Genre Defying Stuff

[MaxFaust]

There are some bands that seem to fall inbetween the cracks, or whatever. 

I've spent some time searching for Jinjer ... one of my favourites as of lately ... but couldn't find anything anywhere on-site, but perhaps more worrying is that they didn't even have anything on them at metal-archives (and they seem to typically have something about everything). What to call them? Tech-prog-death-space-goth-core? I don't know. I'm not really a genre man ... but if you had to place them in some of the genres that exist on this site, which would it be? I suppose Tatiana's growling would make it "deathsy", but on the other hand, they're kind of progressive in their instrumentation ... which by no means is stopping them from being all over the place in their 2016 album, King of Everything. 

Perhaps they aren't even considered a "metal" band proper. WTF do I know? I just happen to like their music.

I don't hear anybody questioning the metallic status of Gojira though (even though people are kind of either on the love or on the hate side, not so many are "neutral"). Nor Meshuggah ... that I would think belong wherever Gojira belongs ... as they appear to have structural similarities, at least in my ears. Be that as it may, I've chosen to place Jinjer next to Gojira and Meshuggah in my shelf ... because that's just how I feel about it ... and nobody gets to "moderate" my choices in my own house. (Although a friend recently remarked that "you sure have a lot of Iced Earth albums for someone claiming to not like power metal.")

Anyway, since I couldn't find anything on Jinjer, I shall take the liberty of promoting them a little here and now.

 

[BlutAusNerd]

There are some bands that seem to fall inbetween the cracks, or whatever. 
I've spent some time searching for Jinjer ... one of my favourites as of lately ... but couldn't find anything anywhere on-site, but perhaps more worrying is that they didn't even have anything on them at metal-archives (and they seem to typically have something about everything). What to call them? Tech-prog-death-space-goth-core? I don't know. I'm not really a genre man ... but if you had to place them in some of the genres that exist on this site, which would it be? I suppose Tatiana's growling would make it "deathsy", but on the other hand, they're kind of progressive in their instrumentation ... which by no means is stopping them from being all over the place in their 2016 album, King of Everything. 
Perhaps they aren't even considered a "metal" band proper. WTF do I know? I just happen to like their music.
I don't hear anybody questioning the metallic status of Gojira though (even though people are kind of either on the love or on the hate side, not so many are "neutral"). Nor Meshuggah ... that I would think belong wherever Gojira belongs ... as they appear to have structural similarities, at least in my ears. Be that as it may, I've chosen to place Jinjer next to Gojira and Meshuggah in my shelf ... because that's just how I feel about it ... and nobody gets to "moderate" my choices in my own house. (Although a friend recently remarked that "you sure have a lot of Iced Earth albums for someone claiming to not like power metal.")
Anyway, since I couldn't find anything on Jinjer, I shall take the liberty of promoting them a little here and now.
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Hadn't heard that before, but I tend to ignore bands that get a lot of hype. It is all over the place as you mentioned, but mostly exists between melodic metalcore and "djent" (i.e. that Meshuggah sound), so I can see why it's not on the metal archives. The more progressive parts sounded good, but I can't say that I liked her harsh vocals or their more superficially"aggressive" passages.

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[MaxFaust]

12 hours ago, BlutAusNerd said:

I tend to ignore bands that get a lot of hype.

Yeah, I feel you. In the words of Chuck D: Don't believe the hype. On the other hand, some of the time it's simply because it's a great act. Case in point (with a side nod to a parallel discussion on trad heavy that's going on in another thread), how people would try to shove Mercyful Fate down my throat back in 1983, when Melissa was something new and sensational. They had to trick me, i.e. play it "in the background" without telling me, so that I could pride myself in "discovering" MF on my own. I can be a right bitch like that ... although I've loosened up over the years. I no longer feel as if I have to be the one who calls the shots.

It's very interesting how "djent" (and most things that end with "core") seems to be so strongly hated by so many. I kind of get it, but at the same time I don't really get it. ("The lady doth protest too much" as Shakespeare said.) It reminds me of how "proper rockers" used to hate prog and heavy. Narco-infused psycho-jazz was but one of the things that were said. Then they would beat us up, for good measure. It's nice having someone to beat on, I suppose. The path of the righteous man is fuelled by hate for all things they consider to be "wrong".

