Best and worst era of metal?

ze_mau wrote:

Vexer6 wrote:

ultmetal wrote:

Shawn Of Fire wrote:

Personally, I think Rage Against the Machine, Korn, Rammstein and Marylin Manson suck. And though I can respect the musicianship, I can't get into As I Lay Dying or Dillinger Escape Plan. I do like White Chapel, Meshuggah, Born Of Osiris and a little Winds Of Plague, though. I love Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, Opeth, & Death too.

The 80s had much better stuff than what you listed. Helstar, Watchtower, Metal Church, Accept, Agent Steel, Abbatoir, Trouble, Candlemass, Armored Saint, Chastain, Jag Panzer, Lizzy Borden, King Diamond, Mercyful Fate, Sanctuary, Riot, Slayer...many more. You just had to know where to look.

And Black Sabbath w/ Dio is some of the greatest Heavy Metal ever made.

What he said!

I personally enjoy Rage, Manson, Rammstein and Korn, Alice In Chains are OK but not great, not really a Soundgarden fan.

Who in the world would call all this "alternative nu crap" "METAL". this is everything Metal ISN´T. Grunge and Nu Metal are the extreme oposites of real metal.

No, it's metal. Whether or not you like it is irrelevant. I'm not big on nu metal, but it is a metal subgenre (a lazy tag, really) for obvious reasons.

I will defend grunge until the day I die. 'Grunge' is just another lazy tag which acted as an umbrella for a hundred different subgenres, MOST of which were metal. Soundgarden was metal. AiC was metal. Pearl Jam was hard rock. Nirvana was stoner rock. The Melvins, hell they were doom. These 'grunge' bands simply brought back the elements of 70's metal and rock that commercial metal was dismissing, and for that we should be tipping our hat. They were great bands and a great period for organic, sincere, no-frills rock n roll.

Let´s say the "organic , sincere" thing is OK , but Grunge is NOT Metal, by any means. Nu Metal the same.

Grunge basically killed real Metal in the USA in the 90´s. there are some few grunge songs I like you know. Nirvana and Soundgarden where OK, but they are not Metal not even in China.

Grunge was no more "organic" or "sincere" than any other form of music.

ze_mau wrote:

Let´s say the "organic ,  sincere" thing is OK , but Grunge is NOT Metal, by any means. Nu Metal the same.

Grunge basically killed real Metal in the USA in the 90´s. there are some few grunge songs I like you know. Nirvana and Soundgarden where OK, but they are not Metal not even in China.

Wait, so real metal was White Lion and Steelheart and Warrant and Firehouse and Poison?? I mean, I like those bands (save fore Poison) but I would never call them the epitome of heavy metal. Plus they killed themselves off. Grunge had little to do with it. Thrash was getting tired and a lot of those bands were adapting experimentation with groove. And grunge is technically metal when it has heavy guitars, rhythms, etc. It's not much different than what Sabbath and Zep were doing. You seriously wouldn't call this metal:



The generalization that grunge killed metal is a tired convention that has lost any validity in contemporary discourse.

Witchfinder wrote:

Grunge was no more "organic" or "sincere" than any other form of music.  

I'm just saying more so than the commercial rock acts which preceded it. Lyrical depth, naked sonics, unadulterated aesthetics...how could that be as organic and sincere as a Def Leppard album?

corplhicks wrote:

Witchfinder wrote:

Grunge was no more "organic" or "sincere" than any other form of music.  

I'm just saying more so than the commercial rock acts which preceded it. Lyrical depth, naked sonics, unadulterated aesthetics...how could that be as organic and sincere as a Def Leppard album?

Organic and sincere are meaningless terms when applied to music. If Def Leppard wanted to make albums like Adrenalize and sincerely chose that sound, how is that less valid than anything else? To say grunge is more valid is complete crap and assigns objective terms to a completely subjective realm. I reject this out of hand and it smacks of elitist hogwash. It represents conventional music journalist wisdom that assigns some type of worth based on grunge saving music from those heathens.

 

You CAN'T win an argument with a lawyer !

Witchfinder wrote:

corplhicks wrote:

Witchfinder wrote:

Grunge was no more "organic" or "sincere" than any other form of music.  

I'm just saying more so than the commercial rock acts which preceded it. Lyrical depth, naked sonics, unadulterated aesthetics...how could that be as organic and sincere as a Def Leppard album?

Organic and sincere are meaningless terms when applied to music.  If Def Leppard wanted to make albums like Adrenalize and sincerely chose that sound, how is that less valid than anything else?  To say grunge is more valid is complete crap and assigns objective terms to a completely subjective realm.  I reject this out of hand and it smacks of elitist hogwash.   It represents conventional music journalist wisdom that assigns some type of worth based on grunge saving music from those heathens.  

