Not my kind of music

Kim, there is a college station in our area (89.5 WSOU) that plays this genre
of music more than anything else.

I've always had a hard time classifying it.

It's not speed metal (not fast enough) and it's not thrash metal (drums are
all wrong). I hate just calling it heavy metal because it does a disservice
to heavy metal tunes from the good old days like Ministry, which was
actually Industrial Metal.

N.W.O from Psalm 69: The Way to Succeed and the Way to Suck Eggs
from 1992, is probably their most famous song.

Here it is:


It's an acquired taste.

I grew up during the early days of metal when it was really underground.
Most of the stuff, IMO, was unlistenable. There was a definite divide
between those who enjoyed hard rock (Stones, Who, Zep) and those who
listened to bands like Ministry and Nine Inch Nails (Trent Reznor is
considered a genius by these folks)

What most people don't realize is that Ministry started it all. The copycats
off of them and Nails are basically what permeate the air waves today.

In other words, if you've heard one, you've heard them all.

However, there is one band today that I like very much by the name of
Dragonforce. They're more musical than most. They also play extremely
fast. Their guitarists are pure technicians.

Heroes Of Our Time is probably their best song.


Watch these guys play...wow.

Anyway, that's what having no life does for you. You're full of totally
useless music trivia that nobody gives a rat's behind about.

But it's still a hell of a lot of fun.

Kim, the problem with music from the 90s on (and I'm assuming that this
is essentially what the problem is that you're objecting to) is twofold.

1. It has become more about money. Back in the old days, it didn't cost a
small fortune to produce an album or go on tour. Record labels (and there
were more big ones back in the day) could take a chance on an act, even
if it wasn't a big seller. So you heard a lot of music that, today, wouldn't
even get off the cutting room floor. Many of those old bands would have
no audience today...even if they did record.

2. Technology has taken over the artistic process. Even hard rock of the
70s (Zep, Uriah Heep) didn't have the tools at the disposal of bands today
so they really had to PLAY. It was more about the song and less about
the production. If you listen to a lot of old songs that you loved and
objectively listened to the production quality, in comparison to today's
music...it was horrible. Hell, back in the 50s, it was almost unlistenable.

A lot of what you hear today is so slickly done that you sometimes wonder
if it was simply manufactured with a drum machine and a computer.

The sad part is, if you want to hear stuff like Dylan, it's there...just not on
the radio. I could play you some local bands that really have some nice
stuff. My daughter works at many clubs with her friend who books acts
that actually, as he says, "contribute something new to the music scene."

He is also jaded on today's popular music, but you'll never hear any of
these bands on the radio...ever.

I try to listen to all kinds of music objectively and try to find something
positive to say about just about anything, which I can do with few
exceptions. For me, rap is what killed it for me as far as listening to top
40 radio. I don't so much mind the pop stuff like Backstreet Boys, NSync
and stuff like that, but after a while, even they start to get on my nerves.

Back in the late 90s, there was a group called Jellyfish. They were a cross
between the Beatles and The Beach Boys. They were really, really good.

Here they are performing live on the UK show The Beat


Music didn't die in the 90s Kim.

It's just so damn hard to find anything worth listening to since then.

Ha ha - yeh your daughter has taste Kim - that is a CUTE guy (lead guitarist) who will suffer whiplash forever (tell me about it) Oh it is so cool to toss your hair - (she says after decades of chiropractic manipulation)

Yes Pat, same guys.

It's from the album Twitch which was their second studio album.

I followed them for a long time back in the early days, but after about 6
years of heavy metal, industrial, thrash, glam metal and so on, I kind of
burned myself out and actually stopped listening to anything for about
5 years until my daughter was like 5. I then started to listen to country
and got into folks like Vince Gil, Travis Tritt and John Michael Montgomery
whose "Life's A Dance" is one of my favorite songs of all time. There are
no versions other than covers on YouTube that I can find, so I'm going
to guess that the record company (another feud with YouTube) has
requested they all be taken down.

Getting back to metal, as you get older (at least for me) I just don't
see how you can listen to a steady diet of that stuff. It really begins to
sound like noise as the ears start to age.

Gary, not a lot of people do.

The distinctions among these genres are incomprehensible. It's essentially an ongoing battle to place labels in just the right way, so all the music you like has the same label, and any music you don't like has a different one. It's just juvenile.

I do distinguish between black metal vocals, which are a "shrieking" style, and death metal vocals - which are the "growling" style heard on the video. But when you come right down to it, I prefer combination styles that actually involve... well, singing: