Ok, this is another problem. I'm going to use Edguy as an example because they are currently doing this to their music. It's funny that gorobschnitt mentions power metal being in trouble. I have noticed that bands like Edguy are trying to ditch the power metal sound in favor of a more hard rock vibe. This is problematic for the same reason that I mentioned earlier...that 80's hair band connection. By trying to sound like that I believe that Edguy (and Tobias) is really shooting himself in the foot trying to get an American audience. The speedier stuff (thanks to Dragonforce/Guitar Hero) actually has peaked some interest, but the timing for these bands reverting to hard rock is not good. Kamelot also seems to be doing this with Ghost Opera. I actually think that Symphony X would do good to release a track like The Accolade, because I have let people that into classic rock hear that and they love it. It just seems ironic to me that these bands are turning their sound towards 80's metal/hard rock. Personally I liked that music, but they need to look at what happened to those bands as a result.
Why does the media ignore power metal in the States?
- Thread starter TheGraveDigger
- Start date
Ok, this is another problem. I'm going to use Edguy as an example because they are currently doing this to their music. It's funny that gorobschnitt mentions power metal being in trouble. I have noticed that bands like Edguy are trying to ditch the power metal sound in favor of a more hard rock vibe. This is problematic for the same reason that I mentioned earlier...that 80's hair band connection. By trying to sound like that I believe that Edguy (and Tobias) is really shooting himself in the foot trying to get an American audience. The speedier stuff (thanks to Dragonforce/Guitar Hero) actually has peaked some interest, but the timing for these bands reverting to hard rock is not good. Kamelot also seems to be doing this with Ghost Opera. I actually think that Symphony X would do good to release a track like The Accolade, because I have let people that into classic rock hear that and they love it. It just seems ironic to me that these bands are turning their sound towards 80's metal/hard rock. Personally I liked that music, but they need to look at what happened to those bands as a result.
Claus / Intromental
20 years of uniting the powers of metal
Why is the power/prog scene in so big trouble? Well, besides all the points made by several people on this thread, the post from Gorobschnitt brings me to another important point; dishonest people. Unfortunately this business is full of them, both from promoters, bands, managements and labels. It's sickening to be honest.
That guy, Mark from Metalfest UK, might have lost lots of money on his festival, but apparently he has no problem leaving others with a huge debt too. We (Intromental) paid for flights to the festival for one of our bands, and the agreement we had said that Mark was going to reimburse us prior to the show. He didn't. He didn't pay AFTER the show either, nor has he responded to a ton of mails from us after the festival-disaster.
Funny thing: the guy is STILL arranging local shows in the UK. How can that be?
To be totally honest with you, a guy like this in my book counts as nothing but a thief!
With this happening too many times, either promoters never paying, or bands (!!!) leaving us with huge debts, there's no way we'll ever again pay upfront for bands plane tickets for going to any shows around the world. Once bitten, twice shy ... right? What this means is that unless the festival OR the band is willing to pay upfront, the bands won't be playing out - at least not on our account.
So, this is another reason for why this scene is so screwed up.
Claus
That guy, Mark from Metalfest UK, might have lost lots of money on his festival, but apparently he has no problem leaving others with a huge debt too. We (Intromental) paid for flights to the festival for one of our bands, and the agreement we had said that Mark was going to reimburse us prior to the show. He didn't. He didn't pay AFTER the show either, nor has he responded to a ton of mails from us after the festival-disaster.
Funny thing: the guy is STILL arranging local shows in the UK. How can that be?
To be totally honest with you, a guy like this in my book counts as nothing but a thief!
With this happening too many times, either promoters never paying, or bands (!!!) leaving us with huge debts, there's no way we'll ever again pay upfront for bands plane tickets for going to any shows around the world. Once bitten, twice shy ... right? What this means is that unless the festival OR the band is willing to pay upfront, the bands won't be playing out - at least not on our account.
So, this is another reason for why this scene is so screwed up.
