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The Webernets

“I DON’T KEEP UP WITH NEW MUSIC ANYMORE”

 Wednesday, June 1st, 2011 at 2:30pm by

Cosmo at Invisible Oranges, whose pieces are becoming ever more introspective in his last days running the blog, posted a really interesting article last week. “I don’t keep up with new music anymore.” How many times have you heard this from old friends of yours, many of whom you grew up listening to music with? Cosmo wants to know why people tend to lose interest in new music as they age; is it the loss of the teenage need to rebel? the presence of other obligations in life? the feeling that new music just doesn’t carry the same rush it used to? Here are two quotes from the editorial:

This phenomenon has bothered me for years. A good number of friends with whom I first bonded with through music don’t share that passion anymore. They always cite things like family, work, and time. But that doesn’t stop them from watching movies or TV. That makes sense. Watching movies or TV is often more passive than listening to music. Movies and TV come at you through your television set (and, increasingly, your computer screen). Outside of radio, one has to go to music. Music also doesn’t hand people visuals like movies and TV do.

What interests me more, however, is the conscious choice to stop seeking new music. People draw lines in the sand: there’s no good music now, music was better when I was young, and so on. I don’t hear people saying, “I don’t want to travel to any more countries” or “I don’t want to try any more kinds of food”. But they’ll say that they are not interested in hearing new music. Why do people seek out new experiences as they age – except for music?

Great questions, all of them, and I’ve often wondered these things myself. I’d love to hear the opinions of MS readers on the matter, and I’d also like to take things one step further: “I don’t keep up with new metal anymore.” Is metal a movement of the youth, inapplicable in its rebellion and ferocity to us olds? Does new metal pale in comparison to old metal? Chime in below.

Props to Cosmo for not dismissing djent, and recognizing that the subgenre’s existence “has merit;” “Uneven Structure, 7 Horns 7 Eyes, and Chimp Spanner caught my ear,” from a sampler posted by Basick Records.

-VN

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  • Las7

    I’m guessing you become comfortable with whatever music you’ve found thus far and no longer have an interest to discover new bands and new genres – unless they are somehow directly linked with things you like.

  • Philip

    I first got into metal with Pearl Jam back in the early 90′s (old school i know) and now the only thing Im looking forward to is the new PJ lp, cant wait til it drops!! These new metal bands are crap (the Ukalele songs album is good but i cant really consider it metal!)

    • Metalguy

      If you consider Pearl Jam metal, its no wonder you hate modern metal

      • http://www.facebook.com/people/Drew-Goodwine/1693216336 Drew Goodwine

        Yeah really.

    • Viking_xxx

      FYI: They used to play PJ on Headbangers Ball. That doesn’t make it right, but I’m just sayin.

  • http://deathmetalbaboon.com/ byrd36

    I could see giving up on new music, even metal, if the radio was your only source. I mean, you’d have to think it’s all bullshit. Having internet access to thousands of bands in countless genres including the ever evolving hybrids of metal should prevent that from happening for serious fans.

    I say this as a father of two teenagers in my seventeenth year of marriage and sixth year of running my own electrical contracting business. Family, work and time are not reasons for giving up music. In fact those things make music an even greater escape. I have given up alot of TV watching but if I ever give up on music, specifically metal, someone kill me.

  • http://crescentshield.com Crescent Shield

    I think he’s wrong, generally people are always looking for more music. But as you get older you already have so much music you already own and love so the need to constantly find new stuff is not as important. Still it’s ever present and significant.

  • Matt

    I’m 23 and for myself I’m in a stage where I find out about old music just as much as I find new. Personally I like where I’m at in life because I can listen to music from any year and probably enjoy it. I don’t have to listen to only “new” or “old” music. If it’s something I can relate to age of said material means nothing to me.

    Having a lost interest in new music is probably deeper than just hatred for new music. Maybe new music brings feelings of personal ressentiment of a modern age. Too bad 10 years from now I will have totally forgot this post because it would be interesting to see how my opinions change.

  • Wowwee!!

    Good thing Cosmo was diggin Chimp Spanner, shows he has berry good taste.

