Artemisia

I'm still wondering as to why the gothic label is so shunned. Bands like Nightwish and Moonspell have publicly denied the label, even though their music has distinctly gothic elements.

Brilliant! Very talented guys

Linkin Park are nostalgic for me. They remind me of high school days and the emotions I felt back then. I certainly couldn't listen to them now, I find their new material rather dull. Chester also can't do the vocals he once did after his surgery. His voice is pretty stuffed. Two words: Justin. Bieber. And here's a humorous little video:

As an avid fan of gothic metal, I have wondered about the future of this particular genre. As we know, gothic metal had its heyday in the 90s and early 2000s with bands like Nightwish, Tristania, Within Temptation and Theatre of Tragedy. As a result, the gothic metal sound became synonymous with female fronted bands using operatic or soprano vocals and heavy symphonic elements. As more and more of these bands appeared, it became a cliche and the genre was criticised for its lack of diversity. However, there are plenty of gothic metal bands that never used the operatic/beauty and the beast vocals. The forerunners of the gothic metal genre: My Dying Bride, Paradise Lost, Anathema, Tiamat, Moonspell...all male fronted and definitely a far cry from the female fronted bands that became included with the genre. But I digress. It seems a lot of bands wanted to shirk off the label of "gothic" entirely, as though it were a bad label. I understand the goth and metal subcultures are vastly different, especially concerning music, but this crossover created some beautiful music and amazing bands...what is so bad about being labelled "gothic?" Even on this forum, I have noticed that this particular sub forum is probably the least active of all. Is the gothic metal genre going to die out or become assimilated into other genres, simply because there is a stigma attached to the title?

Babymetal are just the worst. My housemates regularly torment me with them

I use music to get up and going in the mornings. I suffer from bouts of depression which make getting out of bed and doing simple tasks like getting dressed and eating breakfast difficult. Putting on some good music gets me going and into the swing of things.My car must be well stocked with CDs, and I like to play music while I'm cooking or doing housework, again because it seems to motivate me to move.

Will give them a listen, as I am also from South Africa. Living in Johannesburg at the moment. Are they doing live shows?

He did a song with Within Temptation if I'm not mistaken...interesting transition

I want to travel Scandinavia, especially Denmark (my family are from there), Iceland, Norway and Finland...I hope one day I will have the money to be able to do it. I would also love to go to China and Japan. Japan in particular...I am quite fascinated with their culture.

There is nothing sexier than a man hugging a cat

2 cats and 1 doge...also have one "cyber-adopted" cat in a haven, I donate money every month to them for the upkeep of the kitty. Hoping to expand my animal family but funding and living space restrictions are in the way :-/

I enjoy anime, though I'm very fussy about what I choose to watch as yes, a very vast majority of it is utter rubbish. But I have watched some excellent anime, Death Note and Elfen Lied being the two best ones I have seen.

Sombre Romantic wasn't *that* great an album in any case, I vastly prefer Elegant and Dying and the Requiem albums. Still waiting patiently for Pianissimo.

A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal by Draconian.

I had a pretty brutal dream of some man following me and harassing me. I tried to call the police but they refused to believe me. He started overturning things in my house and taunting me. I tried to fight him but he was too strong. Somehow I managed to subdue him and started smashing his head into the tiles. My mother appeared with a gun and shot him in the face. The rest of the dream (which was quite lengthy) consisted of me scrubbing blood and muck off the walls and wondering where to dispose of the body.

I was at a local bar with 3 friends last weekend, and we must have put about 200 bucks into that jukebox, playing all the metal we could in a bar that only plays pop music...we got away with it until the manager arrived. Luckily our playlist had finished by then, because bars in my town will just switch the music off if they don't approve, regardless of how much money you feed into the jukebox. This raises the question of why they have metal on it in the first place. Their excuse is "you're scaring away the other customers" - yet I didn't see one person leave because of our music.

Black metal is terrible. Whoever thought painting their faces with clown paint and making noise that sounds like it was recorded in a public bathroom was a good idea? And quite frankly when every single song on every single album is about Satan it gets a little stale. I'm aware that not every black metal band is like this, but they all look and sound the same to me: corpse painted dudes with spikes everywhere with dramatic hand gestures, unintelligible band font and Satan Satan Satan.

My favourite male vocalist has to be Rowan London from Virgin Black. Multi-talented, able to sing classically as well as growl and scream. His vocals are evocative and powerful, perfect for the music he does. Favourite female vocalist is Lisa Johansson, former vocalist of Draconian. Interestingly their new vocalist is a South African like me, and a very talented singer at that. Can't wait to hear their new material with her behind the mic, but Lisa's work is still amazing.

I went through my Slipknot days in high school but I wouldn't be able to listen to them again for many of the reasons stated above, the main one being that they feel cheap and shallow compared to the bands I listen to now. I feel like I've outgrown them, in all honesty. There are still a few songs of theirs that I will bop my head to but you won't catch me listening to their album in the car anymore. Slipknot aren't BAD, but they aren't that good either.

I love the soundtracks to Miyazaki's films (Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, Howl's Moving Castle). Also the soundtrack to Memoirs of a Geisha. Yes, it seems when it comes to movie soundtracks I have an Asian flair I like to listen to them while I'm doing housework.

Metal evokes that elusive little slip of an emotion called Happiness and Contentment, it gives me a sense of completion, warmth and coldness at the same time. In short, emotions that few people or other forms of media can stir.

I don't care much for Dream Theater. I simply cannot stand the vocalist. I encounter a lot of people who prattle on about how wonderful and progressive they are; I tried to listen to them but it was unsuccessful. I also don't give two hoots about Nirvana and I don't understand the idolatry surrounding Kurt Cobain. That also goes for the Mayhem/Burzum crowd, though I find them marginally more interesting than Cobain.

I shall humbly accept my punishment. I should feel bad for the rest of my life.

Projector divided fans that's for sure. Similar to what happened to Tiamat post-Wildhoney. But everyone is entitled to their own opinion, of course! I enjoyed their work before Projector as well, but me being one for moody and introspective music and my love of clean baritone vocals made Projector a win for me.

I enjoyed the new album, goes back a little to the Haven/Projector days, which were my favourite.