"Growing out" of metal.

[phlogiston]

When I was growing up a lot of people told me that eventually I'd "grow out" of metal, and some of my peers did grow out of metal.

Obviously I haven't, and I'd argue that my tastes are heavier now than they were at uni.

What do you think? Do a lot of people grow out of it? Concerning those that do: were they ever really into it? Were they into it for the wrong reasons?

I don't know why I started thinking about this. Might have been because my random playlist on my mp3 player gave me a particularly rockin' trip home tonight.

 

[Iron Zombius]

My family is still waiting for me either grow up...or grow out of metal....I am thinking that this is the natural responce to those that either dont understand, or dont want to!

Maybe those that do grow out of metal are, or were in it for the wrong reasons....such as peer group pressure and so on.

 

[Shadow298]

a few of my mates "grew out" of metal but that was more because they were more into trend bands such as Pantera (after Far Beyond Driven), Slipknot, Cradle of Filth and all the Nu-Metal bands.

But they grew out of it because they moved onto the next alternative trend or just moved more conventional mainstream after getting a family and such.

Think that if I grew out of metal, a lot of people would disown me.

Hell, I got my mum into metal and she'll lose her main source of it if I left it.

I won't grow out of my metal but I also keep my interest in so many other musical forms and genres that I'll always have something to listen to.
Especially when metal leads me into an interesting new twist on what is established or an interested previously unexplored subgenre.

so many opportunities that metal provides that many other genres don't, so no need to ever grow out of it.

I look forward to introducing my kids to it one day.

 

[Bucko]

maybe you will, but I have'nt at 44 years old although I do listen to at lot of other music other than metal, mainly classic rock and the 70's and 80'S stuff that was on Countdown, hence recently purchasing Countdowns 1 hit wonders volume 2...

 

[FerretallicA]

It's a fair enough call when applied to the kind of people who are completely obsessive about, for argument's sake, Slayer and only listen to them and a handful of bands that sound like them. I don't think you 'grow out' of metal as such but there's definitely a lot of room for people to grow out of the metal box they let themselves reside in. Don't forget how "cool" it is to be against everything commercial (including any metal that makes it onto Video Hits; instant dishonour).

As an admirer I haven't grown out of metal at all. If anything I like a lot things like grind and tech death which I once would have cringed at, though I also listen to a lot of soft, ambient, acoustic etc stuff which I also would have once cringed at. As a musician though, I've definitely grown out of the 'sports' mentality which seems to be part and parcel of earning your stripes as a metal head. Playing repetitive scales at a billion notes per second, token bitch squeals (sorry, 'power metal screams'), seeing how low everything can be tuned, how many necks you can fit on a single guitar body at once etc... it's one thing to have mean chops in your arsenal and I still appreciate advanced technique and talented musos that push the boundaries of convention but I'm very much over metal for the sake of 'look at me'.

That said: yes, I still like Dragonforce.

 

[Spiff]

I haven't grown out of it. If anything, I've gotten more into it over the years, but my tastes in music have also expanded. I too listen to a fair bit of classic rock these days, but I still likes my metal and always will.

I did grow out of prog though.

 

[Lord Tim]

Musical tastes do change as you go along, but I find the idea of growing out of anything to be kind of weird. Why grow out of something when you discover something new that you enjoy? I didn't suddenly go "yep, now I hate Duran Duran because I really enjoy this here Kreator album" - the Kreator album may be something which is inspiring me more than anything else has up until now but it doesn't invalidate the music I was in prior to that.

I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing that with changing tastes you find stuff you once listened to as not being as inspiring as the stuff you currently listen to, but "growing out of stuff" (ie: "man, I can't believe I used to listen to that shit") really strikes me as someone who was never really into it in the first place, at least for the right reasons anyway.

 

[Southy]

those that 'grow out ' of metal or anyform of music/art really I guess, were never really 'into' it, maybe their mate were or they were trying to fit in or something but none the less IMO they were never into it in the first place

 

[Lord Tim]

Don't forget how "cool" it is to be against everything commercial (including any metal that makes it onto Video Hits; instant dishonour).

+ fucking 1.

I have a big problem with people who instantly hate anything that becomes popular.

I remember a guy who used to post on our forum ages ago and we suggested that Australian metal needs to expand into a larger market to grow or it'll be stuck with the same 200 faces at each show, and he hit the roof. "Metal isn't about fucking mainstream shit, it's underground!!!" Sorry to tell you this, man, but metal is about the MUSIC. I couldn't give a fuck if I was the only person who knew about it or every bastard did - I like it because *I* like it. Hating something just because it's popular = instant poseur.

 

[TinMan666]

spelling poseur with a U = instead poser!

but for serious, this is a really good topic and i agree with most of everything everyone has said.