  • trence75

    I think people are given a certain amount of metal when there born and some just use it up. Some of the people that I went to school with (my 20 year reunion is coming up..blah) were fucking hardcore. Wouldnt even associate with some of the rest of us metalheads.. What are they doing now? Not listening to metal. Me? Still casually looking for new music and still digging metal after all this time… They used up all their metal

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Vince-Decker/100002225040320 Vince Decker

      haha that is an interesting take. do you think one could use up any kind of genre? i used to think new music was doomed (was only listening to the doors, hendrix, lz etc at the time) as an art form until my cousin took me to vegas and i saw protest the hero live. that show made me realize there is really good music out there, one just needs to look. for me, i didnt know where to look. i add pth on myspace, see they are friends with this band the human abstract….. need i say more?

  • Brian

    I see getting to a point where trying to keep up with new music gets overwhelming, and you give up on new bands, just following the ones you know you already like/love. But I don’t understand giving up on new music completely.

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Andy-Acosta/793917379 Andy Acosta

      so true man bands come out like never before now

  • junkyardgod

    I just think life gets in the way. You’re married, have kids, have a full time job, (maybe not the first two, but almost everyone suffers the latter) and at the end of the day, with the very few hours/minutes of free time you have to yourself, you just want to listen to something you know you enjoy. There’s a lot less time for taking chances because if you give a new band a shot, and hate it, you feel like you have wasted and didn’t fully enjoy the precious free time you have. Younger generations don’t face this problem as often because more often than not we’ve got more free time than we know what to do with, so we spend it seeking out our passions and evolving intellectually, musically, spiritually, whatever.

    Also, listening to music is an investment. With movies/TV, most people only watch them once, maybe twice, and move on to the next one. But with music, you listen to it over and over, for years (assuming you like it), and it usually takes more than one listen to grasp an entire album. Music is something that you react to internally or emotionally, not visually, and is usually a very personal experience. It’s not as instantly stimulating in the same way that a movie or TV show is. When you’re listening to a new band, you’re looking for longevity, something to stand the test of time and that you can see evolving with each release, and something that strikes a chord with you personally. Therefore, at least from my point of view, it’s a much larger investment of your time than almost any other form of entertainment. And as you get older that time dwindles away, and is typically devoted to other, more “important” things. Sad really, but I think it’s just one of those things that tends to fall by the wayside for a lot of people.

    • Milan

      I like your point about music being an investment. I feel like I’m never really able to judge an album,artist, etc. until I’ve listened attentively to the album 3-4 times. This can take quite some time: 2-4 hours. So yeah, as you have less and less time, it becomes harder to invest 2-4 hours of your time to just see whether or not you like an artist.

      • Eloli

        I agree in both points: that’s exactly what’s happening to me, being 38 and having a kid.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Devon-Czekaj/550092101 Devon Czekaj

    This past year I’ve been listening to very few “new albums”, not because I hate new music, but because I’ve been more interested lately in listening to all the classic albums I’ve yet to hear.

  • uhaduhsauhdsaduhasuhi fuck

    the only new music i like listening to is metal because that’s my favorite style and i like listening to and seeing how metal has progressed and where it will go, but other than that, i don’t really listen to any new punk or pop or whatever. i’m 25 and i grew up listening to mainly metal/90s music (like pearl jam era bands) and oldies so all my records are either metal or classic rock, funk, and oldies. a lot of metal bands i think are trying to be so niche it’s hard to get into them.

    i think i read through a link on metalsucks to no clean singing’s “modern big four” list which i thought was extremely dumb. the faceless, kylesa, ulcerate, and revocation. i mean besides faceless and revocation, i haven’t actually met anyone in real life that listens to kylesa or ulcerate. how the fuck does a sludge band make a “big 4″ metal list?

    the most accurate modern big 4 list i saw was, i think, here on metalsucks that listed lamb of god, killswitch engage, and 2 other bands. while i don’t listen to kse much at all, i think lamb of god could definitely be the “metallica” of a modern big 4 list. i don’t think there’s any other band that garnished as much success as them in popular culture in movies and videogames in the recent years in spite of their original name, vocal style, lyrical content, and overall behavior. i mean they’re not exactly the most proper behaved band so it’s great to see a band like that get mainstream success.

    what i’m trying to say is besides lamb of god, i don’t think there are many new bands right now that have had great success and music that can make them a “big four” that everyone will go see no matter what. everyone at my work hates metal, but they love metallica. if i were to play faceless or kylesa for them, they’d probably say “what is this shit” but when metallica tours, they would most likely go.

