Metal = Satanists in my country's culture

There are a few decent bands in Brighton but Old Mayor are probably the best who play very heavy sludge doom. I was really looking forward to seeing them live when they played at a place right near me but when I got to the venue I realised I'd got the wrong week and they'd played the week before. Instead I got a quite impressive instrumental tech/prog metal band.

There's a few good bands in my area, mostly generic death metal but also very good Thrash like Prematory or Striking Death. Considering Death Metal there's Warbeast, Batallion and Aborted (although they're not really from MY area, still Belgian tho).

When I was living in Colorado, USA there were tons of great black and death metal bands. Pretty talented ones as well. Now that I have moved back to California most of the shows out here are hardcore, deathcore, or screamo. Kind of blows. Thankfully I have a car that's good on gas.

I'm right in the middle of NYC and Philadelphia, each is about an hour and a half away. So I can almost always catch a good show if I'm willing to travel a little.
In my direct area though, I've been seeing a massive influx of this garbage deathcore for a few years. One of my roommates is really into it and it drives me crazy. I really can't wait for the day when I don't have to hear songs with ten of the same breakdown any more.

Written by Metal_4Ever on 16.08.2011 at 22:48

Metal = Satanists in my country's culture

Couldn't agree more.

My area sucks when it comes to metal. Textures hails from a village close by my city but the city itself has no scene whatsoever. The only two bars that play rock and metal are always crowded with scene kids, emo's and posers, of the kind that think Metallica is too loud for their tastes.
But 15 minutes by train there is a nice venue where a lot of metalconcerts take place and you usually meet te same people there, so it's not totally dead. Just as far as underground bands go, there aren't a lot. But those who exist (including my band) form a nice little group with a fair share of notoriety

Here Welsh people prefer some kick-vagina electronica stuff like dhik dhok dhick dhok druccccccccccccccch thik thok thok and they're ready to shake it. Probably, 4 miles from where I'm living there is little bit( very little bit?!) Deathcore, Thrash and Progressive Death Metal scenes. 'Nuff said.

It's funny how very few people who have posted in here actually have solid metal scenes...

Written by Doc G. on 25.08.2011 at 10:30

It's funny how very few people who have posted in here actually have solid metal scenes...

It wouldn't surprise if they actually do have solid metal scenes but just don't know about it because they don't attend small local gigs and only look at big bands stopping over.

Written by Marcel Hubregtse on 25.08.2011 at 11:21

Written by Doc G. on 25.08.2011 at 10:30

It's funny how very few people who have posted in here actually have solid metal scenes...

It wouldn't surprise if they actually do have solid metal scenes but just don't know about it because they don't attend small local gigs and only look at big bands stopping over.

That and if it's really that bad, don't sit around waiting for it to get better. A lot of friends I knew in high school used to rent out cheap, small community halls and fill the bills with other high school bands just wanting to start to get their name out. Sure, the bands weren't very good, but you'd be surprised how things catch on and expand through that community feeling. That's how metal scenes are built, after all. I remember the metal scene in Calgary being pretty much a +18 only thing when I was in high school, now there's all sorts of local all-ages shows being put on basically every weekend. Being a regular concert promoter is a lot of work from what I've heard, but putting on a show maybe every month or two can be done fairly easily with a couple of friends. If there are people as hungry as you for metal out there, you'd be surprised how these things can take off.

Written by Doc G. on 25.08.2011 at 12:06

Written by Marcel Hubregtse on 25.08.2011 at 11:21

Written by Doc G. on 25.08.2011 at 10:30

It's funny how very few people who have posted in here actually have solid metal scenes...

It wouldn't surprise if they actually do have solid metal scenes but just don't know about it because they don't attend small local gigs and only look at big bands stopping over.

That and if it's really that bad, don't sit around waiting for it to get better. A lot of friends I knew in high school used to rent out cheap, small community halls and fill the bills with other high school bands just wanting to start to get their name out. Sure, the bands weren't very good, but you'd be surprised how things catch on and expand through that community feeling. That's how metal scenes are built, after all. I remember the metal scene in Calgary being pretty much a +18 only thing when I was in high school, now there's all sorts of local all-ages shows being put on basically every weekend. Being a regular concert promoter is a lot of work from what I've heard, but putting on a show maybe every month or two can be done fairly easily with a couple of friends. If there are people as hungry as you for metal out there, you'd be surprised how these things can take off.

