Dethklok: A cartoon that makes fun of metal's weaknesses, hilarious. This coupled with recycled riffs, dumbed down song structures and commercial, jingling melodies makes it the ultimate hipster band - especially since theyve sold even more than Cannibal Corpse.
Ulver: A career out of being different - conformity disguised as non-conformity - electronic, neofolk, is there any genre they cant play? Ulver imitate black metal bands by playing indie rock with their sugary melodies, electronica that sounds more rebellious than the other electronic and concept albums sounding like two indie with re-written lyrics. Belong in the indie section of your local store, image above music.
Cannibal Corpse: Lyrics of misogyny entrails ripped from a virgins... and childish & offensive gore (no examples needed). Their studying of metal and classical training, taking the style of Suffocation and composition of Malevolent Creation, resulted in mindless songs with their ever trusted philosophy of "only death is real." Over 1 million records sold, purely a money-making gimmick.
Cradle of Filth: For rebels who want to be extreme, when really its just Iron Maiden with fast melodic death metal riffs using the pentatonic scale.
Opeth: Taking simple songs, spicing them up with watered down Rush riffs, and varying acoustic to distorted on the chorus has attracted many pseudo-intellectual fanboys. What is it progessing towards? No real musical development, no song structures building upon themes or face-melting chops.
Enslaved: A band who changed their style, but the only aspect progressive about their later Opeth influenced music is the augmented chords. The riffs use more than power chords, but are usually with one string (e.g. Clouds) and hooks and repeated them with a few breaks for interlude ambience. There are some jam parts, but with simple chord progressions, and straight forward song structures.
Necrophagist: Nothing but short blasts of melody repeatedly and abruptly before jumping to jumps to something unrelated. Riffs disguised as advancing guitar exercises and rhythm starring a jazz drummer covering NIN.
Cynic: Got rid of their jazz fushion, added harmonized vocals, and quit being death metal. Then Cynic revamped their reputation by mashing together jazz and metal cliches because their fans know nothing about music. Listening to genres like jazz in essence degraded classical music inspired them to disguise the complexity of their music. Look at the tabs - random pieces stuck together with excessive guitar licks.
Meshuggah: A jazz percussion approach to metal rhythm guitar - offbeats within offbeats, with no melody and - like Opeth - no song development. Linear song structures following the sub-division of beats to a riff, expanding in a circular fashion. For music fans of technical metal, who want an artless band.
Baroness: Distortion and sluggish tempo with blatant stoner themes. 1970s music revived thanks to the record companys marketing.
Boris: Only the true understand the music we play (indie rock as if it were black metal.) The hipster fans can't tell the difference because they dont realize music is beyond guitar playing and theory, its soul.
In Flames: Their old style is watered-down Dissection laced with Iron Maiden harmonies, getting away with it by appearing fresh.
Pantera: Latter albums in their discography are a tough-guy version of Metallica, before dipping into death metal and blues rock, resulting in a mishmash of completely random influences. Despite Dimebag guitar genius Darrell, Pantera are an introduction to basic rock guitar.
Wolves in the Throne Room: Tree-huggers with moral opinions that church goers and Democratic fund raiser would agree with. Just like Ulver its Indie disguised as Black Metal and wailing / droning in the background.
Sunn o))): Overconfident of knowledge but poorly informed concept art. (i.e. thinking up an unusual idea, and making it in musical form.) So when O'Malley plays a guitar really slowly for ten minutes and it never develops into a song then the fans pretend to enjoy it. Throw in an orchestra show up and make a 2 note riff and call it concept art.
Katatonia: Made some of the best Doom Metal, decided to cash in with Agolloch and Amorpis by mellowing out their sound and then decided subsisting Cs for Ks was pretty Nu-Metal. The chugging downtuned riffs with Jonas' clean vocal patterns and the effects makes The Great Cold Distance sound like an Untouchables rip off without the eerie atmosphere and superior song structures. Playing False Metal is fine, just don't rip off great Korn albums.