  • cyrollan

    I think the market is getting saturated. I belong to a hard rock/metal website which introduces new bands by the boatload. For every 10 bands I give a try, I truly enjoy one. Simply put, finding quality new music now qualifies as work. (Well not hard work by any means, how about calling it “a chore”?)

  • Ian

    Interesting topic I have thought about a lot.

    I think first one thing all the writers are missing is that learning about new music requires network effects. Most of us who got into metal got into it because we also had friends who were interested back when we were teens. Then if you went to college you also had a huge group of people all getting into and discussing new music.

    But as you head out into the workforce you become more and more isolated from like-minded people who are all growing and sharing. So then it becomes a much greater individual effort to follow new music.

    In order to find it you have to both 1) have the passion for music and 2) know where to look.

    I had the passion but after college found myself drifting more mainstream except for buying new CDs by bands I always liked. That was, until the explosion of internet resources became available, as well as when MTV first rebooted Headbanger’s Ball with Jamie Jasta. That gave me new places to look, along with Decibel, and now I’m more on the cutting edge with what I listen to than ever, at age 39.

    But I don’t think you can underrate #1.

    For most people, music is something that they enjoy listening to. They like a good beat, something they can sing along to. They have no desire to ‘work at’ appreciating that. When they were around people who did work at it, they might have sometimes gotten turned on to new things by recommendation. But they never made an active effort of their own. And once they no longer had people who were truly passionate about music around them, they had no motivation of their own to seek stuff out.

    For metal you can take it one step further because a lot of metal is inaccessible and an aquired taste. If you’ve never heard anything heavier than Metallica, hearing Anaal Nathrakh will just sound like raw noise.

    I have found that people who used to be into heavier stuff but stopped listening to new music can slowly be brought back into the fold by finding good ‘bridge’ bands. For example I just took a friend who probably never listened to anything heavier than Metallica, and generally listend to early 90s alternative metal like Tool, to go see Amon Amarth and he loved it.

  • http://satanicpowerpop.tumblr.com Isaac

    I’m always on the lookout for new music, personally. I like expanding my taste and listening to stuff that I wouldn’t normally.

  • Trux

    I am way past 30s and I am looking always for new music. I, however, tend to search in very specific subgenres : traditional metal, prog, power and thrash.

    All this new-ish subgenres like metalcore, deathcore, djent etc., dont have any appeal to me, find them boring, songless, souless and therefore I run from them like the plague.

    • Ian

      So you listen to new music, but its new music in old styles? Sort of like listening just listening to new delta blues music.

      I’m not being critical, its music and everyone’s choice is valid. But it sounds like you are actually who this topic is about to a large extent. Our parents likely thought that thrash sounded songless and soul-less as well.

      But your list does bring up another point. Though it ties into what I said about ‘accessibility’. For some, they could never cross the river when it came to listening to bands that used death-style vocals. I know it took me a couple years to really enjoy bands that used that vocal style. A large part of modern metal relies on non-clean vocals, and if you never bought into that sound, its understandable that so many genres would be off-limits to you.

      • Trux

        well, there was a time when I was all about the melo- death scene…. but not into the whole brutal death metal bands at that time , if that makes sense to you.

        I conccur with you that the more I get old, the more singing I want to hear in my metal and less screaming/glowling/pig squealing…

        I find true pleasure in listening new releases in the prog metal camp as well as in thrash and power metal….. Thats where my musical tastes really are…

        Tastes are like colors my friend.

        • Trux

          … and you know what ?… I am also 39, so there you go.

          • Fat ass

            Im still in high school but im into the same metal as you minus the power metal. Over the past few years i have been actually listening to what i want to hear rather then what my peers think is metal and as a result i love thrash, lets be honest who doesn’t, and progressive and also i love bands such as Between The Buried And Me and Protest The Hero. Im fond of bands like PTH because every single member in those bands know every inch of the instrument and how to use. Their singer is my personal favorite because he has an incredible range from death growls to the high notes the britney spears wishes she could hit

  • Mitch K.

    i find it hard to keep up with new metal music 1) because there is SO MUCH of it 2) alot of it now sounds the same and 3) current trends just dont catch my attention at all to be honest. most of the new music that i listen to is new music from bands that ive been listening to for years. every once in a while a new group or artist comes along that really catches my ear and i want to listen to it because it sounds interesting or inovative, but other than that alot of the new stuff that i come accross just seems uninspired and derivative.

    i miss when i was younger and new bands were constantly coming out of the woodworks that for the most part all had an origional “identity” and sound. i still love finding new music that i really enjoy, i just find that it happens ALOT less than it did in the past. even buying cds doesnt tickle my fancy like it used to because i can get it for free on the net if i want and there just doesnt seem to be many bands that i feel are worth spending money on. i dont even really have the excuse of other things happening in my life because honestly im not all that busy. music just isnt as interesting as it used to be i guess. but i still fucking love it and keep searching for new bands that really excite me.

