Johann Sebastian Bach: The Bar-Brawling, Substance-Abusing, Genius Godfather Of Heavy Metal

Long before the advent of free love and LSD in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, before the rise of the Beat Generation and the hectic lifestyles of icons like The Doors, The Rolling Stones, and Hunter S. Thompson, there were pioneering artists who laid the way for all the loose units, wasted rockstars, and creative booze fiends of the future.
One such epic figure is Johann Sebastian Bach, a man whose musical style was considered “old-school” by his contemporaries, yet who was so far ahead of his era that he was appealing to death metal fans who were centuries away from even being born. While Bach predated Elvis Presley by a couple of centuries and some change, the pair were both responsible for shaking up the music scene of their time, paving the way for new genres and new forms of artistic expression.
The genius of Johann Sebastian Bach
Before we get into Bach’s rockstar lifestyle, it’s important to establish just how much of a musical badass this guy was. There’s not a classical music lover in the world who wouldn’t count Bach among their most influential composers. He may not be everyone’s favourite, but there’s something within the intricate complexity of his compositions that grasps your brain and shakes it into a state of transcendent awe. His music is like braille for your ears, allowing you to experience what it feels like to flow along the neural pathways that populate the mind of a genius. As BBC radio host Clemency Burton-Hill so succinctly put it, “he is the ultimate composer. Trying to explain why is a fool’s game: It’s like the famous quote attributed to several that ‘writing about music is like dancing about architecture.’”
In a sense, Burton-Hill is right. However, there are still many words that can be said about Bach and his music. If you’ve never taken the time to immerse yourself in the works of his catalog, you are missing out on the aural equivalent of a dose of California Sunshine. Bach conductor, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, describes the great composer’s music as “another world we enter, as performers or listeners. You put your mask on, and you go down to a psychedelic world of myriad colours.”
Bach: heavenly music from a devilish soul
Another unique facet of Bach’s music is the fact that so much of it was directed towards Christianity. While this may seem like something that would narrow his audience to other God-fearing folks, Bach and his music are both far too complex to be pigeon-holed like that. Over the years, fans and biographers have done their best to sanitize the affairs of his private life and preserve the sanctity of his heavenly music. However, the truth is far more interesting. Though his soundscapes truly do feel like they’re lifting something that might well be your soul up out of your body and into a higher realm, the man responsible for them was far from saintly.
For so long, Bach was depicted as a genius, but a painfully dull one who spent every spare minute studying, composing music, and always doing what Jesus would do. Delving into his school records, court records, correspondences, and other archival sources, however, revealed to Sir John Eliot Gardiner (whom we met two paragraphs ago) an entirely different picture. Among other things, Bach was accused of (and quite likely the victim of) gang warfare, bullying, sadism, and sodomy. And that was just while he was in school.
As the years went on, B-dog developed a heavy drinking habit, which he seasoned generously with bouts of vandalism and wild, debaucherous sexual exploits. He loved nothing more than getting wasted and then challenging his companions to drunken duals, brandishing his sword with the awkward, wonk-eyed grace only a seasoned alcoholic is capable of. As a God-fearing young drunkard, Bach was known for threatening all who failed to acquiesce to his demands with “eternal damnation.” Whether he said such things in seriousness or in jest is a crucial shade of context that has, sadly, been lost to the vagueries of history.
From this hectic and riotous rockstar foundation, Bach did indeed develop himself into the studious and masterfully talented organist and composer his more sedate fans prefer to remember him as. However, that genius he possessed was indelibly connected to the violence and rashness of his personality. While it had the power to inspire transcendental orchestral creations, it had a shadow side; one that fostered in him a penchant for all things dark and dangerous.
The ongoing influence of Bach, the timeless rockstar
Something about Bach’s nature makes his specific brand of genius accessible to musicians of the modern era. It’s worth saying again: the man was remarkably ahead of his time. Because of this, he continues to inspire modern artists. You will find Bach brilliantly replicated by speed metal and death metal musicians. In fact, the man has been so influential within these and related genres that he’s been described as “the godfather of heavy metal.” Indeed, if you listen to the metal version of the Toccata and Fugue in D minor below immediately after listening to the original version above, you may even come to the conclusion that Bach’s organ piece is the heavier and darker of the two.
You’ll also regularly hear rockstars like Suzi Quatro singing his praises. In an interview with The Guardian, she explained, “I love Bach in particular for his use of two-part melodies and his way of repeating phrases and modulating so cleverly into related keys and tones.”
For musicians and music-lovers alike, a trip into Bach’s sonic wonderland is an essential outing, one that’s about as close as you’ll ever get to the soma holidays of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. Get set for an experience that, like its creator, is as devilish as it is angelic, as dark as it is light, and as psychedelic as it is sedate. Perhaps this is only to be expected when you draw your inspiration from a deep well of grief. Bach transformed the pain of his orphaned childhood, the loss of 11 of his kids, the death of his wife, and every other extremity in his life into sonic beauty. While his passage out of this dark place led him through years of secret sex with groupies in the church’s organ loft, drunken duels, and violence, it also shaped him into a creative genius who, centuries later, continues to inspire new musical generations.