Voices about KMänRiffs from the metal hordes

What would be a write-up about our island in twitterverse without some words from the metal hordes? When this article idea took shape, I thought it would be nice to also add different perspectives about K and our community, so I reached out to some of our friends, and quickly saw myself overwhelmed by the positive responses - Everyone was just happy to contribute!

After having originally asked for some quotes, I got back way more than I had expected, and would like to share the respective stories here in their entirety, as they give a wonderful impression about what this place can be when you use it the right way. Thanks to all who jumped on board for your input and support!

Welcome to take a look behind the scenes! And if you're new to the party, these fellow metalheads might be a good point to start with your journey into these wild fields :-)

About ten years ago, at the time I joined Twitter, one of my first welcoming acquaintances was KMan. I have had the privilege to call him my brother into metal ever since!

A circle of rock and metal maniacs was already forming. Throughout the past years that group developed into a community that continues to grow, where KMan quickly became the pillar and the main driving force!

Make no mistake, this larger by-the-day community would have not thrived as it did without KMan’s unconditional dedication to relentlessly promoting new music. Algorithms might work to a certain point, but having a truly reliable source of information and the ability to discuss it, is what gives KMan the upper hand. Brother K’s work is truly public service that clearly extends far beyond our community. Long live Rock'n Roll!

KMäNriffs, Master of Hype and Protector of the Realm, we salute you!

After creating my profile, I spent the first few months roaming the Twitter wasteland and not getting what the app was all about. I found the environment noisy at best and toxic at worst. Furthermore, music had also sadly started fading away from my life…till I found KMaN here and my entire perspective changed.

I still remember where I was when I first bumped into our Ozzie leader: at my gym in Genova with Spotify metal playlist in my earbuds. Years have gone by and I now proudly consider King K a friend and an eternal source of music joy. Forever grateful for the impact he’s had on the whole community here. Not only did I connect with a ton of great people from all over the world, but managed to get back in touch with old friends that I had not talked to in over 20 years. Long live KMaN & metaltwitter.

I first discovered metaltwitter in 2019 via KMan and Jack (darkirondwarf).

I’d been listening to various styles of Metal since my early teens and relied mainly on magazines to find new music. There aren’t really any mainstream outlets for Metal in the UK, so once I left school and started adulting, I was kind of on my own to find new music. Nobody I worked/socialised with listened to the same music as I did, so other than bands like Slipknot & Limp Bizkit who were riding high following a UK number 1 with Rollin’, nobody had any idea what metal really was. I’d been a lifelong collector of CD’s, but once I bit the bullet and joined a streaming service, my desire to buy physical media soon dried up. Once firmly nuzzled in the bosom of metal Twitter, my excitement for discovering new music was reignited. It wasn’t long before Full Force Friday became routine (and a household expression!). I’d try and get through as many KMan drops as possible before sleep took over. I was excited to discover bands I’d never heard of and most importantly, talk about them with like minded people from all over the world who share the same passion for music.

With a whole host of new bands to explore, the need to start collecting soon returned, first with vinyl and later tapes. Metal Twitter is a collectors wet dream, with photos of users new additions adorning the timeline for all to drool over.

It’s mostly thanks to KMan and his tireless efforts that I’m now more into the music I love than I ever have been. He is the centre of the Metal Twitter universe I’m proud to be a part of.

Not only is K viewed upon as the centre of metaltwitter, he is also a beacon of respect towards bands and fans. His genuine enthusiasm on the music is infectious, but I also really appreciate his passion when interacting with his followers. He is not doing his stuff to be the metalcircle's centre, but his care and passion put him there nonetheless. Combine this with the shear volume of his work that comes forth from the incredible effort and amount of hours he puts into his passion, and it's easy to see how he earns the respect he has.

Personally, I'm very lucky to have other highly respected sources for metal - the chief editors of Aardschok magazine - but because of the whole metaltwitter community that exists around K, the world of my favourite music has opened up in a way I couldn't have imagined before I joined.

It also brought me new friendships, which have extended from the online world into real life. How amazing is that?

