Freaky Furry Music – from the punk, goth and industrial underground.
by Patch O'Furr
“What Is Furry Music?” It’s a topic that Rakuen Growlithe started on Flayrah. It can be music with furry themes, or music made by (or even popular with) furries, or both.
Rakuen dismissed much of the latter kind for not being furry enough. I don’t think that’s quite fair. Consider overlap with rave scenes and gaming. Music related to those things can carry furry culture or spirit without animal themes built in. Music has context – it even matters where you go for it (yay for dive bars!) Some classic electronic/rave music was made with animal sounds for their musical tones. Doesn’t that bring out a little furry spirit?
I’d love to get into this and get responses from Furry music makers about how they personally define it. This gets very much into “personal taste”, but that’s the fun of it. Just like tasting different foods, it’s hard to say anything is right or wrong.
Arts, music, furry, and other subcultures have many overlaps. A while back I covered the super incongruous overlap of furries and industrial music. (Part 1, part 2, part 3.) I liked contrasting the extremes of cold, robotic and aggressive vs. warm, fuzzy and cute themes. You could do this for many genres. How about heavy metal? It’s often associated with Wolves.
Here’s some personal favorite stuff that came out of 1970’s/80’s classic punk and goth.
I Wish I Woz a Dog, by Alien Sex Fiend. (It’s easy, be a furry.)
This is like the anthem for an underground sewer club full of feral furry rats and stray mutts. In the beginning of the song they’re banging on a real trash can. Then it revs up like a washing machine full of spikes. The drum machine and no bass/guitar-only sound makes exciting rawness.