posted April 28, 2014 12:12 AM            

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No matter how dark or intimidating someone may seem, he’s bound to have a soft side. Like, a really soft side — one that meows, purrs and takes naps in the sun.

“Metal Cats,” a new photography book by Alexandra Crockett, definitely shows that heavy-metal musicians across the land are crazy about their cats. When they aren’t unleashing sonic mayhem in bands with names like Cattle Decapitation, Wizards of Wor and The Cauterized, many metalheads are snuggling felines with names like Nico, Princess and Mr. Whiskers.

“I knew a lot of my guy friends in metal bands had cats, but I didn’t realize they were more ‘crazy cat ladies’ than I am myself,” Crockett, 30, said of “Metal Cats,” which is already gaining a cult following ahead of its May 6 release date.

“For this project, they didn’t care so much about publicity for their bands. They were way more excited for people to see their cats. It’s super cute!”

Crockett, a musician and a staunch metalhead herself since age 14, has her theories about why thrashers and tabbies tend to be so tight.

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In that sense, she has a lot in common with a number of high-profile heavy-metal musicians who routinely rouse their fan bases to help — you guessed it — cats. It turns out that in addition to being cat cuddlers, some rockers are also hard-core animal activists:

Greg Ginn of Black Flag has run an in-home cat rescue;
Donald Tardy of the band Obituary helps hundreds of feral cats in Florida through an effort known as “Metal Meowlisha”;
The Canadian metal band 3 Inches of Blood recorded a jingle for the pet store Long Live Cats and Dogs;
Metal bands Evoken and Wilt have put on cat-benefit concerts;
The nonprofit Neüterhead: Ace of Spays uses metal music to raise money for pet-rescue groups' spaying and neutering costs.

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I love that name Metal Meowlisha (from Metal Militia, I believe a "classic" of Metallica, and I'm sure I've seen stickers that said that), and thus why I named this thread after it.

I know it's not just cats, I vaguely recall one metal musician (King Diamond) who plays up the Satanism angle and basically gave dire warnings to any thought of hurting his small pet dog to "send a message" to him saying it would be better for them to attack him directly instead. I barely recall what was said actually but it was clear he loved his dog with a passion.