I wanted to talk about selling out and the culture behind it, specifically from a metal & rock perspective as we notoriously see it get tossed around! What're your opinions on this topic?! Be sure to let me know down below!!!!!!! But for now, cheers, rock on, stay heavy and have yourselves a fantastic rest of your day or night, depending on when you see this!!!!!!! 🤘🤘🤘🤘🤘🤘🤘
I think 9 times out of 10 when I hear people complaining about a band 'selling out' its literally just a case of the band being more popular than they were before. Bands and artists change and evolve all the time, its a normal part of the creative process and frankly of growing older and if a specific change brings a band success then more power to 'em. We should be celebrating when bands get bigger and break through into the mainstream because no genre on Earth survives by never adapting, never breaking through, and staying underground.
exactly! for every popular metal band that crosses over into the mainstream (which is a big term to throw around considering even the biggest metal bands will not be nearly as large as pop/hip-hop/electronic/kpop etcc), there are hundreds who won't. thousands if not tens of thousands. so people throwing that term around simply because they don't want to see a band they may have enjoyed otherwise become popular is incredibly petty.
I have a silly opinion... And it's all based on the Industrial band called Ministry. Al Jourgensen has done every type of music known to human kind... sort of. When he started as a young man with his band mates in 1981 as a starving musician squatting in Chicago he signed a contract for an Album, and made a New Wave Album. (His least favorite work he ever did. But it got him started) He was able to then make his own music afterwards, a lot of Metal today owes a lot to what ministry did in the late 80s, the harsh wall of sound was really their calling card. But Al didn't stick to one style, even in his earliest Industrial Albums he mixed it up Wall of Sound Industrial metal, Pure Rivethed Industrial, Rap industrial metal, and other sounds. The thing is Al has earned money from Films and literally making a studio album, yet I feel he has never been a sellout, (although he has a song with those lyrics) he does what he must to eat, and now after 40+ years of making some of my favorite music, he's never felt like a sellout, yet he has by definition sold out his first album. We wouldn't have his goldmine of music without that though.
When I hear the term “selling out” now, it feels as though it’s no longer about self-expression but just to keep the crowds pleased. Maybe at one time fans had a legitimate concern about a band’s career progressing, but somewhere along the lines became more of a mark of entitlement. Personally, I can care less about stylistic changes that a band makes. I’m more about songwriting and execution. Granted, I’m very much aware that doing something outside of your usual repertoire does not necessarily guarantee success. I just feel like the term has now become some arbitrary limiter on band for what they can and cannot do artistically. I know some folks were quick to write off Linkin Park after Minutes to Midnight (as a matter of fact I became a fan during the A Thousand Suns cycle), but the band have kept my interest on what project they would take on next. Even in the behind-the-scenes documentary, Mike Shinoda said that they felt that their early nu metal sound was played out and wanted to take a different direction. And year by year, I’d hear the same old complaints: “Where’s the nu metal? Where’s my Hybrid Theory? How dare they change!” Also, I find it strange how fanboy demands to be rather contradictory, not wanting bands to change, but throw fits when they are perceived as stagnating. When Lamb of God released the track “Overlord” that introduced clean singing, a few commenters accused the band of “trying to get on the radio” and writing them of as done for. Then when the band released “Checkmate”, guys were like “oh its nothing new here. Just the same old tricks.” And I’m just sitting here thinking: MAKE UP YOUR GODDAMN MINDS ALREADY! Every band is going to have its highs and lows. Not everything they make is going to be the gold standard. I just think that we have got to stop acting like everything they do is some sort of “attack” on the fans. You didn’t form the band; you didn’t write their music. You are a spectator in the crowd. I just want to see what they have got to offer and enjoy the music.
Your contention about a lot of these folks coming from a place of entitlement I absolutely agree with. There’s a lot of people that will assume things like if someone doesn’t speak on a matter matter, then they refused to have principals about a subject. If they don’t lash out against a band that is critical of them, then they are weak and don’t believe in what they stand for anymore. I’ve seen so much talk online where people will take their speculations about the wise and wherefores of an artists actions and assume that they cannot only, make an assessment on everything regardless of the truth of the matter, but almost disregard what the artist might actually say or do with their reasoning for why they change their sound up or discuss things in a certain way or take a hiatus or what have you.
