Bands and the awfulness of their fans are wholly connected and to say otherwise is intellectually dishonest.

Lamb of God's lyrics and musical style attract working-class guys because they want them to. They've marketed themselves that way for years. And it makes perfect sense - working-class dudes are willing to spend a lot more money on frivolous shit like CDs and merch than yuppies. Why do you think a can of wild turkey & coke is so much more expensive than a glass of wine? And to go (logically) one further, the band members are probably being themselves. Authenticity is key to popularity in these subculture-type genres, and I can't imagine they'd be as popular as they are if they weren't the real deal. They're dudes from the same walk of life as their fans, which is really important.

I mean, if they were writing "thinking man's metal" with lyrics inspired by the philosophers of old, yet STILL attracted bodybuilding.com subscribers, then sure. But in any case, the chances of them complaining about their fanbase are.... zero?

Lamb of God are an excellent example of a lot of the mantras of the underground - never sell out, don't bring in clean vocals where there haven't been any, don't lighten up (especially when you sign to a bigger label with more exposure), stay true to your roots, tour hard and work hard.

Never "sell out", never lighten up - Lamb of God are one of the more aggressive bands of their style and movement, and they never lightened up. There was never any clean singing. Remember when Bury Your Dead had clean vocals? It is admirable that they have been so unrelenting in sticking with their style. They have done this while on a major label, and we all know that major labels tend to be more inclined to get bands to put out more palatable stuff. If anything, they have stuck to what they do too strongly and have become popular as their style started to tire. They resisted another trend and stuck to what they do as deathcore bands became popular for being the "chug-n-breakdown" bands.

Work hard, tour hard. They've been doing this in one form or another for around 20 years. They have toured extensively, and they have a reputation for intense live shows (killer shows in Europe, from what I've heard). The intensity and hostility of the music spilled over into the well-known fights between band members - it is also admirable that they admitted to it and worked things out rather than hiding it or subtly taking jabs at each other, as so many bands have done.

The negativity towards them is often admittedly ignorant - "I heard one song and they are ___ and nothing more" - some evaluations just sound like typical complaints because people couldn't be bothered to get past the fact that they don't like the band in principal. Dismissing them as wholly derivative of another band is short-sighted. It is more common amongst underground metal fans that they simply don't like the style of music, but words spoken against them more often seem to be words of resentment against them as figureheads of the groove/metalcore style.



Inoffensive to who, exactly? Safe from what?



I agree that Lamb of God are heavily inclined towards repeating themselves, but you are completely wrong about metalcore bands not experimenting. A broad range of metalcore bands have mixed up the style with nearly anything you can think of, with tons of bands spawning new styles like deathcore, djent, and some of the non-metal metalcore bands mixing in electronics to create some bastard child of dubstep and post-hardcore, some metalcore dance music abomination. Metalcore has quickly had numerous offshoots like that which were quite innovative in mixing things that hadn't been done before, and of course metalcore has been mixed with pretty much every other existing metal genre that you can think of - bands like Winds of Plague playing symphonic blackened deathcore when opening for bands like Mayhem are probably a significant cause of hate towards metalcore in general, since they're a horrible second-rate bastardization of everything they do.

I'm with Zodijackyl.



Leaving BT aside, I'd say you can hear clear differences in songwriting in New American Gospel, As the Palaces Burn and Wrath.



You're probably right, but "I guess I just needed to think outside of the box a little bit to begin to understand" and "I hate to admit it, but I think you're right. Very Vulgar-esque as far as substance goes... Awww, now I'm sad" and "The young one is beginning to understand..." sounded to me like he is being a little influenced by what he was hearing.



...what?

Ok.
- to say "you can't judge a band by its fans" is untrue to a large extent. Manowar should be a good example of why.
- Lamb of God probably identifies well with their fans and is happy to have them.

Many bands that 'lighten up' a bit and/or incorporated clean vocals have released even better stuff than their most aggressive material, like Enslaved. Even Morbid Angel incorpored clean vocals in one of their best albums effectively: Covenant.