Claus
HA and I'm pretty sure most of them have vacation homes in Florida, Specifically in Tampa or Orlando
gorobschnitt
Member
I deliberately didnt put much detail in about Metalfest UK. You are right, from what I understand Mark left a number of people out of pocket over this and Rockfest, both bands and helpers. I helped out with some catering people over that weekend and met loads of the bands who had serious doubts but were great guys and put on good shows. Mark was seriously out of his depth and despite sound advice from others in the business went ahead with a really ambitious project. From what I have heard he is not continuing to promote, has been very ill and to be honest I cannot believe he has a bean left to do anything being up to his neck in loans! I too have not heard a word from him. You are right though, it just screws everybody and no-one will venture out without seeing the money up front. I seriously thought about getting into the business myself but the experiences of Mark and others just demonstrates that there just isnt the punters out there who want to see this type of music at the moment. I shall remain a happy spectator!
On a lighter note, Metalfest was a fantastic weekend depite it all - Brainstorm and primordial were best of the bunch.
Dead Winter
STAHP
Metal in this form killed itself and has nothing but itself to blame. You can whine and cry all day that grunge killed it, and that may be partly true, but it wasn't because people were impressed with their technical prowess or anything...they started writing GOOD SONGS, and not songs about slaying dragons or drinking and partying.
Alice in Chains and Soundgarden were grungy metal-ish bands for all intents and purposes who knew how to write good music. They wrote music because they had something to say in their own way. Not one single grunge band sounds like another...you can't really say that about a big chunk of the power/progressive/flashback metal bands out there. Grunge bands didn't care about what people thought of them, they didn't have snotty attitudes, and they didn't care about the random dork guitarist out in the audience pointing and laughing because the guitarist wasn't shredding onstage. They wrote SONGS, not scales rammed together with a vocalist to sing over the top of it.
Now, it should be said that I like literally every single form of metal (maybe except for metalcore). If it's good music, then it's good music. If it's not, then it's not.
Before you all start hurling insults, of course not every single prog/power band falls into this category...I'm not broadbrushing an entire genre. However, sadly, there are a whole heap of bands these days that personify the following:
You should also take into consideration the leanings of society and how it has changed over the years. People want things heavier and more extreme every day and that reflects in the popularity of some of these relatively big name bands today. Bands like Gojira would never have made it to their popularity of today if it were 15 years ago. Also, to be fair, many prog/power bands use the same modes and scales over and over and over again. It's really bright, poppy, and cheerful most of the time. When they want to write something a little darker and sinister, they think about it. They think, "A major scale wouldn't be useful here, and the average Phrygian is overused, so maybe I'll use a harmonic minor or Phrygian dominant, blah blah blah...". Creating music with feeling requires *gasp*.......FEELING! You can't manufacture feeling. Just because a song is theoretically dark-sounding based on the mode doesn't mean it's gonna convey the feeling you're looking for.
It has to be natural; it has to come from within, not "Let's put a galloping riff on the low E string (or B string for a 7 string...just because it's downtuned doesn't mean it's heavy), then let's sing an octave lower and then use the right scale for it." It doesn't work that way. Prog/power metal is notorious for being unable to write a simple, bone-crushing riff. Tuning is irrelevant; if it's a cheesy riff, you can be tuned to A like Nile and it's still gonna sound cheesy. You can cover it up with as many polyrhythms and odd time signatures as you want and try and impress your friends, but if it's shit then it's shit.
Alice in Chains' new album is better than anything "metal" has put out in the last ten years.
Alice in Chains and Soundgarden were grungy metal-ish bands for all intents and purposes who knew how to write good music. They wrote music because they had something to say in their own way. Not one single grunge band sounds like another...you can't really say that about a big chunk of the power/progressive/flashback metal bands out there. Grunge bands didn't care about what people thought of them, they didn't have snotty attitudes, and they didn't care about the random dork guitarist out in the audience pointing and laughing because the guitarist wasn't shredding onstage. They wrote SONGS, not scales rammed together with a vocalist to sing over the top of it.
Now, it should be said that I like literally every single form of metal (maybe except for metalcore). If it's good music, then it's good music. If it's not, then it's not.
