Heavy Metal
 

Any metalheads here? And I mean true metal, not emo-core bullshit.

Metalhead is an ambiguous term. Do you mean hair metal, thrasher metal, speed metal, death metal, norse metal, black metal ........

You are very right, but I mean metal in general. What I mean by that is, by my biased opinion, that it excludes most mainstream bands (Hair Metal, Nu-metal, Metalcore) and includes Death, Black, Doom, Traditional, Thrash, Power, etc.

How many categories does "metal" need, and how are they really all that different from each other?

;)

Actually, they are different. Maybe not to the 'outsider' but for instance. Death metal usually involves lots of gore and death, obviously. Folk metal takes songs that are a beautiful part of a culture's tradition and performs them over 2 or 4 really loud guitar chords and someone banging on the drums as fast as they can.

There are some really good bands out there. Nightwish is a finnish band that does sort of fantasy epic goth metal (Meaning they do songs about fairies, with string orchestras in the background, and they actually have music that sounds like music over operatic lyrics) but they recently changed singers and I'm told the new stuff isn't as good.

Is "Enter Sandman" metal?

In my day, Blue Oyster Cult was metal. The godfathers of Metal were alleged to be Steppenwolf.

So...what, exactly constitutes "Metal"? And don't say elemental properties such as Iron, Zinc, Lead or any of the actinides.

Boy, you really sold me on its merits there. :rolleyes:

I know two or four guitar chords. Now, all I need is a giant PA and someone to bang the shit out of some drums.

Metallica used to be a hair metal band, now they're just ... I dunno.. Is there such a thing as hard country?

It's hard to generalize with a genre that's been so diversified, but .. in general ... usually it's fast-ish music, heavy drums, drop-D tuning in the bass guitar, screamed lyrics though some can actually sing.

Mind, those are ranged. For instance .. Dimu Borgir. Literally screams their lyrics. Nightwish has two singers, female and male. The old female singer sang in opera style, the male just .. sang. Kind of growly voice, but definite singing, not screaming.

I'm no expert, though. You can often identify thrasher or speed metal by this simple test: Start playing the song, randomly change the position of the song. If someone else listening can't tell when you switch places, it's probably thrasher or speed or the like.

I find metal to be ok, but I have to be in a certain mood. You identified a couple of the reasons I don't prefer metal in your post.

Screaming instead of singing typically depicts a lack of musical talent.
"2 or 4 really loud guitar chords" (usually borrowed from something else)

"banging on the drums as fast as they can." I prefer an innovative beat that leads or compliments the music.

Metallica was a Thrash Metal band, and Enter Sandman was the song that made them sell out, and sink really, REALLY low. So, no.

To answer the questions about the sub-genres of metal, they are VERY different from each other. Lets take Black and Death metal for instance. If you do not listen to metal, they would sound the same to you, blast-beat drums, heavy guitars, screaming vocals, so they are almost the same, right? WRONG. It isn't just the music that is different, it's the image, the lyrics, the vocal style, even the number of people in the band in some cases. Death Metal, as already mentioned, is PARTIALLY about blood and guts (the Death Metal I despise, otherwise known as "Grindcore"), but another good half is filled with fantastic lyrics about Ancient Civilizations, (Nile is a good example, as they sing EXCLUSIVELY about Ancient Egypt), places of despair (although this is mostly doom metal, it is done in Death Metal also), etc.

Most Black Metal is about hatred, evil, and Anti-Christianity. The majority of Black Metal sings about Satan, and is filled with shreiking vocals and bad recording quality. Some examples of bands are Dark Funeral, Darkthrone, Slavia, etc. etc. There are, however, Black Metal bands that have fantastic and the most beautiful lyrics you can imagine. Lets take Summoning, for example. They are considered Black Metal, but they barely use the guitar and stick to horns, flutes, and choirs, and sing exclusively about the Lord of the Rings. They even wrote the first song ever to be written in the Black Speech of Mordor (for people who read the book).

Since I am still under the illusion that any of you care, you can read more about the different genres here:

http://metalcrypt.com/ Just go there and click on "metal genres" on the left side.

To Stress Puppy: Dimmu Borgir is a bad example of "screaming" vocals, as that guy has the worst voice I have ever heard, and the band is so fake it's unbeleivable.

;)