So the holidays are over, the whiskey bottles and cookie crumbs have been swept off the tables, and we are restocking the cabinets for the New Years Eve parties. All is well. Except, hold on, its really not! One only needs to turn on the radio to a “rock station” to know that something sinister has happened. But what, you ask between holiday induced food strokes, could that be??? All I hear is that top 40 R’n’R and some metal! AND THAT’S WHAT’S WRONG. Its not metal. Its… FAKE METAL. (More after the link, so hurry the hell up)

So, my definition of fake metal might be a bit loose. Just accept it and move on with me, I turn the lights off as I move around and it gets REALLY dark. Basically its this: the commercialization of any form of metal to become a viable money making business that loses the humanity it started with. This does not apply to super groups of cash grab albums (Christmas music comes to mind). When a band starts to simply become a hit factory, instead of a good band, this leads to becoming a poser. You no longer wish to be part of the scene (shudder) with your fans, those who loved you from the start and who you probably helped through a rough patch in life, and simply want people to buy your shit.

I’m going to use a biggie for this: 5 Finger Death Punch. They are EVERYWHERE. I can’t accidentally click on an fm rock station without hearing one of their lackluster slow-heavy-slow songs that have simply become an outline for younger bands now. They simply crank out the exact same record, but somehow more neutered than the last. They have become extremely predictable, and don’t seek to evolve within what they want to do. Fozzy has done this same thing. I loved their first couple of records, they were really good, straightforward hard rock. They have since abandoned the cool sound they had and gone straight to generic heavy rock, and I couldn’t pick them out of a crowd if you held a gun to my head. Its a terrible fact of life when a current band picks Faeries Wear Boots (Black Sabbath) as an album closer, then proceeds to make the pile of shit that is Do you Wanna Start a War (sing THAT to Frozen, and I’ll watch it!). You rely on the easy production tricks like vocal fx and editing, and just let actual playing and the art of crafting the fucking songs just go away. You’re lazy assholes who want to stay commercially viable, and I hope that feels good. I personally like to play something I create, even if its not flashy and over produced.

We have placed an odd lack of appreciation on many things, but music really galls me. Music is a place inside me that I can travel and wander as long as I want. Its magic in the real world. It has lead people to create amazing things, or to absolute acts of glaring evil. It is mind control, and freedom for the soul. And you have taken that magic, and made it boring. The corporations that seek to squeeze that last penny from your happiness, or sadness, or just plain difference, has lead to this homogenization of the art and craft. Listening to the music of just 20 years ago, you can feel the difference, even if you’re not hip to any of the processes. There was a soul there, and its now replaced by soundboards and virality.

Another great compare and contrast is the Country music scene, and I may have just doomed myself to the purgatory that is Hell’s Utah. I absolutely loathe that which is called country now. When Country first really differentiated itself from Gospel and HeeHaw, the goofy, kids song stuff, it was fucked up. It was known as Outlaw Country, and it was smoking weed, drinking anything that could take paint off a car, and ploughing fine country women, who also drank cocaine and snorted whiskey. They were some of the most real motherfuckers out there, and they didn’t give two fucks about success. They had a song in their pickled hearts, and by god they told you exactly how it was. Regardless of topic, like the aforementioned drugs, women, drinking, and often, suicide, they were honest and wove their emotions into every note, every chord, and their voices simply told you a story. Where the hell did they go? Now it’s all guys who look good with makeup on, who sing about getting drunk on a plane or something else equally stupid. They don’t inspire, they don’t slam a spike of depression into your heart like an adrenaline needle. They don’t do anything. And Rock has gotten exactly as bad.

When’s the last time you had a badass myth about Metallica? When did the partying of a rock band last make a city ban them from their premises for life? When has a building burned down from cocaine fueled antics? You don’t hear it, because all those guys stopped wanting to make the music, when any jackoff with a MAC can make a song about cats and get a record deal as soon as they get 250,000 hits online. Its all gimmicks and fads, and they will eventually all dry up and die. And they might well take all the creativity with them for a few decades. YOu have diluted the pool, and the harvest is mighty light anymore.

And please don’t misunderstand my sentiment. I loved 5FDP’s first 3 albums, and seeing them live was one of the greatest shows. They have spectacular talent at their disposal, but they just don’t get to let it out. Or maybe they don’t want to. Either way, they get paid for what they are doing, so I guess they are living the dream.

Apparently they forgot… NOBODY ASKED ME?!