Unlike a lot of people my age -- many of them my good friends -- I don't feel as if metal had its golden age in the 80s. That's a load of crap to me. Or at best, a blatant example of selective memory. I was there. The 80s was a miserable decade, with cold war and aids and whatnot. The only golden age worth shit is the everlasting "right now" ... and right now, I see a metal scene that's more diverse and vital than ever. After the rise of YouTube, it's possible to find stuff that you'd only hear people whisper about during the so called golden ages ... and if you tried to get your hands on any of it, you'd have to pay several months worth of hard earned salary. That it to say, if it was even on the market. (Even a -- strictly speaking -- pirated cassette copy of the crappiest kind would cost you a pretty penny.)

[MacabreEternal]

I don't hear anything in any of those three tracks that "defies" anything.  As @BlutAusNerd says there's some pretty recognisable traits in there (although none of it appeals to me).  Not sure where we are going with this thread?

[BlutAusNerd]

Yeah, I feel you. In the words of Chuck D: Don't believe the hype. On the other hand, some of the time it's simply because it's a great act. Case in point (with a side nod to a parallel discussion on trad heavy that's going on in another thread), how people would try to shove Mercyful Fate down my throat back in 1983, when Melissa was something new and sensational. They had to trick me, i.e. play it "in the background" without telling me, so that I could pride myself in "discovering" MF on my own. I can be a right bitch like that ... although I've loosened up over the years. I no longer feel as if I have to be the one who calls the shots.
It's very interesting how "djent" (and most things that end with "core") seems to be so strongly hated by so many. I kind of get it, but at the same time I don't really get it. ("The lady doth protest too much" as Shakespeare said.) It reminds me of how "proper rockers" used to hate prog and heavy. Narco-infused psycho-jazz was but one of the things that were said. Then they would beat us up, for good measure. It's nice having someone to beat on, I suppose. The path of the righteous man is fuelled by hate for all things they consider to be "wrong".
Unlike a lot of people my age -- many of them my good friends -- I don't feel as if metal had its golden age in the 80s. That's a load of crap to me. Or at best, a blatant example of selective memory. I was there. The 80s was a miserable decade, with cold war and aids and whatnot. The only golden age worth shit is the everlasting "right now" ... and right now, I see a metal scene that's more diverse and vital than ever. After the rise of YouTube, it's possible to find stuff that you'd only hear people whisper about during the so called golden ages ... and if you tried to get your hands on any of it, you'd have to pay several months worth of hard earned salary. That it to say, if it was even on the market. (Even a -- strictly speaking -- pirated cassette copy of the crappiest kind would cost you a pretty penny.)

You have to consider the source, especially when there is music flooding your horizon from every direction. The stuff that gets hyped in mainstream metal publications and news sites like Metal Sucks don't tend to be my flavor anyway, so I'm usually slow to check out stuff that gets most so called "metal fans" wet in their panties. If it's hyped by one or more sources that I know and trust, then it's a different story, but I'm still terrible at keeping up with new releases even when they do have glowing recommendations. Either way, it's easier for me to let the initial hype die down and see what's still standing after the "hot new thing" phase has passed.

As far as djent and melodic metalcore getting hate, well, that's life I suppose. I think those dorky downtuned groove riffs sounded kind of cool when Meshuggah did them, or when a band like Gojira took them to a different place, but it sounds pretty lame to my ears when it's used as a heavier substitute for dance flavored beats in a poppy sounding song. The same goes for melodic metalcore, no amount of stolen In Flames and Arch Enemy riffs will make it sound any less like a Hot Topic flavored emo song to me.

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[MaxFaust]

5 hours ago, MacabreEternal said:

Not sure where we are going with this thread?

That makes (at least) two of us.

To begin with, I didn't understand why Jinjer wasn't to be found anywhere. I tried to express why I like them / what I like about them by -- facetiously -- saying that I have them placed next to Meshuggah and Gojira in my CD shelf (I'm old, so it's all about the hardcopy for me). I am completely mystified by "modern" concepts such as Djent -- that I initially thought was a Belgian city, and tried to make sense of it the same way that there is a "Gothenburg" sound -- but when looking at Wikipedia, it was examplified by Animals as Leaders ... which I have to say are awesome musicians, but perhaps too good for their own good, so to speak, and not really expressing the "feeling" that I find to be the lowest common denominator in my own music taste.