I don't understand. I'm just using semantics to describe the sound of an era of music. Sincere=lack of pretense and organic=lack of artifice. I enjoy many a pop metal band, and have no problem with them even if they sound artificial or pretentious. Hell, Steelheart is my favorite of the last men standing. The musical direction leading into the 90's, on a commercial level, was the issue. Grunge brought back a much more raw period of sonic delight for me. It's greatly misunderstood and deserves more appreciation. That's all.

corplhicks wrote:

No, it's metal. Whether or not you like it is irrelevant. I'm not big on nu metal, but it is a metal subgenre (a lazy tag, really) for obvious reasons.

Actually, it's not. A case could be made for some of the late '80s/early '90s alt-metal groups that inspired nu metal (Faith No More, King's X, Ailce in Chains, Soundgarden, Life of Agony, Helmet , White Zombie, The Melvins, Mr. Bungle and a few others), I can't think of any of the later alternative or nu metal bands that actually played metal.

corplhicks wrote:

I will defend grunge until the day I die. 'Grunge' is just another lazy tag which acted as an umbrella for a hundred different subgenres, MOST of which were metal. Soundgarden was metal. AiC was metal. Pearl Jam was hard rock.

I'm not really and expert on grunge, but I could only name three metal bands from the grunge scene (Alice in Chains, Soundgarden and The Melvins).

corplhicks wrote:

Nirvana was stoner rock.

What?  

corplhicks wrote:

These 'grunge' bands simply brought back the elements of 70's metal and rock that commercial metal was dismissing, and for that we should be tipping our hat.

*cough*
Great White
Kingdom Come
Tesla
Badlands
Blue Murder
Bonham
Whitesnake
Kix
Bulletboys
Roxy Blue
Krokus
Cinderella
Britny Fox
Rhino Bucket
Johnny Crash
Enuff Z'Nuff
Guns 'n' Roses
Extreme
*cough*

Yeah, so dismissive of the '70s bands. Not a single band influenced by Led Zeppelin, AC/DC or Van Halen there.  

Mglaffas81 wrote:

I like how this guy, for some reason, chose to overlook the entire NWOBHM and Thrash movements.

Also notice that he didn't stick around the thread to defend his nonsense. Something fishy about him if you ask me.

corplhicks wrote:

Witchfinder wrote:

corplhicks wrote:

Witchfinder wrote:

Grunge was no more "organic" or "sincere" than any other form of music.  

I'm just saying more so than the commercial rock acts which preceded it. Lyrical depth, naked sonics, unadulterated aesthetics...how could that be as organic and sincere as a Def Leppard album?

Organic and sincere are meaningless terms when applied to music.  If Def Leppard wanted to make albums like Adrenalize and sincerely chose that sound, how is that less valid than anything else?  To say grunge is more valid is complete crap and assigns objective terms to a completely subjective realm.  I reject this out of hand and it smacks of elitist hogwash.   It represents conventional music journalist wisdom that assigns some type of worth based on grunge saving music from those heathens.  

I don't understand. I'm just using semantics to describe the sound of an era of music. Sincere=lack of pretense and organic=lack of artifice. I enjoy many a pop metal band, and have no problem with them even if they sound artificial or pretentious. Hell, Steelheart is my favorite of the last men standing. The musical direction leading into the 90's, on a commercial level, was the issue. Grunge brought back a much more raw period of sonic delight for me. It's greatly misunderstood and deserves more appreciation. That's all.

Sorry. It's a pet peeve of mine that some people seem to think that grunge saved rock n roll. That's a load of crap. I know that you listen to all sorts of music and enjoy a wide variety of material. I just personally cannot stand some people that argue that grunge is inherently more valuable than hair metal because of "authenticity." Grunge was no more or less authentic than any other form of music.

I also don't think grunge is actually Heavy Metal. I think this because it rejects the central ethos of Metal. I also don't think Nu Metal is actually Metal, but rather a combination of the angst of grunge with hip-hop - with a terrible snare sound. Ah well, it doesn't really matter anyway. People like what they like, end of story.

If anything, grunge ruined rock music. It was the last good thing in mainstream rock music, but basically everything it influenced was crap.

What is the "central ethos of metal" btw?


P.S.
Why do people feel the need to capitalize genres?   

TheGreatDuck wrote:

If anything, grunge ruined rock music. It was the last good thing in mainstream rock music, but basically everything it influenced was crap.

What is the "central ethos of metal" btw?


P.S.
Why do people feel the need to capitalize genres?   

