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Genre Nazis


ShadowBlade
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I think most musicians face this.

For example, many of the metal songs I do by myself have electronic drums and bass and some other synths. Though I use my guitar for rhythms and leads as well in the songs.

Literally every time, some elitist claims it's "not metal" because I'm using synths as well. I guess then none of Rob Zombie's albums are metal either. The beastie boys must not be rap because they use lots of rock rhythms. They must also not be rock because they rap.....but I'm sure somebody gets offended if you call them rap-rock.

Am I the only one who gets legit angry with people who insist on nitpicking every detail of the song genre wise? What are your thoughts on genre nazis?

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Eh, its annoying whenever it gets into "No True Scotsman" territory (like you described) but genres emerge because they can often be helpful descriptors. Given the state of music now and how its branching off into innumerable niches it seems that "tag-like" descriptors have been used more and more to describe music (most obviously by Pandora, but something I've noticed around people as well).

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If someone cares more about what particular pidgeon hole music belongs in then it's actual audible content, you should ignore their face and it's various energy emissions.

We here prefer to tag with regards to content then have genre lists :3.

Agreed and are you really from Banff? I could never survive in that town....so many gift shops.

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I don't know anything about the conversation you had so I can't really say. But I do know there are specific genres that use programmed electronic drums and other electronic elements, like cybergrind (electrogrind). I wouldn't call the guy you spoke to a genre nazi. I'd call him inexperienced.

Oh well the particular thing that got me talking about this is I recently did a Britney Spears electronic-metal thing. I listed it on youtube as Britney Spears "Metal" and got flamed because it's not "true metal" basically lol

I run into stuff like that all the time. I was wanting to hear other people's experiences with genre nazis.

For me I guess the only genres of music is "good" and "bad".

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I'm not a genre nazi per se, but I DO get pissed when idiotic teenagers with no concept of music comprehension classify ALL electronic music as "techno" and that nerds listen to it. Sure I'm a nerd and I assist the stereotype, but there's a vast difference between 90s eurodance that everyone thinks of when you say techno or electronic and Pendulum DnB beats or Zircon downtempo breaks. There are way too many sub sections (large ones, at that) of electronic music to generalize it. I'm sure if everyone listened to every type of electronic music, everyone would find something they like.

Unless they hate synths. Then they've probably haven't heard much of what you can do with a synthesizer.

If they honest to god have heard every type of synth timber and still hate it, I give up.

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No, he means:

heavymetalsubgenres.png

And "techno" is generally accepted as an all-encompasing label for electronic music, just like "electronica". I see no more problem with using "techno" to describe a piece than a similar categorization like "rock" or "jazz".

I enjoy reading about the history and evolution of music, and subgenres aid in this quite a bit. They're a natural extension of that, actually. So they're good for more than just pigeonholing. Though the op's issue seems to be with idiots, not subgenres.

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No, he means:

heavymetalsubgenres.png

And "techno" is generally accepted as an all-encompasing label for electronic music, just like "electronica". I see no more problem with using "techno" to describe a piece than a similar categorization like "rock" or "jazz".

Techno has fallen out of touch as a catch-all term. Everyone is calling everything "electro" now instead. Pretty annoying seeing as the music was pretty underground as late as around 2004, now the internet is saturated with so much regular house or whatever labeled as electro, it's kinda tough to pick out the genuine stuff.

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When I read the thread's title, I thought it had something to do with people putting ridiculous composite labels comprised of over 5 different words to describe their music and insisting that everyone else memorizes them.

Either way, people like that aren't worth trying to convince. If they want to be overtly selective, let them. The rest of us will enjoy good music, whatever fusion of genres it may be.

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Agree with OP and theres so much genres out there its stupid, I mean there no need to classify every thing, its all fucking House music , its all fucking Rock music, its all fucking Hiphop or Rap and its all fucking blues/jazz, whats up with all these darn lables, its making me more confused on what im listening to when you could define simply, not some stupid ass name as "minimal-industrial Tech House" or "Diary Farm-cthulhu metal", thats just way to complicated when its just house 8-O

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Agree with OP and theres so much genres out there its stupid, I mean there no need to classify every thing, its all fucking House music , its all fucking Rock music, its all fucking Hiphop or Rap and its all fucking blues/jazz, whats up with all these darn lables, its making me more confused on what im listening to when you could define simply, not some stupid ass name as "minimal-industrial Tech House" or "Diary Farm-cthulhu metal", thats just way to complicated when its just house 8-O

Genres do have a purpose. The best example I can think of is comparing punk rock and GY!BE. They're both technically rock, but they're not very similar. In moderation, they're incredibly helpful for finding things that you'd like to listen to.

In moderation.

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people who listen to metal are worse than anybody for genre nazism, but the practice in general is kind of retarded

That is so true lol. Like there's so many labels in metal. Thrash, Death, Progressive, Neo Classical, Melodic Death, Glam, Power Metal, Symphonic Metal, Black Metal, Folk metal.....

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The best example I can think of is comparing punk rock and GY!BE.

godspeed you! black emperor is a rock band

punk rock is a kind of rock music

genres are meaningless

instead of using a stupid title like POST-ROCK or FUSION BLACK METAL or ELECTRO-SYNTH-J-FOLK-POP do try and sort out your music why don't you just fucking listen to it and be goddamn done with it

if I ever want to ask somebody if they like the same music that I do I will just ask HEY DO YOU LIKE MUSE or HEY DO YOU LIKE DAFT PUNK instead of HEY DO YOU LIKE PROGRESSIVE SPACE ROCK or HEY DO YOU LIKE FRENCH HOUSE DISCO MUSIC

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