Right ... so there's "metalcore" ... which sounds like an amalgamation of metal and hardcore (even though the suffix "core" can apparently be used in a number of weird ways that I don't understand) ... and that ought to be a blend that unites the best from two worlds that I've kind of lived in since the late 70s. The first band that jumps to mind when people say "metalcore" is D.R.I. although I fail to see how any genre can be so obese that it can contain both D.R.I and Gojira. But D.R.I. did as a matter of fact appeal to both the punks and the metalheads back in the day (at least the metalheads that were down with thrash, which not everybody was). To make sure we're on the same page when it comes to hardcore though: Black Flag, Dead Kennedys, Agnostic Front, Blood for Blood, that sort of thing. A more recent act such as Hatebreed should perhaps be called "metalcore"? They have the more "fat" (or perhaps "groovy") sound down ... which to me sounds like genetic material from Pantera, only they play much faster, of course. (Didn't Phil use to sing in a HC band before joining Pantera? His style was certainly more HC than HM.)

This thread could be moved to another location, I suppose, but what I want to discuss is musical taxonomy (genres) in general, rather than what is and what isn't "true" or "fake" (because that just ends up being a bitchfest of private taste and opinion). Not so much how to classify the three bands I've specifically mentioned so far ... as they -- private opinion alert! -- don't really fit well with any of the genres that people typically tend to use most. (Forgoing weirdness that people seem to use for purely spiteful reasons, such as emo and mallcore.) And leaving completely out of the discussion raw facts, such as how neither Lemmy nor Ozzy (or other "old guard" musicians in general) were ever really comfortable with being labelled heavy metal ... which is something I completely understand because they were around before metal proper (the genre) became a thing. As was I. That being said, I can of course see how genres are useful, if not even outright necessary, for music journalists and others who are speaking theory rather than playing music themselves. But it can easily slip into counterproductive mudslinging, typically with fighting words such as "true" (and its opposite). 

What people like and dislike based in personal taste is fair enough. I just don't see how that should ever become objectified and made into some kind of crusade against the "not worthy" ... who are honestly just making music that they themselves like. Which is also fair enough. Case in point, a band such as Carcass, that didn't sound good to me until they released Heartworks, which is probably among my ten favourite metal albums of all time. But that's me. Others may feel otherwise. I even know some people that were deeply disapponted when Carcass "went soft". But what can you do? The heart wants what the heart wants, right? I went to the other forum and read my way through the "metalcore" thread, without becoming any the wiser. I tend to "get it" fairly rapidly, however complex the subject matter. I understand quantum mechanics and general relativity, for instance, but that may just be because they are farly accurately defined by their mathematical structure. Art is just so much more slippery like that. Open for subjective interpretation and various degrees of perceptive extacy. Speaking of which, the point of all and any music for me is the "eargasm". I don't think I can express it any more accurately than that. Which is why debating the merits of this and that subgenre seems a lot like trying to nail down what's the right way to have sex.

[BlutAusNerd]

