 The NWOBHM involved both musicians and fans who were largely young , male and white and shared class origin , ethic and aesthetic values . American sociologist Deena Weinstein , in her book Heavy Metal : The Music and Its Culture , describes the rise and growth of the movement as the achievement of maturity for heavy metal , after its birth in the early 1970s and before branching out into various subgenres in the following years . British heavy metal fans , commonly known as <unk> , metalheads or headbangers for the violent , rhythmic shaking of their heads in time to the music , dismissed the simplistic image of rebellious youth inherited from the counterculture of the 1960s and the psychedelic attachments characteristic of heavy rock in the 1970s , updating the shared principles and codes of the heavy metal subculture and definitely separating it from mainstream society . 