  • Krang10

    As with most things, there are shades of gray. Every reason is valid. Especially lack of time (because of family, work, etc). It takes a LOT of time to do a decent job of sorting through all the shitty music out there. I cannot even count the amount of hours I put in sorting through all the new music that comes out, not just metal but all the other genre’s out there. HOLY FUCKING SHIT, there is so goddamn much music coming out. I mean, it’s awesome…but at the same time it is really difficult (especially when you aren’t paid for it…) to give an awesome album the amount of proper attention it deserves when there were also hundreds of other songs released that week, not to mention the ones from last week, the week before, etc…

    And that is a pretty damn good excuse these days. I am a single 25 year old who could work a lot harder than he does, AKA I have the time to do it. I can’t imagine doing this if I had a wife, kids, serious job, or other shit that sounds equally terrible.

    Another reason I may point out, is that perhaps Cosmo’s friends, like many of our friends who “love” music were/are trendy. Not that there is anything all that terrible about that, but people usually (hopefully anyway…fuck old people that actually still care about that shit, worst people on the planet, you are fucking old, get it through your aging head) grow out of the trend scene. Let’s face it, music is the easiest, and also cheapest thing to be trendy with or about. It doesn’t cost all that much to be wise to and listen to some “hip bands” but it ain’t cheap buying expensive clothes/cars/other trendy shit that people care about.

    At this very point in time I am at the downtown library going through my weekly assortment of new music. I do make a point to share though, I realize that not everyone has the time or the awesome music tastes (yeah I am fucking serious, so what) but no one should miss out on some of the amazing stuff that is out there because they got sucked in by a chick or the television. I am also reallllly baked so that may be a reason that this takes so long. Peace out. Love Krang

    • rawr

      that was an awesome message for something you wrote baked. interesting idea about the trendiness aspect of music. i guess if that’s the only reason that people listened to music as a kid than once they grow out of it there’s no appeal, cause it feels like music itself is trendy? maybe?

  • bukowski

    I haven’t given up on new music completely but I have enough “old” music to keep me occupied for the rest of my life.

  • Angel Vivaldi

    It’s a tough call, but personally I agree with Cyrollan.

    I find the metal world to be overly saturated with too many bands, imho. It’s simply overwhelming to keep up with amount of signings and new music out there. Every time I log onto to Blabbermouth/some metal news site, there are 3 or 4 new bands being signed- weekly. I feel that people are satisfied with latching onto the bands that do their genre best and only keep up with those. Maybe once a new genre rolls around they’ll give a few of its leaders a shot.

    Furthermore- I don’t know 1 person my age who sits in a room and doesn’t do something else while listening to music. Metal fans in their late 20’s/30’s usually listen to metal while driving, checking email, cleaning the house etc. It becomes more of “background theme music” as opposed to a part of who they are as it did when they were younger. When I was in my teens, I’d lay on my bed and listen to CDs for hours on repeat. Now, not so much lol.

    Granted I detest television, however I can see why people would choose that over seeking out new music. It’s difficult to be bored watching a television show you’re into as it’s both visually and sonically stimulating/engaging. Now try sitting there while solely listening to metal album youre into. Chances are you’ll sign onto Facebook within the first 2 songs lol

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Ryan-Sean-Heron/9391234 Ryan Sean Heron

    people, and men in particular, tend to lose interest in new anything as they get older. whether it be music or technology or anything else that comes along. there is a certain point where people are comfortable with what they like and they just stick with it. I try my best to avoid this.