That makes (at least) two of us.
To begin with, I didn't understand why Jinjer wasn't to be found anywhere. I tried to express why I like them / what I like about them by -- facetiously -- saying that I have them placed next to Meshuggah and Gojira in my CD shelf (I'm old, so it's all about the hardcopy for me). I am completely mystified by "modern" concepts such as Djent -- that I initially thought was a Belgian city, and tried to make sense of it the same way that there is a "Gothenburg" sound -- but when looking at Wikipedia, it was examplified by Animals as Leaders ... which I have to say are awesome musicians, but perhaps too good for their own good, so to speak, and not really expressing the "feeling" that I find to be the lowest common denominator in my own music taste.
Right ... so there's "metalcore" ... which sounds like an amalgamation of metal and hardcore (even though the suffix "core" can apparently be used in a number of weird ways that I don't understand) ... and that ought to be a blend that unites the best from two worlds that I've kind of lived in since the late 70s. The first band that jumps to mind when people say "metalcore" is D.R.I. although I fail to see how any genre can be so obese that it can contain both D.R.I and Gojira. But D.R.I. did as a matter of fact appeal to both the punks and the metalheads back in the day (at least the metalheads that were down with thrash, which not everybody was). To make sure we're on the same page when it comes to hardcore though: Black Flag, Dead Kennedys, Agnostic Front, Blood for Blood, that sort of thing. A more recent act such as Hatebreed should perhaps be called "metalcore"? They have the more "fat" (or perhaps "groovy") sound down ... which to me sounds like genetic material from Pantera, only they play much faster, of course. (Didn't Phil use to sing in a HC band before joining Pantera? His style was certainly more HC than HM.)
This thread could be moved to another location, I suppose, but what I want to discuss is musical taxonomy (genres) in general, rather than what is and what isn't "true" or "fake" (because that just ends up being a bitchfest of private taste and opinion). Not so much how to classify the three bands I've specifically mentioned so far ... as they -- private opinion alert! -- don't really fit well with any of the genres that people typically tend to use most. (Forgoing weirdness that people seem to use for purely spiteful reasons, such as emo and mallcore.) And leaving completely out of the discussion raw facts, such as how neither Lemmy nor Ozzy (or other "old guard" musicians in general) were ever really comfortable with being labelled heavy metal ... which is something I completely understand because they were around before metal proper (the genre) became a thing. As was I. That being said, I can of course see how genres are useful, if not even outright necessary, for music journalists and others who are speaking theory rather than playing music themselves. But it can easily slip into counterproductive mudslinging, typically with fighting words such as "true" (and its opposite). 
What people like and dislike based in personal taste is fair enough. I just don't see how that should ever become objectified and made into some kind of crusade against the "not worthy" ... who are honestly just making music that they themselves like. Which is also fair enough. Case in point, a band such as Carcass, that didn't sound good to me until they released Heartworks, which is probably among my ten favourite metal albums of all time. But that's me. Others may feel otherwise. I even know some people that were deeply disapponted when Carcass "went soft". But what can you do? The heart wants what the heart wants, right? I went to the other forum and read my way through the "metalcore" thread, without becoming any the wiser. I tend to "get it" fairly rapidly, however complex the subject matter. I understand quantum mechanics and general relativity, for instance, but that may just be because they are farly accurately defined by their mathematical structure. Art is just so much more slippery like that. Open for subjective interpretation and various degrees of perceptive extacy. Speaking of which, the point of all and any music for me is the "eargasm". I don't think I can express it any more accurately than that. Which is why debating the merits of this and that subgenre seems a lot like trying to nail down what's the right way to have sex.

I guess the most basic answer to your question of why Jinjer hasn't been posted here before is because they're a band that doesn't really interest the regulars on here, so there hasn't been any discussion about them until now. We all like what we like, and when a new member comes in to enter the discussion and beings their different tastes and opinions with them, the discussion changes. I didn't think you were being facetious about the comparison to Meshuggah and Gojira, those comparisons are certainly valid based on the song I listened to by Jinjer when you mentioned them here.

While I may not be as old as you, "djent" is a label that I tend to use in quotes because I still don't think of it as a real genre. To the best of my knowledge, it was first used by Meshuggah to describe their sound, but prior to that point, Meshuggah was known as a technical groove metal band. At that time, they were pretty much the only ones doing that sound, so it seemed silly to create a new genre just for them when the old one still fits. However, maybe now that so many bands have taken Meshuggah's formula and ran into a completely different direction with it, maybe it does merit a different name. The bands that seem to exemplify that sound don't do anything for me, so it's not a label I find myself frequently using because a lot of it either ends up in really self-indulgent jazz/progressive metal territory, or sounds more akin to electronic/dub-step music with guitars, or sometimes both. It did seem like Jinjer occupied some space in both of those camps, but I thought that part of their sound was decent. It lost me when the contrived aggression with the bland screams ala melodic metalcore entered the picture, as it often does.

Metalcore is a tough one in the internet age, but it shouldn't be. Its nomenclature should be pretty indicative of what it will sound like, a fusion of metal and hardcore that broke out in the 90's by fusing the more pummeling New York hardcore sound with metal elements that were prevalent at the time, mostly from death and groove metal (though the name was originally assigned to groups like D.R.I., which makes sense, but it tends to be more specifically referred to as "crossover thrash" since thrash is what it basically became). Melodic metalcore arose much like melodic death metal ("gothenburg" as you put it) from its parent genre, but very quickly devolved like melodic death metal did into something bearing little resemblance to how it began, and within a couple of years had almost completely forsaken its roots. The two sounds are also connected because in their move away from their roots, they borrowed some superficial traits from one another as they drifted closer towards pop music territory. It seems that people continued to use these same labels for the bands in question, even though they had basically lost their meaning due to no longer sounding like "death metal with a focus on melody" or "metal/hardcore fusion with a focus on melody". These labels are still misappropriated like wildfire, especially among the younger generations browsing the internet that aren't familiar with the roots of either sound (and these are only two examples of that phenomenon out of many). Derogatory labels tend to arise out of this misappropriation by fans who see bands being grouped together incorrectly as disparaging and not representative of the music they like. Whether or not that's fair is another issue, but pop and metal don't tend to mix very well, so I think some irritation at this grouping is understandable.

