What's with the negative view on rock/metal music?

[MonkeyGH]

Rock and metal happen to be two of my favorite musical genres. However, I've noticed that without fail if someone doesn't like rock or metal, it seems to immediately goes beyond simply "I don't like that genre." to something along the lines of "How can you listen to that crap?" or "That music is so offensive!".

How can something be offensive purely based on it's musical content? It doesn't even seem to matter what band is playing the music or what is even being said in the lyrics, offensive or not.

Maybe it's just me, but as a regular listener I've gotten plenty of crap for listening to it.

Thoughts/opinions?

 

[Vault101]

really?

thats called ooinion, and with music its all over the place

I would say more people "generally" dont like rap or somtimes electronic,

I'm not a fan of most rock, it just sounds boring and generic to me, like well loves stuff like guns n roses, or ACDC

oh and I dont like bob dillan

 

[DoPo]

Oh look another one of those threads. "Some people do not like what I like, why don't they like it?"

I've noticed that without fail if someone doesn't like rock or metal, it seems to immediately goes beyond simply "I don't like that genre." to something along the lines of "How can you listen to that crap?" or "That music is so offensive!".

And it's not at all possible that it's confirmation bias on your part? I'm pretty sure that those who neither like nor dislike the genre often don't say anything about it and only the haters speak up.

I've seen it happen - I've asked people for opinions and I've been there when somebody else did it. If I don't have a particular preference for something, why bother announcing it? Let other people talk about the matter. If I literally have nothing else to contribute to that particular conversation aside from "Meh", why should I get involved at all?

That's why you get only strong responses. They may be stupid and unreasonable but they are, first and foremost, opinions.

 

[Lunar Templar]

hehe, if rock and metal are 'offensive' then those prudes should take a wide birth in avoiding rap/hiphop

 

[unoleian]

I'd hardly say there's an overwhelming negative opinion about rock/metal. On the contrary, they seem to be one of the most popular kinds of music, full stop. Everyone I know likes rock/metal, in one flavor or another.

It's far from hated.

Now, my favorite dubstep and heavy bass music, on the other hand....

 

[Vault101]

I'd hardly say there's an overwhelming negative opinion about rock/metal. On the contrary, they seem to be one of the most popular kinds of music, full stop. Everyone I know likes rock/metal, in one flavor or another.

It's far from hated.

Now, my favorite dubstep and heavy bass music, on the other hand....

its not even real music! how can people like all that WUBWUBWUBWUBWUBWUWBUWBWUBWUB crap!?

hahah I know how that feels, I almost had a bran hermage when somone refered to glitch mob as "techno" gahhh

 

[Shadowstar38]

When people who dont listen to metal think of what metal is, they think of this...


This is pleasing to my ears, but the vocalist doesnt sound like, you know, actuall singing. And of course, hyper violent and all that shit.

They dont know about all the other types of bands out there. Its more of a pre-consived notion than anything else.

 

[requisitename]

I'm not sure what you consider "rock", but as far as I know, it's generally fairly well received.

As for metal, I just don't care for it. I'm not that into guitar and I loathe minutes long solos because I listen to music for lyrics I can relate to. That's just my thing. I also prefer a "cleaner" sound to music, without (or with much less) distortion. Again, my thing.

Everyone has different tastes in music, that's why there are approximately 3 gazillion bands.

 

[kiwi_poo]

I think I don't like it because of the loudness of it (I know it sounds weird, but I'm trying not to use the word "offensive"... oh, wait). It's not because of the lyrics. I can put up with a lot of "offensiveness" with the lyrics. To me, the problem is the instruments. It's just so busy that I usually say "fuck it" after 30 or so seconds and go listen to something else.

I don't really care if people listen to it (as long as they don't turn up the volume so high that I can hear the song from 5 meters away, but that counts for everything). I simply don't like most of the songs. I'll usually give them a chance, but as I said, I often go "fuck it" after a while and listen to something else.

 

[Nouw]

Eh it's just like any other genre. You could ask the same for pop,hip-hop,electronic music and everything else. Not everyone listens to the same music.

Now if I they're being ignorant or a bandwagon hater, they're better off being ignored.

 

[Don Savik]

I like rock, don't get me wrong, some songs are quite amazing. But I prefer techno/electronic/house because rock is something that hurts my ears when listened to nonstop. Its just too noisy in large quantities. And I find that a lot of artists don't try to sound unique to other rock bands out there. It all kind of bleeds together.

 

[Mr Somewhere]

Opinions, I guess. Both are still fairly popular. We can all have our own individual tastes without getting into a tizzy. I like rock, but I myself can't stand metal. It just isn't my taste.

