New topic: My theory on Scandanavian music.........

[Vincent J.]

I am American so I see it first hand.
The mainstream consists of easily digestible garbage music that can be completely understood with one listen. There is no depth, there is no meaning. It is only designed for the average musically incompetent person to enjoy with little thought. It is designed to appeal to certain demographics to make money and it accomplishes that perfectly.

Hm ok, but on another note...
I used to hate that music when I was younger, but now I really respect the songwriters, cause they have to write music that is easy, but catchy. I'm not sure if we're talking the same thing here, but there's a lot of VERY well written stuff on the charts here most of the time.
Sure, it often gets sold by an empty disposable shell (the "performer"), but in fact the music is pretty good

 

[MiniMoose]

Hm ok, but on another note...
I used to hate that music when I was younger, but now I really respect the songwriters, cause they have to write music that is easy, but catchy. I'm not sure if we're talking the same thing here, but there's a lot of VERY well written stuff on the charts here most of the time.
Sure, it often gets sold by an empty disposable shell (the "performer"), but in fact the music is pretty good

+1

I agree with you all the way here Vincent.
It's so easy to say that americans are stupid (even when you are an american). America is HUGE and of course there will be music that sucks incredibly, but there's also a LOT of good music. If you just look at metal, then maybe Europe has the upper hand right now, but it's as always just a matter of taste. You'll find the whole spectre of the music industry over there..from horrible to heavenly...

I used to hate american music in general, but now I'm far from it. There's a lot of unique music over there. Some in the charts and a lot well hidden. I haven't found much in the metal genre, but that's just me.

The main music industry will always seem a bit hollow, but it also can produce good music. We want something that seems real and true, but all in all it's just music and it's a subjective experience.

If it's real/good/true/whatever to you, then it is. Either way, it's an illusion. My Dying Bride, Paradise Lost, Katatonia aren't half as depressed as the music they make, and black metal bands aren't as dark or half as satanic as they want to seem...that means I guess, that it's not as true or real as we want it to be. It's just music we love and relate to for different reasons.

Either way, do you listen to music because you like to listen to it or do you listen to it because it makes a statement..or a combo? It's subjective and as we grow older our taste change. How many times haven't you hated some type of music and later learned to love it? Or the other way around...

Damn..I write too much...

 

[Catoya]

So.. I found myself reading Minimoose's opinion and I really got stuck for it. Though its alot to read I really loved what you had to say, nice one.

 

[Sdob]

Care to name some good charting American bands?
I like alot of the relatively unknown American bands such as Agalloch, Between the Buried and Me, Cynic etc, but all the mainstream seems to be sterile and empty.

 

[Kitiini]

MEtallica \,,/

 

[Keltoi]

Agalloch, Daylight Dies, Obituary, Cannibal Corpse, Six Feet Under (to some extent), Slayer(old), and several other death metal bands carry the flag for American metal. Not a huge club, but still some good music being released.

 

[Antyman]

let's thank Entombed for starting this swedish movement

 

[hauntedinflames]

more great american bands:

Malevolent Creation, Deicide, Wolves In The Throne Room, Tool, Alice In Chains, AFI, Mr. Bungle, Faith No More, Jeff Buckley, 108, Defeater, Black Flag, Hot Water Music, Ours, Thought Industry

 

[bosomblob]

Care to name some good charting American bands?
I like alot of the relatively unknown American bands such as Agalloch, Between the Buried and Me, Cynic etc, but all the mainstream seems to be sterile and empty.

The new Lamb of God charted at #2, but you said GOOD, so never mind that. The only mainstream band I can think of then would be Mastodon.

 

[Vincent J.]

Care to name some good charting American bands?
I like alot of the relatively unknown American bands such as Agalloch, Between the Buried and Me, Cynic etc, but all the mainstream seems to be sterile and empty.

If you give me a chart, I can pick the good ones out of it

 

[Heliotropic_Rose]

I never started this thread intending that the conversation would revolve around metal music only.

MiniMouse - Yeah I understand what you're saying about the money situation in America compared to Scandanavia. And yes in some ways I am irritated that TOOL never really CAMEBACK, fully anyway, Lateralus was really epic for the most part, mostly the Later half of the cd with songs like Disposition, Reflection and Triad (as well as Lateralus)

What I'm not getting is that some people here on these threads (and in real life) listen to Underground metal, aka obscure unknown bands just for the sake of listening to unknown bands. Then on the other end of the spectrum you have the teener boppers and the Abercrombie & Fitch wearing douche bags that only listen to what's hip and happening (which is usually R&b/Rap/Pop)

I myself listen to some main stream bands and some unknown bands (once again I'll mention Saturnia, Failure, and HUM, you should check those bands out). But many of the great american bands just don't put out that many albums (Alice in Chains is an exception, and NIN has finally started pumping out albums but they have had a lot of hits and misses since the Fragile, Year Zero sucks, With Teeth sucked, Ghosts was phenomenal, and the SLip only has like 3 good songs (but those 3 songs are great!).........anyway I just didn't mean for this to be a "metal" thread.

