# I hate grunge.



## Marla1978 (Feb 13, 2018)

Tygers of Poontang said:


> @Marla1978 What do you think about the impact of thrash on the hair/glam metal scene ? Do you think that thrash metal also took away a lot of the audience ?


In the broadest possible sense there are two "schools" of heavy metal pre-1980s (kind of like how there are two schools of jazz tenor playing, you're either a Hawkins disciple or a Lester Young disciple).

Theres the European school: Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Uriah Heep, Budgie, Rainbow, Judas Priest, etc.
There's the US school: Van Halen, Aerosmith, Ted Nugent, Kiss, Alice Cooper, etc.

In the 80s the stuff generally considered to be "heavy metal" was bands influenced by the European school and the slightly later NWOBHM offshoot. This extended into newer genres like thrash, doom, power metal (the 80s definition of the term, not the modern definition of the term), etc. Thrash then later begat further offshoots like death metal.

The "hair metal" stuff was generally bands influenced by the US school...and mostly Van Halen to be honest. The US school to me has always been right on that cusp of hard rock/heavy metal, generally being more focused on upbeat party rock and stuff that "chicks dig".

The influence of Led Zeppelin kind of falls somewhere in between the two schools as Plant's stage presence was a popular influential thing for hair metal vocalists to emulate...if you could mix Plant and Steven Tyler together you basically have every frontman for every commercial metal act during the entire decade.

This is of course an over-simplification, but I think it works from a cursory standpoint. If you read interviews with Motley Crue or Ratt during the 80s they always listed bands like Kiss and Aerosmith as primary influences. If you read interviews with bands like Metallica or Slayer they usually mentioned Sabbath, Deep Purple and all the NWOBHM bands. Anybody who thinks hair metal bands didn't care about the music is just ignorant. They cared no more or less than musicians in any other rock genre. Not saying it was all gold, but the implication that because of their appearance they didn't care about the songs is just asinine. Any thought that musicians in thrash or speed metal or just rock bands didn't care about the way they looked is also completely misguided. FWIW, as someone who grew up as a metal girl in the late80s/early 90s the genres weren't nearly as defined as they are now. We'd listen to Metallica or Iron Maiden or Megadeth and then something on the poppier end of the scale - Crue, Warrant, Slaughter, Cinderella, whatever. Yeah some people weren't into the extremes on either end (Firehouse or King Diamond, for example), but for the most part metal was metal and it was all rock.


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## VoodooDolls (Jul 30, 2013)

i also hate with all my passion hair metal and glam bullcrap, i know a few kids who dress up for saturday night in their local 80s metal club
i think it's like carnival every weekend

i like sepultura and pantera and other bunch of metal bands

i have more opinions too but whatever


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## Not that guy (Feb 26, 2015)

Ya, back in my day men put on makeup and poofed-up their hair with at least three bottles of hair spray. Men worn women's underwear and they sang songs about the devil in a falsetto. Men were men and that was music and we liked it.

I don't remember those days fondly. Metal seemed so corporate and pre-fabricated, every third album followed the power ballad formula. Nirvana, Pumpkins and NIN were a breath of fresh air. The kids were making rock music again. NIN, NIN holy s*&!. Downward Spiral sounded like the soundtrack to a Hieronymus Bosch painting. I still remember where I was, who I was with and what car we were in when I first heard In Utero. Grundge quickly became commodified and burnt itself out like punk. But there were a few good years.


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## Flow Ozzy (Nov 7, 2015)

Not that guy said:


> Ya, back in my day men put on makeup and poofed-up their hair with at least three bottles of hair spray. Men worn women's underwear and they sang songs about the devil in a falsetto. Men were men and that was music and we liked it.
> 
> I don't remember those days fondly. Metal seemed so corporate and pre-fabricated, every third album followed the power ballad formula. Nirvana, Pumpkins and NIN were a breath of fresh air. The kids were making rock music again. NIN, NIN holy s*&!. Downward Spiral sounded like the soundtrack to a Hieronymus Bosch painting. I still remember where I was, who I was with and what car we were in when I first heard In Utero. Grundge quickly became commodified and burnt itself out like punk. But there were a few good years.