They either make music I enjoy, or not. Sometimes that can be affected by them doing something that could be considered "selling out" (e.g. the whole Batushka split/drama) as it might colour my perception a bit - but if the stuff is good, I'm probably still going to listen to it.
Oh boy… I’ve got some thoughts on this topic considering I’m a bit of a prog rock nerd. I have the possibly unpopular opinion that the prog rock/art rock artists of the 70s becoming the pop artists of the 80s was a good thing for both popular music AND said artists. For one classic example, I love Yes’s Fragile as much as anyone. But I don’t need Yes to try and remake Fragile a thousand times (especially considering they’re still making music after over 50 years), so I’m extremely glad that 90125 exists, and I’d honestly consider them to be equally good albums. I kind of reject the idea that going popular or mainstream automatically means watering down an artist or making them worse - I’d actually say that in some cases it does the opposite by forcing artists to experiment with new sounds and song structures. If a band does the same thing over and over again, they often just come up with weaker versions of what they’ve already done. Also, I find it a bit frustrating how rock/metal fans often seem to value music more the further away from the mainstream it gets - while it’s great that smaller, independent bands exist, popular music matters too, and probably shouldn’t automatically be dismissed as unimportant. And when a band goes mainstream or pop, often they’re able to bring some of the elements of their original sound to a mainstream audience, thus allowing more people to enjoy a greater variety of sounds and genres they otherwise might have never discovered. Just think of how many Americans have now been introduced to Kate Bush and her discography because she made a few synth pop tracks in the mid 80s, one of which was popular enough to get onto the Stranger Things soundtrack and chart 36 years after it release. It’s looking like we might even get a new Kate Bush album because of that revival. I like it when my favorite artists succeed!
I don't think Bring Me The Horizon sold out. They're working on getting back to their roots when Oli and the other members found themselves disagreeing with what Jordan Fish wanted to achieve and feeling like the others were taking a backseat. Apparently they left on amicable terms. In my opinion that and explicitly not wanting a documentary about the band, and some of the stuff in YouTopia is actually pretty humble. For a topical example, the scientology stuff with Linkin Park's new singer and Mike Shinoda basically having his hands tied in terms of addressing it (due to how the church of scientology harasses detractors), to me, that seems more like selling out. Some people mention Green Day and RATM too, but I'm a bit conflicted about that. At least in my eyes, selling out is sacraficing your image and beliefs for an empty promise of breaking into the mainstream. Kind of like grifting in a way. I don't mind Armstrong's vocals, but that kind of stuff is going to be a shadow behind LP.
All That Remains is a contender when they dropped their unique style of melocore for a more popcore, KSE-clone approach on "The Fall of Ideals". Honestly though its kind of impossible to tell the difference between passionate evolution and experimentation and straight up selling out at times.
I get what you're saying but I think that ATR has gone through transitional periods that comes with age. They remind me of how Darkest Hour seem to reinvent themselves with every release.
@gutsgonebad I dont know enough about the band history although things got quite different on that album... very reminiscint of the KsE formula and general pop metalcore of the 2000s in contrast to the more technical and sparse-cleans based approach of ths first two albums
I hate the term selling out. The problem I have ran into is I have genuinely heard the argument "If a band is well known and successful they sold out" In reference to slipknot,soad,slaughter to prevail,etc. And that makes no sense,if you like a band would you not want them to be successful? Do you not want them to get the profits from their work?
Let an artist do what they want to. Its art and art has no rules. So if a metal band wants to suddenly sound like Taylor Swift, i wouldnt care i probably just would never listen to their new music again but its art so i dont see anything too bad about "selling out"
I'll bring this up again. A band is bound to blow up eventually, hell, a band is bound to land a huge deal with a record deal eventually too. You gotta make that bag and you gotta get yourself out there! If anyone gets their panties in a knot over it, then were they really fans in the first place?