That same argument can be used to say they are one dimensional. They don't know how to make anything else but their not-so-original brand or metalcore, doesn't?

Also, what I've heard from LoG (which is 3 albums and single songs off the rest), they aren't away from the "chug-n-breakdown" tag you mentioned. it's not the same than the slam thing, but you get the idea, right? they DO chug a lot and use breakdowns, c'mon.



It's not an isolated thing: here in Southamerica most of decent bands plays in front of a relentless crowd. Intense live shows are not a really good way to validate an artist' quality: I'm sure teenagers go apeshit with Justin Bieber, Ricky Martin, Simple Plan, Blink 182... Turkish pop singer Tarkan plays in front of crazy crowds too everytime. About the problems between them: it's just an adult thing. Not every metal band is childish as Metallica and again, it's not a point to redeem them in any musical way, which is what matters.



So, it's not possible to dislike the band cause people dislike the genre or cause, they're not good for many in the first place? You can say they are figureheads, but who cares? it's like complaining cause Katy Perry sells more records than, say, Incantation... just childish people would get pissed off that fact.

Metalcore is a way easier to digest form of metal, with simple and standard structures, ear candy chugga chugga riffs and 'aggressive' stage presence. Some metal fans likes things more complex, more aggressive, with more atmosphere, with better lyrics, with more intimidating vocals, or simply something with good/awesome riffing and soloing, etc.



Inoffensive to me at least. They don't do nothing to me and they don't fill any of my needs: thrash is already a superior genre in terms of violence and for heavy metal, there are thousands of better bands which provide better vocals, better riffs, better solos, better lyrics, better performance, etc.

Safe? it's the same view of the one dimensional thing, they don't even try to make something slightly different and they copy themselves a lot, they play their formula and that's all. About it:


[/quote]

You said it.

Fanboyism much? it's ok, but posters are making some decent points too and Metalcore isn't exactly the best the metal genre has to offer.

You surely know them better than me so I won't say otherwise. I just think people take some expressions too literally, take "one dimensional" as we've seen here. I'd say Pantera is such a band, even though I like four albums from them (90-96) and although there are some stylistic differences between them. It's just that they never deviate much from the original formula that much. BT, just to wrap it up, have grindcore roots which is noticeable on their early albums, whereas groove era Pantera always has the same base formula. That was my point actually and why I agree with Emp on his earlier statement.


Uhm, you're probably right there. But I'm a positive guy so I hope he doesn't need reassurance from others when it comes to musical appreciation.


So we should define how good a band is based on the people supporting them? Well, you'll find yourself with a rather small repertoire of bands to listen to then if you only listen to bands that have fans that you can relate to.

Here's a crazy thought though, why do I need to relate to fans to be able to appreciate the object of their fanboyism when I listen to music for myself?! Crazy idea I know...

All thier albums sound the same to me but they have some good songs and were fun to see live a few years back. Kind of meatheadish sure but tolerable.

Their last album is horribad but the rest have at least one good song. They are definitely overrated though.

This is preposterous. Seriously, why should I give a shit about a band's fanbase to measure their quality, when I can simply listen to them by myself. What you say makes no sense whatsoever.

Came here, to say that, you beat me to it. Really everything, that needed to be said, has been said in that post. 'kay.

The album Wrath has a punk rock song, Contractor, which sounds very different from the rest. Overall the band uses a lot of acoustic and spoken word passages. Already with only that they're more varied than most death metal and doom metal bands out there. What major experimentation have excellent bands like the aforementioned Bolt Thrower or Malevolent Creation done to deserve their praise?

The impression I'm getting from most of you is that your main issue is just this lack of variety or experimentation rather than straight up poor music, when it should be the other way around. Does this double standard exist because there is a greater expectation for variety in metalcore than in death metal (for example)?
Like I said earlier, I'm lukewarm on LoG just to be clear. 50/50.

This one?

http://www.metal-archives.com/albums/La ... bs_reviews

Maybe it's both?

My only problem with them is their guitarwork is unmemorable.

