Moritz excerpted one part of a long, ongoing email discussion between I didn’t say I *never* listen to modern metal — I said I „nearly never A contemporary metal band in my view is any band which was formed since As far as I’m concerned, any band which was originally formed before the Helstar, the great 80s heavy\/thrash band, just released a new record on Now let me give two examples of true contemporary bands, who sprang into Gitarrist von Slough Feg<\/p><\/div>\n I admire Slough Feg very much. Their music is distinctive, technically Edguy, on the other hand, easily fit into the European Symphonic Power To infer, therefore, that I’m somehow prejudiced against contemporary Look, the point I was making to Moritz is that the music business has Gamma Ray, whom I love dearly, are constantly under fire from the press, There are exceptions to every rule, and I’m sure each of you could find I don’t believe that anyone is particularly to blame for this shift in I can certainly see why the rush to specialization occurred, I just Could we ever have another Queen or another Rush in this modern The gripes I have with this contemporary musical climate have nothing to (Raphael Tehan)<\/em><\/p>\n
\nhim and me, during which many thoughts about the music industry had been
\ndeveloped and discussed. The dialogue had developed a kind of resultant
\nshorthand: read in isolation, therefore, it’s a bit truncated, and some
\nof my opinions here may not seem adequately described. I wanted to take
\na moment to address one of the issues some of you have about my
\nreference to modern metal.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nlisten to new metal bands“. This is an extremely important distinction,
\nbecause it means that I do in fact listen to contemporary bands, and
\neven more importantly, it means that I *give a try* to new modern bands.
\nAs a point of fact, I follow and admire a number of contemporary bands
\nand regularly purchase new releases, and I never said anywhere in the
\nexcerpted email that I think modern metal music has no good material.
\nWhether the contemporary music is good or not was quite simply not even
\nthe point of my argument at all. I’ll reiterate that argument in a
\nminute, but first, let me explain what I mean by contemporary metal:<\/em><\/p>\n
\nthe mid-1990s, after the major shift in the metal scene and business,
\nwhen the climate and the requirements for new bands entering the
\nbusiness had radically altered.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nearly 90s is not a „contemporary metal“ band. They are instead a metal
\nband which has weathered the changes in the music business, and
\ncontinues to release contemporary records. Iron Maiden, Judas Priest,
\nMegadeth, the various versions of Black Sabbath, even Blind Guardian,
\nall fall under this category. Blind Guardian developed as a group
\nshortly before the metal industry splintered into so many fragments.
\nNowadays, we generally hear all sorts of very specific stylistic labels
\naffixed to Blind Guardian, but the fact is that when they first
\ndeveloped their reputation and name — even into the early 90s, when
\nthey evolved their sound — the term „heavy metal“ was still routinely
\nbeing used to describe virtually any metal band, and Blind Guardian was
\nnot subject to the kinds of creative restrictions that today’s
\nhighly-specific style labels might subject them to. I need hardly say
\nthat Iron Maiden compose music in whatever style they see fit, without
\nregard to musical labels whatsoever. They are the perfect example of the
\n„mega-band“, whose reputations were established decades ago and
\ntranscend the pigeonholing of any genre. They are also a good example of
\na heavy metal band on a major record label, and are not subject to the
\ncomplexities of boutique genre record companies.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nAFM, a genre metal label, and I own a copy. It is certainly a
\ncontemporary release, but that doesn’t make Helstar a contemporary band.
\nBoth their identity and their reputation were formed before the change
\nin the metal scene. Even Gamma Ray, a band of which I’m very fond, is
\nnot a contemporary metal band, though they also release contemporary
\nrecords (which I love).<\/em><\/p>\n
\nexistence since this fundamental change in the metal world: Edguy, and
\nSlough Feg.<\/em><\/p>\n![\"Gitarrist](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.nmz.de\/badblog\/files\/2009\/05\/slough-feg1.jpg?resize=116%2C126&ssl=1\")
<\/em>
\nproficient, and interesting. And I await their new release very eagerly.
