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This will be my own personal opinion. You, of course, are entitled to your own opinions, but they probably won't change mine, no matter how much you quote me and stuff.
To me, one of the most overrated bands is Mayhem. To all black metallers, I've probably just committed treason. "Your avatar is Under A Funeral Moon!" I hear hordes of people cry. To me, however, nothing about Mayhem's music stands out. Deathcrush isn't that impressive, De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas was outdated and pretty much obsolete in a few years and the rest of their crap is . . . well . . . crap. The only redeeming part of their discography is Live in Leipzig, only thanks to Dead. For black metal, little can beat the "unholy trinity" of A Blaze in the Northern Sky, Under A Funeral Moon and Transilvanian Hunger, plus Panzerfaust for good measure. Similarly, Burzum's first four albums are fantastic. Anything in Emperor's discography is brilliant and Ulver's first and third album are black metal classics. Mayhem, in my view, is only remembered because of the antics of Dead and Euronymous, who anyway were out-evil-ed by Varg Vikernes with his arson, murder and Nazi beliefs.
Another overrated band, again in my view, is Minor Threat. This is not so much because they were shadowed by other bands like Black Flag or Bad Brains, but for the simple fact that I don't like them very much. Ian MacKaye doesn't sound that great on vocals. Minor Threat, to me, just sounds like a bunch of angry teenagers bashing instruments (which to be fair they were probably doing anyway). Fugazi overshadows the band greatly, and Ian MacKaye sounds pretty good on that album.
I also feel that Ensiferum and Korpiklaani is overrated. That's not to say that I don't like both band's music (well to be fair I'm not a huge fan of Korpiklaani, but I really do like Ensiferum). I don't feel that they made as much of an impact as people claim they did, I don't see what's so fantastic about them, especially compared to bands like Eluveitie or Arkona. Part of that, for me, are their lyrics. I really hate the jovial attitude that they have to war and death, and for pity's sake Korpiklaani have a song called "Vodka"! Arkona has songs about Slavic paganism and Russian culture. Eluveitie have songs about the Gallic Wars, death and destruction, nature etc. To me, that's a lot more interesting than simply singing about drinking and fighting while drinking and partying while fighting while drinking.
The worst musician in the world? That's hard. Maybe Lil Wayne?
People often have a go at the 80s but the decade produced some excellent music. The Smiths, Joy Division, Sonic Youth, The Pixies, REM, Jesus and Mary Chain, Cocteau Twins, My Bloody Valentine. It could be argued that no decade since has produced quite that number of great bands.
Don't forget that, for extreme metal, the 80s was where it was. You had the emergence of thrash metal, followed by black metal, followed by death metal. Venom, Celtic Frost, Bathory, Death, Morbid Angel . . . For punk, you saw the diversification of the genre from just the Ramones or Damned clones, you had hardcore, grindcore, horror punk, UK84 and melodic hardcore. There was the Misfits, Black Flag, Bad Religion, Crass, etc. running around during the decade and being active.
Scream Bloody Gore, Under The Sign of the Black Mark, Suffer, Walk Among Us, Damaged, My War etc. were released during the decade. While black metal and death metal-wise the decade was soon to be eclipsed by the 90s, what with the 2nd Wave of Black Metal and bands such as Cannibal Corpse, Nile, In Flames, Dark Tranquility etc., 80s punk is often unmatched. No Horror Punk band has bettered Walk Among Us or Earth A.D., Damaged is still probably the definitive hardcore album, Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables is still gold, Suffer sounds amazingly good and who can forget Multinational Corporations?
dæl wrote: People often have a go at the 80s but the decade produced some excellent music. The Smiths, Joy Division, Sonic Youth, The Pixies, REM, Jesus and Mary Chain, Cocteau Twins, My Bloody Valentine. It could be argued that no decade since has produced quite that number of great bands
I could easily find tons of great bands from the 60's and 70's that being said there's still some great stuff that came out the 80's, but probably most music from any decade is mediocre or worst with a few innovators popping up once in awhile.
Could you find tons of great bands post millennium though? There really doesn't seem that many, although I may just be getting old.
For metal, then definitely.
Eluveitie, Arkona, Ensiferum, Agalloch, Alcest and Amon Amarth have all released great albums post-millennium. Listen to "Autre Temps" by Alcest or "In the Shadow of Our Pale Companion" by Agalloch if you don't believe me.
No, it's really that bad. I fething hate Black Veil Brides. It's taking the most commercial image ever in metal (glam + emo = their look) and selling it to 14 year old teenaged girls.
Albatross wrote: I checked them out expecting to be horrified, but they weren't all that bad. Don't get me wrong, if I was buying a copy of their record I'd hide it inside a porno mag as I left the store, to avoid embarrassment at having purchased it, but yeah... Not getting the hate.
Is this one of these ridiculous 'death to false metal' things?
Kind of . . . it's hard to understand if you don't like metal, but when the listener of DSBM or artsy post-black metal is lumped with these fethers, then you may understand.
Albatross wrote: I checked them out expecting to be horrified, but they weren't all that bad. Don't get me wrong, if I was buying a copy of their record I'd hide it inside a porno mag as I left the store, to avoid embarrassment at having purchased it, but yeah... Not getting the hate.
Is this one of these ridiculous 'death to false metal' things?
Kind of . . . it's hard to understand if you don't like metal, but when the listener of DSBM or artsy post-black metal is lumped with these fethers, then you may understand.
How do you know I don't like metal? I do like metal, as it happens. It's the schlock-y, viking-obsessed, pseudo-orchestral, quasi-Nazi, Odinist Black Metal rubbish I find ridiculous. And that is only because they take themselves so seriously.
I mean, come on.
Well, that's Immortal. They're a bunch of jokers, really. This is the lead guy Abbath giving an interview:
Anyway, the post-black metal stuff I was talking about is more this stuff:
Which is rather artistic and beautiful in parts. Compare that to:
I genuinely preferred the second one. Like, waaay more.
Don't get me wrong, I didn't love either of them. Each to their own, I guess.
Each to their own, I suppose, but I would have thought that overall the first one was a better crafted song with more intricacies than Black Veil Brides. You may prefer the second one, but the first is clearly a better song in terms of musicianship and the composition.
Out of curiosity, was it the harsh vocals that put you off, the utter pretentiousness of it or something else entirely?
As for bands taking themselves too seriously. Well, a lot of the guys in metal are very serious people. A lot of them probably are depressed as feth (I mean, try making DSBM when happy) and many probably are misanthropes. That's one end of the spectrum. Then you have the other side, the Folk metallers, who drink beer all day and dance to jigs all night. I don't know. Modern extreme metal (as in, modern forms (as in, post-90s stuff) such as 2nd wave black metal, melodic death metal, folk metal, post-black metal, Cascadian black metal (where you, Albatross, will find people that you probably never knew you hated so much - look at an interview with Aaron Weaver from Wolves in the Throne Room) and slam) probably is a weird thing to people not versed in the stuff. For some people I know (online, I don't know many people who listen to the same stuff as I do), listening to the Agalloch inspires images of nature, forests and snow.
It's a subgenre of doom metal. It's quite slow, but really heavy. Actually, thinking about it again, you may prefer death/doom, for example My Dying Bride:
No matter what comes in the future, Bathory will remain epic! Even if you don't like Quorthon's music, you have to accept that Bathory has created some of the best heavy metal music ever.