Exactly.

Seems i haven't replied to this thread (yet). and after some thought i consider what Doc says and i agree.. the fact is that when it comes to my city (and i think in some ways also nationally speaking) there is in fact a very lively underground scene when talking about genres like classic heavy metal, hardcore and black metal (relatively speaking, of course). the only band that is quite popular but doesn't really fall into one of these categories is from Constanta and called White Walls, and they play progressive technical deathcore (yeah, i know).

the bad thing is that many (scratch that, pretty much all) of these concerts of local bands don't get advertised almost anywhere, so you wind up with clubs like Apasu'(which unfortunately has closed) that host 3-4 young bands a night every other weekend playing in front of 30-40 people tops (most of which are friends of the band members too). one time last year i was actually looking for a concert of my favorite local band which disbanded recently (9.7 Richter) and accidentally wound up in Apasu, where to my surprise there were 4-5 unknown local rock bands playing. the guys were all either teenagers or barely in their early 20's, and there was no advertising on any of the major metal websites, no flyers, banners, posters, nothing. people just knew their friends were gonna play there or simply showed up to have a beer and check out the bands playing on that particular night. i even randomly met up with a chick from my college group, it was a great night all round. what was not that great was that i had to walk home for an hour afterwards through the hood in freezing cold, but looking back i learned a lot from what i saw that night. there was also an extreme metal festival, OST Mountain Fest, organized this year and last year, but i personally didn't like the bands on there so i didn't go (after all, it's the moral duty of the people who are actually into black/death/whatever to support these genres and bands)

unfortunately there are lots of douchebags who always seem to have money for cigarettes and beer but never have money to go to concerts or, god forbid, buy an actual CD from a local band. there are many people who complain about the size of the metal scene and how hard it is for bands to make a name for themselves, "not like in the 80s" or whatever.. well with a piracy rate probably close to 99%, what do people expect? i know i'm digressing now but this is one of the main factors here: i download too, but at least i had the decency to buy one of Truda's DVDs, and a few other CD's from local bands that deserve it.. people are going backwards with it, one guy gave a copy of The Final Frontier to a friend as a birthday present.. i seriously cannot see the logic in that, seeing as he is only mildly impressed with the album and the birthday-guy also complained it's way too long and boring. if, on the other hand, he gave MS - Rugina Nu Moare or, fuck it, even Trooper I as a present, that would be insanely more interesting and even appreciated and the difference would be actually felt with the band. i'm pretty sure if i meet Bruce Dickinson and tell him my friend bought that album, he won't give one microscopic fuck about it.

Complaining, Smoking, Supporting only the well-established bands - this seems to be the Romanian Metalhead Triathlon...

Around here we'd just xerox-up some cheap posters and tape them up in relevant places (high schools, coffee shops, telephone polls, community boards etc). 30-40 people sounds like about the usual turn out we got. Occasionally you'd get those weekends where it seems everyone decided they had nothing better to do and there'd be a 100+ attendance (this was extremely rare). Then again, we also have Alberta-Metal.net which has made our scene pretty strong I'd say.

In Utrecht which has a shattered and fragmented scene to be honest, 30-40 show up as well on a usual night.
Hell when UtrechtDoom was organised last year with bands such as

Ataraxie
Funeralium
Ophis
Eagle Twin
Switchblade
Pombagira
Ortega
Terzij De Horde

not even a 80 people showed up.
But those sorts of crowds are the usual sizes for local scenes and underground gigs.

