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Music discussions: The Social Cafe Edition

horgen · 2009-11-17 03:31:12

I didn't see a music discussion thread be floating around the first 50 topics so I decided to make one myself... And lock it if you don't want it Julian. As usual I think we should start with telling what kind of music we usually listen to, what bands are our favourites and so on. But I would also like to discuss generalizations you've met/heard about the music you listen to or other genres. To start off with I got this excellent post from Something awful. Be warned though it insults a group of people, but that is not my intention with quoting it in this thread. [spoiler] http://www.somethingawful.com/d/your-band-sucks/metal.phpI tend to scoff at those unfortunate philistines who utter things like 'rap isn't real music,' or 'R&B is pure crap.' I tend to scoff at a lot of things, but those guys get deep scoffs, from the diaphragm. Genres are far too broad and diverse to be encompassed by such generalizations, right? I want to believe that no genre is inherently bad; most of them are quickly ruined by musicians, but the genres themselves contain some spark of an ideal that can't be corrupted. I try to make myself believe that, but one thing always gets in my way: heavy metal.I've never found the metal counterexample. If there's one metal track out there that disproves the notion that all metal is complete **** crap, I'd absolutely love to hear it. I would rest easy for the remainder of my days, comforted by the knowledge that my jolly, populist theories about music were confirmed. I've been searching for a non-horrible metal song like the Holy Grail, but whenever I find a cup to drink from, my face melts off like the Nazi in The Last Crusade.And no, metalheads, I'm not referring to the awesome power of Dragonforce's face-melting riffs. You're an idiot.(Let me define my terms here: bluesy hard-rock protometal like Zeppelin or Aerosmith is not what I'm talking about; that sucks for overlapping but nonidentical reasons. Nu-metal and rap metal are arguably even worse than vanilla metal, but they're not the subjects of this article. Particularly, I'm referring to anything from Iron Maiden onward: 80s British **** thrash, death metal, black metal, power metal, et cetera ad nauseum. Maybe not hair metal; in retrospect, it had its moments.)But in my futile longing to grasp that modest chalice, I've suffered quite a bit of metal. I used to think it was my fault that I found it so unfathomable. I wondered if some mental defect kept be from enjoying this vast cornucopia of music, from the troll-worshipingest death metal to the sword-swingingest glory metal, and everything between. I couldn't understand Pantera, I didn't get Iron Maiden, and I couldn't **** stand Metallica. As I grew older and more confident in the fact that most people other than me are idiots, it became clear that the defect wasn't mine.In all these years, I haven't seen a single satisfactory shred of evidence that heavy metal doesn't suck completely and utterly. I haven't heard any metal band isn't composed of stunted adolescence, half-assed rebellion, tongue-in-cheek stupidity, masturbatory pap, tuneless dirge, juvenile morbidity, retarded sexuality, or some nauseating combination of those elements. I haven't heard a single defense of its artistry that made a shred of sense. I haven't heard a 'serious' metal song that didn't sound comical. I haven't heard a fantasy metal song with anything **** interesting to say about dragons. I haven't heard anything, seen anything, read anything or met anyone who could convince me that metal, as a whole, is not artistically bankrupt, direly uncool, and irredeemably **** dumb. Not most of it. All of it.It's based on a kind of stupidity that I find impossible to comprehend. It looks and sounds so fundamentally opposite to art that my brain reels when I even try to consider the idea of enjoying it. It's so incomprehensible to me that I sometimes get the feeling that it's all a huge joke that everyone else is in on but me.Yes, I'm talking about an extremely vast, overarching genre encompassing countless subgenres and thousands of bands that I've never even heard or heard of. Yes, I'm talking about something I don't understand. Yes, I'm painting the dumbest fantasy metal and the most intricate symphonic metal in the same broad stroke.Maybe you listen to British metal from the early 80s, or you only listen to thrash, or you only listen to glory metal 'ironically.' I don't care. I'm saying it's all stupid as hell. I'm saying you're stupid as hell if you like it. I'm saying you're stupid as hell even if, maybe especially if, you like it even though you know it's stupid as hell.It may seem like I'm shooting fish in a barrel here. Metal is, with a few exceptions, critically ignored and popularly derided. Aside from holdover metal stars like Metallica, the above-ground music press couldn't give a single **** about metal; it's music for misfit nerds, sociopaths, big-haired whores and mulleted heshers. Cool wouldn't touch metal with a ten foot pole, and metalheads are so hopelessly uncool that they've developed their own laughable little chic around leather and headbanging. Despite all this, people continue to defend metal as an art and a life**** Even people who 'don't take metal seriously' often take it really **** seriously.I consider myself a public servant, so it always fills my heart with pride when I turn someone away from their ****ty taste. Unfortunately, this article can't do that. Metal fans are simply too entrenched in their own art-killing quagmire to be swayed by any rational argument. Their synapses are too brutalized by bluntness to recognize subtlety ever again; real music may be forever useless to them. I'm not asking them to stop listening to metal. I'm asking them to shut the **** up about it forever.Stop tainting our discussions. When the grown-ups are talking about real music, stay the **** out of it. If we're talking about ...

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