Check out this site, friggin hilarious! http://www.entertainment.inuk.com/music/numetalguide.html Here's one of the funnier articles... How to form your own Nu-Metal band. By following these simple and easy to follow guide you too can form your own nu-metal band, musical proficiency not needed. 1) You must cover an 1980s novelty song for your debut release. This is not an option 2) You need a gimmick. This is essentially important for the vocalist (they're not singers) be it bullied at school, self-mutilation, playing the bagpipes or spooky appearance. 3) Recruit a female bassist. This will lead to initial magazine exposure before the critics notice you can't actually play. By this time you will have built up a hardcore following of teenage boys. 4) Write some songs. About 12 will fill up an album. Don't worry about B-Sides, use crap remixes instead. A whole remix album would be perfect! 5) Incorporate a trendy DJ member into the band for that 21st Century feel. 6) Claim to be "down" with your fans. Express your thoughts on topics you have no clue about such as the Presidential elections and rage how much Britney Spears sucks. Never speak up about anything remotely important. 7) Recruit lots of band members. About eight or nine is about right. Having three members is so passe nowadays. 8) Request famed nu-metal produced Ross Robinson to produce your debut. He will declare it to be most intense, pissed-off music ever released. Until the next one. 9) Claim Black Sabbath are your favourite band. Even if you've never heard of them, it's just cool to declare the Brummies as 'gods'. 10) Get the music press to compare your band to the Deftones and Tool and moan about how much you hate the comparisons. Put across that your own band are here to save music from all the rubbish currently in the charts even if your band are indeed rubbish. That s**t is so true! There's a lot of other really funny things on that site, so check it out.
This actually made me this about what the backlash to this will be. During the past decade we have gone from the 80's poppy metal to depressing grunge to peppy Ska/Swing dancing fad that was around for a few years. The backlash to the swing dancing was this "I'm such a badass, look at me" Nu-metal fad. Well this will die too, otherwise I will if this is what I have to listen to the next few years. So what do you guys predict? My prediction? If Grunge as coming back, more bands would have followed Puddle of Mudd through the doorway. That's not happening. It's not going to be Punk, that probably won't ever become mainstream cause what would they do then... hate themselves? What about Techno? Hah, no way. There's too many non-extacy users out there to make that The Music today. (Hah, joke people.... I'm into Techno and have never used extacy myself.) Besides, Moby a few years back was the closest we'll get to having techno being the trend. We know the music coming will have a much lighter tone to it, possibly even a happy sound to it. It will have more talent and more creativity than the nu-metal because there is none in that. So we're seeing a huge boom from these psuedo-punk bands and emo-esque bands. Good Charlotte and Sum 41 are noth getting pretty big. Other bands like Jimmy Eat World are also getting a lot more airplay. We're definately going towards this poppy-punk/mid-90's alternative mixed with a whiney voice. I welcome it. Jimmy Eat World, Good Charlotte, poppy-emo/wanna-be punk is tons better than hearing Limp Bizkit scream about nookies and cookies, or Aaron Lewis sing about how every waking moment of his life just cometely sucks ass ( he's probably really singing showtunes inside of his head), or this rap-rock that was cool before Kid Rock and Fred Durst came along when it was like just the Beastie Boys and Run-DMC with Aerosmtih. Biohazard douing with whoever that was in the mid 90's was the downfall of rap-rock. I mean seriously... Canada is making the same music we are, shouldn't that tell us something? God that's pathetic. (To the canadians out there... just a joke! ) As someone mentioned in the Omaha thread... Right on.
Fads usually fade when the kids who listen to them grow up. Having said that I thin NU-Metal has been on the downslide since 2000. Basically we are at a point where copycat and cookie cutter bands are the only thing coming out. Thats too bad for the GOOD Metal bands out there but the genre is basically dead. I myself have noticed a REAL drop in attendance at shows. Its not like it used to be from the mid to late 90's. Maybe it has to do with the fact that every show is like $30+, but I also like to think that its because its fading. That's good for metalheads like myself cause that means prices go down and bands play smaller arenas. But thats all depending on wether the bands continue or not.
MTV hasn't pushed nu metal out the door yet. They're still playing bands like Korn, Papa Roach,Chevelle,Taproot. The fact that they still play these bands and also play the garage rock bands like The White Stripes,Hives, Vines,etc. leads me to believe that the days are over where their have been only 1 form of mainstream rock music. It seems that now and in the future their is room in the mainstream for many different kinds of rock music to coexist together at the same time.
Maybe its time for the hair/glam rock bands in the mid-80's tradition to come back: Ratt, Motley Crue, Poison, etc. At the time they irritated me (being a punker) but now looking back on them, they were sort of upbeat and lively, unlike the morose and dour metal of today. I think Poison said it best: Ain't lookin' for nothin' but a good time And it don't get better than this
my take again, it goes in cycles...sometimes people want politically/socially significant music, sometimes they don't: 1950s: sweet, happy lyrics (think beatles) 1960s: politically charged lyrics (think the Who) 1970s: sweet, diversionary disco (think bee gees) 1980s: back to political again (think u2, clash) 1990s: utter crap (limp bizkit) 2000s: back to socially significant stuff (my prediction) as evidence for this i present you with a band called desaparecidos. their first and only album is a diatribe against the growing commercialism in their home town. my thinking is that this is going to be the trend for the next decade or so... expand your horizons: http://www.thedesa.fsnet.co.uk/
Re: my take Okay. But if the 90's were, as you say, a 'down' cycle for political music, then how do you explain NWA, Public Enemy, and Rage Against the Machine, among others?
Re: Re: my take ask anyone 20 years from now and i guarantee they won't mention those bands when asked about 90s music. i guarantee it. those bands did not define the decade. ask someone about the 90s and they'll say britney spears, nsync and limp bizkit/linkin park. listen, i'm not saying i agree with it or that it makes any sense, i'm just saying...it is what it is. nirvana were in the 90s but people don't think of them when they think of 90s rock...
Re: Re: Re: my take I do. I totally think of grunge as the 90's. Anything at about '98 or later I'll lump into this Nu-metal Limp Bizkit genre. Nirvana and Grunge dominated the 90's, it was only about two or so years that it was Britney and Fred that ruled during the 90's. That list above way to opinionated to much much value in. When I think of the 80's I think Montley Crue, Bon Jovi, etc... not U2 and the clash. When I think of the 70's it's all about The Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, crap like Foghat, etc... Ask someone else what they think of when they think of those eras and they will tell you something totally different. Too much happens in a decade to slap a label on it.
Hah... well right now I'm thanking god for MP3's and Kazaa otherwise I wouldn't be listening to any new music at all. I live for "The 90's at noon" a local radio station does. I can't stand any of the new mainstream stuff.