Future of heavy music

[jonajon91]

This. Right now everyone is trying to outdo each other in an arms race of technicality, which will build up until the bubble breaks. Afterwards I predict a trend of stoner/sludge type stuff, just like grunge was the response to music becoming too technical and overproduced, we will have a similar trend of simple, lo-fi metal.

As far as bands that will become the next legends, Mastodon is definitely one. They are getting radio play and in the equivalent of the early nineties Metallica phase.

Also, maybe it is just bias from this forum, but I think Periphery have the potential to eventually reach that point. They are influential, and I think eventually one of their more poppy sounding songs, like Jetpacks or Erised could get radio play and make them pretty big. I would not be surprised if eventually, like the big 4 of thrash, we end up with a "big 4" of djent bands that end up making big. Periphery, Tesseract and such could definitely do it depending on how their next couple of albums go.

Music getting too complex? coming from the person with the TooL logo

 

[Asrial]

IMHO Mastadon or Opeth as much as I love them could never headline a festival like Download simply because they don't have the fan base and they aren't generic enough.

FYI, Mastodon was on Orange Scene on Roskilde a couple of years ago, which is quite frankly pretty fucking big. Big enough to house Metallica and Deadmau5, which is mainstream.

And I can sort of agree on a possible rise in middle eastern music influences and microtonality.

 

[Dan_Vacant]

I don't see current bands gaining the iconic mainstream status of Metallica or Slayer in a long time. Mainly because production is now so plentiful the audience is more divided than before. And I'll say that growling bands are out, by default. It also heavily depends on countries, heavy metal is still huge in germany and non existent in France.
Those iconic bands (Metallica etc) can have a good 15+ years of touring lifespan left, so we're not there yet. Ozzy is still there after all.
I do think however that to appeal to the masses you must be reasonably close to standard tuning. Dropped Z guitars won't be mainstream for a looooong time. The public just isn't used to it.

Most nonmusicians i talk to don't know a thing about tunings.

 

[RustInPeace]

I think the likes of Metallica are going to be replaced by Avenged Sevenfold, Five Finger Death Punch, Slipknot, etc. There's always going to be that mainstream market and appeal that certain bands have and will fill the void for. Its a certain kind of person that gets past those bands and into the subgenres, mainly the musician type or aficionado.

I have a few friends that love Ozzy, Metallica, and Megadeth to death, but I cant get them into the likes of Periphery, Devin Townsend, or Dream Theater. There's just a certain level of appreciation that some people dont have for music, and its sometimes hard not to come off as some kind of musical snob.

Where does heavy music go from here? Its tough to say, but im sure there will be a new trend that emerges in the next 5 years or so that everyone gets into, which isnt a bad thing. We've moved on from thrash to groove to nu to core to prog and to djent, and Im happy to say I've taken some influence from each. Its rather exciting to see where we go next!

 

[jwade]

The majority of the bands you guys are talking about aren't really the kinds of things that could be on your standard pop/rock radio stations. I think the future big metal acts are probably not going to be any of the current crop of stuff out there, it'll be something with massive pop crossover appeal, like Metallica had with the black album.

I think there are only a couple bands going right now that might be capable of vaulting into that mainstream awareness like Metallica did. One would be Torche, despite them not considering themselves a metal band, and the other is Baroness, who admittedly have shed much of what made them 'metal' before.

 

[leechmasterargentina]

My humble oppinion: Metal will never die. "Big bands" are just old dudes who only care about their lives; not making great records anymore. Remember they didn't start big either. Most of the bands you mentioned were a bit of "under" in those days. If you said you liked Metallica in 91, that was just a Metal band. Nowadays they're considered a big rock band and many posers listen to them. Rammstein is becoming a big band in my oppinion. They tour the world, fill stadiums, etc. I guess some of the underground bands of today will become the big bands in the next decade.

 

[Andromalia]

Most nonmusicians i talk to don't know a thing about tunings.

Yeah, but they will instinctly like more what looks a bit like what they know. I didn't say it talking in technical terms. Music with an overabundance of low pitched instuments never is the popular one. Guess why the "king" instrument in classical music isn't the cello and you have 10 pieces written for violin for each cello one.

 

[celticelk]

My humble oppinion: Metal will never die. "Big bands" are just old dudes who only care about their lives; not making great records anymore. Remember they didn't start big either. Most of the bands you mentioned were a bit of "under" in those days. If you said you liked Metallica in 91, that was just a Metal band. Nowadays they're considered a big rock band and many posers listen to them. Rammstein is becoming a big band in my oppinion. They tour the world, fill stadiums, etc. I guess some of the underground bands of today will become the big bands in the next decade.

I'm not comfortable with a definition of "metal" that hinges on whether a band has a large mainstream following, fills stadiums, etc.

 

[celticelk]

Yeah, but they will instinctly like more what looks a bit like what they know. I didn't say it talking in technical terms. Music with an overabundance of low pitched instuments never is the popular one. Guess why the "king" instrument in classical music isn't the cello and you have 10 pieces written for violin for each cello one.

A lot of the nu-metal bands did pretty well despite writing in tunings a whole-step or more below standard. Doesn't Korn tune to drop A? There's not a lot of daylight between that and the tunings that the extreme bands are using. I think that tone quality rather than pitch as such is a much more significant factor in popular acceptance.

 

[bhakan]

Music getting too complex? coming from the person with the TooL logo

I love the technicality, but not everyone does. I've been hearing a lot of "_____ is too technical and too overproduced, it lacks feeling," which to me suggests that the next trend will go in the opposite direction- more straight forward and raw sounding.

Yeah, but they will instinctly like more what looks a bit like what they know. I didn't say it talking in technical terms. Music with an overabundance of low pitched instuments never is the popular one. Guess why the "king" instrument in classical music isn't the cello and you have 10 pieces written for violin for each cello one.

I don't know if people dislike low tunings as much as they dislike the fact that most bands tuning low also scream and are generally heavy.

 

[All_¥our_Bass]

Yeah, but they will instinctly like more what looks a bit like what they know. I didn't say it talking in technical terms. Music with an overabundance of low pitched instuments never is the popular one. Guess why the "king" instrument in classical music isn't the cello and you have 10 pieces written for violin for each cello one.

Also, how many upright bass concertos can you think of?

I think that tone quality rather than pitch as such is a much more significant factor in popular acceptance.

That's true, but there is definitely a correlation between bands tuning REALLY low and having a tone quality that the average person might not like because it's too different from the bands they already know and like.