Cheese Metal

[DBB]

Molten Mozzarella & Metal Editorial

 

[Farseer of the Benighted Land]

That article was hilarious. Very entertaining! I only agree with about 2 sentences, however.

 

[Jim LotFP]

I can't even decide whether I envy people who can't take their passions seriously.

 

[Cheiron]

I tend to a like a lot of what some others might call "cheese metal." But I won't use that term to describe the metal I listen to.

 

[Scourge of God]

I can't even decide whether I envy people who can't take their passions seriously.

I don't see how this comes down to whether one takes metal 'seriously' or not. It's a simple recognition that the outer trappings of 'seriousness' have nothing to do with whether the art itself is serious.

 

[DBB]

It's a simple recognition that the outer trappings of 'seriousness' have nothing to do with whether the art itself is serious.

Can you be more specific? This is vague, and I am having trouble pinning down what you mean in this statement.

 

[Scourge of God]

Can you be more specific? This is vague, and I am having trouble pinning down what you mean in this statement.

Very often, we treat bands that have no sense of humor about what they do as 'serious' and artists who do as 'cheesy,' regardless of the core of their work.

Classic cases:

Opeth spends a lot of time looking dour and telling everyone that will listen what serious artists they are and how they're pushing the boundaries of 'extreme music.' Immortal poses for deliberately absurd promo pics and goofs off in the occasional video. And yet, Pure Holocaust is a serious, coherent work of art and Opeth's music is a meaningless fucking joke: only the band and their fan boys seem unaware of the Spinal Tappish stupidity contained in the average Opeth disc.

 

[Occam's Razor]

But you should also differnetiate between how fans look at a band and how a band sees themselves. If you look at an Opeth live performance lately, these stupid jokes Michael Akterfeldt tells between songs contradict the starry eyed stance of their fans. They also frankly admit ripping off seventies prog bands, so it is not really magic they claim to create. But the listeners do, now in conjunction with a label that hypes the significance of this band into unhealthy dimensions. I think the RR deal was a fault for them, as they have definitely done something positive for the public image of metal, so the scene views them ambiguously anyway (depending whether you are a metal separatist or want apprecitation from the outisde). With RR now, there is basically no escaping them: they will suffer from the trendies that listen to them to be cool and jump off when the hype is over, as well as from the old fans that are jaded and turn off due to the lost "exclusve" appeal of the band (the musical quality of their recent work is another debate).

Jim?

 

[Jim LotFP]

Jim?

To me, "serious art" implies a greater meaning to music than just enjoyment on a purely sonic level. Lyrics and presentation are important and are part of the whole just as much as the actual instrumentation. That said:

Opeth lost me after Blackwater Park and I find myself caring about just the first two albums these days, along with When from MAYH. I can't argue about the pointlessness of their current work, and I can't even speak to it at all for the current album they have out.

Early Immortal is nothing I've ever explored based on their later albums and presentation, and the scene they get lumped in with in the early 90s. So Pure Holocaust may be meaningful, I can't speak for or against it. I've heard Damned in Black and Sons of Northern Darkness, but I only had the promos so lyrics and such weren't included, and just based on those albums they came across as basically a "black" version of Rhapsody. Nothing serious, you either like the riffs/melodies or you don't, without much more to it than that.

But the word "cheesy" to me implies a shallow presentation and a lack of meaning, so nothing can be be both "serious" and "cheesy." If there's talent displayed amongst cheesy material, then it is a waste of that talent, not a vindication of the cheese.

 

[Occam's Razor]

well, you cannot dispute Opeth's musical talent (affected by the producer of some of their work, of course - this is to be taken into consideration). As for the lyrical depth, I don't see Opeth any more cheesy than some other bands. There may be more intense texts out there, but the fantasy stuff Akerfeldt does has been executed much worse and still is by many, many bands. I don't know why Opeth is picked upon so much at the moment. They have lost importance for me as well, but you have to remain fair.

 

[Scourge of God]

But the word "cheesy" to me implies a shallow presentation and a lack of meaning, so nothing can be be both "serious" and "cheesy." If there's talent displayed amongst cheesy material, then it is a waste of that talent, not a vindication of the cheese.

But a lot of what gets considered 'cheesy' isn't necessarily shallow as a work of art, it's simply highly dramatic and aware of some of its internal absurdities (which all works have).

The danger lies in reaching the point where the creative impulse is gone and only the irony remains. To an extent, that's precisely what happened to Immortal, and as their music became blander, their image became correspondingly more ridiculous. The absolutely classic example of this phenomenon, though, is Manowar. This was a band that, while they certainly had a sense of humor about some of what they were doing, released several slabs of classic metal before becoming a parody of themselves. By the time of Kings of Metal and especially The Triumph of Steel, they'd ceased to do anything but play ironically with their own image (making them, I suppose, the first hipster metal band). As a consequence, their music not only suffered, it ceased to be metal in any meaningful way (seriously, listen to say "Metal Warriors" - it sounds like what a cartoon soundtrack writer thinks metal might sound like).

