This article is so incredibly valid

[Alex]

You know what I hate? I hate talking about heavy music with people who don't listen to heavy music. Not like your mom who's NEVER heard heavy music (my mom described my band's sound to us as "ju-juh-juh-juh-juh-juh" to us a few weeks ago, right around the same time my boss, who is a really lovely person but not too hip with the kids, played me a slide guitar based Christmas song and asked me "is this metal?"). I'm talking about someone who THINKS they listen to heavy music but has never come within ten feet of it.

The conversation usually goes something like this:

---

Some Fucking Idiot: Dude. Have you heard the new Tool record?

Me: No.

SFI: Dude. Dude. Seriously. It's like... the HEAVIEST fucking record ever. It might even be heavier than The Great Southern Trendkill. I NEVER thought anyone would pull that off, but Tool totally did it!

Me: Sounds great.

SFI: Yeah. I mean, after that last Disturbed record wasn't as heavy as their first record, I was pretty down on metal, but the new Tool record totally turned me around.

Me: Cool. Good for you.

SFI: So you like heavy music, right?

Me: Yeah.

SFI: Like what? Slipknot?

Me: Well, no. Like, uh, lately I've been listening to Esoteric, and the last Neurosis record was pretty heavy, and, hmmm... The new Ancestors album is pretty thick sounding. Here, take a listen...

SFI: Hmmm... This is okay. But they're just ripping off Pantera.

Me: (Head explodes)

AND... Scene!

---

So yeah. A couple of years ago, a whole bunch of my students showed up to class wearing matching Tool shirts. This was the tour when they had Isis opening for them. I asked them how the show was and they gushed. I asked them how Isis was and they said that Isis was a "weak-ass, pussy, bunch of Tool-wannabes." Now while it's definitely true that Isis has gone more in that direction in the last couple years, there's this weird blinder thing that people have where they have a total inability to tell a band that's "heavy" from a band that "uses distortion."

Here, then, are my criteria for heavy bands:

1) Thick sound- not scooped, like Pantera, but THICK. Metallica are not particularly "heavy" just because they have some guitar distortion. The sound should feel like it's fucking engulfing you.

2) Riffy and/or doomy- if the riffs aren't pushing that thick sound towards its logical end by showing it off in sludgy riffs, then it's not heavy. Therefore, just chugging on low chords is not necessarily heavy. Feeling like you're being kicked in the gut by mean-ass riffs is fucking heavy.

3) See items 1) and 2). That's fucking it.

To assist you in making the mental connections necessary, here's my list of bands that are fucking heavy vs. bands that people say are heavy, but aren't particularly heavy:

HEAVY
Cavity
Neurosis
Asunder
Buried At Sea
Bongripper
Ocean
Ocean Chief
Sunn O)))
Reverend Bizarre
Esoteric
Corrupted
Dirge
Boris (when they feel like it)
LentO
Pelican (on their first two albums)
Deadbird
God's Temple of Family Deliverance
Men in Search of the Perfect Weapon
Rosetta
Seven Nautical Miles
Tides
Weedeater
Sleep (on Dopesmoker)
Juicfer (on the Lambs ep, mostly)
etc.

NOT HEAVY
Tool (I cannot stress this enough)
Pantera, save a few songs (once again, I cannot stress this enough)
Metallica
Danzig
Deicide
Emperor
Almost anything which the words "Nu" or "metal" can be applied to
etc.

Please note that I like many bands which are not heavy, including a few of the ones listed above. I'm just intensely bothered by the utilization of the term "heavy" to describe any band which flips the distortion on.

We have to have some fucking standards here, people.

So there you have it.

I guess that I'm MOSTLY just irritated when people listen to mediocre music and then when you say "hey, you should check this out, too" take the attitude of "why would I listen to that when it's automatically a pale imitator of this much bigger band which I heard first?" I feel like I've tried to convince so many people who are into some of the above mentioned bands to check out stuff that's the same idea, but better, only to be met with a totally blank stare which seems to say "but Tool invented music. Why would I listen to anything else?"