Written by Doc G. on 25.08.2011 at 12:43

Around here we'd just xerox-up some cheap posters and tape them up in relevant places (high schools, coffee shops, telephone polls, community boards etc). 30-40 people sounds like about the usual turn out we got. Occasionally you'd get those weekends where it seems everyone decided they had nothing better to do and there'd be a 100+ attendance (this was extremely rare). Then again, we also have Alberta-Metal.net which has made our scene pretty strong I'd say.

that's really nice to hear, i also want to put up posters in support of our own concerts when the time comes. as a case study, look at Anvil's "The Story of Anvil" - without any advertising, they played in Prague in front of 4 people, which was seriously the most depressing point for me in the whole movie, but in Tokio they played in front of what looks like at least 7-8 thousand screaming fans at 11 AM in the country's biggest rock/metal festival. i bolded 11 AM to emphasize that they purposefully got up early just to watch Anvil, these guys weren't just going to check them out in between two other bands while drinking some beer and making sarcastic comments. advertising sometimes makes or breaks the whole show..

there was this guy i met while travelling who went to a special Virgin Steele acoustic show in Milan. now to me that sounds like a hair-raising epic metal bonanza, but then he added "yeah, we were only 20 people.." and i didn't have time to ask but i can bet that a city as big as that has more than just 20 VS fans lurking around, not to mention the surroundings, so lack of advertising is probably to blame.

Written by Valentin B on 25.08.2011 at 12:58

Written by Doc G. on 25.08.2011 at 12:43

Around here we'd just xerox-up some cheap posters and tape them up in relevant places (high schools, coffee shops, telephone polls, community boards etc). 30-40 people sounds like about the usual turn out we got. Occasionally you'd get those weekends where it seems everyone decided they had nothing better to do and there'd be a 100+ attendance (this was extremely rare). Then again, we also have Alberta-Metal.net which has made our scene pretty strong I'd say.

that's really nice to hear, i also want to put up posters in support of our own concerts when the time comes. as a case study, look at Anvil's "The Story of Anvil" - without any advertising, they played in Prague in front of 4 people, which was seriously the most depressing point for me in the whole movie, but in Tokio they played in front of what looks like at least 7-8 thousand screaming fans at 11 AM in the country's biggest rock/metal festival. advertising sometimes makes or breaks the whole show..

there was this guy i met while travelling who went to a special Virgin Steele acoustic show in Milan. now to me that sounds like a hair-raising epic metal bonanza, but then he added "yeah, we were only 20 people.." and i didn't have time to ask but i can bet that a city as big as that has more than just 20 VS fans lurking around, so lack of advertising is probably to blame.

Even with loads of advertising that gig would only draw 40-60 at most. Remember that 99% of all so-called metalheads are only interested in the big names playing live and what the big labels shoves down their throats and aren't interested this type of special stuff.

Written by Marcel Hubregtse on 25.08.2011 at 13:00

Even with loads of advertising that gig would only draw 40-60 at most. Remember that 99% of all so-called metalheads are only interested in the big names playing live and what the big labels shoves down their throats and aren't interested this type of special stuff.

i know, but at least it would not be as embarassing/depressing as playing in front of an almost-empty club, also considering that we're not talking about some obscure local band struggling with their first couple of shows. Lips says at one point in the documentary that he sometimes closes his eyes and imagines that the place they're playing is full and everyone is freaking out, then he opens his eyes to the awful truth.. i don't want to know how that feels

Written by Valentin B on 25.08.2011 at 13:15

Written by Marcel Hubregtse on 25.08.2011 at 13:00

Even with loads of advertising that gig would only draw 40-60 at most. Remember that 99% of all so-called metalheads are only interested in the big names playing live and what the big labels shoves down their throats and aren't interested this type of special stuff.

i know, but at least it would not be as embarassing/depressing as playing in front of an almost-empty club, also considering that we're not talking about some obscure local band struggling with their first couple of shows. Lips says at one point in the documentary that he sometimes closes his eyes and imagines that the place they're playing is full and everyone is freaking out, then he opens his eyes to the awful truth.. i don't want to know how that feels

To be honest Anvil have only themselves to blame for their decline in popularity. No matter how sympathetic a band I find them to be. Musically they haven't progessed at all since Forged In Fire. Actually, they only made two good to great albums (Metal On Metal and Forged In Fire) the rest is mediocre to shit. And lyrically it's of a juvenile level that even my 14 year old nice and nephew would be ashamed about.
Not only that, let's be honest both Lips and Rob Reiner aren't the brightest lights around why else would they use that totally inadequate woman as their manager. Even someone who has no notion of what goes on in the music business could see from miles away she wasn't suitable for such a job at all.