Before you all start hurling insults, of course not every single prog/power band falls into this category...I'm not broadbrushing an entire genre. However, sadly, there are a whole heap of bands these days that personify the following:
You should also take into consideration the leanings of society and how it has changed over the years. People want things heavier and more extreme every day and that reflects in the popularity of some of these relatively big name bands today. Bands like Gojira would never have made it to their popularity of today if it were 15 years ago. Also, to be fair, many prog/power bands use the same modes and scales over and over and over again. It's really bright, poppy, and cheerful most of the time. When they want to write something a little darker and sinister, they think about it. They think, "A major scale wouldn't be useful here, and the average Phrygian is overused, so maybe I'll use a harmonic minor or Phrygian dominant, blah blah blah...". Creating music with feeling requires *gasp*.......FEELING! You can't manufacture feeling. Just because a song is theoretically dark-sounding based on the mode doesn't mean it's gonna convey the feeling you're looking for.
It has to be natural; it has to come from within, not "Let's put a galloping riff on the low E string (or B string for a 7 string...just because it's downtuned doesn't mean it's heavy), then let's sing an octave lower and then use the right scale for it." It doesn't work that way. Prog/power metal is notorious for being unable to write a simple, bone-crushing riff. Tuning is irrelevant; if it's a cheesy riff, you can be tuned to A like Nile and it's still gonna sound cheesy. You can cover it up with as many polyrhythms and odd time signatures as you want and try and impress your friends, but if it's shit then it's shit.
Alice in Chains' new album is better than anything "metal" has put out in the last ten years.
nomisofsiman
Member
This is the sort of thing that just makes me sick to my stomach. Sometimes I wonder where human decency is gone. This guy should be reprimanded for his actions in one way or another.
Jasonic
Doom On!
While I am not the biggest grunge fan, I do have to agree with this.
The grunge scene was bred out of the same DIY ethics of punk rock.
The early bands worked really hard to get where they are at, self promoting, and trying to differentiate one from another.
I got turned off of power metal for a couple years about 3 to 4 years ago when many of the long running bands started releasing clunkers. Let's face it, many of our favorites go in this bucket (IE - Sonata Arctica, HammerFall, Rhapsody, etc, etc)
dcowboys311
Member
This is really what needs to happen to metal for people to regain interest. Atlanta has a pretty good DIY metal scene (aside from Hoyt's!). Shows have been getting bigger and bigger, and more bands seem to be popping up. We've gotten lots of bands from other places doing the DIY touring thing too.
DIY is what builds a scene.
This is pretty much true for every style of music. That's why the best death metal bands right now are very young bands just doing the old style of death metal. All the old bands (Obituary, Morbid Angel, etc) just aren't really putting anything memorable out.
Diabolik
Member
Dead Winter
STAHP
The funny thing is the bands that grunge influenced the most are the crappiest bands on the planet who all sound the same. Creed, Daughtry, Nickelback, etc.
I literally cannot count how many American baritone singers there are anymore.
Jasonic
Doom On!
Dude, we both have!!
It seems these days many local bands think that all you need to do to promote a show is tell people on Facebook and my Space. Sure, it will attract attention. I guess I come from the days where if you were in a band, and had a show, for many weekends prior, you would spend driving all over the city and suburbs dropping off flyers everywhere (bars, clubs, coffee shops, record stores, etc, etc).
I have said it before, and I know I will get slammed here.
There seems to be an overall "rockstar entitlement" feeling about many bands in the metal scene.
No band is above playing any show, in any slot.
No metal band is selling out football stadiums in the states.
Sometimes you need to put a little short term pride aside for potential long term gain and the ability to remain as a going concern as a band.
I was reading through the Seventh Wonder forum on here and was reminded of this. Now, especially with Symphony X about to release a new CD from Nuclear Blast they should jump on this. Of course within the links Harmonix also gives reasons why "your band" should be in Rock Band. This is the post originally posted by Browncoat in the Seventh Wonder forum. I still think this is the best shot for a lot of power/progressive bands to be heard. I actually like All That Remains now, due to playing it in Guitar Hero 2...and I never thought I could get into metalcore at all. And there are a lot of kids now having awesome experiences playing the "Boston" track pack. I know I loved those songs before but now it's like the ultimate Boston experience. LOL!
mtaffer
"Hi everyone,
I'm writing to inform the band of the Rock Band Network, which is a system that allows any artist/band to have their music transposed for the Rock Band video game. You guys may have heard of this already. I think that not only would SW's music be absolutely awesome to play on the game, it would be a tremendous tool to get the band to reach more ears.