That's mostly what happened in the US, I think the 'heavy metal' which came from Birmingham (England) had nothing to do with poofed up hair and boatloads of makeup, Black Sabbath even hated the whole 'flower power' culture to an extent ... 

This is metal:


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## Surreal Snake (Nov 17, 2009)

Thanks for sharing


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## incision (May 23, 2010)

Wat? OP, you and I have polar opposite tastes, lol.

Let's compare a tune in each genre:

Motley Crue (pop hairband, light fluff)






Pearl Jam (grunge, darker more intense)






NIN (industrial metal - dark and intense)


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## crazitaco (Apr 9, 2010)

I don't just dislike hair metal, I loathe it! I need a bit more complexity in my music than what it had to offer and way less sex-obsessive lyrics. I'll take pessimistic lyrics over that tripe any day! Like "she's my cherry pie" wtf is that even supposed to mean.

I know a lot of grunge fans would probably crucify me for saying this, but my favorite grunge band was Days of the New. Er, technically they're post-grunge. I loved that its almost entirely acoustic instruments, and that it could best be described as a "western folk-grunge" fusion genre. I have a thing for fusion genres.

Lead singer/writer had/had a great voice and plenty of potential, sadly got addicted to meth and ruined his career. I still have a strong attachment to this band as my parents used to play it in the car when we drove out of town to go camping.


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## Flow Ozzy (Nov 7, 2015)

@crazitaco @Duo What about other genres of heavy metal and Rock ? Many heavier bands kinda started making radio friendly music in the 80s to get more popular perhaps, Judas Priest did that ... a lot. Some other bands just went totally over the top with that, Def Lappard were pretty good earlier then they lost the plot ... 

This is from late 70s






This is a much radio-friendly stuff from the 80s






PS I don't happen to dislike grunge/post-grunge but it's not something I am into, anyone who can reproduce what they've put on their studio albums ... you got my ear. (The only thing I probably loathe is hip-hop,rap)


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## Flaming Bassoon (Feb 15, 2013)

I can understand a dislike for grunge if you find it moody, self-absorbed, etc, and that in decrying the over-commercialization of pop music, it sort of became a parody of itself. Still love it tho. But I agree that post-grunge almost always sucks, sounding something like this:


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## incision (May 23, 2010)

Pass on Judas Priest. My preference leans as follows:

Gothic metal






Industrial rock/electronica






Industrial metal






Nu metal


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## crazitaco (Apr 9, 2010)

Hywen Mrath said:


> What about other genres of heavy metal and Rock ?


I like many kinds of metal and rock. But a commonality is that I like music that is unlike anything I've ever heard, has to be sort of innovative or stick out. I mostly enjoy music that can appeal to my inner bandgeek who remembers music theory. Wanna hear harmonies, disharmonies, syncopated rhythms, unusual time/key signatures, accented notes, etc. Also I like music with speed, plenty of screaming/"heavy" bits, and music that blends genres, the more seamless the transition and incorporation of other genres the better. And then music with lyrics that pleases my Fi, grunge and punk lyrics are very appealing to me. My main genres that I like to listen to is prog/avante garde metal/rock. I also like "concept" rock/metal. 

Uncommon/weird bands that I like: Unexpect (avantegarde metal), Ephel Duath (avantegarde metal), Sleepytime Gorilla Museum (avantegarde metal), Diablo Swing Orchestra(avantegarde swing-metal) Les Friction (symphonic concept rock), Pinata Protest (tejano-punk), Streetlight Manifesto (ska-punk), Dream Theater (prog metal), Tool (prog metal)

Well known metal/rock bands I like: Queen, Metallica, System of a Down, Linkin Park, Buckethead, Dethklok (fictional band, lol), Alice in Chains,


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