f13.net

They're both right. It's cool to enjoy things, but to call Baby Metal any kind of actual Metal is silly.

Edit by Trippy: added context

They're more Metal than most of the hair bands. Mostly Speed Metal, which was never to everyone's taste, but they'll do.

--Dave

Googling them and listening to a few random tracks...... other than not doing the Cookie Monster voice, they are right on tone with most speed metal (as Mahrin pointed out).  Is Cookie Monster voice required to be ‘metal’?

Dio.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTEYUFgLveY (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTEYUFgLveY)

If that doesn't count as metal then you have to have a pretty limited view on what metal is.

K.

Didn't know we had so many Babymetal fans on here! I've seen them live twice, loved them both times.

When musical types stop evolving, they die. It's now further from my headbanging jean-jacket days than those days were from Doo-Whop, so it's good to see someone doing something *new* with the sound, instead of just rehashing it ala Finnish Black Metal.

--Dave

At minimum, their sound is just as metal as DragonForce and such.

Sounds metal to me. I'm more into Power Ballads but I cant see why anyone into speed Metal wouldn't be enjoying that, unless you were some kind of Metal Snob, in which case F you, basically. Good for the Girls.

They supported RHCP when they played Glasgow Recently.

I have little to no opinion on them, but they entertained the crowd hugely.

Babymetal is metal af.

This is what I call marketing genius.  Way to hit the demographic for maximum $$$.

Is this metal or nah? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10Rh5mjOOG8

Yes.

I'd prefer his metal cover of Adele's "Hello" but ya, I'd say it was.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtQUJMBH8uE

If you don't think it is,  that's cool.

Metal. As. Fuck. (https://youtu.be/OWjOQao1q4k)

--Dave

Since this is nominally a forum about games here's my contribution to the discussion:

Nier: Automata - "Weight of the World" cover: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v72zoaQVTg0

Original English language version* for comparison: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Egn_VNVKzI4


* The OST has Japanese, English and French versions

Metal hipsters never fail to amuse.

What's a metal hipster? Someone who thinks they have a lock on a metal purity test of some sort? In that case, yes, that's obviously a fallacy, since metal is as hard to pin down as anything else in music. Is just guitar distortion necessary but not sufficient to classify as metal? If not only that, then what? Is it a specific beat? How about Rage Against the Machine or Bad Brains? Do they get into the halls of metal Valhalla or not? Do you need to be 'serious about a thing' in order to qualify? Do you have to have a song about being on death row to be taken seriously? I guess that would disqualify Van Halen and Bon Jovi right out of the gate then. Is it a matter of being iconoclastic and anti establishment somehow? An appeal to the lower classes a la Motorhead and AC/DC perhaps?

I would rather see Babymetal and Maximum the Hormone than any two Western metal bands.

They are a gimmick band that happens to have some serious talent behind the instruments.  I take them about as seriously as I took the Spice Girls.

I am not going to bash someone for liking them and if I had a young daughter I would absolutely take them to see Baby Metal in the hopes that an appreciation for heavy music develops.

In the Is it Metal? question - Thunderstruck Played by Cellos (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uT3SBzmDxGk)

Dupe

The metal community is some of the most pessimistic and protective of their "TR00" bands and applies all sorts of purity tests to groups to determines who gets in and who gets rejected. Metallica losing their metal card was a HUGE argument that to this day nerds still slap fight each other over. It's part of the reason I don't hang out with metal fans anymore, too much drama and energy devoted to making sure you weren't listening to false metal or "garbage" (or at least not letting anyone find out that you did).

Yeah, music arguments are the only thing worst than sci-fi/fantasy nerd slap fights.  And arguments over ‘metal’ is the worst sub-genre of that.  Like, literally every time I see any sort of metal band posted, it results in an argument or discussion about the 100 different types of metal that apparently exist and are all totally unique we swear.

It’s just such a vague concept I have a hard time taking ‘metal’ discussions seriously.  Black Sabboth and Metallica was considered Heavy Metal back in the day, and both of those are basically what the minimum baseline for being vanilla ‘rock’ is now.  And Fraeg, because of that, I’d say the thing that makes anything actually metal is being a gimmick.  The entire genre is a gimmick.  The only reason you go to watch this shit is for what ever gimmick they are doing.  Which is by no means bad, I enjoy the performance art aspect of it.  But basically metal bands revolve around being a gimmick to be ‘metal’, as far as I can tell.

This guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hfUidAhKKg

My brain translated that as Red Hat Clown Posse.

I saw the RHCP tour as well.  The people around me were completely unprepared for Babymetal and it was hilarious.

I saw RHCP after Ministry. After Al's show, RHCP came across as so boring we nearly left.

https://youtu.be/MH9FyLsfDzw

Dude cracks me up. He has more fun than should be allowed.

Leo is too damn good. Actually happy that him and Rabea started a group.

Great Africa cover. Then he actually made Despacito and any Adele songs he's covered not just listenable, but awesome.