Hipster metal. Or is it just popular?
Now here’s a hot topic if ever there was one; ‘Hipster metal’.
This is something that I’ve been giving a fair bit of thought to recently, mainly thanks to the release of The Sword’s new album, Warp Riders. Regular visitors to Thee Big Black’s forum will probably have spotted the thread Ed from Doom Metal Alliance started a couple of weeks ago. If not here’s a quick run down to give you some idea of what I’m talking about.
One of DMA’s contributors recently posted a review of Warp Riders on their website, this seemed to open a flood gate and Ed was left fielding a torrent of comments ranging from moronic to the outright abusive. Apparently the Warp Riders review actually holds the record for the most number of comments ever posted on DMA’s website! Here’s one of the emails sent to Ed in response to the review . . .
“I don’t give a shit about “hipster this” or “hipster that.” This band fucking sucks and so does this album. Derivative wannabes with a shitty vocalist and ridiculous lyrics”
You can have a look at Ed’s thread by clicking here.
Some 'hipsters', yesterday.
Now, whether you like The Sword or not (personally I do) you have to admit that this level of hatred seems a tad extreme. There’s a few things that generally get brought up whenever The Sword get slated. One is that they didn’t ‘pay their dues’ and appeared fully formed, the other is the rumour that they are a bunch of indie musicians who decided to cash in on the stoner thing (as someone said on the forum ” . . . not exactly the most lucrative genre to go in for is it?”). Well I don’t know about that and, to be honest, don’t really care. However I can see where people might get that sort of idea, there’s a few points that could be raised to defend this point of view. First there is the band’s apparent apperance from nowhere, their debut Age of Winters and the band as a whole seemingly appeared fully formed. No years of begging the metal crowd to take notice, no apparent trawling around the toilet circuit in a battered Transit for this lot. Something that, as we all know, is massively frowned on in alternative circles. Second, and for many this is quite damning, is the fact that Kemado, the band’s label, was apparently owned by Disney at the time Age of Winters was released (I think it’s now owned by Sony but don’t quote me on that). There’s some pretty tasty fuel for the ‘haters’ fires right there.
But this whole ‘hipster metal’ thing doesn’t stop there, a lot more bands are being dragged into this one.
Matt Pike: One of the beautiful people, apparently.
First off let’s talk about High on Fire. After The Sword these guys seem to be the other great ‘hipster’ band doing the rounds. Whereas there is possibly some sort of case to be brought against The Sword (if you’re that way inclined) thanks to the Disney connection (although, let’s be honest, they ain’t exactly The Jonas Brothers) I don’t think anyone can accuse Matt Pike and Co. of band wagoning. Anyone who doesn’t know what I’m talking about should go and look up his credentials.
Then, of course, there’s Baroness. This is a band who released what are, in my opinion, two of the best records of the past ten years with ’07′s Red Album and ’09′s Blue Album. Baroness now seem to be coming in for similar treatment as The Sword and High On Fire, but yet again this is a band who can’t be accused of not ‘paying their dues’. Much like High on Fire the cries of “sell outs!” are starting to be heard. I’ll skip past mentioning Torche or Mastodon at any length as I think you’ve got the point. That’s a fair few of my favourite bands of recent years written of as being ‘hipsters’ and ‘sell outs’!
So what’s going on? Maybe to some degree this is simply jealousy. Everyone and their dog is in a band, myself included, and maybe the green eyed beast is starting to raise it’s head. ‘The scene’ has always been quite firmly ‘underground’ until fairly recently and this, to me at least, reeks of the scene police getting a tizz on. “How dare they want to play gigs to more than eight guys in a stinking basement!” I know, the nerve! This is nothing new, the underground is notoriously intolerant of success.
It seems that some of the most vocal critics of ‘hipster metal’ come from the more mainstream parts of the metal scene. This rather depressing thread was posted on another forum a while ago. To give you some idea of the angle this is the opening post . . .
“sludge/stoner is fuckin EVERYWHERE at the minute! the army of em with cheque shirts, american trucker style caps and full on chin wigs… are we gonna be BOMBARDED by stoner clones for the next year or so then?”
That started up a fairly extensive debate on our own forum. You can read it here if you feel inclined. Rather than jealousy this seems to suggest a more stick-in-the-mud dislike of anything different. Again, something the metal world is not unknown for.
So, with Sunn o))) appearing in the NME and The Sword appearing on the front page of Myspace does this mean that doom, stoner, sludge or whatever you want to call it is the in ‘thing’ at the moment? And more importantly, does it matter? If the sound coming out of your speakers is good or the band standing on the stage in front of you is making you move then, surely, that’s all that really matters. In my humble opinion if you’re worrying about a band’s credentials when you’re listening to their album you’re probably over thinking things a little.