Not sure, sometimes it just feels right sometimes it don't. If you were to look at all my posts about genres, I'm not consistent with capitalizing or not.

TheGreatDuck wrote:

If anything, grunge ruined rock music. It was the last good thing in mainstream rock music, but basically everything it influenced was crap.

What is the "central ethos of metal" btw?


P.S.
Why do people feel the need to capitalize genres?   

I capitalize genres to indicate I am talking about a type of music rather than a generic thing.

In my opinion, Metal is essentially masculine and concerned with traditional masculine fare - achievement, sexual prowess, technical ability, combat, battle, etc... It's also generally individualistic and usually positive in nature. Grunge was introspective and not concerned with these matters and thus is certainly loud, and has guitars, but doesn't really "fee" like Metal. Deena Weinstein has written extensively about this from a sociological perspective and I agree with much of what she has to say on the subject.

I would most definitely not call Soundgarden or AIC metal in any way.

I usually don't get involved in these discussions, but I do not know how you cannot consider this metal:



That's a kick ass metal riff with an awesome solo!
... and some nice harmonies as well.

Witchfinder wrote:

corplhicks wrote:

Witchfinder wrote:

corplhicks wrote:

Witchfinder wrote:

Grunge was no more "organic" or "sincere" than any other form of music.  

I'm just saying more so than the commercial rock acts which preceded it. Lyrical depth, naked sonics, unadulterated aesthetics...how could that be as organic and sincere as a Def Leppard album?

Organic and sincere are meaningless terms when applied to music.  If Def Leppard wanted to make albums like Adrenalize and sincerely chose that sound, how is that less valid than anything else?  To say grunge is more valid is complete crap and assigns objective terms to a completely subjective realm.  I reject this out of hand and it smacks of elitist hogwash.   It represents conventional music journalist wisdom that assigns some type of worth based on grunge saving music from those heathens.  

I don't understand. I'm just using semantics to describe the sound of an era of music. Sincere=lack of pretense and organic=lack of artifice. I enjoy many a pop metal band, and have no problem with them even if they sound artificial or pretentious. Hell, Steelheart is my favorite of the last men standing. The musical direction leading into the 90's, on a commercial level, was the issue. Grunge brought back a much more raw period of sonic delight for me. It's greatly misunderstood and deserves more appreciation. That's all.

Sorry.  It's a pet peeve of mine that some people seem to think that grunge saved rock n roll.  That's a load of crap.  I know that you listen to all sorts of music and enjoy a wide variety of material.  I just personally cannot stand some people that argue that grunge is inherently more valuable than hair metal because of "authenticity."  Grunge was no more or less authentic than any other form of music.

I also don't think grunge is actually Heavy Metal.  I think this because it rejects the central ethos of Metal.  I also don't think Nu Metal is actually Metal, but rather a combination of the angst of grunge with hip-hop - with a terrible snare sound.  Ah well, it doesn't really matter anyway.  People like what they like, end of story.

No worries   . I honestly can understand the pet peeve because I agree, grunge was never the savior of rock music in general--IMO grunge never killed pop metal but pop metal was already a dying breed--but to me it was simply a refreshing alternative to a relatively stale radio market. Pop metal was great stuff, but thanks to the labels' indulgence and MTV we were getting slammed with a lot of style over substance in the later years. It's fun stuff until it starts choking the pipes like a candy binge. For the record, grunge became increasingly stale as well.

In the end, each subgenre is valuable in its own right, just as photoshopped, glamorized photography can be just as enjoyable as avant garde, introspective photography. Or big budget blockbusters and independent film. Or Snickers and Clif Bars. Etc.

Vexer6 wrote:

I would most definitely not call Soundgarden or AIC metal in any way.

^^what chewie said.

And the video I posted. How are these different from all the doom, retro, stoner, and sludge bands we have scattered around here?

AIC's "Facelift" and "Dirt" albums sound pretty damn metal to me. ..and Soundgarden's "Badmotorfinger" too

Just sayin.'

More AIC metal:

How can you deny this killer riff!



More killer metal guitar riffs.


and to go off on another tangent, imho Jerry Cantrell is a much better guitarist than Zakk Wylde!

Yeah Facelift and Dirt are definitely metal albums. And very good ones,at that.

And let's not forget Tad:



And Mother Love Bone, the precursor to Pearl Jam:

My Sister's Machine:

Best was the 80's
Worst was when MTV quit playing hair metal and traded it for Nirvana. THAT was the day the music died for me.

For me, late 90's was pretty great:

My Arms Your Hearse (Opeth) 1998

Biomech (Ocean Machine/Devin Townsend) 1997

Projector (Dark Tranquility) 1999

Colony (In Flames) 1999