 

[Jim LotFP]

But a lot of what gets considered 'cheesy' isn't necessarily shallow as a work of art, it's simply highly dramatic and aware of some of its internal absurdities (which all works have).

Agreed.

The absolutely classic example of this phenomenon, though, is Manowar.

I'll agree with Manowar as a whole (early albums rule), but Triumph of Steel isn't a good example as a whole. The Achilles affair was ambitious, and Master of the Wind is certainly as good as that type of song is going to get. Sure, Metal Warriors is cringeworthy (although it's great fun to imagine them opening a show up with that one and a few people actually going "Oh shit! Wrong concert!" and leaving), and Spirit Horse of the Cherokee is incoherent since they go on about the Cherokee yet none of the people they name... are/were... Cherokee. ffuuckk. heh.


I'll throw another name out there - Lost Horizon. That was an odd way to get their message across.

 

[Occam's Razor]

As cool as his music was/is at times: King Diamond is awfully pretentious and probably writes the most cheesy lyrical concepts - at least on his later albums. Voodoo is a good record still, but these texts...I don't understand the concept-knack, because The Spider's Lullabye only had the last three songs woven together - the rest was independent songs and ruled.

 

[DBB]

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Zach Spittler “Progressing Beyond the Meathead Music” The Daily Iowan March 21, 2007

"Dude, that's totally metal."

Not exactly the Queen's English, is it? Yet that's how metal seems to appeal to the masses: Meathead music for meathead fans. The perception has plagued the persuasion of percussive rock for decades.

To many, metal functions like the drunken uncle you're embarrassed to tell your friends about but whom you really like because he sneaks you beer and cigarettes behind your parents' backs, tells you childish, raunchy sex jokes, and seems like a total badass, despite the fact that he's a total loser with a beer gut (you know, like Axl Rose). But is such an observation justified?

Since grunge came along and killed what we previously knew to be "metal," the darker side of rock went underground and spawned into an all-out plethora of subgenres, including the ever-snobbish, technically meticulous "prog metal" -- short for "progressive metal." Iowa City, Iowa, gets a rare taste of two prog headliners within a week of each other, starting Wednesday night with a performance by Pelican, followed by ISIS on March 26, both at the Picador, 330 E. Washington St. ISIS guitarist/electronics performer Bryant Clifford Meyer says there's no reason metal should be perceived as any dumber than other types of music.

"There's plenty of crappy pop and R&B shit, and plenty of idiots listen to that as well," he said. "I don't think any more dumb people listen to this than to any other genre." And yes, while there is a predomination of people who will go to, say, a Lamb of God show, just to guzzle down about seven beers a minute and push people around in a thuggish, cathartic frenzy, the progressive or experimental side of metal proves there can be more to the art.

"It's unfortunate that sometimes the idiotic, stupid redneck kids get into [metal], and they, like, start with ICP and then go buy a Tool shirt," said Dave Soltis, a University of Iowa senior and bona fide prog-metal snob. "[Metal] does emphasize the image of the rowdy idiot, but with prog metal, it's a little less about breaking bottles and swinging around in a mosh pit. It's about making something new and doing something different."

Soltis has been a fan of prog metal since he came to college. The sophisticated experimentations of both ISIS and Pelican have more than once pumped through the earbuds of his iPod since that time. He was attracted to prog because it wasn't necessarily, well, attractive.

"You have to invest more time in [prog metal] to like it. It's the complete opposite of pop music, because it's instant gratification," said the 22-year-old journalism major. "Bands such as ISIS, all their songs are seven minutes long, and that makes people turn away."

With both Pelican and ISIS, vocals are used sparingly compared with most types of rock. The groups pepper their songs with occasional lyrics that sound more like another instrument instead of a primary focus -- another deterrent to many people used to rock gripping them with an aural hook.

But that distance from catchiness tends to separate prog rock, to a certain extent, from the over-populated "die-hard" factor. There aren't many people in this world (though there are some), who will rush out of class to throw on the newest experimental-rock song and quell their "craving" before the next class starts. And that's probably a good thing.

"When you become a die-hard in a certain genre, that's when you start to like stuff that sucks," said Luke Tweedy, the store manager of Record Collector, 125 E. Washington St. "Your taste is so concerned with one specific thing that you'll bend [in taste] a little just to get that sound."

Thus, metal has given itself an "out," so to speak. Yes, there still remain thrashing Metallica descendants who want nothing more out of life than sex, drugs, and Lars Ulrich after a hard day at the plant. But that's not all, anymore.

Will Hancher host features by Tool and Dream Theater anytime in the near future? No. But at least now metal has the opportunity to become the rich uncle who drives a Mercedes and knows something about Descartes instead of the one who drives a big, red Chevy truck and fills his fridge with Busch Light. And one must look no further than the crowd at tonight's Pelican show to realize such a shift.

"When you go to the show, you'll see it's not just a ton of long-hair and beer-guzzling," Tweedy said. "There'll be more hipster doofuses there than metalheads. OK, maybe there will be a lot of beer-guzzling."

 

[Jim LotFP]

That article killed brain cells.