rock genres Options

[xhiddenemotion]

hey i listen to a lot of rock. but like i`m confuesd with the genres. like i mean i usually dont analyze it or anything. so can u guys help me out? like define some rock genres like alternative, (i know emo & punk lol), indie, grunge... etc. and name some bands that go with it.

[antix10_kos]

Let me see....I'll start with my faves and work my way down the list...

Industrial - I just call it "rap for white people". that's what it boils down to, really. Good beats, sometimes joined with crunchy guitars for an aggressive effect (KMFDM, Front 242) other times it's joined by a full band or just a single vocalist to make it more "listener friendly" (Nine Inch Nails). The roots of industrial music are just plain bizarre. People who got frustrated with the punk and rock scenes and went to the extreme side of things. Banging on pipes, cutting themselves, shorting out speakers, television static and lots of screaming qualified as industrial, as did early machine-generated music like Kraftwerk (today, the music is called "techno"). Synths became popular and then mainstream music found them. The hybrid of synthpop was born. Industrial music's heyday was from about 1989-1994, the majority of the top-notch industrial bands coming from Europe, but the US also had a few good ones as well. Industrial music is coming back in a new forms, one that goes back to it's roots in punk and combines it with its own bizarre-ness and one that strips it down and takes it back to the dancefloors

Noteworthy bands: Kraftwerk, KMFDM, Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode, Front 242, Ministry, Mindless Self Indulgence, and The Faint.

Goth - It's a broad genre, but I'll do my best here. The goth scene was an offshoot of the punk scene. Goth is the original emo, really, a bunch of broken-hearts and depressives looking for a good beat beat the dance to and lyrics to describe their emotions. "Music as black as my heart..." The goth scene had it's heyday in the mid-80's and resurfaced again in the mid-90's. True goth music has changed very little over the past 20 years (mainly cuz there's no new bands coming in and out of the scene). Joy Division and The Brithday Party were closer to the punk scene and really gave birth to the goth genre. The Sisters of Mercy and Bauhaus were the first "goth" bands, specializing in that dark, moody, depressive feeling that is "goth". The Cure was music for the more broken-hearted goths. The last two bands were "revival" bands from the mid-90's. Switchblade claimed that they weren't goth, Rosetta Stone simply disappeared from the scene as quickly as they'd come.

Highlights: Joy Division, The Birthday Party, Sisters of Mercy, Bauhaus, The Cure, Switchblade Symphony, and Rosetta Stone.

Metal - Metal has so many sub-genres, it's ridiculous. Let's start at the beginning...Once upon a time, there was a group of English guys who loved blues and loved taking LSD and smoking pot. They started playing a strange new type of music that was "heavy, dark, mysterious, and some say "satanic". They were (and still are) called Black Sabbath. Many people were inspired by Sabbath's sound, and they went on the form new bands or change their bands music to keep up with the new sound. There was Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Led Zeppelin, Kiss, Rush, Aerosmith...then, in the late 70's a little English band called Vader shook things up a bit. They played a song called "black metal" and sub-genre was born. Black metal, however, didn't really take hold until the 90's, so we'll leave it along for awhile.
Thrash metal, however, was an 80's phenomenon. From about '81 to '86, thrash was the name of the metal, baby. Young bands like Metallica and Slayer became hits, Iron Maiden jumped from obscurity to stardom and Judas Priest became a household name. Each band had their own specialty. Metallica was a pissed-off band that sand about everyday life, in their own way. Slayer was dark and "satanic", singing about the devil, killing, blood and anything else they liked. Maiden sang about history, fighting, and whatever else there was. Priest, well I don't think anyone really understood what they were singing about until Halford came out...
Hair metal took over in the late 80's. It was poppy and crap to the hardcore metal and punk fans. Catchy riffs, tight pants, and the motto "The bigger the hair, the closer to God.", proved to true. Bands like Twisted Sister and The Scorpions were okay. Metal went underground and met up with the agitated punk scene to form hardcore. Hardcore was strictly piss-off and get f**ked and stay away from me. Punk ethos combined with metal aggression formed this little scene. Stormtroopers of Death, DRI, and Suicidal Tendencies made up the late 80's version of the hardcore scene, joined by members of the hardocre punk scene like Black Flag.
Metal took a vacation after the late 80's and most of the 90's. Grunge came into play during the 90's, with bands like Nirvana, Alice In Chains, Peral Jam, Soundgarden and Mudhoney reveling in their successes and dying from overdoses. Meanwhile, in Europe, a group of pissed off psychos were coming up with a new form of extreme metal called "black metal". Called so because it focused on things like Satan, Satanism, black magic and violence. The only thing that I can say about this scene was that they are most definately very f**ked up. Bands like Emperor, Immortal, Mayhem and Burzum really created a new and disturbing sound. Today, bands like Cradle of Filth and Dimmu Borgir have more or less popularized black metal by combining it with classical music and synths, making it more "listener-friendly".
A band called Pantera breathed life into the American metal scene during the 90's, creating an ass-kicking lesson in metal brilliance. The took the pissed off attitude of hardcore, the riffs of thrash and the pure emotion of the south and brought metal back from the dead. Other bands during this era in metal capatilized on different styles, but brought life back to the ailing scene. White Zombie created a metal/industrial/acid trip that was second to none. Corrosion of Conformity smothered the scene in southern style. Cannibal Corpse pushed a new, extreme form of metal called "death metal" into the outer edges of mainstream.
Exit the era of revival and now what come after is a disappointment...nu-metal. A fusion of rap, metal and marketing that is strictly entertainment. Bands like Limp Bizkit, Linkin Park, Korn, and countless no-name bands jump aboard this craze. Other bands come from this era as well, but they capitilize on different styles. I call this group of bands "the Masked Bands" cuz they all wore masks in their heyday. Slipknot is like an assault to your senses. Take the aggression of Cannibal Corpse, the beats of a industrial/rap madman, and the lyrics of a group of f*d up midwesterners and you have Slipknot. Mudvayne follows suit with a slightly toned down sound. Mushroomhead breaks through with their sleeker version of Slipknotic sound (called so because Slipknot made it popular, despite the fact that Mushroomhead was around longer.)
Now, metal has cycled back to its hardcore roots. There's a great variety in the sounds of these bands, more so than in the old days, and some of the music is more melodic. There's a whole bunch of bands in this catagory...bands like Killswitch Engage and In Flames, who both had a hand in creating the melodic side of the scene. There's bands like Children of Bodom and Kalmah who are more thrash influenced and have a harder sound. Then you have bands like Underoath, He Is Legend, and Dead Poetic, who represent the Christian side of the scene, which is the largest and fastest growing part of the scene. Then there's bands out there that are hardcore but don't really claim a part in the scene (as far as I know), like Bleeding Through, Most Precious Blood, Dillinger Escape Plan, Bury Your Dead....Metal is still alive and thriving, albeit in a new form.

Bands to know: Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Slayer, Metallica (early albums only), Suicidal Tendencies, Black Flag, Nirvana, Soundgarden, Emperor, Burzum, Pantera, White Zombie, Danzig, Static-X, Slipknot, Children of Bodom, In Flames, Arch Enemy, Extol, and Bleeding Through....many more....