 

[LightspeedJack]

The more extreme a music genre is the more extreme the reaction.

 

[repeating integers]

Rock and metal are worlds apart. Metal has become pretty much all I listen to over the past few years, but most rock sounds boring and generic to me, most of it fails to stand out and because it lacks things that are technically tough to pull off, there's nothing left to listen to. Same by the way for some types of metal. Especially American metal bands seem to have no clue how to build a decent theme and just seem to abuse guitars almost at random untill the singer is through his lyrics. That video Shadowstar posted is a good example of uninspired songmaking.

I guess it's unsurprising my second most listened to genre is dance. It used to be also hardstyle and hardcore, but that kind of disappeared for me over the past few years. There your songs also either build a strong musical theme or die.

Then again, the problem with saying 'metal' is it's become so big and diverse there's almost no point to seeing it as a genre, but at the same time neither do I like the rigid dividing into subgenres. Some of those divisions make sense, but others don't. I honestly can't separate trashmetal, powermetal and whatever closely related subgenres some people distinguish.

But I suppose I also owe an example of what I find a good musical theme. I can think of this song:

Basically the theme is what it starts with, and it's totally recognizable as a result.

For another example, listen from 0:41 forwards, what they're singing about there is a charge on horseback. The guidance by the music fits the lyrics perfectly.

To each his own, I see... most metal songs sound similar to each other to me. Not quite to "they all sound the same" level, but it's rock music I find can't be properly looked at as a single genre. Hell, compare these two:

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(Long as the second one may be, you don't need to listen to much of it to see what I mean).

I dunno about you, but to me these don't sound much alike, and they're both rock (Alternative and Progressive, to be precise). Also, it sounds like you might like Progressive Rock as it usually relies on a great deal of instrumental complexity.

 

[Ignatz_Zwakh]

I'll admit I've trouble finding people among my peers who dig the extreme shit I'm into, but it usually doesn't bother me. Barring the way some people have behaved....

 

[IamLEAM1983]

When people who dont listen to metal think of what metal is, they think of this...


This is pleasing to my ears, but the vocalist doesnt sound like, you know, actual singing. And of course, hyper violent and all that shit.

They dont know about all the other types of bands out there. Its more of a pre-consived notion than anything else.

...which is kind of the point, as Dethklok is actually Comedy Metal. It's a partially fictitious band fictitiously made up of Black Metal dudes who ended up with a combined wealth greater than Switzerland's economy; and factually made up of the voice actors of "Metalocalypse" and some regular collaborators.

The character the singer is singing as is Nathan Explosion, a typical Black Metal vocalist who's lucky to have a peanut for a brain. Considering this, it would make perfect sense that he'd glorify ultraviolence because it's, well, brutal. And no true Dethklok fan (in-universe) would abide the thought of a Dethklok song not being brutal.

The best kind of Metal to show to detractors is Power Metal, provided you can get them to read the lyrics at the same time. Most people think shredding and pounding unilaterally leads to singing about demons and scantily-clad succubi and, well, generally everything that ends up in a typical Cradle of Filth song. Bands like Helloween, on the other end, are typically steeped in Tolkien-based hero worship and maintain a largely positive outlook on things. The same goes for Italian Metal (i.e. Rhapsody), where ending up with an operatic finish about some sort of epic clash between a single wizard against an entire army is fairly commonplace.

There's plenty of Metal subgenres that absolutely don't wallow in doom and gloom, but they naturally don't get much circulation. The mainstream media tends to give more attention to anything that's borderline Screamo or that makes Trent Reznor's melodramas look like a half-hour spent watching the Teletubbies.

As for the OP: who gives a damn, honestly? Keep liking what you like and let anyone stupid enough to condemn your tastes prattle on. Opinions are pretty hard to modify, and trying to get someone who's convinced Metal is all about eating babies in the name of Satan to think otherwise is a lost cause.

I've been there, man. An atheist who likes Metal? LE GASP! Thine soul is twice damned, young man!

 

[TheScientificIssole]

Also, it sounds like you might like Progressive Rock as it usually relies on a great deal of instrumental complexity.

OOOOOO! Suggestion time! I think that Rush should be the first thing listened to, and if you're not in to that you shouldn't attempt to move in to King Crimson and Zappa and all that jazz. Because Zappa is some risky ass business.

 

[Benni88]

Thread title should be "What's with the negative view on (insert genre here) music?".

Same beef is applied to anything if you think about it. Dubstep and Hip-Hop take quite a battering (biased I know but they're two genres I enjoy).

Pretty much boils down to personal taste and whether or not somebody wants to broadcast their dislike of a particular kind of music.