Anyway, for what it’s worth I think Warp Riders is great and will be reviewing it for the next issue of Thee Big Black. Should I expect the same torrent of shitty posts that Ed and the guys from DMA got? Probably. Do I care? No.
There are 7 Comments to "Hipster metal. Or is it just popular?"
I happen to like The Sword. I like High On Fire too. I even reviewed, favorably, Warp Riders for my own blog. All I see with The Sword is that they went with a concept and recorded it. Maybe it is to far off from what they’ve done before. So what. It’s actually a good thing for bands to try new and different things to keep things fresh. Without that you may have just renamed your band Disturbed. Did anyone ever stop to think that maybe the guys in The Sword want to make it big? Maybe they want to stop playing the clubs and start playing the 20,000+ venues? If they do, great, good luck and more power to them. If you don’t like it, then ignore them and listen to what really makes you happy.
The term hipster should be thrown more towards bands like Mudvayne, Disturbed and Godsmack. Even more of an extreme, Linkin Park, Soil, Hoobastank or Drwning Pool.
This is a subject I’ve thought about a little to much, I spend quite a bit of time in Hoxton due to work and I know the hipsters love their Doom at the moment. This was sparked by Sunn o)))’s rise to fame and they dragged the whole southern lord label with them. The Hipsters of Hoxton don’t know barely anything outside of that label which is a real shame and I think that personally think it shows how shallow minded they are when it comes to the genre. That aside I’m happy Doom is big now, it means I get to go to more shows of more bands I totally love and all my old doom shirts now get people talking to me.
Bill, Linkin Park are not Hipster at all. The term refers to super fashionable kids that are on the cusp of cool. Nu-metal has seen a micro revival of late mind.
Doom on on for the masses I say, but proud to say I’m old skool
“I’m happy Doom is big now, it means I get to go to more shows of more bands I totally love”
That pretty much sums up how I feel about it. The whole point of this post is basically ‘so what if these bands are popular as long as the music is good’. I’m getting pretty fed up of the scene police turning their nose up at the bands that are getting successful and looking down on the people who continue to listen to them.
Like I said in the blog it’s kind of understandable where people could get that idea about The Sword, that doesn’t make it right. At the end of the day the music is what counts and whether or not they ‘paid their dues’ (a daft concept at the best of times) they produce some great music. High on Fire, Baroness etc. are a different matter, how anyone can accuse them of cashing in is, again, beyond me. If you want to be a rock star and make loads of cash there’s better ways of doing it than playing the sort of music they do. Besides all of them have some pretty respectable ‘scene’ credentials.
Aside from the detractors within ‘the scene’ the guys who seem to assume that everyone who is into these bands are scene hopping hipsters hail from the ‘old school’ metal crowd. That has enjoyed a peak of interest over recent years but there seems to be a popular shift towards doom and stoner at the moment. Really I think that the thread I posted a link to complaining about “stoner clones ” reeks of bitterness. Maybe it’s because their band missed the boat on the classic metal revival or maybe they just resent anything new happening in the metal world.
Anyway, my point is rather than people slating some great bands for some perceived slight to their alternative sensibilities they should just shut up and enjoy some great music.
i guess it seems that even paying your dues doesn’t mean anything anymore.
“Ultimate Dragons started in Richmond, VA in 1998 when Ben White and JD Cronise quit Burn Witch Burn. They recruited Trivett Wingo to play drums and the Ultimate Dragons were born. After a few months and several shows, David DiDonato joined on lead guitar. One by one, they all moved from Richmond to Austin, TX and reformed the band first with Adam on drums, then Alan. Then they broke up.”
Wingo and Cronise then went on to form the Sword.
That is really handy to know, cheers. Next time someone starts bollocking on about The Sword being cash in hipsters I’ll pull this bit of info on them.
Again, cheers!!
hehe! why even care what´s changing! There so many new bands finding their way thrue
the smoke these days that you alway can find a new favorite.
I´m glad for the development in stonerdoompsychtrancedrone-druggish bong noise global
scene is so diverse. For example i like Bongzilla – great concept, muffish,stoned, repetetive
heavy, but i hate his screaming-fucking destroys the mood for me. But hey Toner low delivers what bongzilla could have done, laidback singing,more psych, more STONED etc I loved the sword – age of winters, but then they abandoned the stoney and just went on riffin ala metal style. To me boring, got warp riders, good album but not an album i ever feel like listening to or ever will, i have tried…Happily there are other heavy fans out there that feel the same as me and can play and will do it right!
That´s why STONER never will vanish as long as their´s weed on the planet. A STONER BAND WITHOUT STONERS SUCK BALLS!
Cheers&Doom
WORD UP HANNES!!!