I actually quite like Lamb of God; Vaguely catchy, quite enjoyably fluid and in places technical, and all in all quite enjoyable, albeit not something I get the urge to listen to every day. They're probably my favourite "Groove-metal" band.

I definitely see why they're disliked though, although it's kind of abstract and hard to qualify. Personally my main annoyance are the fans who are "oh so very metal" but only know about seven bands, but, as stated earlier, that's no grounds for criticism. Or is it? Presumably there's something about the band which causes it to be the case, which other bands do not.



...I thought the Opeth thing was just experienced by me - I'm almost glad that it's universal.

I can understand why people don't really like LoG that much around here, although some have really dumb reasons why not to..

For example, like many as stated before: "why should I give a shit about a band's fan-base to measure their quality, when I can simply listen to them by myself.
And to the ones calling them "overrated", just because people labelled them as overrated is really no reason to stop listening to it or to give them a try, also.. to think that something labelled overrated is automatically bad is dumb too.

Zodijackyl have some interesting points as well. Anyway if you don't like the band just don't listen to it and if you like it enjoy the music and that's all were all happy.

Clean vocals have certainly been incorporated in renowned and successful music, I was pointing out that the band is often dismissed on trivial points when they do most of what the underground as a whole tends to ask for. As with most metal riffing, there's quite a bit of chugging, but the band didn't start adding more and more breakdowns, they have stayed with the groove-verse-groove-verse-breakdown-x type of structure. They do take advantage of forms that are conducive to their style, more of a complement than a supplement IMO. They also have one of the most charismatic screamers of a band that isn't straight-up extreme metal.

I don't know where you're coming from calling their style not-so-original - especially at the time of their first two albums (99/00), they were standouts, and they renewed that in 03/04 with their next two. They were a much more aggressive band than the big bands from MA (KSE/SF), they didn't have the post-MDM vibe of European metalcore or American "Gothencore" stuff, and they were certainly a different generation from 90s groove metal bands that were much more derivative of Pantera - they weren't stripped down shoutcore like the "Walk" wannabes. There's a southern/sludge feel, and it's constantly aggressive and/or hostile, but it has much catchier grooves than Ozzfest-style nu-metal. It's not really like breakdown-oriented hardcore, quite removed from tough guy hardcore (see: Punishment [PA]), not chaotic and technical like Converge. They carved out a sizable niche, and while there are many imitators, it's not really accurate to describe them as primarily derivative and unoriginal.



By similar logic, isn't death metal better than thrash metal? More violent and aggressive!

Style is a matter of preference, but the era is also something to consider. A lot of "thrash" bands were putting out awful groove stuff around the time Lamb of God were rising. They were a league above God Hates Us All and St. Anger for their time. It's pretty damn hard to top all-time classics, but few bands have been putting out good thrash in the last 15 years or so. Sign of the times, I guess.

Do they play it safe? That's one way to put it, the second half of their career has been pretty stale, though it has probably seen the peak of their commercial success primarily due to it taking so long to be exposed to a mainstream audience. Many bands have had achieved commercial success after their peak in quality, this is another one of them.

I don't think you're using "inoffensive" in the way that it is commonly used.

I despise the band's metalcore sound, their attitude and their fanbase. Shit, they're not even worthy of Phil Anselmo's approval. That doesn't mean I'm bashing the creator of this topic, but the majority of their fans are brainless shitheads much like Hatebreed & Killswitch Engage fans.

I don't feel like getting into a long-winded philosophical rant about this. This of course is just my opinion. Then again, I know people who are Vomitor & D666 fans that I fuckin' despise & those are bands I like very much so, go figure.

The vocalist sucks, riffs are the same, drummer never tries to do anything more then keep a beat, and the bass is too low to be heard. Not really fast at all either so they really don't do it for me. To me, its really boring and doesn't do me anything.

That's just what I feel. If I showed a Lamb of God fan Dark Angel I'm sure they wouldn't understand why I like it so much. And yes, I'm sure there are fans who like Lamb of God and Dark Angel but it is not typical to say the least. Who cares, like what you like and let it go.