    • shpostal

      You’re right about that. I’m 50 already, and my friends who claim to still like rock music can’t tolerate anything that was made after 1980. Classic radio makes me puke. How many fucking times does Boston’s first album have to be played, anyway?
      Maybe it’s a comfort zone, and I guess there’s nothing wrong with that, but music is such a huge varied world. I’ve loved heavy music forever, and if I do say so myself I keep up with metal pretty well, although I will admit I don’t like metalcore or deathcore, maybe with the exception of Whitechapel. That screaming with no real riff to speak of gets old quick. But just to show you that you don’t have to be stuck in a time warp if you don’t want to be, here’s a few metal bands I dig: Fear Factory, Meshuggah, Dillinger Escape Plan, Kreator, Sodom, Motorhead, Morbid Angel, Obituary, Death, Electric Wizard, Evile, Havok, Celtic Frost and Triptykon, anything from Devin Townsend, Slayer, Exodus, Forbidden, High on Fire and Skeleton Witch.
      This isn’t complete, and I have the older classic stuff, too, but while I don’t have everything, I do keep up better than anybody else I know my age. Somebody told me that it was time I went to country music. I said that will never happen and I will have a stereo strapped to my scooter chair at the rest home blasting out “Dopethrone” and running over old farts who don’t get out of the way. If I like it, I like it and fuck anybody who tries to tell me different.
      Just to show you I do have variety, I also really dig Chet Atkins and Les Paul with Mary Ford. She had a voice that would make your pee pee melt.

  • Ben

    It’s a simple answer:

    the person saying it is closed minded and stuck in their opinion that the music from “the good ol’ days” is better than anything currently coming out (see bitches who trash anything that came out from the mid 90′s- early 2000s rejoicing at the fact that it’s en vogue to like Maiden and Priest again and enjoying current bands that are doing nothing but playing in that same, exact sandbox)

    • shpostal

      You’ll find it’s not just music that’s been confined. If a person doesn’t actively try to make life interesting through travel, books, music and other activities, he or she gets in a rut that makes him or her distrustful of new ideas, afraid of anything they’re not intimately familiar with, and their minds and spirits become robotic.
      As an example: with the exception of folks who simply don’t have the money to do so due to the economy, or health or other good reason, there are millions of people who rarely if ever venture out of their home towns, counties or states. Haven’t we all heard of people who live in a huge place like NYC or Chicago who’ve never been out of the city limits?
      You can’t learn much sitting at home, and if you do travel, you must do more than just go to Disney World or some other tourist location. While they may be nice, and the scenery beautiful, it’s all those towns and cities you pass by on the interstate or fly over that make this country tick. Housing projects, poor areas of large cities and depressed parts of the country where unemployment is terrible are important to understand, too. This country ain’t all a picture postcard.
      There is no such thing as “good old days”. These are false memories made up by people who can’t accept the fact that they’re aging and aren’t trying to keep up.

  • dr. doomdrummer

    I, being 37, still enjoy searching for New metal music. I have been playing drums in metal bands for twenty some odd years. The last being a signed doom band that toured often(Vasteburai). Having a four year old drummer son on my hands has made me go back to my roots by showing him older music to teach him history first before the new stuff. All he loves at this point is Zeppelin, Beatles, Sabbath, kiss, etc. He likes gojira, clutch, deftones, nachtmystium, Torche as well, but I always make sure to instill the lineage going backwards. I myself started an outlaw country band because I was tired of PLAYING metal but I still bleed metal. I actually have it kinda easy, new music is brought to me on a weekly basis as I DJ metal nights in a club for the past 10 years.
    Here’s me and my son at a country show playing drums together notice how easy he keeps up.(proud papa)
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXoG2Vlag9Q

  • wil

    alot of excuses , would never work in an environment i couldn’t listen to, music , if you love it and have a passion for music you will listen to it , i have a kid and i am listening to the new morbid angel while she plays right here beside me , as for new music , it takes a little bit of searching to find real music , the bs you here on the radio or see ads for everywhere , real metal head, like drug addicts need the next fix so have to seek it out , i think commercial music today with out a doubt sucks , muse is the only newer band on the radio worth half a shit, but stuff like agalloch, russian circles, a forest of stars, watain etc you have to open a decibel or click on last fm or whatever but its out there we know this , why some draws a line in the sand -the are stagnant as people and have lost the fire to feel inspired

  • BloodHockeyHeavyMetal

    “Does new metal pale in comparison to old metal?”
    Yes Yes Yes.

    Id rather have my balls tortured while listening to Morbid Angel, than given money to listen to 90% of the crappy “Metal” out now. (this excludes SUNN0))), ISIS, ANb)

    Am I wrong?

  • EmmureRules

    It’s not just a “getting old” thing. The Internet has changed music. Quality has gone down, quantity has gone way, way up. It’s that simple.

