I have no quarrel with Blabbermouth.net, but something has to be said site of their comments section. Whenever they post an artist people don’t immediately know it quickly becomes a game of “Who?” and other unoriginal comments that are (still) painfully unfunny nearing the end of 2017, which  says quite a lot that people aren’t willing to read or, most importantly, listen to bands they aren’t familiar with.

In a year where we’re ending it knowing that the general public prefers hip-hop to rock music, people are claiming rock music is dead more than ever. I disagree, mainly because “rock” as a whole has quite a lot of talent under its massive umbrella working today. It’s hard rock that is dying painfully in the street as the rest of the world goes on without it.

Forbes published a very detailed, well-written article last year asking “Is Rock Still Relevant In 2016?” In the past year, amazingly enough, the newer acts that have been mentioned there are still among the most recognizable in the mainstream media Twenty One Pilots get name dropped, but them being considered a “rock” band should just go to show that there’s a lack of a figurehead in the scene, which the article so importantly states. When a pop act such as them are getting labeled as a rock band, clearly there’s some identity issues at work.

Hard rock typically has lead the charge over the years in the rock scene, primarily in the 90’s with the rise of grunge, leading into the 2000’s with the popularity of bands that would frequent on the Uproar Festival. It was that post-grunge, “alternative metal” sound that really took everyone by storm when (at the time) pop punk bands like My Chemical Romance and Fall Out Boy were starting to strike it big on MTV 2. (Dating myself here, I know) Breaking Benjamin, Three Days Grace, Stone Sour, Seether, Theory of a Deadman, Hinder, and yeah, even Nickelback were part of that sound, and they were the bigger names at the time for everyone coming up as a rock musician at the time. Myself included, that was what we clung onto.

Fast-forward to 2017 and how many of these bands have actually developed their sound at all? You can say Stone Sour, who took a chance in doing two albums within six months of each other. (Even though it was back in 2012 and 2013) Flyleaf has lost yet another vocalist as of last year with no further updates. Three Days Grace are still doing the ir thing, but then again aren’t Hinder, Theory of a Deadman, and Seether?

Is that a coincidence? No, not really.  It actually correlates perfectly with the state of hard rock today and speaks volumes about what can happen in a few years. Hard rock, the bands, and its musicians have a serious problem, namely in their conservatism and how they refuse to move their sound forward. We currently have a music scene in the world where the majority of people see bands like Seether as the be all, end all of their sound, and if that isn’t sad then I don’t know what is.

Going out to a music venue at night, there’s a damn good chance you’re going to see a band performing. In my case, if it’s a rock band who tries emulating AC/DC or Van Halen or aping that post-grunge/hard rock sound, I shut off immediately. That sound is old, it’s tired, and it’s practically begging for a change. AC/DC and Van Halen are great bands who have done great music, and I’ll even go so far as to say albums like Breaking Benjamin’s Phobia and Stone Sour’s Come What(ever) May stand the test of time by still being pretty solid. However, if those albums came out today, in this music climate, would they be accepted and have the lasting effect that they do today? Now go back further and ask that about Van Halen’s debut or Highway to Hell. The answer: they probably wouldn’t be given so much of a thought unless a ton of websites picked up on them and they got a feature in Revolver. With them not being part of the current, aimless trend in rock music today, the chances of that are highly unlikely.

What’s baffling to me is that these bands are still getting views on their videos. Theory of a Deadman somehow has 16 million views on their track “Rx (Medicate)” and it’s from an album that I saw nobody care about. There’s obviously people still clinging to this band, that’s for sure, but my question remains is this band who’s able to get this kind of attention on a music video actually doing anything in the hard rock sound that’s worth mentioning and they didn’t do on Scars & Souvenirs?

It’s funny that I bring up Theory of a Deadman, because they’ve done the most interesting thing in try to sound the same but be different at the same time. It’s a huge backfire, if I’m being fair, because the band tries to be different by being a literal pop rock band instead. Hell, I skimmed through the album, Wake Up Call, and it’s all pop with acoustic guitars and ambient keys. Please try and justify this song to me.

This isn’t evolution. You can call it artistic expression all you want, but I call it a goddamn identity crisis. Not just for this band, but all of hard rock in general. Pop rock is a thing and that much has been apparent since The Beatles made it big, but in hard rock making a dive to becoming pop, it makes hard rock seem even more lost than it already is. It’s not lost, but just comfortable as it slowly slips into the background of current music.

So that begs the question: where are the hard rock bands that are doing things a little differently? You can say The Pretty Reckless are doing something different, but when we’re starting to say a blues rock influence is “doing it differently” you have to step back and realize how inbred and out-of-date that sounds.

What hard rock needs the most, honestly, is to be engaging. If there’s one thing current music outside of hard rock can do, it’s engage the listener. It may not be in the best ways, with highly repetitive lyrics and overly simplified music being the focus, but at least that makes people physically or emotionally react to it.

With that said, hard rock isn’t in a good place anymore. Its conservative stance is destroying itself and the bands that were once pushing the hard rock sound forward are doing nothing to help it now. There’s no leader of this pack, and perhaps it’s time for some band to come out of the blue and actually point it in the right direction instead of imitating things that already happened.

Below you can stream Seether’s “Let You Down” from this year’s Poison the Parish. I love the cinematography, but musically it’s relevant to the article.