How large is your sample size?



Introduce a Lamb of God fan to Asphyx, more often than not, they'll like it.

I liked Burn the Priest at the time when they came out, I liked New American Gospel... after that I pretty much lost interest. It wasn't my standard listening at the time so it was pretty much a nice diversion from black/death & grindcore. I did get the 2 albums after NAG 2nd hand and they are alright but really hold no interest for me. So I didn't bother with anything further. No hatred for them, just typical indifference that i have for most stuff that doesn't fill me with a desire to listen to it.

I was a naysayer for all of their career, but Resolution was actually pretty catchy.

I think they're a pretty solid band, then again I'm okay with metalcore.

This is basically it for me. I just plain and simple think they're a shitty, uninteresting, band with a retarded tough guy image. Embarrassing lyrics, too. And not to diminish Pantera more than they deserve, Lamb of God is a lot worse than Pantera.

Never liked LOG, to me it's just macho BS with shitty Pantera rip-off riffs. Pantera created Metalcore, and LOG have carried that torch for the last decade spawning so many of the worse bands in history Chimaria, Trivium, August burns Red, ect...I mean you couldn't go to a show in the 00's without having to sit through at least ten of these shitty metalcore bands. I'm glad this style is pretty much dead, and LOG has basically a cult following but are hated by the General extreme metal public.

A lot of the hate some of these bigger bands receive is just because of the fact that they're go-to bands. They have some unique style, or are one of the few popular bands in a genre, or are dramatic, or something that brings attention to them. People listen to them and don't like them, but instead of any of the other hundreds of bands they could hate on, they will hate on this one band because it's the one that comes to mind or comes up in discussion.

I have mixed feeling about the band. Other than Laid to Rest, I don't have any favorites by them. I have never got into them and never replayed an album. Back in the day when my library was small, when one of their songs would come up on shuffle, I would usually skip it. It's not that I dislike them, it's just that I've never been a fan.

While I do believe the hate is unwarranted, there is no doubt that the band is overrated and that in itself is a reason why some people may dislike a band. Lamb of God is one of those bands that even non-metal heads can listen to. I knew a couple guys in high school who listened to mostly pop and rap but who would listen to some Lamb of God (a good deal of my high school senior football team listened to LoG yet none of them were really into metal). Obviously the reason why these people listen to Lamb of God isn't because the band is phenomenal and innovative and ground breaking. No, it's because they're a popular band who's material is easy to find, who's fans aren't hard to find, who's material isn't that hard to digest (as opposed to death metal, black metal, etc), and who have at least some minor success into breaking into the mainstream.

The fact that they're overrated is probably another reason why the hate exists. People don't like the band and are bothered not only by their popularity but by the fact that some of the fans don't even really have any particular taste.

Like I said, I could listen to them and not dislike it. But it's nothing I play myself. I don't hate the band and don't think they deserve the hate, but I do believe they're more popular than they should be.

The style is not dead, Pantera did non create metalcore, and it's extremely rare to find a single show that has at least 10 metalcore bands on it, unless it's a festival.

A lot of their songs sound the same. It is just overly boring generic metal. They didn't really do anything special.

Pantera's sound was a big influence on a lot of the bands that DID start Metalcore, though, so in a way, they kind of did. As far as Lamb Of God goes, I enjoyed them when I was younger and less-versed in metal. Only really enjoyed Ashes Of The Wake, honestly, and even that album never gets played anymore. It's just boring, couldn't survive the years. I don't really like groove metal of any sort nowadays, so it's not surprising that it fell, very quickly may I add, out of my playlist. It would be a real stretch for me to call them "technical" in any sense. I'm not sure how many of you are actually musicians, but it's pretty standard stuff that's dressed up to sound technical.

Im not a fan of the vocalist, i think the guitarists are cool, but thats just my opinion..... plus they remind me of the original doom games, because my mate played them constintly while we tried to clock all 99 levels!

i hate the macho asshole vocals too much to give the rest of the music a real chance... tho' by what little i've heard, i figure i'm not missing much

meshuggah is a band i think i could actually like if it wasn't for the similarly awful vocals

I've seen the name bandied about but I have actually never heard any music by LOG. I guess that what happens when you don't check out hardly any new heavy bands for over 10 years.