Written by Marcel Hubregtse on 25.08.2011 at 13:20

To be honest Anvil have only themselves to blame for their decline in popularity. No matter how sympathetic a band I find them to be. Musically they haven't progessed at all since Forged In Fire. Actually, they only made two good to great albums (Metal On Metal and Forged In Fire) the rest is mediocre to shit. And lyrically it's of a juvenile level that even my 14 year old nice and nephew would be ashamed about.
Not only that, let's be honest both Lips and Rob Reiner aren't the brightest lights around why else would they use that totally inadequate woman as their manager. Even someone who has no notion of what goes on in the music business could see from miles away she wasn't suitable for such a job at all.

hmm, i see what you mean by them being to blame for their fall.. anyway their lyrics aren't even supposed to be taken seriously.. Lips i find to be a bit too easy-going and naive, yeah, and Reiner is a clueless stoner (the guy even complains at one point that he can't go on tour without his "drugs" or something), but i think all this imo made them more "human" when it comes to what's shown in the documentary. anyway yeah the guys are hopelessly stuck in the 80s and think they're still 20 years old, at least when it comes to music. Lips makes a comment once that it's everything he knows and it's everything he sees himself doing in his life. so then again i guess he chose this whole lifestyle so he needs to accept the good things and the bad things about it

Written by Valentin B on 25.08.2011 at 13:30

Written by Marcel Hubregtse on 25.08.2011 at 13:20

To be honest Anvil have only themselves to blame for their decline in popularity. No matter how sympathetic a band I find them to be. Musically they haven't progessed at all since Forged In Fire. Actually, they only made two good to great albums (Metal On Metal and Forged In Fire) the rest is mediocre to shit. And lyrically it's of a juvenile level that even my 14 year old nice and nephew would be ashamed about.
Not only that, let's be honest both Lips and Rob Reiner aren't the brightest lights around why else would they use that totally inadequate woman as their manager. Even someone who has no notion of what goes on in the music business could see from miles away she wasn't suitable for such a job at all.

hmm, i see what you mean by them being to blame for their fall.. anyway their lyrics aren't even supposed to be taken seriously.. Lips i find to be a bit too easy-going and naive, yeah, and Reiner is a clueless stoner (the guy even complains at one point that he can't go on tour without his "drugs" or something), but i think all this imo made them more "human" when it comes to what's shown in the documentary. anyway yeah the guys are hopelessly stuck in the 80s and think they're still 20 years old, at least when it comes to music. Lips makes a comment once that it's everything he knows and it's everything he sees himself doing in his life. so then again i guess he chose this whole lifestyle so he needs to accept the good things and the bad things about it

Reiner isn't a stoner he was and might still be a drug addict. The drug he was referring to was heroin. You should read the book as well cause that clarifies a lot in that sense (about Reiner)
I know their lyrics around supposed to be taken seriously but that doesn't make them any less juvemile especially not after writing those sorts of lyrics for almost 30 years already and for fourteen albums. And it also doesn't make them any less juvenile.

Metal scene over here is pretty similar to what a few guys posted here. Lots of local gigs were you'll only see the same 50 people, the classic metal-bar were you'll always see the same people and a certain inmobilism that doesn't help at all.
This said, it's pretty decent. Mainly classic heavy metal, thrash, speed a death, rest of genres aren't popular, specially black and doom. But overall I think Andalucia as a whole is very active, each major city (granada, sevilla, almeria, jaen..) has asociations that promote local bands all around the region and it is very frequent to see the members of each organisation attenting local gigs organised by another one. I also saw them team up and get a bus for big festivals around europe.

So overall, it's alive but I just go meh cos sometimes it seems too hermetic.

Decent bands:

Cabeza de Caballo, Monkey Priest and Orthodox (doom)
Alaja, Omission, Altar Of Sin, Daeva (thrash and death)
Iron Curtain, Steel Horse (heavy and speed)

Madrid, Valencia and Cataluña also have a shitload of decent bands

Written by Guest on 15.08.2011 at 16:51

There's no metal scene here...

Written by Metal_4Ever on 16.08.2011 at 22:48

Metal = Satanists in my country's culture

FIRST OFF, AND COMPLETELY OFF TOPIC.

You two guys better stay safe over there! That violence is definitely heard over here in the States. Probably hollow to say, but many here are shocked at what's happening to the Syrian people, and those unfortunate enough to be caught in the violence are in our prayers.

