I thought this would be a sure bet for me starting up the longest thread in the forum.

Knock yourselves out, guys!

nah, our disagreements need to be natural and pure. not forced.

I'm sure Steve would agree.

To humor keith...



Derek is such a better keyboard player than Kevin.

Awake is a lame album.

Ty Tabor is better off making solo albums.

And Rush and Queensryche have good moments, but have long outlasted their musical relevance.

OK, done.

Oh... re: DT keyboarders...

• Kevin was the best "songwriter" of the bunch. "Space-Dye Vest" and Chroma Key's Dead Air for Radios proves that.
• Derek was the best "rockstar" one of the bunch. Two girls on each arm proves that. His post-DT project (Planet X) was good, but lacking, IMO.
• Jordan is the "wanker" of the bunch. His technical skill, but bad hair, proves that. I think his work on LTE 1 & 2 is better than any Dream Theater he's been in on...

oh, and "damn you, keith!!"

~fafs

ya know, this is too easy. it's just not the same when it doesn't evolve out of some completely unrelated thread.

::sits down in lawnchair and gets comfy::

this could last long enough for me to find a beer i like! thanks Keith. you are so brilliant!

uh, down in front!

d.

sorry d... i think we're spent.

we prefer hijacking...

::looks down at sagging busted balloon::

::sees ballon lawn, marks of a lawn chair... no one in sight, goes home::

* flicks steve with the elasticity of the broken balloon*

what in the bloody hell are you people talking about?

Cheeses.

Wouldn't Cheeses be surprised?

::rolls eyes at Mr. Social::

i'm not really into cheese.

Sorry, I couldn't resist. Hadn't heard that line in a while...

I agree... cheeses are awesome!!

this was C-n-P'd from the Pet Peeves thread...


Your definition of "nu-metal" as "downtuned guitars and screaming" is kind of off-base... regardless, if I could only name one, it would be Finger Eleven. Their debut, Tip, is bloody brilliant. I thank Canada's MuchMusic for getting me into F11. Their second album, Greyest of Blue Skies, was weak. But they bounced back, and their third album, Finger Eleven, is right on the money again. Definitely a band to watch...

Since I can name more than one... here you go...

Sevendust is only half-screaming (it's their drummer's fault). Lajon (the other half) has a beautiful voice. Their albums are so-so. Half is good, half is filler. It's like they work to hard to fulfill contractual obligations, or something.

Deftones have some neat experimentative stuff going on... they tend to resort to screaming, yes, but I find some of their stuff to be pert good. Of course, I also find artistic enjoyment in most of Marilyn Manson's work, too.

Celldweller (on the indie front) makes some great techno, nu-metal. Well-crafted "video-game rock." Along similar lines, I thoroughly enjoy Fear Factory. They are king of the nu-metal genre, if anyone. Lyrically, Burton likes to rehash the whole "computers taking over the world" crap, but all-in-all, I really love FF's stuff.

Chevelle is good... but they're more of a watered-down Tool for skaters... their debut on Squint (Point #1) was pretty damn good. Their latest one (Wonder What's Next) was half really good, half middle of the road. I'd still label them as an enjoyable listen. Same goes for Earshot, another decent Toolish group.

While I don't consider Incubus to be "nu-metal," some do. Both Incubus and their brother group (literally), Audiovent, are good music in that genre. Great vocals, great guitars, a lack of mook-rock lyrics.

downset., in the hiphop-hardcore subgenre, was a brilliant group until in-fighting split the songwriting team in two. Their last one, Check Your People, sucked an egg. Their first two, downset and Do We Speak a Dead Language?, are both keepers in my book. They were P.O.D. before P.O.D. was P.O.D.

Which brings us to P.O.D.. I think they've really evolved. Their last two, Satellite and Payable on Death, have gone miles beyond their earlier work as far as quality. The production is way better than Brown or Snuff the Punk, and the songwriting is better than Fundamental Elements of Southtown.

Would you consider Rage Against the Machine to be "nu-metal"...? They came out about the time of Korn... Rage is a brilliant rock group. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. Sum greater than its parts...

Evanescence is a great group. I'm still shocked at their rise to stardom, though. I remember when Brad Caviness was pimping them back in 2000 on the Over the Rhine actwin list. He produced/financed one (or more) of their indie CDs (Origin). Their Wind-Up Records debut is about 60% that Origin CD... anyway, we'll see what their next one does musically...

Coheed and Cambria might be borderline nu-metal, borderline prog. I dig 'em something fierce. Definitely more arty than most "nu-metal." Perhaps "nu-prog." Yeah, I can see your reaction now. Here's a spoon. Gag if you will, but I'd say not before you give their stuff a good, long listen. It oozes prog-metal brilliance.

I could do without Limp Bizkit, Slipknot, System of a Down, et al... but they still have musical merit (well, maybe not Limp Bizkit after Wes Borland left)...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shall I continue? All I'm trying to reiterate is that "being a music snob to the extent of dissing an entire genre is an ill-informed music snob."

"Genres" are kind of dumb anyway... judge based on individual merit, not on their association with a musical "label" of sorts. The whole "Recommended if you like blah-blah-blah" has its place, but it tends to boil music down to compartments. I don't like that. Some music cannot be pinned down.

~fafs

np: alanis morissette - under rug swept

Well, I've heard most of the bands you mentioned, and I really didn't like them. Maybe because they existed at the expense of more melodic metal, which was pretty much elimintated from popular conciousness around the time Limp Bizkit came out and has yet to return.

I will say that Evanescence's debut (Origin) is pretty good, and rather promising. Their major label album is a total mess, with whatever slick producer they got making them sound like all the other bands on the radio except with a chick singer. "Bring Me To Life" would've been a decent song if they had gotten rid of that random white guy "rapping" in it. Who's idea was that anyways?

I don't consider Rage Against The Machine to be nu-metal. I think of them almost as a hard rock version of a politically-charged Beastie Boys...just take away the samples and turntables and replace them with the absolute genius of Tom Morello. But most importantly, Rage had the funk. It wasn't P-Funk style, but those songs grooved, despite how heavy they were sometimes. They also made the most of dynamics and Morello's innovative guitar playing. Zach got on my nerves sometimes, but the fact that he was talking about real issues and always had a point to his lyrics (even if i didn't always agree) made it bearable. They were just too varied and musical to be lumped into any category with Korn or Fear Factory, at least to me. I'm kind of glad they broke up, because I think their schtick had run a bit thin by the third album, but they made the most out of what they had.

The rest of it...I could do without. I heard Finger Eleven once and couldn't tell them apart from any of the other bands the corporations are forcing on the masses...they all sound kind of the same to me.

I think seeing Finger Eleven's "Above" (from their debut, Tip) on MuchMusic (you know, the good music TV channel) turned me into a lifelong fan. Their second album almost turned me off, but their third (self-titled) bounced me right back... great vocals...

::sets up lawn chair and new balloon::

That might not happen much until he goes to school in the fall and is allowed to post during the day (and secondarily up my post count).

Will your balloon last 'til the fall? If not, we'll pitch in and buy you a nice sturdy one...

~fafs

mwah! thanks dan!

i will be very busy in the fall myself!
d.

So... um... Velvet Revolver... um... seems like Scott's tryin' to sound like Axl.

Thoughts?

~fff