HAVE WE HEARD IT ALL

Well, I disagree about Grin, I love that album.

Voivod is one of those bands from the 80s that still sounds just as fresh and interesting to me now as they did when I first heard them in 1986. That is a rarity for me these days. My favorite era is Dimension Hatross thru The Outer Limits, though I do like other albums before and after those.

But can't you see that the metal community embraced their changing weirdness? (That's also my favorite era BTW but their new disc is great).

Temple of Blood wrote:

But can't you see that the metal community embraced their changing weirdness?  (That's also my favorite era BTW but their new disc is great).

Yes, but they were pretty odd to begin with, so I think people that drank the kool-aid early on didn't have massive issues as they developed later.

I do remember some backlash to Angel Rat which was more polished and slightly more mainstream.

Well, there is a different backlash for blatant attempts to go mainstream than for bands who don't religiously follow metal's rules.

There is tons of diversity and innovation in metal, absolutely tons. Not everybody likes it or is even willing to give it a chance but it's there.

There are also bands out there giving the fans exactly what they want, I approach both in the same way, if I like it, I like it.

Temple of Blood wrote:

Well, there is a different backlash for blatant attempts to go mainstream than for bands who don't religiously follow metal's rules.

I don't think that album was a blatant attempt to go mainstream (Voivod ever being mainstream is kind of funny to think about), the difference was they hired Rush producer Terry Brown who gave them a much improved production and a bit more glossy sound.

Witchfinder wrote:

S.D. wrote:

Witchfinder wrote:

Why would anyone think metal fans are more closed-minded than fans of any other genre of music?

Pardon me, I should have said "a sadly large percentage of the fanbase".  Not everyone of course.  In fact, this particular board is MUCH more diverse and accepting than a lot of other places I've encountered over the years.

I said nothing about metal being more or less closed-minded than other genres of music, that was your addition.  

Can you give me some examples of metal bands that did this and their respective albums that were rejected?  Would Turbo or Diabolus In Musica count, or are those merely albums that reflected a shift to a then more current, popular sound?  Is Painkiller adventurous or a disingenuous aping of more current bands?  How about Motley Crue, Generation Swine, Load, St. Anger, Cryptic Writings, or Risk?  I would assume Coroner's Grin would be on this list, although was that rejected because of content or timing or something entirely different like poor distribution?  

Is this really a question of fans being close-minded, or fans not agreeing with your particular tastes?  

For instance, as you have stated on multiple occasions, you don't like Pantera.  They were certainly a band that stretched boundaries and innovated within metal.  Does your not liking them make you closed minded or do they just not appeal to your particular tastes?

Is innovation a necessary component of musical enjoyment?  

I'm with Ult on Pantera, liked their early stuff but didn't care much for anything past Cowboys.

Witchfinder wrote:

He probably considers me an annoying jerk.

Not at all, I enjoy our conversations. We also have more in common than just Orange Goblin.

S.D. wrote:

But I think if you're listening to stuff like Devin Townsend you're probably already a little more accepting than your average "YO! SLAYER! METALLICA! MEGADETH! DUUUUUUUUUUDE!" kind of fan.

This may just be my mileage on this subject, but I don't really think we have any of those "YO! SLAYER!...etc." fans on the board and I don't know that I've ever met any "metal fan" who was like that. Most music fans who centered on metal were pretty open to hearing new stuff (the attitude seemed to be "more's the merrier" if there's more good music to be found) and the ones who weren't could politely be called "casual" fans at best.

Vexer6 wrote:

I meant evolved more in terms of technology used, nevertheless not everything coming out is a sequel/reboot/remake, and it's not like that's a new trend anyways, sequels and remakes have been around for decades and obviously they're not going to go away anytime soon, so there's really no use complaining about it IMO, and personally I like a lot of remakes/sequels/reboots so I really don't have a problem with them existing at all.

There are probably people more entrenched in both the film and music industries who could call b.s. on me for this, but I don't think music has been any more stagnant technologically than film in the 21st century. Unfortunately, and this is where I earn my Luddite street cred, I think technology has made both music and movies and their creators a lot more uninteresting and lazy. In film, something that SHOULD be awesome - i.e. Computer Graphics - has led to absolute shite visuals, terrible creature and character design, and corner-cutting that you NEVER would have seen in even the shoddiest movie that incorporated practical effects. I direct your attention to movies like I am Legend, where not even an actor like Will Smith could save it.

