Metal is getting worse and worse

[stephen sawall]

This is pretty awful

 

[DanTravis62]

Oh I know the difference and why they do it, but that’s an excellent explanation.
I fucking love every band you mentioned.
Ulver’s “Nattens Madrigal” has got to be one of the most obvious examples of intentional ear rape the BM genre has to offer.
Those fuckers took their studio allowance, blew it on a band sports car, and recorded the album in the forest.
Now that’s BM AF!
On the other hand Bergtatt is my favorite Ulver and one of the most beautifully recorded BM albums ever.

Bergtatt and Nattens Madrigal are both amazing albums, and they are great examples of ways that black metal bands use production as another "instrument" to add vibe to the music they are making

There are bands that use more "modern" production styles in black metal too - Deathspell Omega, Ondskapt, Blut Aus Nord, and Watain all come to mind - but they always do a "modern" production with a twist. Something to make it unique and synergize with the music.

DsO uses modern production clarity to make the angelic choirs and weird off-time signatures stick out more, and so you can hear everything that's going on - if the production wasn't clear and concise, you literally could not hear what it going on in the labyrinthine riffs and time signatures.



Ondskapt is slow, sludgy, and more riff based (more of a Celtic Frost influence than most black metal bands) so it makes sense that they would use the big, clear, modern (ish) sounding production to synergize with their music



I wish death metal, thrash, metalcore and other extreme metal subgenres would use modern production clarity as another tool in the arsenal to get your music across instead of the copy-paste steven slate drums plus mid quack that they all use. I honestly think they could learn something about making your records sound more individual and identifiable from black metal bands.

 

[nightlight]

Yeah, my whole point is that i'm not going to give a band a chance to begin with if they have that production - I don't care what their budget is. I'm well aware of the realities, I worked in studios for years lol

The problem is that it hit a critical mass for many people years and years ago, and that's fine if budgets are a consideration - but if you can't make a record without programmed drums and the same drop z quack tone maybe you shouldn't be making a record?

I think the whole "shouldn't be making a record" is what we are moving towards. I saw a recent video where Behemoth frontman Nergal is saying that if you are thinking about starting a band in the first place, you should know that there are literally thousands of acts - with more releasing music every week - that are looking to grab a slice of the pie.

With streaming services, that essentially means that you are competing for pennies while the labels and the streaming platforms make the money. So rather than setting yourself up for destitution when you gave up a college degree and decent paying jobs, it's better to find work that allows you to support yourself and your family.

Most productions you don't hear are home productions, or productions with limited budgets. Most people can't even get any label interest after that self-produced release. Yet there are tonnes of bands singing pirate songs or viking songs or whatever getting music videos and airtimes.

The music itself doesn't matter, the look and style of the musicians does.

I remember how August Burns Red's musicians all had full time jobs. And how the guitarist or someone from some major band quit to make more money driving trucks. Or how one of the musicians in a band called Wormrot in Singapore used to deliver meals for food apps to make ends meet. Countless stories.

The glamour of being a metal musician is largely gone. The only ones who seem to be making any headway are acts who know someone directly or indirectly in the industry, just like in show business. And a lot of that involves spending money to make money by manipulating social media algorithms rather than through talent and hard work.

 

[DanTravis62]

I think the whole "shouldn't be making a record" is what we are moving towards. I saw a recent video where Behemoth frontman Nergal is saying that if you are thinking about starting a band in the first place, you should know that there are literally thousands of acts - with more releasing music every week - that are looking to grab a slice of the pie.

With streaming services, that essentially means that you are competing for pennies while the labels and the streaming platforms make the money. So rather than setting yourself up for destitution when you gave up a college degree and decent paying jobs, it's better to find work that allows you to support yourself and your family.

Most productions you don't hear are home productions, or productions with limited budgets. Most people can't even get any label interest after that self-produced release. Yet there are tonnes of bands singing pirate songs or viking songs or whatever getting music videos and airtimes.

The music itself doesn't matter, the look and style of the musicians does.

I remember how August Burns Red's musicians all had full time jobs. And how the guitarist or someone from some major band quit to make more money driving trucks. Or how one of the musicians in a band called Wormrot in Singapore used to deliver meals for food apps to make ends meet. Countless stories.

The glamour of being a metal musician is largely gone. The only ones who seem to be making any headway are acts who know someone directly or indirectly in the industry, just like in show business. And a lot of that involves spending money to make money by manipulating social media algorithms rather than through talent and hard work.

Nergal is 140000% correct.