Anyway, whoever said Pantera was somehow germane to metal and hardcore colliding into metalcore is way, way off. Metallic influences were popping up in hardcore and punk bands during the thrash era in the 80s when Pantera was still doing glam metal stuff. Slow, chugging mosh parts in American hardcore date way back to Agnostic Front's and Antidote's early material (1983!). Then you had the crossover era with bands like Cro-Mags and AF putting more metal into their sound. Somewhere along the line, people decided to make an entire song out of these chugging mosh parts. Helmet probably had a lot to do with popularizing that style as well, especially among NY bands. As an avid listener of pre-suck metalcore during the mid-90s, I can tell you that bands like Slayer and Metallica were a far bigger influence than Pantera...a lot of bands at the time WORSHIPED Slayer in particular. If you listen to the chugging section in "raining blood" you'll see what I mean...it was also a common occurrence for bands at the time to cover that song in live shows. The main point I'm getting at here is that Pantera could have not existed at all and metalcore still would've happened.

The biggest problem with metalcore from the late 90s and beyond is that there really wasn't anywhere for things to go but down by '98 or 99 because everything that could've been done with the style was already done by that point. A lot of the groundbreaking bands had either broken up or moved on to other styles of music as well. Cave In's "Until Your Heart Stops" (1999) was probably the last major record to do anything interesting at all with the style.

I simply cannot understand this complaint.
Also, I personally never picked up on this 'annoying tough guy' image people say they are portraying. I never got an excessively tough pretentious vibe from them at all. I just know I listen to heavier and more aggressive music and listen to LoG for what it is. Besides, isn't all metalcore and hardcore supposed to be like that? People complain and call it pussy metal if it were metalcore without toughness.

watered down shit emulating watered down shit+stupid name+angst-y lyrics

it's pretty easy to understand why people don't like the bands oneself likes, especially when they're bands like LOG, don't be so thick

Good musicians, worthless dickhead vocalist.

Me, neither. I can hear differences in their songs.

I'm a pretty big fan of their song Blood Junkie.

While Pantera were one of the more prominent metal bands of the 90s, their influence in metalcore is being overstated. LoG have a similar southern vibe and do name Pantera as one of their favorite bands, but they also cite NOLA sludge and hardcore punk bands as their favorites. I think the connections to Pantera, stylistically, are overstated, while their fanbase and standing with fans is pretty similar to Pantera, for an easy reference.

Other metalcore bands are much more removed from Pantera - you're likely to get NYHC and Boston HC bands named by other prominent metalcore bands, with Swedish metal also being an apparent influence: Gothenburg MDM as well as some early groovy Stockholm DM among some, especially Entombed's "Wolverine Blues". I understand that sometimes simplification is needed, and "NEHC+GBG=MA Metalcore is pretty close to accurate for most bands.

One more thing: "all of their songs sound the same" can be applied to nearly any metal band that someone hasn't listened to enough to understand the nuances of the band. In this case, Lamb of God have a very distinctive style that is harder to hastily correlate to other bands.

I think some people are getting a little too defensive and offensive respectively. There are a LOT worse bands out there proclaiming to fly the flag of metal and whateverhaveyou. I find LoG to be extremely stale, not in terms of not progressing, but just stale. Listening to the heaviest of their songs evokes nearly no response from me whatsoever, none of it is remotely catchy or brutal, and their grooves are just really boring. I saw them open for Judas Priest back in February and while I was super excited to see Priest, LoG put on one of the most unenergetic live sets I've ever witnessed from a band with such a big stature. Even Air Supply had more balls live-wise.

That said, it's far from being shit in your ears like Dew-Scented(:lol:), Avenged Sevenfold or Bring Me The Horizon. I'd still call it metal and I don't sneer at anyone for liking them(despite the fact that a large number of the douchebags I know happen to love them).