Here are a few random quotes I found on why people dont like metal.

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" I can't stand ANY type of screamo music...I am a singer, and screaming isn't singing, therefore it drives me nuts. "

" The music sounded good, but his screaming ruined it all. It sounded like he was going to throw up half the time. "

" Death metal and hard core and all that...where they are either screaming at the top of their lungs or sounding as if they are puking...rank at the bottom of my musical lists...there's no talent involved...although the musicians are usually pretty decent, I'll give them their props for that at least...but that "singing" makes me wanna go strangle kittens and drown puppies...and I LIKE puppies and kittens. "

" Yep your right, screamo, death metal, or whatever else they want to call it is really pointless in alot of cases. If you cant understand what is being said to you than what is point in listening to it. I am a hardrock and metal fan but the music I listen to has to have a good vocalist who can actually sing, rather than yell at me for two hours at a concert. Those bands have some very talented musicians but the vocalists just ruin it for me. "

" I use to love hardcore rock music, but i didn't like when i also couldn't understand what was being said. I use to like bands like 'The Used' 'My Chemical Romance' 'State of Shock' etc. but i still like that kind of music, but i've grown out of it, i'm more into dance and stuff, but i hated turning on a music channel, and hearing screaming. I also went to a show probably 2 years ago or so where the lead singer was doing nothing but screaming, the music was good, the screaming was bad, and everyone there was right into it, and i didn't have a clue what he was saying lol "
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I like heavy metal because it is aggressive and because of the sensitive subjects most of the songs speak about. In heavy metal i can express my feelings in a way that i could not do with other music. I like the savage form of dancing known as headbanging because it truly shows the power of the music as well as screaming.
[b]My son is 20 and my daughter is 21. and I have tried to get them to listen to the MUSIC and the feeling and drama it can bring. As opposed to listening to just the SONG. The MUSIC in a tune should speak to you as much as the SONG does. Im sure you have noticed as i have that most of the mainstream music is all starting to sound the same. They are all fusing into some kinda hodgepodge of bullshit music, that focuses on the singer rather than the music.

What do you think??

Tommy [/b]

I agree most music in all starting to sound the same but its been going that way for a long time now. In every genre of music you have innovators and then have a million copy-cat bands. Some of those bands can still be really good but as riffs get recycled again and again, music loses its potency. Heavy Metal is a classic example of that, i don't even bother following mainstream metal anymore because one look a album cover and i already know what they are going to sound like. As much as i hate to admit it, Doom Metal is just the same.

I also agree its more about the music than the vocals but man, vocals can sure destroy your listening pleasure of a band. One of the big turn-offs for me in most Metal is the vocals. I hate the growling, cookie monster vocals for the most part. There is only a handful of bands i can listen to with those type of vocals and i am not too happy about the way its now worked its way into the Doom Metal genre. Doom Metal has always been about real singing to me and i do love bands like Hooded Menace but apart from them, there is not many bands i can listen to with those vocals.

Also to be honest here, i like how Metal is hated by most people. Its always been a really big but underground sub-culture and i hope it stays that way. Unfortunately, mainstream Metal has hit a all time low now, look at the crap that gets played on VH1 or the bands that play at bit festivals like Wacken, Ozzfest etc, etc. I wouldn't go to those shows if you payed me.

It really is an aquired taste. Sometimes bad vocals do get in the way of good music, but on the other hand sometimes these vocals portray human suffering that a Lionel Richie album could never express. I don't know why I used him as an example haha. I enjoy when bands use the dynamic of two different vocal styles to express their emotions. Either people just have short attention spans, don't have an appreciation for music, or they have just been exposed to really bad metal.


That is a great point you have raised because i have got many people into heavy music by playing them bands they would normally never hear. A lot of people only know heavy music from what they hear mainstream radio and TV which is 90% garbage anyway. For me, i think radio and TV has done so much harm to Heavy Metal by creating a stereotype, mainstream magazines don't help much either.

I tend to be somewhat a bit on the side of the "vocals can save a band or destroy it" position. Not just besause I am a singer myself, but inmetal the vocals do play a very important part and it is why a solo vocalist is called a "frontman". If the vocals are totally crap, this alone can ruin a band for me. I remember back in the 80s when I used to listen to bands like Overkill and Exodus, etc, the music was gret with good sound and riffs etc, but as soon as the singer started, it destroyed everything and I couldnt listen to the band at all.

I doon, it is a similar situation. One band can have a really good music but if the vocals are really bad, it ruins it for me. Old Ozzy Black Sabbath have awesome melodies and stuff, but I hate that nozy pseudo singing. DIO does it great though and that is why DIO era Sabbath is my fave (Tony Martin is great as well). The same happened to Candlemass for a while, on Chapter six, the music was....ok, but that singer? And those horrible albums they released after until Messiah came back to save the day on the "Candlemass" album, and now of course, Robert Lowe, that simply rules.

There needs to be emotions in the vocals, not just growlings or distortioned noises. For me vocals are important, I'm not saying that they are more so than the music, coz again,super good vocals on crappy music does the same thing, I wouldnt like the band anyway. There must be a balance.

Well thats my take on it.

I personally love Ozzy's vocals on the early Sabbath albums because he sounded like no one else which brings me to another point. Uniqueness in metal is hard to come by, listen to how many singers sound exactly the same especially in black / death metal. You can't tell one from another. One thing the Doom Metal underground has going for it is there is many different sounding vocalists out there, they might not all be good but they are for the most part different which is gives most bands in the genre a unique character.