We have too many people who want to play "metal" - wanna know how I know? Because there's freaking 400 trillion bands that sound exactly like most of those bands posted earlier in the thread.

I could literally shit out a record of music that sounds like that in maybe a month max. It's stupidly easy, there's no barrier to entry. There's thousands upon thousands of bedroom warriors with little to no talent that can easily make records that sound exactly like that.

And they do.

Add in distrokid and social media, and now we have a recipe for 400 trillion bedroom warrior musicians with shitty, lame ideas, who can learn the basics of music production in a year or two and churn out Alluvial or whatever that band was called over and over and over and over. And they have, because that's what has happened to metal the past 20 years.

Millions upon millions of people with garbage skills and no creativity - and guess what? The music sounds exactly like millions upon millions of people with garbage skills and no creativity.

Even the Label-backed, algorithm pushed, "check out this new kickass band" advertisements are these same talentless bedroom warriors now. And it sounds exactly like it.

 

[nightlight]

Nergal is 140000% correct.

We have too many people who want to play "metal" - wanna know how I know? Because there's freaking 400 trillion bands that sound exactly like most of those bands posted earlier in the thread.

I could literally shit out a record of music that sounds like that in maybe a month max. It's stupidly easy, there's no barrier to entry. There's thousands upon thousands of bedroom warriors with little to no talent that can easily make records that sound exactly like that.

And they do.

Add in distrokid and social media, and now we have a recipe for 400 trillion bedroom warrior musicians with shitty, lame ideas, who can learn the basics of music production in a year or two and churn out Alluvial or whatever that band was called over and over and over and over. And they have, because that's what has happened to metal the past 20 years.

Millions upon millions of people with garbage skills and no creativity - and guess what? The music sounds exactly like millions upon millions of people with garbage skills and no creativity.

Even the Label-backed, algorithm pushed, "check out this new kickass band" advertisements are these same talentless bedroom warriors now. And it sounds exactly like it.

Some might even be good, but we'll just never see or hear them. Alternatively, we'll give them 10 seconds of listening time and then scroll past because everyone now has ADD.

The algorithms have already been weaponised against ordinary people. A system of rewards and punishments for whatever you posted on social media to show you how things roll under the "New World Order", which is a misnomer because it's an autocratic, kleptocratic and pedophilic system.

Want to be successful? Pay Narc Suckerburger direct to have your album put on blast on Facebook and Instagram. If you fail to do so, you've lost and the money you spent on your album has been a waste.

Or, if you have the misfortune to be a girl in these dystopian times, show us your tits.

 

[DanTravis62]

Some might even be good, but we'll just never see or hear them. Alternatively, we'll give them 10 seconds of listening time and then scroll past because everyone now has ADD.

The algorithms have already been weaponised against ordinary people. A system of rewards and punishments for whatever you posted on social media to show you how things roll under the "New World Order", which is a misnomer because it's an autocratic, kleptocratic and pedophilic system.

Want to be successful? Pay Narc Suckerburger direct to have your album put on blast on Facebook and Instagram. If you fail to do so, you've lost and the money you spent on your album has been a waste.

Or, if you have the misfortune to be a girl in these dystopian times, show us your tits.

Yep that's exactly it.

There's so much complete and utter bullshit, the handful of truly excellent bands and artists (instead of being curated by labels, zines, tastemakers, college radio, and local stores/scenes and delivered directly through the information pipeline to you, the consumer) are completely BURIED in a mountain of bullshit talentless hacks that are using the exact same distrokid/youtube/instagram marketing plan they are.

Want a record deal? Oh nice, that means you're basically paying a middle man to pay narc zuckerberger (as you so eloquently put it) to put it on blast. That's quite literally all they do anymore. Or force you to take a terrible loan that will leave you in debt for the rest of your life! (ask me how I know)

But the thing is, this is exactly what you would expect the metal world to sound like with recording and technique "democratized" by the internet. Every jackass you knew in high school with a schecter and a backwards hat can now put out their "epic progressive deathcore album" that they always wanted to - with about 300$ total investment in gear (and that's being lavish, honestly)

And so what is metal now? It's 400 trillion albums of "Epic progressive deathcore" by the jackass with the backwards hat and the schecter you knew in high school. So what do Jinjer and Effluvia (or whatever that bands name was) sound like?

Epic progressive deathcore where they spent 3000$ instead of 300$ on the gear.

 

[Metalhex]

Altars of Madness and The Bleeding are perfect.
Maybe death metal isn't for you.

I love the music, I just can't hear the riffs clearly. Those early tones get buried in the mix. I think CC's Chaos Horrific guitars sound much clearer in comparison