Hopefully this is a bit more clear than my last response. There were parts of Jinjer's sound that I liked and parts that I didn't, but I certainly didn't hate them. The point was for me to answer your question about where they might fall on the spectrum and why they weren't listed on metal-archives.com.

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[MaxFaust]

1 hour ago, BlutAusNerd said:

pop and metal don't tend to mix very well

 

There once was a discussion where I found myself wanting to bang my head against my own keypad ... because my esteemed "opponent" kept on saying that it's a fact that music was better in the 80s. As in objective, undisputable truth. But that doesn't work for me at all. I was willing to concede, and allow for "mainstream popular music" to have become less dynamic, more bland, or whatever, as a byproduct of digitalization and just more aggressive people coming into the marketing and profits end of the game. But he would have none of that. In his eyes, this was some kind of magical thing (I don't know what else to call it), and that the boat had long since sailed in this issue. 

Cynical as I am, I suggested of course that there may also be something in his age, that whatever he experienced in younger years will stand out as fresher, more vital, hell even better than whatever he's observing nowadays. This was of course also flatly denied. I next tried to come up with examples of horrible, commercal exploitations of music back in the day ... under the umbrella argument that this is hardly anything new. For instance, I said, Elvis is called "the king" and shit ... but he does nothing for me. All I can see is a puppet on a string, or a product as it were. Yeah, sure he could sing and swing his hips and whatnot ... but the greatness is by and large a fantasy. Chuck Berry was the man. Jerry Lee Lewis was by far more of a rocker ... and don't even get me started on Gene Vincent and Kip Taylor. 

I'm not sure that I understand what "pop music" means. Beatles? I love the Beatles. Who doesn't love the Beatles? In fact, I seem to more often than not like all expressions that come from a place of bona fide talent. I find the old story about how Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil for an ability to play the blues quite interesting ... but that's some really twisted shit when you think about it. Most artists who sell their soul do so for hard cash and the devil is usually a record company, or even (as is the case nowadays) whatever corporate conglomerate that owns the record company. You get a flashy car, a nice suit, some coke and a bottle of Scotch. All you gotta do is remove all that's "controversial" from your music. Make it radio friendly.

Shit happens when your objective is to become a rock star, and live the glamorous life, rather than be a creative artist and make your statement about whatever it is you wish to say. There are lots of "honest" artists that never make it until they start caring about what their audience actually wants ... and many see that as the moment of sell-out ... but I don't see it that way. There must be some line of communication with the people that you basically want to buy your music, in whatever form. Selling out is what happens when you allow yourself to become a product designed for mass consumption. Being everybody's friend amounts to pretty much the same as being nobody's friend. Or at least, that's how I see it.

[BlutAusNerd]

There once was a discussion where I found myself wanting to bang my head against my own keypad ... because my esteemed "opponent" kept on saying that it's a fact that music was better in the 80s. As in objective, undisputable truth. But that doesn't work for me at all. I was willing to concede, and allow for "mainstream popular music" to have become less dynamic, more bland, or whatever, as a byproduct of digitalization and just more aggressive people coming into the marketing and profits end of the game. But he would have none of that. In his eyes, this was some kind of magical thing (I don't know what else to call it), and that the boat had long since sailed in this issue. 
Cynical as I am, I suggested of course that there may also be something in his age, that whatever he experienced in younger years will stand out as fresher, more vital, hell even better than whatever he's observing nowadays. This was of course also flatly denied. I next tried to come up with examples of horrible, commercal exploitations of music back in the day ... under the umbrella argument that this is hardly anything new. For instance, I said, Elvis is called "the king" and shit ... but he does nothing for me. All I can see is a puppet on a string, or a product as it were. Yeah, sure he could sing and swing his hips and whatnot ... but the greatness is by and large a fantasy. Chuck Berry was the man. Jerry Lee Lewis was by far more of a rocker ... and don't even get me started on Gene Vincent and Kip Taylor. 
I'm not sure that I understand what "pop music" means. Beatles? I love the Beatles. Who doesn't love the Beatles? In fact, I seem to more often than not like all expressions that come from a place of bona fide talent. I find the old story about how Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil for an ability to play the blues quite interesting ... but that's some really twisted shit when you think about it. Most artists who sell their soul do so for hard cash and the devil is usually a record company, or even (as is the case nowadays) whatever corporate conglomerate that owns the record company. You get a flashy car, a nice suit, some coke and a bottle of Scotch. All you gotta do is remove all that's "controversial" from your music. Make it radio friendly.
Shit happens when your objective is to become a rock star, and live the glamorous life, rather than be a creative artist and make your statement about whatever it is you wish to say. There are lots of "honest" artists that never make it until they start caring about what their audience actually wants ... and many see that as the moment of sell-out ... but I don't see it that way. There must be some line of communication with the people that you basically want to buy your music, in whatever form. Selling out is what happens when you allow yourself to become a product designed for mass consumption. Being everybody's friend amounts to pretty much the same as being nobody's friend. Or at least, that's how I see it.

