The Beginning of the End

So, I've come to a genuinely terrifying realization: The metal scene has been in a state of horrible stagnation for years, and I have simply failed to notice. It all makes a horrifying kind of sense though, like this illusion spanning many years has just come crashing down like Michael Jackson dropping a baby off a balcony (too soon?). My realization has been cued by a few key events, which I shall lay out thusly:

1) Press. I doubt too many people read that many metal rags like Revolver or Hit Parader, but I've read them for a few years now. I picked one up for trashy airplane reading the other day and about halfway through it hit me: every interview is exactly the same. Regardless of the artist, they always have some new album coming out and they talk about how amazing it is and how they really poured a lot of themselves into it and it's the most personal thing they've done to date. Think about it. Isn't that EVERY interview with a musician you've ever read? Then you actually listen to the album and realize it sounds like everything else they've released. Look at Lamb of God's "Sacrament" or Shadows Falls' "Threads of Life". They sound almost exactly like the albums before them, yet somehow right now they are "unique". I just downloaded Devildriver's new album, "The Last Kind Words" and while I find it quite enjoyable, it basically sounds like "The Fury of our Maker's Hand" (its predecessor). The fact that these artists seem to view this as change is frightening though, because it means that the scene isn't going to evolve. And what happens to things that don't evolve (with the exception of the troglodyte that became president)? THEY DIE!

2) Artists that try to change just fuck everything up. I had some prime examples this summer when Marilyn Manson and Linkin Park both released new albums (yes, I liked Linkin Park back in the day, and I still like most of Manson's old stuff even if he is just trying too hard). Like other artists on the scene, they said that their stuff was "radically different". I wasn't too worried, I'd heard that line before and usually I was a fan of the results. Manson's new one had one good song. ONE. LP have an album that has some ok tracks, but after about any given 3, I get bored and change albums. So when the artists are trying to evolve, they're not even picking up on which traits to take with them, they just do artsy bullshit without realizing that metal is not an artsy crowd. And yes, i know calling Linking Park metal is like calling Slayer soft rock, but bear with me here. After all, nu-metal still has "metal" in it.

3) Bottom line, I just haven't been listening to newer metal that much. My latest acquisitions tend to be garage rock from Allison or Japanese Rock from Mike and Ryan. Hell, my favorite CD's I've gotten all summer were Bad Religion and Smashing Pumpkins (the latter is kinda metal, but kinda moreso grunge, so I don't count it fully). I figure I've got a hefty collection of awesome metal, but why keep paying for the same damned album over and over again? What's distressing is that this really only seems to be happening in the metal scene. SoCal punk has taken a really favorable turn lately, the more indie rock I listen to, the more diverse it seems, and what with having gotten into J-Rock last year, I now have an entire other country's scene and evolution to explore.

I really don't want to be the guy on the street corner trumpeting that the end is near, calling out the harlots, blaming the guv'ment for lack or morality etc....and say that metal is dying, but look at it rationally: Do we have a Led Zeppelin or Iron Maiden from our generation? Fuck, we don't even have a Poison or a Warrant. In 20 years, is anyone even going to remember this scene?