So it seems here in Melbourne, Australia at least two foreign (from places like America, England etc.) crust punk bands are playing here every week yet it is like one or two months an international metal band plays here. I would have thought it was around the other way because how 'underground' crust punk is...
Does this happen in your area?

No way, here its deathcore. Generally though, I hear down under isn't the greatest place for gigs anyway. Iron Maiden hadn't played there for what, ten, twenty years?

Deathcore is quite well known and popular though, I don't really think crust punk is.
We have our moments, Iron Maiden played earlier this year and sold out pretty quick.

In Sydney, it's emo and hardcore. I work for a company that films events, and the place where most of them play is a place that is filmed a lot by the company, so I'm glad I've never had to endure filming one of these gigs.

I don't think Crust Punk is more popular than metal, I'd be hard pressed to find a group of people around my area who even know what crust punk is.

More like 10 months. But before that it had been about twenty years.

And in regards to crust/metal; no, crust isn't all that popular here. Good crust bands don't roll around any more often that metal bands, really.

That is why I wonder why they get more bands here than metal...

No way, in Italy crust punk is underground, while it's not that uncommon to see people with metal t-shirts.

at maximum metalcore is becoming more popular than the classic metal...

Metalcore's time has passed. Deathcore is becoming more popular, and I think that these retrothrash bands might become popular after deatchore fizzles out.

I hope for thrash metal...I dislike deathcore...

Same here.
In my area (Valencia, Spain) punk is very popular, and there are a few bands that could be considered crust around.
We play with the drummer of one of them, for a start

In two years time every second thread on this board will be "OMG this trendy nu-retro-thrash... I hate it". Trust me.

Probably, that's a good point. Won't stop me listening to Violator, Municipal Waste, Warbringer and Toxic Holocaust though

He meant prior to the SBIT tour. He said 'hadn't' not 'haven't'. And before this year, they hadn't been since the FotD tour I believe, which makes it fifteen years.

Where I live, specificaly in Pennsylvania, its all about Hardcore Punk and 'Hatebreed Hardcore'. Metal sits on the back burner.

Could just be that (not gay) hardcore and crust bands are more tailored towards a live situation, that's always been the thing with hardcore. Metal, not so much.

Yeah talk about it! I have a lot of crust friends and I've seen my fair share of it and they come here and play half hour sets with two minute max songs. Not really worth it.

I suppose that a lot of the attendance would be more of a community gathering sort of thing though.

There are only metalcore, hardcore, deathcore etc. concerts in Denmark.

i've never lived in an area where metal is popular at all, though i was around in memphis during the mid-late 90's when crusty/sludgy hardcore received some loving in tight-knit circles.

i'm now in south carolina where really terrible bands who desperately want to sound like the last replacements record are a dime a dozen.

There are tons of Punk kids here, and plenty of bands to choose from from all different styles of Punk. Crust is deffinately more popular here than Metal is, but not many kids go beyond the basics(same goes for those who actually listen to Metal).

I live in rural Nebraska, country is definitely king here. There is a rock station in the area but it mostly plays radio-friendly stuff like Nickelback, with some grunge, nu metal, metalcore, and the occasional group like Metallica and Pantera thrown in. In other words, very mainstream.

Crust punk is not more popular than metal, but crust punk shows might happen more often because they are often more "D.I.Y." type events and local support tends to be pretty strong, in my limited experience.

Over here, you would be VERY hard pressed to find people who even know there is a genre by the name of crust punk, let alone what it is. You would be even harder pressed to find people who listen to it.

In fact I can probably say that I am the only person I know personally whom has ever heard a crust song.

So, NO, crust punk is not more popular than metal.

Here, if you want popular, you shouldn't even go with deathcore, hardcore or metalcore. Not a lot of people listen to this shit either. Most kids listen to little at all except for the super-shitty electronic techno/pop music which is on mainstream radio.

There is one radio station in Sweden which plays any type of heavier music during the day. And even then, it is only the most mainstream stuff, and this channel isn't even availible in most of Sweden (I think it only exists in the area around Stockholm).

Let's just say that when metalcore or any type of music with distorted guitars (or in many cases even real instruments), except for the most mainstream pop punk there is out there, isn't even very popular at all, crust sure as hell ain't.

And yes, the musical taste of the general population around here tends to be on the intellectual level of feces or a bit below it. I've heard quite a lot of foreign metalheads talk about Sweden like it's some sort of metal kingdom of heaven, but that sure as hell isn't the case in real life. Here, shitty pop music in the vein of Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake (but mostly their even shittier swedish variants which sing in gay Swedish/broken English) totally dominates the market. Our domestic variant of Eurovision Song Contest and our domestic American Idol is basically the template for what kind of music gets popular here, until the next seasons of these two TV shows come along and ruin everyone's lives for another year.

I think the OP has answered his own question. The reason "international" acts only come so often is because they are being "international" and playing shows all over the world. The reason crust punk shows seem to be happening more is because crust punk bands do not travel the world like metal bands do.

