Found this Simon Reynolds piece from way back when very interesting. (Despite being particularly unfamiliar with Sunn)
Followed that to this interesting essay (which I find apt, since most dubstep strikes me as dreadfully dull but I like what I’ve heard of Burial).
Yes, the conversation is a few years old, but the popularity of a few metal bands with the indie music nerd mainstream (and the general angst that produces in “metalheads”) is an ongoing phenomenon.
As an aside, describing metal lyrics as “intelligent” or, as a lesser prize, “more intelligent than pop music” is laughable and really, really beyond the point. You’re talking about a genre that encompasses both Municipal Waste and all those guys in clownpaint who got raped by the Swedish welfare state.
Intelligence is an ancillary issue at best.
here there be rodents 
Metal is for kids that are too white for gangster rap but still like wearing white trainers and bandannas.
i thought that was icp?
lyrics aren’t “intelligent”. it’s missing the entire point of lyrics and of music. done well or poorly, sure, but what the hell is an intelligent lyric? (they probably live next to the intelligent dance music.)