Yeah, I can't get behind that either. Most of my favorite music comes from the 90's, but so does some of the most obnoxious crap that I've ever heard, so it's something that's hard to quantify.

Pop music in modern terms probably starts with The Beatles, and while pop music was arguably better in the 60's and 70's, The Beatles has got to be one of the most overrated artists of all time. There's nothing outwardly off-putting about them to me, I just don't see what all the fuss (and by extension, record sales) is all about. I can get into a few songs I guess, but that's about it. I agree that I can usually find appeal in genuine expression even if it's outside of my preferred/main listening genre (metal), but when a band is trying harder to sell an image, gimmick, lyrical theme, or whatever else over the music itself, then it's hard to see them as anything other than a product for mass consumption. There's a pretty big difference between being honest with yourself in terms of musical expression and connecting to your audience versus pandering for record sales. It seems like most that jumped aboard the melodic metalcore, melodic death metal, and djent bandwagons just seem to be riding the wave, and will likely either hop on the next trend that arises, or try to eek out some kind of self-parody driven career and fade out slowly. That's not to say that all trends are bad (musical or otherwise), but again, there's a big difference between latching onto something that speaks to you to do it your own way and slapping together some music to sell your image for a quick buck. I don't think there's a set criteria for making that kind of determination, all I know is bullshit when I smell it. I won't say that I smelled bullshit on the Jinjer song that I heard per se, but a lot of the techniques they used (in a fairly unique way, mind you) are prevalent among bands that do tend to smell like bullshit to me. Maybe those techniques themselves aren't at fault for this, but that's what it triggers for me most of the time when I hear them.

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[MaxFaust]

9 hours ago, BlutAusNerd said:

I just don't see what all the fuss (and by extension, record sales) is all about.

 

Beatlemania was undoubtedly an exceptionally weird cultural phenomenon. I remember Whoopi Goldberg -- who strikes me as being a no nonsense kind of woman -- getting all dreamy eyed and nostalgic over how much she was in love with the Beatles back in the day, during some interview (I can't remember the exact context). The same thing happened to the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin. "Star worship" might be an alternative take on the old canard "cult of personality" ... or at least, that's how I choose to see it. (I seem to remember that being the title of a hit song in the 90s ... but I'm hard pressed to remember exactly by whom. Some kind of nu-metal act? That particular genre failed to ever interest me much.) 

There's an interesting personality that's lurking behind the scenes here, one music producer named Joe Meek, who wrote the first ever UK hit single to break in the USA. The year was 1962 and the song was called Telstar, by the Tornadoes. He's definitely worth looking into, because he was a HUGE influence on not only pop music, but also metal, particularly because a certain Richie Blackmore used to be a session musician in his studio ... and as such was massively influenced by Joe Meek's "anything is possible" kind of attitude. Anyway, Telstar was a communication satellite, and the first of its kind, that opened the air waves across the Atlantic. To what extent this should be celebrated is a matter of opinion ... but that it was an important cultural event is beyond reasonable doubt. Beatlemania would probably not have happened were it not for the Telstar.

Since I am a bit of a snob and an elitist when it comes to art, I don't like "cheapness" and shit that's obviously made for the quick-fix end of the consumerist market. However, I respect the choice some make, that they should try and capitalize on their art as best they can. It's pretty fucking far from the worst thing that people can do ... although it is cheap and vulgar. Case in point, the direction Iron Maiden took after they fired Paul Di'Anno. Or Judas Priest in the 80s. (Glenn Tipton said in an interview that "they wanted to eat" after having been struggling musicians for the better part of a decade.) Or how Lemmy once sat at a train station, broke and disillusioned, eating baked beans out of a tin can with his comb, thinking "fuck this shit, I want money". 