I've seen KISS so I know selling out is real, but I always give the artist the benefit of the doubt when they change sounds because in my opinion 99% of the time it's just a new creative direction. It is a different story if they are constantly railing against corporatism and then start shilling for corporations but that one also doesn't affect the music, so I may still listen to it if it's good.
well let me play devils advocate , let's look at something like say Metallica .., I mean the black album I think was ok , not really a sell out , just going more polished , more commercial , but then to chop your hair off , start wearing make up , and try to fit in and compete with the grunge wave ????., erhmm sell outs ;) .., and as a 53 year old having lived this thing of tape trading , discovering thrash and sharing it , living the culture with my pals and sharing bootlegs and all of us looking the part .., what they became in the 90's was a slap in the face ..,
lmao nah. if I wanted more popularity I'd present much differently and fit into the norm of most metal youtubers and not hate on certain popular figures. or at least critique.
I disagree, if you act like you don't care that certain band sold out it means you don't care... and you probably don't care about the scene enough to have an opinion. What would happen if everyone would just say, hey they sold out, good for them! How many more bands would sell out because of that? I am sure a lot more. Therefore criticism and negative opinion about selling out is part of what makes underground scene connected and why it exists in the first place, once no one cares about self-preservation it dies off. And yes it might be entitlement but who cares? Why do you even care about feelings of the band that sold out? They clearly don't care enough about being called sellout? So how exactly are they hurt? Selling more records? If you think selling out does not exist then you think exactly like the bands who sellout, big deal. And if you think it does exist then to you it might seem they are afraid to sell out, but in reality they just do what they enjoy the most.
I wanted to talk about selling out and the culture behind it, specifically from a metal & rock perspective as we notoriously see it get tossed around! What're your opinions on this topic?! Be sure to let me know down below!!!!!!! But for now, cheers, rock on, stay heavy and have yourselves a fantastic rest of your day or night, depending on when you see this!!!!!!! 🤘🤘🤘🤘🤘🤘🤘
I think 9 times out of 10 when I hear people complaining about a band 'selling out' its literally just a case of the band being more popular than they were before. Bands and artists change and evolve all the time, its a normal part of the creative process and frankly of growing older and if a specific change brings a band success then more power to 'em. We should be celebrating when bands get bigger and break through into the mainstream because no genre on Earth survives by never adapting, never breaking through, and staying underground.
exactly! for every popular metal band that crosses over into the mainstream (which is a big term to throw around considering even the biggest metal bands will not be nearly as large as pop/hip-hop/electronic/kpop etcc), there are hundreds who won't. thousands if not tens of thousands. so people throwing that term around simply because they don't want to see a band they may have enjoyed otherwise become popular is incredibly petty.
I have a silly opinion... And it's all based on the Industrial band called Ministry. Al Jourgensen has done every type of music known to human kind... sort of. When he started as a young man with his band mates in 1981 as a starving musician squatting in Chicago he signed a contract for an Album, and made a New Wave Album. (His least favorite work he ever did. But it got him started) He was able to then make his own music afterwards, a lot of Metal today owes a lot to what ministry did in the late 80s, the harsh wall of sound was really their calling card.
But Al didn't stick to one style, even in his earliest Industrial Albums he mixed it up Wall of Sound Industrial metal, Pure Rivethed Industrial, Rap industrial metal, and other sounds.
The thing is Al has earned money from Films and literally making a studio album, yet I feel he has never been a sellout, (although he has a song with those lyrics) he does what he must to eat, and now after 40+ years of making some of my favorite music, he's never felt like a sellout, yet he has by definition sold out his first album. We wouldn't have his goldmine of music without that though.
When I hear the term “selling out” now, it feels as though it’s no longer about self-expression but just to keep the crowds pleased.
Maybe at one time fans had a legitimate concern about a band’s career progressing, but somewhere along the lines became more of a mark of entitlement. Personally, I can care less about stylistic changes that a band makes. I’m more about songwriting and execution. Granted, I’m very much aware that doing something outside of your usual repertoire does not necessarily guarantee success. I just feel like the term has now become some arbitrary limiter on band for what they can and cannot do artistically. I know some folks were quick to write off Linkin Park after Minutes to Midnight (as a matter of fact I became a fan during the A Thousand Suns cycle), but the band have kept my interest on what project they would take on next. Even in the behind-the-scenes documentary, Mike Shinoda said that they felt that their early nu metal sound was played out and wanted to take a different direction. And year by year, I’d hear the same old complaints:
“Where’s the nu metal? Where’s my Hybrid Theory? How dare they change!”
