''No Clean Singing'' is an American heavy metal news and media website based in

Seattle Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...

. The website primarily covers extreme music, and "bands with vocalists who exclusively scream, growl, or otherwise avoid melodic, 'traditional' singing". Islander is the site's owner. ''No Clean Singing'' features news, album reviews, interviews, and event calendars. Unlike most heavy metal websites, it does not publish negative reviews. Islander has said that when he launched the website, he vowed that he would "write about music I liked and wanted to recommend, rather than pretend to be some kind of critic .. ndto support music I enjoyed rather than tell people what they shouldn't listen to or make fun of bands."

History

''No Clean Singing'' was founded in November 2009 by Islander, Alexis, and IntoTheDarkness. The site was named in reference to Islander's dislike of Myke Terry, then-vocalist of

Bury Your Dead Bury Your Dead is an American metalcore band from Boston, Massachusetts, formed in 2001. The current lineup is guitarist Chris Towning, lead vocalist Mat Bruso, drummer Mark Castillo, and bassist Aaron Patrick. To date, they have had eight relea ...

, feeling his use of clean vocals (in contrast to previous vocalist Mat Bruso) was part of "an awful trend". By 2012, the site had regular writers based in three US cities, and some based in Japan and the United Kingdom. In a May 2016 interview, Islander reported that ''No Clean Singing'' had received 1.1 million

page views In web analytics and website management, a pageview or page view, abbreviated in business to PV and occasionally called page impression, is a request to load a single HTML file (web page) of an Internet site. On the World Wide Web, a page reques ...

and about 260,000 users in the previous six months, with 40% of its internet traffic coming from the United States. At that point, the site's most popular post was their 2014 review of

Babymetal (stylized in all caps as BABYMETAL) is a Japanese kawaii metal band consisting of Suzuka Nakamoto as "Su-metal", Moa Kikuchi as "Moametal" and Momoko Okazaki as "Momometal". The band is produced by Kobametal from the Amuse Inc., Amuse talent a ...

's 2014 debut album (21,000+ views), followed by a post about

Gojira is the original Japanese name for Godzilla, a giant monster at the center of a media franchise. It may also refer to: Films *Godzilla (franchise), ''Godzilla'' franchise, known as in Japan **Godzilla (1954 film), ''Godzilla'' (1954 film), relea ...

(20,000) and a review of

Devin Townsend Devin Garrett Townsend (born May 5, 1972) is a Canadian singer, guitarist, songwriter, and record producer. He founded extreme metal band Strapping Young Lad and was its primary songwriter, vocalist, and guitarist from 1994 to 2007. He has also ...

's ''

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'' (2011) by writer Andy Synn (16,000+). Although the site itself does not feature any advertising, Islander has had to pay to promote the site on

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; he has publicly criticized the platform's EdgeRank algorithm for limiting the site's (and other blogs) reach unless they paid for promotion. In 2017, ''No Clean Singing'' collaborated with ''

Invisible Oranges ''Invisible Oranges'' is an American online music magazine dedicated to heavy metal news, band interviews and album reviews. It was founded by Cosmo Lee in September 2006 shortly after emigrating from San Francisco, California, United States t ...

'' and Southwest Terrorfest to launch the Northwest Terrorfest. The website continues to sponsor the festival.{{Cite web , last=Diers , first=Kevin , date=April 18, 2023 , title=Northwest Terror Fest Returns for Three Days of Brutal Riffs , url=https://www.thestranger.com/spring-music-2023/2023/04/12/78945073/the-best-death-metal-fest-in-seattle , access-date=May 27, 2024 , website=The Stranger , language=en , archive-date=June 7, 2023 , archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230607095503/https://www.thestranger.com/spring-music-2023/2023/04/12/78945073/the-best-death-metal-fest-in-seattle , url-status=live

References

Heavy metal publications Publications established in 2009