f MMS at ten: Achievements, aspirations and challenges on the horizon

This editorial reflects on the achievements, challenges and future aspirations of Metal Music Studies (MMS) as it marks a decade of the journal’s contributions to the field. Over the past five years, MMS has significantly expanded its scholarly reach, evidenced by a 25 per cent increase in institutional subscriptions and a tripling of citations. The journal has achieved recognition through indexing in Scopus and the Web of Science, placing it in the top quartile for music studies. Alongside these successes, the outgoing editorial board reflects on emerging challenges, including the risk of academic normalcy and the need to maintain the transgressive ethos of metal studies. The authors also advocate for broadening the scope of metal music research through ‘extremity studies’, which apply metal-derived theoretical frameworks to wider social phenomena.