To me, this is a weird chestnut I see a lot of people banging on. I mean, yeah metal wasn't as huge as it was in the 80's, but for people to say it died (and yeah, I know you're not saying that specifically)-- or more specifically, that it was the label's fault that it died--I'm not so sure. Honestly, labels have and always will sign whatever the people go for. It's not their fault that generation found bands like Nirvana, Peal Jam, Blink 182, and Green Day to be cool. Conversely, SONY signed Earache Records to major a distribution and marketing deal in the 90's, because they believed Carcass, Napalm Death, At The Gates etc would be huge mainstream acts. Many of those bands themselves landed major label deals that did not last long. Oh and let's not forget Roadrunner also getting major label push from Def Jam in the mid 90's as well. The labels definitely tried to push metal, but nobody bought it -- at least not compared to the amount of people that were buying alt rock, pop punk and grunge. It was the buyer's fault for metal not taking off in the 90's, not the label.