Being a stranger in a strange new social network land is not always easy, unless, like myself, you are lucky enough to be greeted by the amazing and welcoming community that is metaltwitter!

Within a week I felt part of a living metal ecosystem, fully invested in discovering new music and connecting with some of the most passionate individuals I have ever had the pleasure of knowing. 

One such passionate individual is KManRiffs who feeds this crazy machine almost daily with new album release roundups, upcoming track highlights and a healthy dose of heavy metal history celebration.

Frankly, Kman’s passion was downright infectious, his reviews unhinged and one-liners hilarious, so of course one thing led to another and I now have a custom shirt of his logo that I proudly wear. “Have riffs, have metal”, you absolute legend!

The highest praise I can give KMänRiffs and the amazing metal community built around him is that despite how much worse the average user experience has become on Twitter over the last couple of years, it is still such a valuable platform to me. KMaN’s #FullForceFridays have totally transformed the way I listen to music. I had no real appreciation for just how much quality music was released every week, whereas nowadays I can’t wait to sift through the veritable deluge of releases to find my next obsession.

As far as the wider metaltwitter community is concerned, I love its warmth and positivity. The majority of people I’ve encountered love discovering & sharing new music with essentially no elitism - you can love whatever subgenre you like and people are just happy that you’re happy. It’s a rare corner of social media where positivity reigns and I find that not only refreshing, but necessary in a world that feels increasingly negative & polarised.

Somewhere around the late 00's I hit that period of my life where I became complacent in discovering new art. Sure I'd always check out new albums from existing favorites but discovering new bands or new genres, it had felt as though I was past my time for that. In 2018 I started interacting with some folks in what would be known as 'metaltwitter'. Many of whom shared my love for lesser known thrash artists or progressive power metal bands that eluded the average music fan I encountered offline. What really stood out to me though was how they were so attuned to new releases within these sub-genres and I began to re-open the book on new music and couldn't be happier for it.

There are dozens of wonderful people in this community who are engaging and sharing their love for favorites new and old, but the linchpin is K-Man. Our riff loving friend down under does yeoman's work tirelessly delivering us the goods on all things metal week after week. He's got a keen ear for the classics (one of only a handful Forbidden-Green fans I can count on), and has turned me onto scores of new music these past few years. For this I am grateful, I look forward to sharing a pint with him someday, but until then he is a mandatory follow for anyone interested in heavy music.

You could say I’m ‘old-school’. I was a teenager in the 80s. And ‘pre-Kman’, my listening habits were also pretty much stuck in the old-school. I liked the occasional newer band, but almost everything I listened to was stuff that came out pre-1991. Then I discovered Kman, around 4 years ago I think – and a whole new world opened up.

First, I realised not only how MUCH new stuff was being released every week, but also, how GREAT some of it was. Every week, BOOM! A bunch of new albums by bands I’d never even heard of. And among those, some absolute stone-cold gems that now count among my favorite ‘newer’ bands – Hellripper, Urne, Demiser, Enforced, Moonlight Sorcery, Necropanther, The Bleeding, Crisix, Sunczar … fuck, bands I didn’t even know EXISTED ‘pre-Kman’, let alone had ever listened to. The list is endless – and keeps on growing!

Secondly, and even more importantly, as a result of Kman’s Friday new releases efforts, I discovered and became a small part of the giant metaltwitter community. And THAT led me to discover podcasts run by guys who I now consider personal friends – in particular Tregenza, Ant & Bean of the In The Abyss podcast and Jimi, Dazz & Defa of the Bangers & Mosh podcast – not to mention the countless others (you know who you are!). This is not the place to go all deep and meaningful, but making those friends, at that particularly difficult time in my life… well, it might just have saved my life.

And finally – I have to mention Kman’s awesome support of my own band, Chupacabra. We released our debut EP last year and Kman couldn’t have been more supportive, both in the months leading up to the release, and by featuring it high up in that week’s Full Force Friday. We got more traction for that little self-release than I ever thought would happen – and a large part of that was thanks directly and indirectly to Kman.