But I'm digressing. I'm terrible like that.

What do people think about the Butcher Babies? They seem to have a bit of the same "djent" (or metalcore?) vibe going on, if I've undestood this correctly (which may not be the case). Also, proper hard-ass metal boys seem to hate them. Whereas this may not be a requirement for joining the club, it's a phenomenon of some predictability.

 

I love this shit. It's gaudy as all get-out but they seem to be having fun with their stuff. Is it metalcore though?

[BlutAusNerd]

Beatlemania was undoubtedly an exceptionally weird cultural phenomenon. I remember Whoopi Goldberg -- who strikes me as being a no nonsense kind of woman -- getting all dreamy eyed and nostalgic over how much she was in love with the Beatles back in the day, during some interview (I can't remember the exact context). The same thing happened to the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin. "Star worship" might be an alternative take on the old canard "cult of personality" ... or at least, that's how I choose to see it. (I seem to remember that being the title of a hit song in the 90s ... but I'm hard pressed to remember exactly by whom. Some kind of nu-metal act? That particular genre failed to ever interest me much.) 
There's an interesting personality that's lurking behind the scenes here, one music producer named Joe Meek, who wrote the first ever UK hit single to break in the USA. The year was 1962 and the song was called Telstar, by the Tornadoes. He's definitely worth looking into, because he was a HUGE influence on not only pop music, but also metal, particularly because a certain Richie Blackmore used to be a session musician in his studio ... and as such was massively influenced by Joe Meek's "anything is possible" kind of attitude. Anyway, Telstar was a communication satellite, and the first of its kind, that opened the air waves across the Atlantic. To what extent this should be celebrated is a matter of opinion ... but that it was an important cultural event is beyond reasonable doubt. Beatlemania would probably not have happened were it not for the Telstar.
Since I am a bit of a snob and an elitist when it comes to art, I don't like "cheapness" and shit that's obviously made for the quick-fix end of the consumerist market. However, I respect the choice some make, that they should try and capitalize on their art as best they can. It's pretty fucking far from the worst thing that people can do ... although it is cheap and vulgar. Case in point, the direction Iron Maiden took after they fired Paul Di'Anno. Or Judas Priest in the 80s. (Glenn Tipton said in an interview that "they wanted to eat" after having been struggling musicians for the better part of a decade.) Or how Lemmy once sat at a train station, broke and disillusioned, eating baked beans out of a tin can with his comb, thinking "fuck this shit, I want money". 
But I'm digressing. I'm terrible like that.
What do people think about the Butcher Babies? They seem to have a bit of the same "djent" (or metalcore?) vibe going on, if I've undestood this correctly (which may not be the case). Also, proper hard-ass metal boys seem to hate them. Whereas this may not be a requirement for joining the club, it's a phenomenon of some predictability.
 
I love this shit. It's gaudy as all get-out but they seem to be having fun with their stuff. Is it metalcore though?

I think Butcher Babies is an awful band. Musically, it's kind of a crossroads between where nu-metal ended up (Five Finger Death Punch comes to mind), melodic metalcore (which, again, is a misnomer and is not metalcore), and some Rob Zombie/Marilyn Manson styled modern shock rock. If you want to talk about a band using their music merely as a vehicle to sell an image, you couldn't find a better modern example. Fake tits, false metal.

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[MaxFaust]

14 hours ago, BlutAusNerd said:

Fake tits, false metal.

That would actually make a kickass album title. 

The position form whence the work of other people seems fake or false or whatever is an eternally weak one. "Not to my liking" is fair enough, but what exactly is the whole "fake" thing about? I've seem that done to death over the years. Particularly as the 90s came to be ... and all kinds of "fake" shit was happening to those knights of the true and real metal. You are obviously not a stupid person so there must be some kind of rationale behind this position of defence. The anger (or whatever lies at the bottom of this issue) seems wasted to me. I don't get it. Why even feel anything at all? 