\nThis is a contemporary band who write the music they see fit, and do not
\nallow themselves to be constrained by musical labels. Slough Feg is
\nreleased by a very small boutique metal label from Italy, and their
\npeculiar style of heavy metal will never find a large audience. I’ve
\nspoken at length with founding member Mike Scalzi on the phone about how
\nthey fit into the modern metal world, and he told me he finds it a
\nlittle confusing and restricting. The press and the audience are
\nconstantly trying to affix specific descriptive labels to Slough Feg’s
\nmusic, and fail. Why do they not simply use the loose term „heavy metal“
\nand be done with it? Why, because in the modern metal scene there is no
\nmore basic heavy metal — it must be power metal, pagan metal, blackened
\ndeath metal, etc. Slough Feg do not fit comfortably into any of these
\nspecific styles, and this has actually hurt the band.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nMetal slot when they first appeared, and their second and third albums
\nreally scored with that prebuilt Symphonic Power Metal fanbase. But they
\nhave since evolved away from the symphonic power metal type of sound,
\nand while they continue to be successful, this has also alienated some
\nof their fanbase, and it remains an interesting challenge for their
\nrecord label to target audiences with their more contemporary,
\nhumour-filled, Kiss-inspired type of hard rock. I’ve spoken to both
\nTobias Sammet and Dirk Sauer on the phone, and I really like these guys.
\nAgain, this is another example of a contemporary metal band that I
\nlisten to and enjoy.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nmetal bands simply because they are contemporary, is incorrect.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nbecome increasingly specialized. Record labels pigeonhole artists into
\nprogressively more and more specific styles, catered to an inbuilt
\naudience that is progressively more and more narrow. Although having a
\nprebuilt fanbase for a particular style of music is nice, if a record
\nlabel enforces too many stylistic labels on a band, in the hopes of
\nattracting a core audience, it could smother the band’s ability to ever
\ntranscend their confines and evolve into something new. Affix too many
\nstyle labels to a group, and they’ll collapse under the weight of them.
\nA band like Slough Feg, who don’t fit nicely into these many fine
\ndistinctions, have the reverse problem — they can’t attract a core
\naudience because their label doesn’t know where to go to push them.
\nThese millions of stylistic distinctions are a problem from both ends.
\nBut if another band composes music consciously only to satisfy, say, the
\npreconceptions of Euro power metal fans, they will have little chance of
\ngrowing beyond the mould and finding new listeners. If they do try to
\ngrow beyond the mould of Euro power metal, they risk enraging their core
\nfanbase. These many formalized stylistic labels, and the changes they
\nhave wrought on the music business, only increase these risks.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nwho accuse them of being a „nostalgia band“, because their music „sounds
\ntoo 80s“, or insist on applying various narrow labels to their type of
\nmusic: power metal, etc. I once asked Kai Hansen if all this press
\nlabeling and the criticisms and reactions they elicited got on his
\nnerves or made it difficult to creatively express himself: he simply
\nshrugged and told me that he just does whatever he feels like. Kai has a
\nparticularly strong sense of musical identity — other less-seasoned
\nartists might be less able to withstand this onslaught of prejudicial
\nlabeling, and lose the ability to freely express themselves.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nan example or two to illustrate a modern band that began life confined
\nto a highly-specific musical style, then managed to find the success to
\ntranscend it and grow beyond it, but this happened *despite* the
\nconditions of the modern music industry, and not because of them.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nthe musical climate. The rush to high-specialization happened by
\naccident, and bands, fans, and record companies alike all reacted to
\neach other to accelerate the process, instinctively. In the heavy metal
\ninstance, when Seattle Rock killed off the fad in thrash music, extreme
\nmetal rushed in to fill the gap, and the very extremeness of it created
\na whole evolutionary process of sending bands rushing in one reactionary
\ndirection or other. You could be a death metal band, or you could *hate*
\ndeath metal and be a power metal band. You could be a gothic metal band
\nbecause you’re interested in vampyres, or you could *hate* vampyres and
\nbe a true metal band — „death to all poseurs!“. When the band itself
\nwasn’t reactionary to one specific style or not, the fans and the record
\ncompanies often were for them. There seems to be an increasingly
\nunavoidable desire to affix a specific label to a band in the modern
\nworld. We’re not content to simply enjoy them for what they are — we
\nmust define them somehow, to make sense of their place in this musical
\nclimate we have.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nbelieve that it imposes many risks and difficulties, and the musical
\nworld has become irrecoverably complicated.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nindustry? Or would they be instantly labeled „avant-garde progressive
\nalternative rock“ and „epic progressive alt-metal“, respectively,
\nreleased by a label that markets them only to the tiny preexisting
\nfanbase for these genres, and doomed to never be heard by a general
\naudience?<\/em><\/p>\n
\ndo with the relative merits of any contemporary band that must fight to
\nfind their identity in the middle of it.<\/em><\/p>\n