We geniuses are always unappreciated in our time.

Awesome read

 

[Celes Chere]

Like what? Slipknot?

This is okay. But they're just ripping off Pantera.

How could you be so calm in such a situation.

 

[Alex]

Holy shit, I've just discovered this article is ten times more win than I previously thought because it mentions Tides

 

[CK]

lolz these guys are a good laugh.

 

[crevaxa]

IDK how he wrote an entire article about heavy music and failed to mention Black Sabbath.

 

[Cthulhu]

I'm also missing Korn, but that would probably fall under the 'nu' denominator. Also, yeh i agree lol!!!!1!

But also on a less detailed level. 99% of music will never reach the ears of 90% of those that listen to music, so when people listen to Tool, Metallica, or what-have-you (and those are just examples, feel free to insert 'Akon', 'Pussycat Dolls', or whatever shit kids listen to these days), and claim it's the best evar, they're wrong - both because they just are, and because they can't make such a statement without knowing their music.

I mean, this kid (ish) I live with, short, 'hip', chav, you know the type, who claims to have converted to Christianity a while back (but fails at that since I can disprove all of his claims whilst knowing more about the subject, lol), ANYWAYS, this kid came to me once going 'omg dude check dis out its awesoem', and made me listen to some leaked track by Akon. I was wtf, it's the exact same as all the other shit he's put on radio etc, and it's still a default beat, default 'lyrics', with the dude's altered voice in the exact same manner as all his last albums.

No evolution, nothing new, original, or requiring even an inch of talent. People that think that is good music, imo, don't know their music and/or are musically shallow.




/rant. Also, I'm musically shallow.

 

[CK]

99% of mainstream music isn't about being ground breaking and intelligent. It's about how many records they can sell for their greedy jewish record company.

 

[Cthulhu]

Jewish indeed. Then again, you'd think there'd be a surge of good music back in the late '30s / '40s last century, which, afaik, didn't happen :/.

 

[Ⓐaron]

I disagree on his criteria for heavy bands, to me it sounds like he's saying just slow, doomy stuff is heavy, which means by that scale stuff like Gorguts and Immolation would be less heavy than stuff like Reverend Bizarre and Isis. Also, I don't know how teh f00k he managed to make a long list of heavy doom bands without mentioning Electric Wizard.

That said though, I do agree with the main point of the article, which is that discussing metal with people who don't listen to metal is phail.

 

[CK]

Aaron there's a lot of bands. Someone is always going to miss one you know.

 

[CK]

btw alex when you get unbanned find me a link for starkweathers Croatoan. D:

 

[Ⓐaron]

Aaron there's a lot of bands. Someone is always going to miss one you know.

While true, I'm just surprised at Electric Wizard being omitted since they've so frequently been labelled the heaviest band ever (which I'd dispute, but not by much).

 

[CK]

send me some links to their works on msn?

 

[Ⓐaron]

cba atm, remind me later.

 

[Edley]

Was never a big fan of Electric Wizard, if you're gonna play that sludgy you might as well just be called Chopped and Screwed.

I'll take Cult of Luna for that title.

 

[Ⓐaron]

Cult of Luna are pretty awesome. The self-titled album, Salvation, and Somewhere Along the Highway are all classics. Still haven't gotten into the other two yet, apart from individual songs.

At the moment I'd have to say Kayo Dot's Choirs of the Eye is one of the heaviest albums I've ever encountered. The guitars on their own aren't the reason it's so heavy; it's the combination of the emotional intensity + musical complexity + occasional dissonance + distorted guitar sound + huge, crushing riffs. Though obviously it's not heavy from start to finish, but the mood never really lets up until the end, which is awesome.

The rest of their stuff isn't as heavy, unfortunately, but it's pretty awesome and it'll take several moar listens for me to wrap my brain about it. For now I'm just enjoying Choirs as much as I can.