------

I live in the clutches of a Republican stronghold of a county in New York, a little south of Albany. It's pretty desolate, seeing as I can 'barely' see my neighbor's house across the street. Also, it's about 7 miles to the nearest grocery store, aside from the little county store on the corner across the street from The Pub.

Harhar.

When I was in high school there was a really active scene for Punk and Hardcore. Honestly, not my favorite genres (even with me playing in one of the punk bands), but really the best part about it was having kids getting together to just play music.

Unfortunately, the whole music scene seemed to die after my class graduated. Around 130 kids in that class, just to give you guys more perspective, haha. Honestly, there was never any Metal scene around where I lived. I started a band that was Metal, but we would always open at shows before the other punk, hardcore, and funk guys. Eventually, we broke up. But, now, one of my younger friends has a really solid pile of musicians together and they actually pull off a really good Progressive Metal sound... Real good use of poly-rhythms and unorthodox time signatures.

Beastly, if you ask me, I try to help them out whenever I can, getting them gigs wherever, haha.

But, yeah, the scene around where I live is dead, aside from the occasional gem or two of brilliance. My group years ago was called Heaven Denies, and my friend's band is Arrest The Dreamer.

...They have a Facebook if you wanna taste of rural NY flavor. O: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Arrest-the-Dreamer/140053088599?ref=ts

Metal scene in Cork isn't as good as it once was. Very quiet at the moment. In Ireland as a whole there is a healthy scene for the size of the population. Alot of bands but very few new bands to my taste.Altars of Plagues are problem the most well known local band at the moment. Don't like them myself. We have had some great bands come through over the last few years....Decapitated a few times, Behemoth, Vital Remains a few times, Cannibal Corpse, Exodus, Amon Amarth twice, Shining, Taake, Gorgoroth, Suffocation, 1349, Enthroned, Destruction, Napalm Death, Hail of Bullets, Vader, Anathema, Dismember.... and more i can't think of. We don't get nearly as many gigs as Dublin but we get by.......Oh yeah Dragonforce and Turisas, worst gig ever. Two shit overrated bands. I was bored silly.

Some local bands that should be checked out-
Belinus (on hold at the moment) Black battle metal
Carnun Rising - Death thrash
Sirocco - Celtic Thrash
Flatline - Thrash
[R]evolution of a Sun - Hardcore Metal
I'll Eat your Face - Grind
Brains- Stoner 70's Rock
Days of Night - Melodic Death Black metal

I live in Israel, and the only successful bands here are Orphaned Land, Salem and Betzefer.
In the last year there was a concert with a big band abroad almost every month (Megadeth, Dream Theater, Napalm Death, Grave Digger etc...) but since there's only 7 million people in this country the concerts are more expensive than Europe and fewer people are coming to shows.
there's barely melodic metal in here, especially because most of the singers knows only growls and we don't have roots of melodic metal - unlike other countries, the first metal bands here came from the extreme metal.

Despite this, we have a great scene with great people

>Metal scene
>My area

BAHAHAHAHAHAHA

The bay area/east bay metal scene is pretty good, recently discovered this up and coming band Karusoh, a prog death metal band from oakland http://www.facebook.com/Karusoh

Right now, and it seems to be growing alot more, the scene in and around most of the highschools in my area is that shitty deathcore and metalcore. There are alot of faggots walking around with straightend black hair and band shirts that looks like someone took a shit on them. Alot of local deathcore and metalcore bands too, seems to be the most popular thing. There are a few old school metalheads around including myself, and maybe a couple local thrash bands, mine included. Hardly any punks at all, there might two or three, me included once again.

Written by Guest on 28.10.2011 at 07:17
There are alot of faggots

All right I know you don't like deathcore and metalcore but you're going to need to find a different name for people who listen to that music. Throwing around derogatory insults will only result in a temporary loss of posting permissions.

Written by Troy Killjoy on 28.10.2011 at 07:33

Written by Guest on 28.10.2011 at 07:17
There are alot of faggots

All right I know you don't like deathcore and metalcore but you're going to need to find a different name for people who listen to that music. Throwing around derogatory insults will only result in a temporary loss of posting permissions.

How about emos, whimps, posers, or butt-burglers? Is that better?