I only hope then that I wont be reprimented by my singing since it seems I am so close/compared to Robert Lowe in practically every reviews we have hehehe. Cant help it if my voice sounds like that

This topic is close to me ,in many ways . but from a listening approach ,i could not sit a listen to a album of screaming and grunt of gaaaarrhh for 50 mins it bores me , i took my 7 year old son to Download Festival ,time to pass the torch ,or rights of passage. On the sunday ,sheltering from a down pour , i thought i would check out Whitechapel it just confirmed that side of Metal bores me, So it makes me dislike what i call metal , thats why my listening choice is Stoner/Hard Rock ticks the box"s maybe its a age thing ,i noticed they made the vans tour...
but i love vocals maybe it be spit,growled,soothing with something to say , not hiding the fact that some shouters ,can not write good lyrics .
But with music's we are all critics and lovers of its form !!!

I have said this a million times before but even though i call myself a metal fan, 90% of Metal bores me to death especially the more mainstream bunch and that includes most Black Metal. Big festivals usually feature the worst of the worst in my opinion, there is exceptions like Roadburn that has a lot of quality acts but most festivals and the bands that play at them are a joke in my book. It upsets me to say that and i know it makes me sound old but back in the 80's i would say about 70% of Metal i generally like. These days its down to about 10%, that is one of the reasons why i stick to Doom Metal and so called Stoner Rock (ugh theres that tag again). For my tastes the quality of the underground doom / stoner scene is way higher than anything in the mainstream.

I don't worry much when I hear non-metal heads complain. In fact, it is music to my ears. The music is not meant to be appreciated by every person. I have gradually become accustomed to almost every kind of metal vocal...it takes some doing. For example, I detested Obituary at first because I had never heard anything remotely like Tardy's vocals before. Now I can't imagine listening to Obituary without them, he brings such a sound of pure agony to the music. That being said, there are still places I do NOT go....including goregrind vocals that sound like squealing pigs or chirping crickets. I'd rather listen to death metal growling than whiny emo vocals any day.

A lot of this can just be chalked up to personal taste. I don't worry about pure haters, just like I'm sure rap fans ignore me because I think their music absolutely BLOWS!!

Yeah that reminds me of a dude who messaged me once saying he heard this great new band called Saint Vitus ha ha. He couldn't believe it when i told him i have been listening to them since 1985. These bands are big in the minds of Doom fans like us but still remain non-existent in the eyes and ears of the mainstream.

IMO, most people doesnt hate everything that´s heavy,

...they just like lighter stuff.

i personally cant stand growled or screamed vox anymore, after years and years of being a huge dm and bm fan i hate it now, i love the pete steele type vox, or spoken word type, the only screaming vox i dig now and have since 94 is dax riggs

I liked the growl vocals if they are not just the same pitch throughout a entire album which most of them are. It can get very tedious.

I resisted harsher vocals for a while when I first got into metal, and now I find that typically 'good' singing (ie: technically good, in either harsh or clean) is rather tedious. I like unique voices and vocal approaches, for example:

Nemesis (Pre-candlemass)
Reverend Bizarre
Ozzy (In Sabbath)
Black Hole
Paul Chain
Cloven Hoof
Pagan Altar
Manilla Road
etc

Great bands, unique singers (I could have gone on for a while!). I also have a great love for oldschool death metal with its emphasis on disgusting, out of control vocals: technique be damned, its all about feel. Thats why I resisted Tony Martin (and even Dio) for a long time, although Headless Cross has grown on me a lot.

Yeah, its hard to find good vocalists, no doubt. They are worth their weight in gold.

It is metal-fans themselves that turn people off, you see this footage of drunken morons at festivals and it turns people away from the actual music.

You are right there, I know someone who wont got to metal shows because of that.

Its turned me off before. The majority of metal-heads I've met (even when I've gotten to know them in non-drinking situations) are abysmally boring people.

Unless I know the music is worth it I rarely attend gigs for the hell of it anymore.

As Ed will be able to tell you, I hardly ever go to straight metal shows anymore, I hate crowds and I hate aggressive people pushing me around which is what happens to me at thrash gigs especially. Doom gigs ain't too bad as it is usually just people standing around watching the bands.

I find it very hard to enjoy myself at metal shows these days, the overblown drink prices, the hassle of getting there and home again and then the idiots you come across at the venue. A lot of the time it is just not worth it.

I have had more people criticize my screaming vocals than I can count. It's always, "I like the music, but I just can't get into those vocals." I guess that I can understand where they are coming from. In my case, having a twisted childhood, from a broken home and all that crap; I just really grew up pissed off. Metal was an escape for me, it still is to this day. It was always a great way to clear my mind and bring things into perspective for me; whether I am playing or listening.

It is definitely an acquired taste; you don't just wake up one day and decide to get into this stuff. A lot of my friends have no idea what kind of brotherhood that we have here; a place where we all belong and where we all are cool with each other. I have met so many musicians, from so many underground metal bands over the years, and everyone has always been super cool. Metal is the only music that I know of where you have the opportunity to do that. There are a lot less "rock stars" in our metal scene.

The best is this old redneck fucker in my neighborhood, that I used to drink with...he always told me that my music wanted to make him stomp on a box of puppies! I love that one!

Bands, in genres of metal, start to blend together and sound like each other. That's why we try to use elements from other types of music, as well as being primarily sludge / doom metal; we do our best to do something fresh.

...But I scream like hell and that turns most people off.