For that alone, I’m forever grateful – and I know he’ll be just as supportive next time around. If we ever get off our asses and finish off the tunes, that is! Cheers Kman!

Kman is the glue that holds all arms of metal Twitter together. Everyone looks at his vast content no matter which genre they’re into, and is able to come away with something … be it new releases, nostalgic releases, riffs. There’s ideas or snippets from tracks that gel with someone which makes it all worth it for him. He’s all about enhancing the metal experience.

I’ve been a follower of his for a loooong time and the music he has introduced me to over this period is worthy of a collection all its own. I live in Oz as well and I’d really love to catch up with him one day for a beer.

Without KMAN, I wouldn't be so active on Twitter/X today. I've always been very wary of social networks, only using Twitter for my work as a sports journalist. But that's how I discovered KMAN. Someone to keep me up to date with ALL the new releases: exactly what I've been dreaming of for the 30 years I've been a Metal fan. Everything the French press doesn't do any more, preferring to concentrate on headliners rather than the underground.

From now on, the highlight of my week is Friday, with its 'Full Force Friday' release feed. I've lost count of the number of bands and records I've discovered thanks to it. And, just as importantly, KMAN has enabled me to meet and chat with Metal fans from all over the world and to become part of the great Metal Twitter community.

Who, or what, is Kman?

I'm sure there are many who have pondered this. In short, the man is a beast, a preacher, an oracle of all unfolding within the world of Metal. His words, output, and constant stream of knowledge stretch the limits of what many think possible. Seriously, does he ever sleep? And if he does, is he willing to share 'whatever' he might be abusing in order to quell the appetites of the surrounding metal hungry hordes?

The Kman(riffs) weekly roundup (new release) report opens the collective eyes and minds of eager fans from one corner of the globe to the other. But that's not all, far from it in fact, he also manages to promote upcoming releases, churn out commentary on a wide variety of acts, citing specific auditory examples, which have helped shape the many-fractured and constantly shifting genre boundaries we all marvel upon and question on a frequent basis. Kman  even formulates a weekly best of mention (Fire in the Hole) and if that's not enough (for surely it's close?) a years end best of list which spans a dizzying variety of genres.

In short, Kman's dedication to the scene is unwavering, the impact his words have are colossal, and the coverage he delivers far surpasses that which any solitary person has any business delivering. Which brings me back to my original query. Is Kman a machine, a head banging robot with a binary code around generosity, or a time-traveling organism with a seemingly singular objective in mind? I honestly don't believe this question be answered. And not surprisingly, I'm not in the least bit bothered. I'm hugely appreciative, for he's opened my mind to a great many acts which I might not have discovered left to my own devices and has offered more to the collective metal scene than a handful of the better known mags ever have (don't even get me started on Metal Hammer or Kerrang).

Not much is known about the somewhat elusive Man of K. Rumor has it that he resides somewhere Down Under (and by that I mean the land of Oz) surrounded by a computer setup of a towering stature to put the technological array of many a major criminal investigating organization to shame.

Another tale tells of a scampering legion of fuzzy denizens, a multitude of cutesy pouch wielding, crust-loving critters, who scour the globe for breadcrumbs, information spread among a select few, for reporting back to KMan HQ.

There exists, not surprisingly, a wide variety of tall tales, conspiracies and conjecture upon the origins of the one many are referring to as the 'Messiah of Metal'. I have my own theories, but I'll keep them to myself. For now.

I'm proud to report that I've been a follower of KMan since before his (twitter) 'headcount' pushed the seating capacity limits of a large stadium. And I'm happy to state that I'll remain such until the world implodes, explodes, or in the event the wife deems it necessary to "pull the plug".

I was stuck in a rut right around Covid, listening to the same music over and over. Then I stumbled across metaltwitter through a mutual friend and found Kman, who opened my eyes to the amount of releases that are coming out. He not only inspired me to get back into extreme music, but also to venture into some stuff that I hadn't found before, and to even start my own series called "The Index of RiffFraction" (I'm an optometrist - and refraction is the "1 or 2" test lol).