  • tenyearsgone

    With newer metal/rock in particular, it has gotten stale. I’d much rather listen to veteran acts like Symphony X, Led Zep, Motorhead, Crowbar, Blind Guardian, Morbid Angel, Rush, Death, etc. (all different genres as you can see) Those bands have their own identity and put songwriting before showboating. A lot of this newer crap is kids like Animals as Leaders and Periphery, who can play, but write god awful songs. It seems as though it could be any one of thousands of faceless musicians noodling around at your local guitar center. Pass. I’ll take interesting songwriting. I am not old, but I frequently find myself appreciating older artists more, as well as more melodic stuff. I have not stopped searching, and do enjoy some of the bands you guys love around here. Scale the Summit are definitely up there. Challenging but cool melodic ideas come first. Not, “Hey. I can do this.”

  • http://Poopshipdestroy Aaron

    I think a lot of people get stuck in their so-called “glory days” and try to cling to the music that they grew up with and matured to (high school/college age). New music confuses them and they don’t get the same feeling out of it. So when someone says “I don’t get this new music” they are really saying “my life sucks and I wish I was 19 again”.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Matthew-Kurtz/1493586117 Matthew Kurtz

    Another one of these blogs huh? Look, good for you if you don’t wanna listen to anymore new metal, but this line about there not being any good stuff anymore is crap. Every generation says that. Ya just gotta know where to look.

    On the bright side, at least that blog is going out on a high note. Unlike Reign in Blonde which has kinda just dried up after those bitches thought people would give a shit about their papers on “Tween marketing” and “Krazyfest”.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Dean-Cowles/1657411509 Dean Cowles

    I’m a lot younger than most of you guys here, and I’ll be honest – new metal doesn’t interest me the same way as old metal, as well it should. Over time, the shit gets parsed out and all we are left with are the classics. There’s a good chance that none of us will remember 3/4s of the bands today except as a joke – we’ll laugh about how we could like tripe like that. And the classics will always remain the way they are – classic.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Christopher-Ashlock/1300561574 Christopher Ashlock

    Personally, I still seek out new music. New music for me, however is not necessarily just new bands but old bands as well. I’ve listened to nothing but “newer” bands for years now, and I’ve gotten to a point where I feel most new bands, particularly bands people are calling new “metal” bands are just bland, or carbon copies of what was popular 25 years ago. Although I’m confident that something new and interesting will arise in the near future, my interested has taken a complete turn and I’ve started to seek out pioneers of metal/hard rock music. I haven’t felt this ecstatic about music since the first time a metal record graced my ears! But as I said, this is all coming from music that is more or less considered classic rock in this day in age. Despite that fact, I find it more creative and interesting than anything coming out currently. Let me know when the 8 strings and Slam-metal stop being trendy. Then I will start paying attention.

  • Jason

    I’m turning 32 in a few weeks and over the past couple years my love for metal and quest for new music has grown exponentially. I’ve always been a fan of metal but even more so as of late and I am finding myself liking darker and heavier bands. After a long hiatus, I am now going to shows again about 3-4 times a year and I buy several albums from both new and established bands a month. If this article has any truth to it, I am an exception to the case.

  • alex

    Well I’m twenty seven and I’m constantly discovering new bands and styles. Both old
    stuff and new stuff. Personally I think the new stuff is just as good as the old. And I don’t know why people are complaining about it being hard to discover new music. If you go on youtube its incredibly easy. Like it seriously requires absolutely no skill or effort whatsoever. I thinking some people are just lazy close minded grouches.

  • Chris

    I have thought about this a few times in the past.Im 36 years old and have been listening to music obsessively since 1982, when my cousin gave me and my brother a stack of records.I cant even tell you all the records he gave us,I know there was some AC/DC,Ted Nugent and Nazereth, but from that point on I have searched for new music,I was and still am addicted.I met this kid named Aaron in 1983,and his mom and dad were both into music,so he got ahold of some Black Sabbath records of theirs and…well we are still best friends.I remember tedious sessions of thumbing through magazines just searching for something new that I could run out and buy,hoping it would be as great as they described it in the magazine.And when the internet came along it was just so easy,I loved it.But I think that is part of the problem.I think that hunting so hard for something new made it more special when you found it.But thats just my experience,I still search for and love finding new music its just not the same.But I have quite a few of those older friends of mine that just lost it.I was talking to a guy recently that used to be just like me,he would just dig for new bands and he would come up with some good stuff.But after like 1 minute of talking to him I could tell his only source for new music was the radio,he actually asked me if I had heard of a band called Five Finger Death Punch,and I have so many friends like that.And I dont beleive it’s because music was so much better back then.I think there are just as many great bands if not more now than there were when I was younger.The music from when I was young sounds better to me because I have an emotional attachment to it,it’s sentimental.Its hard for me to beleive that a kid today hearing Ride the Lightning for the first time could hear it the same way and with the same intensity that I heard it in 1984 when music just didnt sound like that yet.I think it’s old fart syndrome,you get older and you just want to hear the music that makes you feel young again.Its like your parents watching old movies all day long,they might get a new movie here and there but mostly they just watch old stuff.I suspect I will get old fart syndrome someday but not yet.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Corey-Mitchell/660352330 Corey Mitchell