I think a lot of people get into metal just because they're in their rebellious anti-social teen phase, but they grow out of that. Or they just go from whatever comes into vogue to whatever the next trend is, like a lot of people I went to school with who very suddenly all went from leather jackets and old school metal and thrash, to tie-dye tshirts and RHCP + grunge music. Also I suspect a lot of people just grow up in the sense of getting a job, settling down, forgetting that they used to be an individual and just sorta becoming a normal.

TOTALLY agree with Tim above about idiots being anti-mainstream as well. Remember that time i fkn lost it on the dungeon board with whoever it was talking about how he had to "stop listening to nightwish when evanescence became popular"? JESUS. There should be a law passed that I'm allowed to smack people like that over the back of the head with a shovel.

 

[Winmar]

Like others have said, if people reckon they've grown out of something, they weren't really into it in the first place. There are some bands I don't really listen to much any more, but I don't have any albums I wouldn't want to put on every now and again.

 

[Mean Machine]

Obviously I'm only young so haven't really had time to "grow out" of anything if I was going to. Metal has probably been a stepping stone into getting into other types of music (post-rock, folk, acoustic, ambient, prog etc), and while that means I don't listen to quite as much "metal" as I did say a year or so ago, I certainly don't like it any less. I just have so much other stuff to listen to as well that it means I'm balancing out what I listen to a bit more.

And yeah, I hate that mainstream-hating stuff too. I'm not ashamed to admit I'm a big Slipknot fan, or that I prefer Load over Ride The Lightning, or that I even enjoy certain songs by Pink (more the ballads, not the over-clean pop stuff, can't stand that). If I enjoy the music, then I'm going to listen to it, I couldn't care less about how many scene-kiddies like them or whatever. As far as I am concerned, people who only listen to "underground" music because they hate mainstream stuff, are just as sheep-ish and pathetic as those people who only listen to popular music because "everyone else is".

 

[Lord Tim]

spelling poseur with a U = instead poser!

No way, adding the U adds even more "ghey" to their poseur-ism! HAHA!

 

[FerretallicA]

i fkn lost it on the dungeon board with whoever it was talking about how he had to "stop listening to nightwish when evanescence became popular"? JESUS. There should be a law passed that I'm allowed to smack people like that over the back of the head with a shovel.

If it's referring to how Nightwish started dumbing down their albums around the same time Evanescence 'made it' then it seems fair enough. While it's one thing to say commercial success maketh not the fail, 'commercialising' music is still major fail. One MEGA-fail example comes to mind. Ozzy Osbourne with Busta Rhymes butchering Iron Man. Enough said.

I even enjoy certain songs by Pink

Leave the hall.

 

[Mean Machine]

Leave the hall.

Have you heard the song "I've Seen The Rain"? It's fantastic, with her and her dad singing, more towards a country song than usual pop stuff. "Dear Mr President" is fantastic, it's simple but powerful. That girl has talent.

 

[Blitzkrieg]

Ozzy Osbourne with Busta Rhymes butchering Iron Man.

I really like This Means War.

As others have said, I perhaps listen to metal less now than I did years ago, but that is only because I am into a broader variety of stuff now, and metal occupies a smaller percentage of my collection, but that doesn't mean I like it any less. I would say that metal used to pretty much be my whole life, where as now I have a lot of other stuff going on and metal is only one part of my life, but is certainly still there.

There are some bands and genres that I like less than I used to, such as Slayer and Machine Head, but I might still chuck on an album now and again, and if anything, I used those bands as a stepping stone to get into more extreme types of metal anyway.

I guess some people move on from things that they like for one reason or another, some because they were posers in the first place, others because they feel a need to grow up or conform, or perhaps others simply do grow up or conform without realising.

 

[KoichCPA]

I didn't grow out of it as such, I got bored with the majority of new releases very quickly and stopped finding things that I liked. I found myself trawling metal review site after metal review trying to find something that gave me that spark I used to get. I still occasionaly find it with metal releases, but not as much as I once did.

I still have my favourite metal albums, but they don't get the rotation they once enjoyed.

To say I was never really into metal because I got bored and moved on is a bit wrong. Most can attest to the support I gave bands,the scene and the genre in general. I was fully immersed in Metal, I'm just now kind of not so much. People change, ideas change, life moves on.

 

[Spiff]

I must admit that I rarely, if ever, listen to any new metal bands. I think the last one I listened to and still listen to is Trivium (only heard them anyway because Mark was selling their demo through UM). Haven't got their new album yet.

 

[Sydo]

Grow out of metal?

[ame]http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=zDnXkFVEQ0Y[/ame]

 

[Blitzkrieg]

I too get into newer bands less often these days, but I guess that is because I am still backtracking through older things I haven't gotten to yet, and also keeping up with new releases of bands that I do like.