“My Musical Armor”: Exploring Metalhead Identity through the Battle Jacket

This paper offers the first detailed exploration of key functions and meanings battle jackets—sleeveless denim jackets customized with band patches—for heavy metal fans. Drawing upon a dataset 50 collected from Instagram Reddit, coupled evidence questionnaires comment threads, it identifies three aspects of battle (sense community, pursuit selfhood, codes civility/authenticity) that turn into cultural biography is central to person’s sense identity web memories. It argues should be reconsidered as sophisticated multifaceted artefacts have range important sociocultural embedded in a rich history.