In the case of music, we have TONS of technology with digital even getting to the point where most audiophiles would probably have to concede that, as far as audio resolution is concerned, digital has beaten analog. We can pitch correct, synthesize in ways that were completely unthinkable 20 or 30 years ago, and correct all manner of performance mistakes after the fact. Unfortunately... we can correct all manner of performance mistakes after the fact. The technology is certainly not encouraging bands to play well together or players to excel in their craft because, shit, we can just fix it in the mix. Literally. Like, you could have farted audibly for three seconds and we have a program that'd make it sound like a clarinet solo played by a master.

That's broad strokes, but I don't think a lack of technical advancement could even be claimed with music regardless of what you think of the tech we have and how it's used.

S.D. wrote:

Witchfinder wrote:

He probably considers me an annoying jerk.

Not at all, I enjoy our conversations.  We also have more in common than just Orange Goblin.  

No there is still a lot of room for new and unique stuff in metal.

I do see what you mean by asking though. Most newer albums from newer bands sound like rehashed shit already done prior. It frustrates me too, but I know for a fact there is a lot of undiscovered territory.

I think bands have to be careful when looking for that undiscovered territory, though, for fear of becoming weird for weird's sake and no longer musical.

I think you're dead wrong about CGI, IMO it's lead to some absolutely breathtaking visuals that would otherwise be impossible to achieve with practical effects, and i've seen plenty of films that use only practical effects that look atrocious and far worse then even the worst CGI animation in films(Hobgoblins anyone?), I Am Legend looked utterly fantastic, the only CGI for me that was really obvious was the Deer, aside from that the film did not look fake in the least, it looked damn good.

Technology for music may have advanced, but the type of music that's popular in the mainstream now feels far less complex then the stuff that came out decades ago. Take Metallica's St. Anger for example, Pro Tools was used a lot on that album, yet somehow it's sounds far more primitive then any of the band's previous efforts due to the complete lack of guitar solos and repetitive riffs, and like i've said a lot of band's seem content to only learn three chords and no more, that's mainly why I was never much of a grunge fan.

I'm sure there are tons of untapped ideas that have yet to be incorporated into a rock/metal context. But that doesn't mean it is going to go over well with most people. Bands will continue to experiment with sounds and develop new styles as long as there are people that have imaginations. I welcome new ideas, but when it's all said and done, I will always go back to basics with Sabbath inspired music. It's all about the songwriting anyway... If it's good, it's good. Hopefully there will be something new soon, just to keep things interesting and fresh.

Anything new might have to appeal to our grandparents or grandkids: Polka-Thrash, Barney-metal. Swing-death...... Just kidding. Those have ALSO already been done.

Vexer6 wrote:

I think you're dead wrong about CGI, IMO it's lead to some absolutely breathtaking visuals that would otherwise be impossible to achieve with practical effects, and i've seen plenty of films that use only practical effects that look atrocious and far worse then even the worst CGI animation in films(Hobgoblins anyone?), I Am Legend looked utterly fantastic, the only CGI for me that was really obvious was the Deer, aside from that the film did not look fake in the least, it looked damn good.

Technology for music may have advanced, but the type of music that's popular in the mainstream now feels far less complex then the stuff that came out decades ago.  Take Metallica's St. Anger for example, Pro Tools was used a lot on that album, yet somehow it's sounds far more primitive then any of the band's previous efforts due to the complete lack of guitar solos and repetitive riffs, and like i've said a lot of band's seem content to only learn three chords and no more, that's mainly why I was never much of a grunge fan.  

Personally, it seems a bit lacking in perspective to single out a movie that MST3K riffed on as an example of how bad practical effects can be. Hobgoblins already HAS its pedigree as a crap piece of filmmaking (but the episode of MST3K in which it is immortalized is hilarious). As for I am Legend, I'm referring to the horrible, untextured white rubber creatures that serve as the antagonists in the movie. I mean... WTF? Seriously, it looks like they never finished rendering the damn things - like Jenkins from night shift was supposed to texture them and nobody bothered to check until the night before release. "So, Jenkins, how is that texturing going?" "Oh, crap... I've just been snorting my body weight in coke for the past six months. I forgot!" "Jenkins, you had ONE job..." Just how it plays out in my head. It may just be a piece of personal aesthetic preference on my part nobody else shares, but I thought the creature effects were garbage in that movie and since the movie hinges so intensely on those creatures, it cripples the whole thing.