    As you guys can gather from my monthly Bleeders’ Digest articles, this 45-year-old Old Fart is enjoying listening to new metal. It’s just I do not get turned on by the same “new” stuff as say the staff at Metalsucks or most MS commenters. I am much more excited by newer bands such as Horned Almighty, SubRosa, Of Legends, American Heritage, KEN mode, Seidr, Finnr’s Cane, and Olde Growth than I am by the supposed socially acceptable newish metal acts such as Last Chance to Reason, Periphery, Obscura, etc. The main reason, as I mentioned in last month’s BD, is songwriting. I am much more excited by a cool, simple memorable riff than I am by some godawful Yngwie-like masturbation exercises.

    As for the “too old to listen to new metal,” canon; I’ve been there before. That, in fact, is what inspired me to get off my lazy fat ass and start listening to new metal on a regular basis. You can blame the underwhelming crop of new bands, but metal has always been about 85% crap with very few diamonds in the rough. I remember one young MS commenter called me arrogant because I made that assessment in a previous BD column. That, however, is the harsh cold reality of metal (and most other genres). Most of it sucks. That’s why you need to work at finding the good quality shit out there.

    BTW, here’s a few of the May ’11 bands that got me excited: Hate Eternal, Olde Growth, 16 Volt, Book of Black Earth, and Devolved.

  • Ceiltsei

    I believe time has a lot to do with this phenomena. A few years back, I accidentally got my 60 year old dad into metal by showing him some stuff from Meshuggah and Opeth. I was shocked when he did his own research and gave me an All Shall Perish album for Christmas. Now he spends hours every day listening to music on his laptop through headphones and ignoring my mother. He ended up introducing me to Rotting Christ, Agalloch, Animals as Leaders, Porcupine Tree, and the like. Strange things happen..

  • Dave

    It’s actually a pretty interesting phenomenon – the best explanation I’ve heard is that visual stimulation (tv, movies) are unitive, while sonic stimulation (music) is divisive. Think about this for a second – how many people identify with the movies and tv shows they watch? Do you see people argue over liking 30 Rock vs. Parks and Rec? If anything, when someone has a different viewing taste than you, it’s simply noted and similarities in taste are pursued (you may both agree on Community for example).

    This just isn’t so for music. People argue about it. Endlessly categorize it and label it. Build up social circles and attitudes around it. This site *thrives* on this behavior. And guess what – some people get sick of doing that. They stay within their comfort zones, listen to the music they like/liked and never have to tread in those new circles.

    Q.E.D.

  • Brett

    It’s the “replay value”…as much as I liked Inception, I’ll probably only watch it a few more times ever. However, even my 100th favorite album will get a few spins each month, year, etc…..music is just meant to be repeatedly enjoyed, whereas movies aren’t. So when I’m 40, I’ll be checking out the latest films, but albums I got when I was 20, 25, 30, etc, will still be in my rotation, limiting the amount of room for new stuff.

  • The I

    The Invisible Oranges post was interesting, but I walked away from it mostly just glad that I haven’t turned twenty yet. With that in mind, maybe my opinion here isn’t valid, but I don’t know that it’s so much age that causes people to stop listening to the music of their childhood, but a change in emotional state. I went to college last year and found myself not having to deal with all the claustrophobia and anger associated with being a high school student working for minimum wage and stealing Snickers bars from gas stations, and my music tastes changed because of it. Yeah, I still listen to Slayer and Dying Fetus, but I’ve found myself interested in jazz and indie for the first time (cool kids’ music), and bands like Candiria and Opeth show up on my iPod more and more often than they used to. Its not that I’m a completely different person abandoning my former tastes. It’s just that I’ve evolved to deal with changes in my life. If music is the soundtrack to those changes, an evolution there is also to be expected.

