Musical Pet Peeves

[ASD]

Post all those things in music that absolutely annoying you.

-When the title track of an album isn't the first or last track.
-When a song switches between heavy and soft, or has random parts every two seconds. Opeth and Dream Theater are often guilty of this. I have no problem with dynamic changes, but I like actual defined sections.

 

[waif]

Excessive blast-beats. 'Nuff said.
Vocalists with good growls who can't rasp at all.
When title tracks are short instrumentals (The Mind's I, Whoracle, etc)
Short instrumentals.
When a band refuses to play fast (The first Icarus Witch album is a prime offender).
Excessively polished, riff-oriented stuff. Metalium - Demons of Insanity is a good example of this.

 

[metal_wrath]

Sometimes random growls/shrieks can be annoying.

When practically every song on an album has a long intro.

Repetitive/uninteresting acoustic parts.

Irritating vocalists ex. Anders from In Flames.

 

[meaperson333]

Excessive blast beats.
Vocalists who ruin the music. (the guy from vio-lence)
Useless interudes

 

[Saparmurat_Niyazov]

- Metallica rip-off riffs.
- Slayer rip-off riffs.
- Morbid Angel rip-off riffs.

Please note that I don't take offense to a band wearing their influences on their sleeves, but those 3 bands get their riffs lifted, almost note for note, chord for chord all the time and it's getting pretty fucking old.

- Drummers that rarely/never throw in fills.
- Movie sample song intros.
- Songs that reference other songs in the lyrics. Unless all songs in question are part of a concept album. Otherwise, it's just fucking cheesy.
- Weak assed guitar tones. Guitars need to have a distinctive crunch (not necessarily chugga-chugga shit, just a beefy tone).

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Omnipresent doublebass drumming ala 99% of Euro power.
Omnipresent keyboard delelelele ala the above.
Harsh vocals over both of the above simultaneously.

 

[Satanstoenail]

Cheesy choruses.
Songs that are unnecessarily long.
Bad production (intentional or otherwise).

 

[waif]

- Movie sample song intros.

- Weak assed guitar tones. Guitars need to have a distinctive crunch (not necessarily chugga-chugga shit, just a beefy tone).

These. In a few circumstances a weak or thin guitar tone can suit the music and atmosphere of the recording (Embracing's debut, Human Fortress's debut, Anacrusis's Screams and Whispers), but frequently I'll just think "this riff should be kicking my ass but honestly it's just not there."

 

[IntoPhagist]

I'm starting to really hate clean and growls going back and fourth. Soilwork's the only one I can bare.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

I'm starting to really hate clean and growls going back and fourth. Soilwork's the only one I can bare.

Yep, especially since they utilize them in an effort to throw in "dynamics" or someshit but make it come off exactly the same each time. What's the name of that dorky orange-haired metal-themed comedian? Something-or-other Posner, I think, but I can't find it. Anyways, he's generally not funny but the chorus of his modern metal parody nailed what is wrong with these so called vocal counterpoints used today.

 

[Saparmurat_Niyazov]

Omnipresent doublebass drumming ala 99% of Euro power.
Omnipresent keyboard delelelele ala the above.
Harsh vocals over both of the above simultaneously.

You'll love this song then:

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Symphonic Progressive Metal/Melodic Death Metal

Yeah.

Actually, that one doesn't seem that bad. Some discernible riffs, at least... oh wait, nvm, I had to get past the first minute. Ugh.

 

[IntoPhagist]

Yeah that song is horrible. I pretty much hate all power metal besides now. Besides the classics.

 

[Chanakya]

CC-esque lyrics are my biggest peeve in metal. Apart from that,

- Albums which barely have a solo or two.
- Albums which only have solos.

 

[damnromulans]

I really hate long intros. Waiting 2 minutes for a song to pick up is not cool. A good example of this is "Ship of Luna" by Therion.

Agreed about using movie samples as song intros.

Probably goes without saying, but bad vocals are annoying. I consider myself to have average/lenient standards for metal vocals, but sometimes I can't enjoy a song because the vocals are so bad. Examples are "Bury Me An Angel" by Arch Enemy, or Silencer in general.

Sonata Arctica-esque ballads. Did somebody say "shitty filler tracks?" But I've made my feelings on ballads pretty clear throughout GMD...

 

[sevag00]

Albums longer than an hour.
Albums that have intros and outros which are pure nonsense noise.

 

[Inso]

When clean and harsh vocals are used together on the same song, particularly bad when there is a clean chorus section with a random scream every few seconds. Utterly awful, it just sounds so WRONG.

 

[Onder]

When clean and harsh vocals are used together on the same song, particularly bad when there is a clean chorus section with a random scream every few seconds. Utterly awful, it just sounds so WRONG.

YES. That fucking sucks.

 

[Saparmurat_Niyazov]

I actually enjoy the clean/growl mix, but it gets boring when a band only uses the old and tired "harsh verse vocal, clean chorus vocal" method.

 

[Eligos]

Chants in music come off as awfully gimmicky to me. Not Gregorian Chants, but shit that the audience is expected to shout along to.

Another pet peeve would be sung vocals that add nothing to the music by following the roots of the chord progression note for note, as well as the rhythm the rest of the music is following. Grabnebelfursten does this.