My beef with CGI isn't that it CAN'T be used well, because I think it can be used VERY effectively. The problem is you have these big studios that are inclined to say that as long as it's CGI, it must be good, and that's crap. You never would have had a poorly constructed puppet because the thing had to WORK on film, at least enough to get the shot. It may have been poorly painted, designed or implemented, but the thing had to functionally WORK or you couldn't even get the scene. In CGI, you can have bad animation, bad texturing, bad movement, etc. on TOP of bad design and because it's seemingly thrown in as an afterthought in a lot of movies, you have a lot more of a tendency to lazy ass the job. In the worst offenders, it's slapped on like a coat of cheap paint after filming is finished, so there's no chance to change or fix anything.

CGI is to movies what auto-tune is to music. Yes, you can use it artistically and even use it well, but more often than not, people seem to be using it as a lazy shortcut instead of employing some imagination and craft.

On the music front, I don't think there's any merit to saying the technology isn't COMPLEX. I mean, if we're looking at the engineering feats and mathematical understanding of physics and sound to craft plugins like Melodyne and the like, I don't think there's a precedent for it anywhere in past technology and it's pretty bleeding edge stuff. Really. It's damn impressive when you think about re-pitching a performed note without modifying the speed of it. Remember, the best we had before was to slow down or speed up the TAPE during recording and then bring it back to regular speed for playback for dramatic pitch shifts that were in time with the overall recording. Sampling distorted the original source material. While that's probably true here, the artifacts are fewer and farther between, and that's just ONE piece of kit in the modern production toolbox.

Again, like CGI, it can be (and often is) abused to get a crap performer on a record in a hurry, but if we're simply talking about the complexity of the tech, I don't think you can question it. It's apples and oranges, but you can do things with software now in the audio realm that would be like filming Jim Carrey and having a software rendering tool that would let you make him look like a young Joan Jett with only mild artifacting.

What you seem to be commenting on - particularly with St. Anger - is that music seems to be getting simpler or "dumber." But that's the content, not the tech at work there. Granted, I think the tech has played a part in making players lazier (or simply interested in saving money in the studio by using every crutch they can to finish the job and GTFO...), but that's something else entirely.

Well you did say that even the worst films with practical effects still look better then a lot of films with CGI, so I wouldn't say that my response was "lacking in perspective".

I never said that the technology wasn't complex, I said the music itself wasn't, those are two entirely different things. Pro Tools and other similar programs are great sure, but if the music itself is overly simplified garbage like in the case of St. Anger, then all the technology in the world won't make it suck any less.

I thought the creatures in I Am Legend looked just fine to me, they didn't look "horrible" to me at all, I personally haven't seen too many films with utterly awful CGI, for the most part it's been used pretty well in films IMO, though occasionally you do get some awful looking stuff like in Last Airbender(though bad CGI was the least of that films problems).

I actually don't mind auto-tune that much myself, honestly I barely even notice it half the time.

Shawn Of Fire wrote:

I think bands have to be careful when looking for that undiscovered territory, though, for fear of becoming weird for weird's sake and no longer musical.

Agreed. Some bands seem to forget the importance of just writing a good song.

Eyesore wrote:

Shawn Of Fire wrote:

I think bands have to be careful when looking for that undiscovered territory, though, for fear of becoming weird for weird's sake and no longer musical.

Agreed. Some bands seem to forget the importance of just writing a good song.

Yeah, I think that bands that focus too hard on innovation and those that try to be overly technical/complex fall into this trap. But there isn't anything wrong with either.

I don't think Grin was rejected. It was just bad timing... Grunge was in full force when it came out and the band never even had a big following anyway. They were always under the radar.

I think flamingo music and metal will be more done in a future, and also rumba and metal etc...i am not going to like it but i think thats the future

I can say with near total certainty that we are doing something on one of our new songs that no one has done before.

The possibilities are endless.

Temple of Blood wrote:

I can say with near total certainty that we are doing something on one of our new songs that no one has done before.

I'll be the judge of that.

krokus wrote:

I think flamingo music and metal will be more done in a future, and also rumba and metal etc...i am not going to like it but i think thats the future

I honestly think that if It was done well this could be incredible and I think that if any band were to attempt it it should be the amazing Reek as they already have some nice Spanish guitar elements to their unique brand of thrash.



It isn't all as mellow as that

Better start practicing those Paco De Lucia runs...