    On a side note, djent is not the future. LIke re-Metallica, re-Meshuggah’s on its way out. I see doom/stoner/black metal influence being a bit more on the rise these days.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Josh-Schwartz/644394368 Josh Schwartz

    I listen to new music from older artists, but I don’t really listen to new artists. If something comes along and wows me, I’ll listen. But for the most part I don’t like the newer song-writing styles in metal, I don’t like death/growly vocals, I don’t like a lot of the guitar tones, and I don’t like the rigid click-tracked, beat-detective’d, overly sterile studio recordings. A lot of the classic sounding stuff (power/traditional metal) that I would otherwise like is out because the lyrics are totally cliche or the riffs are just retreads of stuff that’s already been done. Give me good, catchy songs, catchy riffs, clean vocals, some nice tuby guitar tone, and some original lyrics, and I’ll listen.

  • Spermgrinder

    I suppose this is small-minded of me, but I can’t get over what some of these assholes who play modern metal look like. Gauge ear rings? Pretty boy haircuts? Brightly colored clothes? Those of us who grew in the 80s remember a time when things (music, movies, people and cars) were easily categorized into neat groups. You had your hippies, your metalheads, your jocks, your geeks and even your generic background dorks. Nowadays, LOOKOUT, here’s a brutal death band with a ridiculous name, their bassist has gauged ear lobes, the singer looks like a Cure fan, with a couple of fat-bearded metal dudes in back! It’s just odd, confusing and disconcerting for some older people when you can’t classify something and therefore, it becomes hard to relate to. Deathcore is a prime example of this. Why would you go through the motions of writing death metal riffs (albeit simplistic ones), doing growly vocals and write songs about…killing cops or how many chicks you fuck or why your shirt is so yellow? When I first started listening to death metal and grind in 1991, it was new and exciting. The bands looked menacing, sounded menacing and wrote lyrics about taboo shit (ever read the lyrics to Meathook Sodomy by Cannibal?)! The shock value of it has certainly gone, what with changing social mores and desensitization to the extremes of daily life. It was a totallity thing, back then. Image, music and even language have been rendered obsolete by a generation who no longer have to hunt down obscure bands in out of the way record stores. They don’t have to drive hundreds of miles to see a great band play for an hour. And they certainly don’t have to suffer the same social ostracism that listening to metal used to afford us. Nowadays, people don’t have the attention span to listen to whole CDs. Not when they can get whatever they want, almost magically and free, on demand.

  • Joe

    Most new metal is garbage. There are very few bands out there I dig, but then again I’m 34. If I were 14, might have a different opinion. Everything is about technicality, and how low you can tune your guitars now. Its like the 80′s with less hair spray and guitars tuned until the strings fall off.

    I have found it helpful that I can write my own songs and that there are still a few bands out there that dont sacrifice melody and groove for technicality and brutality.

  • DonkeyKong

    I think Tom Waits is cool.

  • chtimixeur

    I’m 30, and I’ve recently come to a point where I don’t care about new music. I’ve listened to pretty much all existing genres, and I know what I like in pretty much every genre : I know the classics, and I’m just too lazy to look out for new stuff. I have enough GOOD music to listen to for the rest of my life, and new music isn’t as appealing as when I was a teenager or a young adult. Now, there’s just too much of it, and finding a decent band requires a LOT of time. I keep reading you have to dig on the internet to find amazing bands, but for the last 5 years, I have never discovered a “small” band that made me become a fan instantly. Instead, I keep going back to the bands that impressed me when I was younger and much more into music.

    In the past, you could rely on labels for finding exciting bands, but since the Internet has drastically changed the music economy, you have to do that “job” yourself, and it’s just boring.

    I don’t know why, but new music isn’t as exciting as before. Maybe it’s because :
    - you can’t make a decent living out of it anymore, and the talented musicians do something else instead.
    - of the technology : every garage band can sound huge, but they all sound the same. In the past, bands that stood out had a unique sound/vibe. It’s just not the case anymore.
    - there’s too much music out there, and our attention spam has diminished
    - there are too many boring subgenres.

    I’d love to be excited by new bands like I used to, but it just doesn’t happen anymore. Too bad for me.