Ars longa, vita brevis ... as the saying goes. Life is short but art is long. It's like suing the government and spending the next 20 years on all sorts of legal rigmarole, so that even if you win the case, you've still spent a lot of valuable lifetime on something that's hardly worth wasting any amount of energy on to begin with. Me, I don't give a fuck. There is fun party music, then there is deep stuff that make me both think and feel. I am able to value both those things for entirely different reasons. There's also shit that I won't waste a moment's time on ... such as hair metal and "nu metal" ... but I don't think it's "fake", I just think that it's not to my liking. If other people like it, fine, let them listen to that crap. I don't mind. 

Butcher Babies say they are inspired by Wendy O. Williams. Being as old as I am, I remember the Plasmatics being called fake by the real and true punk rockers. I didn't care then and I don't care now. I've always liked the Plasmatics, however gaudy they were. So what? Who gives a flying fuck? I'm not arrogant enough to think that my personal tastes should be some kind of template for anyone else to build their sense of art appreciation upon, no matter what amount of people who are in agreement about what's "good" or not. I like Butcher Babies for entirely different reasons than, say, King Diamond or Sacred Reich, but I do like them. Be that as it may, the main point here is that they are just musicians. This is not an important issue.

Then there are bands like So Much Hate, that in their time were held to be a prime example of "Norwegian hard core" in their main market, which was Germany, where they were tremendously popular. Other Norwegian HC acts didn't like that. They were said to be "fake" ... and more a metal band than a proper HC act. I guess that would make them a "metalcore" band, mainly because their guitarist Børre -- one of many musicians who died because of drugs during the 90s -- was too good for his own good in the hard-ass scene that was 80s Norwegian hardcore, where guitar solos and grand riffery was considered indulgent nonsense that had no place in the "real and true" hardcore.

 

[BlutAusNerd]

That would actually make a kickass album title. 
The position form whence the work of other people seems fake or false or whatever is an eternally weak one. "Not to my liking" is fair enough, but what exactly is the whole "fake" thing about? I've seem that done to death over the years. Particularly as the 90s came to be ... and all kinds of "fake" shit was happening to those knights of the true and real metal. You are obviously not a stupid person so there must be some kind of rationale behind this position of defence. The anger (or whatever lies at the bottom of this issue) seems wasted to me. I don't get it. Why even feel anything at all? 
Ars longa, vita brevis ... as the saying goes. Life is short but art is long. It's like suing the government and spending the next 20 years on all sorts of legal rigmarole, so that even if you win the case, you've still spent a lot of valuable lifetime on something that's hardly worth wasting any amount of energy on to begin with. Me, I don't give a fuck. There is fun party music, then there is deep stuff that make me both think and feel. I am able to value both those things for entirely different reasons. There's also shit that I won't waste a moment's time on ... such as hair metal and "nu metal" ... but I don't think it's "fake", I just think that it's not to my liking. If other people like it, fine, let them listen to that crap. I don't mind. 
Butcher Babies say they are inspired by Wendy O. Williams. Being as old as I am, I remember the Plasmatics being called fake by the real and true punk rockers. I didn't care then and I don't care now. I've always liked the Plasmatics, however gaudy they were. So what? Who gives a flying fuck? I'm not arrogant enough to think that my personal tastes should be some kind of template for anyone else to build their sense of art appreciation upon, no matter what amount of people who are in agreement about what's "good" or not. I like Butcher Babies for entirely different reasons than, say, King Diamond or Sacred Reich, but I do like them. Be that as it may, the main point here is that they are just musicians. This is not an important issue.
Then there are bands like So Much Hate, that in their time were held to be a prime example of "Norwegian hard core" in their main market, which was Germany, where they were tremendously popular. Other Norwegian HC acts didn't like that. They were said to be "fake" ... and more a metal band than a proper HC act. I guess that would make them a "metalcore" band, mainly because their guitarist Børre -- one of many musicians who died because of drugs during the 90s -- was too good for his own good in the hard-ass scene that was 80s Norwegian hardcore, where guitar solos and grand riffery was considered indulgent nonsense that had no place in the "real and true" hardcore.
 

You're welcome to your opinion about calling something fake/false being an "eternally weak" stance, but I'm standing by what I wrote. Other than appropriating the black nipple tape from Wendy O. Williams, there aren't really any similarities between Butcher Babies and Plasmatics. Their plastic balloon chests are there to sell albums, and the music makes that pretty clear. The "falsehood" is trying to pass off their music as anything less than a vehicle to that end, so I don't see how that label is in any way unwarranted.

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