white buck.

Malcolm Gladwell: You couldn't have imagined a less metal pedigree than Pat Boone.

Dave Hill: No. He's pretty not metal, but it depends how you define medal. I mean, musically, no, but very metal in many other ways.

Malcolm Gladwell: Tell me what you mean by that.

Dave Hill: Just like, as far as like committing to being a crooner, pretty metal.

Malcolm Gladwell: Did you catch that? Pat Boone, pretty metal.

Malcolm Gladwell: My name is Malcolm Gladwell. You're listening to Revisionist History, my podcast about things overlooked and misunderstood. This episode is the official launch of my campaign to get Pat Boone into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. We're climbing aboard the Pat Boone train. Why? Because if there is ever a cultural figure who has been misunderstood and overlooked, who fits the literal definition of the Revisionist History mandate, it is Pat Boone.

Malcolm Gladwell: You think I'm joking. I'm so not joking. What follows is an argument in two parts. Part one, Pat Boone, no longer Mr. Nice Guy. Part two, Taco Bell.

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