More information can be found here:
http://creators.rockband.com/
These are two different groups that will transpose music into playable Rock Band songs:
http://www.rockgamerstudios.com/about/
http://www.rhythmauthors.com/faq.php
I believe the band can set the price to download the song(s), the range is like $1 - $4 I think."
mtaffer
"Hi everyone,
I'm writing to inform the band of the Rock Band Network, which is a system that allows any artist/band to have their music transposed for the Rock Band video game. You guys may have heard of this already. I think that not only would SW's music be absolutely awesome to play on the game, it would be a tremendous tool to get the band to reach more ears.
More information can be found here:
http://creators.rockband.com/
These are two different groups that will transpose music into playable Rock Band songs:
http://www.rockgamerstudios.com/about/
http://www.rhythmauthors.com/faq.php
I believe the band can set the price to download the song(s), the range is like $1 - $4 I think."
Claus / Intromental
20 years of uniting the powers of metal
I think we actually talked about this issue before (it might have been on another forum though), but the big problem here is the RIGHTS to do it. If a band has assigned the copyrights to different publishers (or even record labels) in different territories, it's going to be hard to re-obtain the rights to put the music on RockBand. There's a lot of politics that goes into re-distribution of musical copyrights, and a band that's signed (to either label or publisher) can not just go out and "upload" their own material at free will for everyone to download/use.
c.
nomisofsiman
Member
Ditto. I think a lot of metal bands are just flat out lazy and feel like someone else should promote for them. This is the problem with even the more successful metal bands. They bitch about not having enough sales or tickets, yet they don't do much promotion themselves and that's where it's all at.
dcowboys311
Member
Hey AeonicSlumber, is your name a Dissection reference? listening to Reinkaos for the first time in years and it just hit me.
TribunalRecords
Record Label(s)/Vocalist
getting into this a little late, but the exact same thing can be said about power metal. to the average music consumer they too could not differentiate between Kamelot, Rhapsody, Hammerfall, etc etc ad naseum.
if you love a genre you will be able to tell a difference between bands for the obvious reason that YOU pay attention to.
not defending anything, but slagging a genre of music as a whole because it "sounds the same" is kind of silly.
it's a genre of music BECAUSE it sounds alike in some fashion. hence the pretty goofy things like differences between "power metal" and "symphonic power metal" how lame can we be as metal heads and expect to be taken seriously at some point??!
i say we just all go back to loving the M E T A L, regardless of what genre it is. metal is metal, period. we are a minority, why segment ourselves into even smaller groups?
we will never make the impact we hope to make doing it the way we have.
TribunalRecords
Record Label(s)/Vocalist
johan68
Member
Maybe AS actually is Jon talking to us from the grave...
They do have a a lot in common. Highly intelligent but with social skills of a wood chipper...
ICEDEARTHFAN
IN MEMORY.....
getting into this a little late, but the exact same thing can be said about power metal. to the average music consumer they too could not differentiate between Kamelot, Rhapsody, Hammerfall, etc etc ad naseum.
if you love a genre you will be able to tell a difference between bands for the obvious reason that YOU pay attention to.
not defending anything, but slagging a genre of music as a whole because it "sounds the same" is kind of silly.
it's a genre of music BECAUSE it sounds alike in some fashion. hence the pretty goofy things like differences between "power metal" and "symphonic power metal" how lame can we be as metal heads and expect to be taken seriously at some point??!
i say we just all go back to loving the M E T A L, regardless of what genre it is. metal is metal, period. we are a minority, why segment ourselves into even smaller groups?
we will never make the impact we hope to make doing it the way we have.
Ozzy once said he didn't understand all the different types of metal.To him it's all rock.
AMBR
Metal Grandma
I think there are a lot of things Ozzy doesn't understand.
But I do agree, the genre differentiation has gone too far and makes little practical sense.
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