When I lived in Boyertown Pennsylvania, most of what was going on at shows was pop punk bands that either sounded like Green Day or Goldfinger. Towards the end of my time living there, I saw a little bit of a surge in Crust and Hardcore bands, one particular band which I had thought about joining was called MK Ultra-violence, who actually sounded a lot like the Cro Mags or maybe Nuclear Assault but without the solos.

In Quakertown, most of what is going on is local stuff, a lot of it is either country, classic rock, or old America folk music stuff. If you go to Philadelphia or Allentown, there is more of a metal scene. I saw Doro and Joey Belladonna's solo act over at the Croc Rock last year. Granted I'm not the best person to ask about this stuff because I only go to concerts sporadically.

Wow, I feel somewhat sad that I'm bad at phrasing stuff like that, this is exactly what it feels like over here. Therefore, QFT for Hungary as well. Though around this area, metal isn't listened to too much, even among the underground, punk and rock dominate. Sear Bliss is still frickin' awesome though!

This.

I knew this guy who put on hardcore/crust shows. He would book as many bands as possible sometimes doing 3 shows in a week with multiple touring bands. The shows were very cheap and all the money went to paying the bands gas money for touring. So the fact that it tends to be a lot more grassroots DIY type of community can definitely cause there to be way more shows, which may in turn give the impression that it is more popular judging by amount of shows.

Exactly. Around here if you go to those super-frequent punk shows it will be the same 50 or so kids attending each time. One (more infrequent) big metal show will have several hundred kids there. Frequency of shows is not a really accurate gauge of a music/musician's popularity.

Same were I am. hell, even ShitKnot went deathcore. When a trendy band like Slipknot recognizes Nu-metal is gone, tis gone. Im not complaining though. Deathcore is infinitly preferable to metalcore, and still closer to real metal than nu-crap.
It seems to me that Americ ais moving closer and closer to metal. Who knows?

As others have said, obviously crust is no where near as popular as metal. I've met punk "fans" who don't even know what crust is. I guess all I have to say is count your fucking blessings. I would shank someone in the neck just to get a few crust shows around here. We have no discernible metal OR punk scene.

I don't really know what crust punk is...
Metal is pretty popular in Australia it's just that we are all too lazy to go and support local bands. You go to see an local gig and barely anyone turns up but then you go to see a intentional band at the same venue and all these people crawl out of no where. Its ridiculous.

Are you kidding? What the fuck is fucking crust punk? Fuck it...

Amebix. That's all I have to say about that.

I thought I stated the crust punk bands came from Europe and America?
They tour a hell of a lot more than metal does. When a crust band plays here, they won't only play one show like metal usually does but they play at least three shows and in some of the most run down places ever like under bridges/run down buildings etc.

Where I live, everyone is playing pop, emo, rap, and metalcore, so I have not really noticed. I do believe metal is more popular than crust punk though. I have barely met any fans of crust punk except for one person.

Playing shitloads of shows doesn't mean you're popular. That is what mostly shitty bands do anyway. They play a few shows a month in the same venues with the same bands and no-one gives a fuck, except their friends (pretend fan base). And these bands all seem to hold the same delusional thoughts, 'The more exposure we get the more recognised and more popular we get, resulting in fame and fortune.'

This isn't really the case here though as these bands the OP speaks of are from overseas and play generally two or three shows in Melbourne, but I'm pretty sure they only play once in other states of Australia.
But again with the bolded comment.
My theory is that the promoter fucking loves his Japanese crust etc and keeps bringing the bands. It all comes down to the promoters musical taste in the end, (unless a band is doing a tour on their own funds).

Or you'll have semi-thrashy deathcore acts labeling themselves as thrash metal.

True, It sorta is. I'm listening to a band called Gravemind that are Thrash, wouldn;t be surprised if they make up the first of a new wave of thrash. Because that's generally what we need right now, new thrash bands. Not just ones that try to sound as classical as possible just the really creative ones like how the thrash before them had that creative, rebellious twist.

Think about it. Thrash is a really known and versatile genre. If it came back as the "dominant metal", it can give way to new genres much like back in the day it gave way to black, death, and all those other interesting styles.

Hopefully I got my point across.

There are a lot of crust punks where I live but they most of them love thrash, old school death metal, doom and NWOBHM. In fact most crust shows here feature at least one or two metal(usually thrash) bands. We get more big metal shows and out of town metal bands but the singer from Bludwulf books a lot of crust bands too. Pisschrist played here in 07 with a couple thrash bands. I talked to the singer from Pisschrist and he told me that there was a big crust and thrash scene around Melbourne and from what he said it seems like some of the punks like the metal bands. I think he told me some of the punk bands have played with or seen Gospel of the Horns and Destroyer 666. I don't think crust is more popular than metal and it never will be, it's too underground but I do think some crust fans can appreciate metal and vice versa.