{"id":12721,"date":"2014-11-05T16:00:55","date_gmt":"2014-11-05T21:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.toiletovhell.com\/?p=12721"},"modified":"2014-11-03T21:18:29","modified_gmt":"2014-11-04T02:18:29","slug":"op-ed-genre-hopping-and-jumping-the-shark","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/op-ed-genre-hopping-and-jumping-the-shark\/","title":{"rendered":"Op Ed: Genre Hopping and Jumping the Shark"},"content":{"rendered":"
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My friends, I’ve got some beef with you. Over the course of these four or so months, I’ve grown very fond of this warm little toilet and its delightful denizens. I feel at home here amid the scum and the filth. But lately, I’ve noticed a disturbing trend rearing its ugly head from deep in the bowels of the toilet, clogging up the joint and emanating an unpleasant odor. Comrades, indulge me for a minute while we talk about the pointlessly prevalent accusation of genre hopping.<\/p>\n

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Before I dive into my thoughts on that topic, though, I need to clear the air about how I feel about metal genres. I’ve seen a lot of bands lately whine and moan about being pigeon-holed into a particular genre even though that is precisely the style they play. “We don’t play black metal, we play transcendent butt-gaze” or whatever. Here’s the thing. Metal genres and subgenres exist for a reason. They allow us to sort and classify the multitude of bands that are clamoring away on basement demos over at bandcamp. They give us a handle for choosing between the glut of new projects (half of which are typically from Mories or Justin Broadrick) and determining how we should squander those precious few dollars and hours that we’ve squirreled away rather than spending them on healthy foods or exercise, respectively. Metal genres have typically been defined both by innovative bands labeling themselves or by journalists establishing the term to describe a groundbreaking scene. Essentially, these brackets have been laid in place by the experts, and we as humble listeners must respect those foundations because they give each of us a communicable language with which we can discuss our interests. Additionally, genre tags provide us with an expected product. We don’t call Metallica death metal because we know not to expect tremolo picking, growls, or blast beats. Similarly, we want to know which sounds to avoid; we don’t call Cattle Decapitation tech death because we don’t want people to be turned away by thinking they play weedly deedlies like Rings of Saturn. Plus, every single one of us here has suffered the indignation of being accused of listening to screamo. Let’s all just agree that genre labels are important and that we should use them wisely and appropriately. Therefore, if you’re in a band and don’t want to get pegged in one subgenre, incorporate elements from a different one rather than coming up with some absurd moniker for your style of music that plenty of other people in your subgenre are playing.<\/p>\n

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Now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk about this insult I’ve seen a number of you (and other bloggers\/readers) bandy about. Many of you are quick to slander any band that shifts between genres and releases an album in a decidedly different style than previous efforts. This honestly baffles me because we as metalheads often profess that we love “progressive” music or that we enjoy when bands “stylistically evolve.” So I’m confused about something. Is the progress only supposed to be made within a particular genre that we enjoy? If a band we love dabbles in some other genre, are we too narrow-minded to appreciate it? Or is the problem more of an issue with control? Are we afraid to let the musicians we idolize, on whom we place an unrealistic amount of expectation and longing for fulfillment, construct art that they think is meaningful? Perhaps, and I think that’s the reason why you’ll often find the same fans who lob accusations of genre hopping also whine that their favorite bands are suddenly releasing a new album. Some of us have grown far too accustomed to the categorization system laid by our forebears, and rather than using genres as a constructive language tool, we use them as a fetter to bind the artists we adore to our own strict guidelines.<\/p>\n

As you can hopefully see, there’s a cognitive dissonance here. We can’t claim to be open-minded while simultaneously eschewing the experimentation and boldness that helped define this genre we all love. We can critique a band as they work within the boundaries of a particular subgenre, but we have to add some more descriptive handles to our criticism if they choose to straddle the lines. Honestly, I think more bands should play with the boundaries\u00a0and not allow themselves to stagnate while working within one predefined set of rules. Think of your favorite band this year. Do they stick to the template of their home subgenre? I assume not, and thus, musical progress is forged.<\/p>\n

Let’s examine some common targets of genre hopping. I’m going to provide several exhibits and explain why the accusation is both lazy and disingenuous. The most consistent target for this insult is Machine Head<\/strong>, and honestly, I think that’s a bit silly. The band has really only ever played two styles: groove\/thrash and nu metal. I find it humorous that people accuse them of genre hopping when there are other bands who have changed styles more frequently and less effectively (looking at you, Trivium<\/strong><\/a>). But when you get down to the core of the attacks on Machine Head, I think what you find is that people dislike the fact that they’ve changed genres when each scene was burgeoning, and thus appeared to be trying to cash in on popular trends. I honestly think that’s a much more legitimate criticism, but I’d still prefere the band that wrote “Wolves” rather than the band that wrote “From This Day.”<\/p>\n