Definetly No ... No all their songs can be called metal songs... must of them are just symphonic stuff other are just ballads, so no , great band thoug but Nop.

I agree with RavenLord in this question... I think many have a hard time to accept that all Nightwish songs aren't Metal.

Why not?? Theres a plenty of metal bands that make non metal songs. Especially classical music. You will find many tracks (most of them instrumentals, though) that have nothing to do vith metal, but they are fine classical songs. Even extreme metal bands have non metal songs, classical, baroque, aqoustic instrumentals...

Yes, ballads are metal to, but just not so loud. Why are they called ballads after else?

Even that some of their song are not truly "Metal"; i think that those song make Nightwish as we know

Lappi I-IV, Kuolema Tekee Taiteilijan, that's not really metal, is it? But never mind, Dimmu Borgir made Sorgens Kammer, and they are considered to be a metal band, therefore, Nightwish is metal as well

Whenever it's electric guitars, drums, bass and keys it's metal.

Written by Dark Cornatus on 19.06.2007 at 01:26

[...]
Nightwish has alot of ballads sure, but their song structure is still based on Symphonic Power Metal, with exception to their first album, "Angels Fall First', which is more Atmospheric Metal.

Take songs like Sacrament Of Wilderness, The Pharaoh Sails To Orions, She Is My Sin, The Kinslayer, Crownless, Dead To The World, Dark Chest Of Wonders, Planet Hell, etc.

They are METAL, of course, Tarja vocals and Tuomas's keys override alot of the heavy sound, it is still quite heavy.

Agree with the above. To me a "slow" song or ballad is metal if performed by a metal band and follow a metal structure

Wow, tough question. It all comes down to what your definition of "Metal music" is. I say yes, I think there music, even the ballads, are closer to Metal than any other genre.

I really don't think it matters anything, if the band is metal in general.

Man, stupidest argument ever. I'm pretty sure Nightwish create an album thinking of it as one whole creation, rather than seperate songs. Pop artists think about songs individually because they try to create hits and fillers. Most metal bands work on a particular theme or story within their albums and they experiment with genres and styles to make the listening journey as interesting as possible.

It's all music in the end and you can't take songs off the one album and say some of these songs aren't metal, but these ones are. THE ENTIRE ALBUM IS METAL, PLAYED BY A METAL BAND. It's like saying a song that uses acoustic guitar and nothing else for 10 seconds is "metal in parts, and non-metal in other parts". It's just ridiculous.

I voted no.

If you take a song such as "Forever Yours" and have Celine Dion sing it without any change to the arrangement other than her vocals replacing Tarja's then I doubt that anyone would consider her to be performing a Metal song, or even a song that is markedly different to those that she normally sings. If she instead sang a song like "Beauty Of the Beast", again without any changes to the arrangement, then almost everyone would consider her to be singing a Metal song, and that she happens to be Celine Dion would not make the song any less Metal. What type(s) of music a song/performance contains does not change according to what that artist happens to do on other performances.

Not all of Nightwish's songs are metal. However, most of their songs are metal, hence the slower ones without the metal riffing guitars and double-kicks are able to be called "metal ballads". Having said that it is still a song that has been written by a metal band and therefore it is classed as metal.
I think that having the female lead gives them many more avenues in which to take their music, as we see in the ballads that they compose. The introduction of Marco as a second vocalist also makes for their more heavier and angry songs that require a male voice.

Not all their songs conform to the 'guidelines' of metal, but it is that which makes them an incredible band.

i think they are still metal songs because it's still Nightwish who play them. and i agree with those of you who brought up the argument of "metal ballads", cuz that's what those songs are.

Some are, and some aren't. Then again, even "metal-ist" bands have their soft sides. But, most still are considered metal. Now, I wouldn't however call really soft bands like Xandria metal. They do have heavy songs, but it just doesn't cut it for me.

Nightwish is a metal band right? so they make metal music....there are a lot of bands who make some more slow, soft, atmospheric songs which they put on their metal albums......is it not metal then? I think it is.

Its just that those songs are made from another approach, but still made by the METAL musicians and their intentions and feelings. Metal music does not always have to be hard and fast you know.

Written by Guest on 26.09.2007 at 23:25

Whenever it's electric guitars, drums, bass and keys it's metal.

Stupid. You can find all those elements in pop rock, jazz or whatever and none of them is metal. You could as well say Bon Jovi is metal with such a flawed reasoning.

Written by Lord_Regnier on 19.05.2009 at 20:15

Written by Guest on 26.09.2007 at 23:25

Whenever it's electric guitars, drums, bass and keys it's metal.

Stupid. You can find all those elements in pop rock, jazz or whatever and none of them is metal. You could as well say Bon Jovi is metal with such a flawed reasoning.

And Abba as well...

Definitely no, but that doesn't mean that they don't have some awesome metal songs, because about 7 minutes into Poet and the Pendulum, it gets metal as fuck.

There are many bands that move in the line of metal/rock/etc. nightwish is one of them. imo most of their songs are metal but yes, not all all of them...

Many metal bands have softer songs. It adds more variety to the bands style. Someone i know calls songs like that Easy Listening Metal and Nightwish songs are mostly about the dark parts of human emotion which is the theme with a lot of metal songs, and could you realy put the into another genre. Honestly could you. Classical maybe but they don't have many electric guitars, bass and drum kits in classical do they?

Instead of taking one side or the other, I think the question is flawed. In my opinion, there is no point in labelling individual songs with genres. That's something I would do to an entire album: "Is Century Child a metal album?" is a much better question. The answer is obviously positive, even if individual songs such as Forever Yours might not sport the typical traits of metal.

I think I can safely say Nightwish is a metal band, and all of their albums are metal. It's not reasonable to discuss individual songs on a genre level, especially because genre definitions are very loose and there are no objective, universal and specific criteria that define "metal", "power metal" or "rock" in general. What's next? Are you going to analyze song structure to determine whether the transitional brige of Song X is metal? It's just, well, silly and serves little purpose.

No,I think that they will be in future some kind of pop music.

@Metalhead3....well then I'm sure this is going to be some very good pop music.....

Oh yes..."pop" really isnt nasty word from definition but it has to be someone to make real music, not commercial shits...

So far ...Nightwish songs are all metal !! a soft song dosent mean isnt metal at all !! however Nightwish is a legendry symphonic power metal band and made the metal music Style look better and better !!
Respect

Just because it is a metal band doesn't mean that all of the songs that they produce will be of the metal genre. I dont know but would you consider the song "The Islander" to be a metal song? Or well Pain of Salvation's Pluvius Aestuvius (sp?) off of BE, that would most likely not be considered metal by many. But that's just my two cents really.

Not "all" of their songs can be called metal. Hell, not all of Opeth's, Motorhead's, Ensiferum's etc can be considered metal.

I don't even know why I actually wrote in this thread before. Now I see that this is another useless question. Just as Doc wrote, Nightwish isn't the only band. Same thing with (even) extreme acts such as Sepultura, Lifelover, Månegarm, Kreator etc. They've all done at least one track which isn't the most metal thing I've ever heard.

Does it really matters?

It's music, I mean music is clasified in genres for matter of simplify things. At the end its music