 

[requiem]

There are some amazing bands from Sweden and the other Scandanavian countries, but lets not overlook the power of trends. Remember in the mid 90s when any half arse black metal band from Norway was getting signed and distributed? And now every Swedish melodic death band gets a deal etc? I'm as guilty as anyone, I'm somewhat interested when I hear about Norwegian Black Metal or Finnish Gothic Rock, because there have been some good bands, great bands in those genres. But all the stuff that follows is pretty weak. Compare Katatonia to Finland's Charon for instance. Charon really suck in many ways, yet they have a following, several albums out. Then look at a band like The Eternal from my home town of Melbourne, who are just brilliant, but they aren't even on the radar. And there must be hundreds of bands like that throughout the U.S, Canada, UK etc.

But stripping all that away, there are some amazing bands from Scandanavia, and my collection of over a thousand (legally purchased) albums is staggeringly Scandanavian.

 

[insidethefall]

My theories

1) America is not very old by worldly standards...I think we're still trying to find a culture
2) we (government) don't treat our citizens very well. The education system in america is very poor and that extends to music education also. I heard once that In scandinavia the governments funds music education programs
3) since sweden, norway and finland are small, they have more tight knit communities (or scenes) where america is huge
4) The weather, nature and feel of Scandinavia influences more dark metal
5) Scandinavians are very passionate about art - I find that europe in general is quality over quantity where as america it's the other way around

 

[hauntedinflames]

you just owned the thread

 

[Sdob]

Well said. America is complete lack of culture in my opinion though.

 

[hauntedinflames]

I wouldn't say a lack of culture. A lack of a definitive culture perhaps, but again there are so many influences that are drawn in to a more or less new country where the mainstream culture is determined by the flavor of the week

 

[Pastor Digger]

My theories

1) America is not very old by worldly standards...I think we're still trying to find a culture
2) we (government) don't treat our citizens very well. The education system in america is very poor and that extends to music education also. I heard once that In scandinavia the governments funds music education programs
3) since sweden, norway and finland are small, they have more tight knit communities (or scenes) where america is huge
4) The weather, nature and feel of Scandinavia influences more dark metal
5) Scandinavians are very passionate about art - I find that europe in general is quality over quantity where as america it's the other way around

I agree very much with this post! Me being a half Scandinavian (my father is from Denmark) but born and raised in America. I have always been dissapointed with the American music scene as a whole and even the general population here. But having said that, America as we all know has produced some amazing art/music in the short history of this country. America in some ways have been leaders and was started in the search for a better way of life. We have both succeeded and failed in our attempts. In general, too many americans want something to come easily or it's not worth it. We are too lazy and that's also why we are one of the fattest nations on earth. Not talking about myself here of course

America is a great country in many ways though, but we've done a lot of wrong things to bring this country down a long ways.

 

[Lisra]

I've never been to the US but from what I've read and been told it is something utterly schizophrenic in the place. It has one of the greatest massements (word? whatever..) of both genius and utter fail, poverty, money, and otehr contrasts. Once you're there, you are no longer in the real world but in the US.
Of course I've no idea what I'm talking about, but it seems so much so..

 

[Pastor Digger]

Yes Lisra,

You are somewhat correct in what you said. America does seem a bit "schizophrenic" as you said. Not utterly so though. And it depends on where you go too.

America is made up of many different varieties of people whereas most European countries are still holding onto more of their own identity (even if they are slowly losing it in some places).

It's still (overall) a great place to live and I enjoy it here, but it's sad to see where we as a country have stumbled downward so bad, and I like how Europe is more. You go Italy and see a bunch of Italians with their own theme, Denmark to experience their own culture, etc. etc....But America doesn't have a unified culture and is a bit messy in comparison. It's very mixed here and also a huge country, so people in the south seem very different than those from the north here. But damn, we have just about every variety of most everything you could imagine! We have some incredible places here, both natural and structural.

 

[MiniMoose]

I get what you mean, Sweden doesn't have much of a culture or identity of it's own either, more of the same pseudo-culture that you're referring to. I believe we're one of the most Americanized countries in the world. Hopefully other European countries have stronger bonds to their cultures.



I hear that a lot from foreigneres, and I wonder what makes them think that. My notion is that what's played on the radio here is about the same as anywhere else in the west, i.e Coldplay, Beyonce and so on. Add to that the huge passion people here have for Eurovision(an even lower type of music than what you hear on mtv) and the music climate is probably as bad as anywhere else.

+1