At the end of the day, it's not just about the music but the community. Kman always comments, shares and interacts even though this undertaking is something that must be all consuming.  I have met so many awesome people through his work and even had the opportunities to go to shows and meet them in 'real' life.

On top of that, we have very similar tastes, and sometimes a tag that pops up with something new, or a chat about an album / song just makes my day!

I proudly rock my Kmanriffs merch to share the gospel of Metal!

I joined Twitter (now X) in 2017 strictly as a way to meet other lovers of heavy music and to discover new artists. I clearly remember seeing these tweets to the “DETH DEKK DOMINIONS” announcing new metal releases by this guy called KManriffs - I thought “what is this!?” I quickly realized this signaled “Full Force Friday” or “FFF” as it is better known. This turned out to be KMan’s flagship content, and it has only gotten bigger and better over time. I believe KMan had around 4,500 followers when I began following - and at now over 19,000, what an amazing ride it has been. . . .

I have uncovered so many great bands and people by being a follower. In a typical day, I interact with KMan in Australia while tweeting with others in France, Italy, New Zealand, Germany, and also In the states like CA and NY. All incredible and knowledgeable metalheads that I met though this network KMan has created with tireless effort and dedication to the music we love . . . .

What keeps new followers coming to KMan’s circle? Besides being one of the nicest, kindest and humble people you would ever want to meet - he is so good at interacting with his audience - KMan never stops creating new content for his followers. In addition to his FFF releases that come out like clockwork every Friday (Thursday night here in the States), K has developed several focused campaigns or themes over the years: (In no particular order) From The Vault, Riffs of Metal History, Fire In The Hole Album of the Week, Gigs of Metal, Songs of Badassery (haha - I loved that one!), Mountain Kings, Disciples of the Watch . . . . . . It goes on and on - the man is relentless in his push to tell others about the music he loves. It is no wonder he has been so successful at growing his legion of followers - KMan has earned it!

I’ll close with this (as KMan says each Friday): “For the Walls of Deth! Into the pit, Have Riffs, Have Metal!”

KMan was part of my first searches into metaltwitter when I wanted to have a fresh twitter account about music. I was coming out of a long period of being a prog-rock head, and I was finally admitting that I was bored with it and all the 'rock' projects of these aging artists. I had rooted out all the good I could find in that genre, from the mainstream to the underground. I came from an indie/underground metal background in the 80s, and when I saw all this new metal being touted as amazing, I started to dig in.

Kman became a kind of default feed as he was listing out everything week to week by type with links. Through his feed, I found myself with actual new music by amazing bands I'd never heard of. Each week I dug in deeper and found a lot of what I used to like about heavy music - great community (at least in this little corner of twitter) - great recommends and great individuals to chat and work with. I support KMan with cash on his Ko-Fi and Todd at Ripple through his bandcamp to let them know what it means to me to find such community in a truly golden age of heavy and extreme music. Kman does A LOT of the tedious work to promote bands week to week and deserves the props he gets for it.

I joined Twitter in August 2017 and very quickly connected with Prog and Metal music fans. Among those fans was Kmän, who shared every week the Metal releases with very well marketed and readable tweets. The amount of work already at that time was huge and immediately impressed me, and also the diversity of styles included, covering all Metal with extents to Prog and Melodic Rock.

I quickly started to diversify my Metal knowledge and discovered thxs to him tons and tons of new bands. When I contacted this very open minded dude, we chatted and I asked him if he had some overviews per year of the best Metal albums, and he shared with me some amazing collages. I realised that this dude had an encyclopedic knowledge and since then I never missed any FFF! He grew as a Metal god in the twittosphere, but remains for me way underrated, and also the huge work he does is very much underestimated as he should have hundred thousands of followers by now!

Kman is an amazing guy who supports the Metal scene every day. I still remember when I talked to him for the first time after the release of our first album. Since then, he has always helped the band by reviewing our albums and making cool interviews. Without his promotion we would be even more underground.

I have a curious story with him. When we released our second album, The Negationist, he bought some vinyls and t-shirts. I prepared the package, went to the post office, and surprise! Shipping to Australia was forbidden due to the covid restrictions... It lasted almost a year!