I would like to talk about this for a long time. To me people that talks about music genres, almost all of them don’t know what they are talking about. Let me ask you something: What is metal music? You might hear on the streets that metal is a powerful music genre, with fat riffs, distortion and fast drums. Maybe they are right in some part. But the real answer to that question is: Metal is Black Sabbath. That’s it. When the band from Birmingham released their first, revolutionary album, they exposed to the world a new sound never heard before.
You might differ with me saying that metal was invented by another band like Judas Priest, but that’s a discussion we’ll cover another day.
You might hear something like, and I’ve heard this so many times, “I don’t like Tool because is not metal” Waaaaaaaaatttthhhhh? Who cares? When a band releases a new piece of music it should be something new, something that no one else had to hear before. Because if so, Why do somebody will hear them in the first place? If the band/artist is that good that craft a new sound and reviewers all over the world labels them with a new “music genre”, that will mean they nailed it! I’m pretty sure Mr. Steven Wilson will agree with me here.
What is the first question people ask you when you say you like music? I bet all my money that is this one: “And what kind of music do you like?”. Right? I will share my answer to that repeated question. I begin saying (always) “Well… Rock, Metal, Psychedelic, Metalcore, Heavy, Pop… It really depends on the mood you are… you know”.
All my life I have been answering the same thing over and over, never overthinking on the subject really. And recently I did. Why do we need to tag some artist with some specific music genre? If I say that Pantera is Thrash Metal somebody that dislikes that genre might never consider listening to a single song of them. But I know that if you play them “Cemetery Gates” they would say… This is Thrash Metal? WTF!
If you take the example of Opeth, the Swedish band. Through all their career, all their records are different from each other in some aspect. Either on the vocals, the intensity or the complexity of the songs. How can you tag on them?
The beauty of a good band is that they are able to create an entirely new sound that will set them apart from the others. A good band should experiment until they find their own unique tone. When I hear a Metallica’s riff, I know that it’s them without opening my eyes, there is no need to.
I invite you to taste every genre without looking at the tag. Because good bands, the really good bands, don’t have another tag that their own names. And you are the only one to know if you’re gonna like the music or not. Period. Take suggestions from others but not too seriously.. if you know what I mean.