Is it just me or does anyone else feel like the classification of metal music as just gotten plain silly?
I know back in the early 00s we were already bombarded with too many sub-genres but I will say that a lot of them are needed since metal is very broad like Thrash, Black, Speed, Progressive, Power, Industrial, Death, Melodic Death, Doom, Hardcore etc.
But kids theses days seem to think we don't have enough so now we have sub-genres in our Sub-Genres (queue Xzibit meme) and naming Sub-Genres after guitar sound (specifically looking at Djent there may aswell call a genre pinch harmonics then) or what seems to be the most popular adding the word core after an existing sub-genre.
Honestly I can't tell the difference so why bother adding even more sub-genres to what is already an over-classified music genre?
Am I alone here or am I just starting to settle more in my ways the closer I get to 30? What do you guys think?
Also as a side note I have yet to hear a good mainstream metal bands in the last 4 years seems like if you want to hear a good band you have to find a unsigned band or one that's on a small label so maybe I am getting old and just don't understand these kids and there mixing of electronic and metal (the bane of existence) etc.
I'm sure there are old metal heads who would say the same thing about some of the genres you listed. It happens in all genres of music. Punk has an insane amount of sub-genres. I tend to only really listen to earlier thrash stuff myself, so I don't think I could tell the difference between speed and power metal. The only one I can really identify is Nu-Metal, because I throw up in my mouth when I hear it.
In the end it doesn't really matter and it's just like a list of tags describing the music. You should remember the bandnames instead, since one band can cover many different genres within it's lifetime. :)
Meh, some times using crazy sub-genres to categorize a band is necessary when you're trying to describe what someone should expect from a band or an album.
Let's take Extol's Undeceived album.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHplTzfFA8g
What is this? Black Metal? Deff not-- but there's still a good deal of BM influence in there. Death Metal? Not really either... it's probably right to say it has blackened death metal sound, even-though that's still not quite right either...
Same thing with a band like these fuckers, what the fuck is this? How do you describe this to someone?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQ_qi26frjY
The more variety a genre gets (metal here), the more sub-genres are bound to come out to try and describe what a band might sound like. There are just too many different sounds in metal right now to be able to classify everything under 3-4 specific genres.
Not everything has to be defined within sub-genres-- in fact not everything can. It's still a just decent way to give an idea of what you might be in for with an album / band when you're coming in blind.
Well calling djent a genre is juts a common error, it's a guitar playing style.
If you were to describe someone some music from a specific metal genre then it's very useful, in fact, the only time when it's a bad thing to have sub sub genres is when people get angry about it or complain etc.
Brutal death is a fuck load different to death metal if you can personally hear it, same with metalcore and deathcore, and grindcore and deathcore and death metal. Same with blackened death and traditional black metal vs Norwegian black metal and gothic rock/extreme metal like cradle of filth.
Also, Van halen and Dio.. sounds like the infamous Glam metal (80's version of metalcore), but is actually "traidtional extreme metal" like Black Sabbath etc, but not like Metallica or iron maiden and slayer as they are more thrashy, but iron maiden is more Neo metal liek and slayer is more satanic and black metal like, but not like black metal..
It gets very confusing but it eventually makes perfect comprehensible sense :)
Yeah sub genres, I dont really understand either. Nor do I pay attention to them to be honest. Im still an old metal fan. I saw Lamb of God live a few years back expecting something grand but was bored after about 30secs, utter shit imho, plus djent ~ i youtube'd that a while back. Its more of a disability than a music style.
I like the bands I like, and when describing how bands sound I simply compare them to other bands. To me, I rarely use a word more specific than metal or rock,
Heh, these guys were also around the same time as Pan.Thy.Monium, definitely a case of the weirds going on in the early 90's too bad it didn't flourish
Something about Norwegian Black Metal Supergroups.....
Yeah it gets taxing trying to pigeon hole bands into their respective subgenres. Let's just call everything Blackened Post Sludge Stoner Power Grind Thrash Prog Cambodian Polka Folk Core.