Also, I find it strange how fanboy demands to be rather contradictory, not wanting bands to change, but throw fits when they are perceived as stagnating. When Lamb of God released the track “Overlord” that introduced clean singing, a few commenters accused the band of “trying to get on the radio” and writing them of as done for. Then when the band released “Checkmate”, guys were like “oh its nothing new here. Just the same old tricks.”
And I’m just sitting here thinking: MAKE UP YOUR GODDAMN MINDS ALREADY!
Every band is going to have its highs and lows. Not everything they make is going to be the gold standard. I just think that we have got to stop acting like everything they do is some sort of “attack” on the fans. You didn’t form the band; you didn’t write their music. You are a spectator in the crowd.
I just want to see what they have got to offer and enjoy the music.
Your contention about a lot of these folks coming from a place of entitlement I absolutely agree with. There’s a lot of people that will assume things like if someone doesn’t speak on a matter matter, then they refused to have principals about a subject. If they don’t lash out against a band that is critical of them, then they are weak and don’t believe in what they stand for anymore. I’ve seen so much talk online where people will take their speculations about the wise and wherefores of an artists actions and assume that they cannot only, make an assessment on everything regardless of the truth of the matter, but almost disregard what the artist might actually say or do with their reasoning for why they change their sound up or discuss things in a certain way or take a hiatus or what have you.
They either make music I enjoy, or not. Sometimes that can be affected by them doing something that could be considered "selling out" (e.g. the whole Batushka split/drama) as it might colour my perception a bit - but if the stuff is good, I'm probably still going to listen to it.
Oh, and yeah, sellout doesn't exist
Oh boy… I’ve got some thoughts on this topic considering I’m a bit of a prog rock nerd. I have the possibly unpopular opinion that the prog rock/art rock artists of the 70s becoming the pop artists of the 80s was a good thing for both popular music AND said artists. For one classic example, I love Yes’s Fragile as much as anyone. But I don’t need Yes to try and remake Fragile a thousand times (especially considering they’re still making music after over 50 years), so I’m extremely glad that 90125 exists, and I’d honestly consider them to be equally good albums. I kind of reject the idea that going popular or mainstream automatically means watering down an artist or making them worse - I’d actually say that in some cases it does the opposite by forcing artists to experiment with new sounds and song structures. If a band does the same thing over and over again, they often just come up with weaker versions of what they’ve already done.
Also, I find it a bit frustrating how rock/metal fans often seem to value music more the further away from the mainstream it gets - while it’s great that smaller, independent bands exist, popular music matters too, and probably shouldn’t automatically be dismissed as unimportant. And when a band goes mainstream or pop, often they’re able to bring some of the elements of their original sound to a mainstream audience, thus allowing more people to enjoy a greater variety of sounds and genres they otherwise might have never discovered. Just think of how many Americans have now been introduced to Kate Bush and her discography because she made a few synth pop tracks in the mid 80s, one of which was popular enough to get onto the Stranger Things soundtrack and chart 36 years after it release. It’s looking like we might even get a new Kate Bush album because of that revival. I like it when my favorite artists succeed!
I don't think Bring Me The Horizon sold out. They're working on getting back to their roots when Oli and the other members found themselves disagreeing with what Jordan Fish wanted to achieve and feeling like the others were taking a backseat. Apparently they left on amicable terms. In my opinion that and explicitly not wanting a documentary about the band, and some of the stuff in YouTopia is actually pretty humble.
For a topical example, the scientology stuff with Linkin Park's new singer and Mike Shinoda basically having his hands tied in terms of addressing it (due to how the church of scientology harasses detractors), to me, that seems more like selling out. Some people mention Green Day and RATM too, but I'm a bit conflicted about that. At least in my eyes, selling out is sacraficing your image and beliefs for an empty promise of breaking into the mainstream. Kind of like grifting in a way. I don't mind Armstrong's vocals, but that kind of stuff is going to be a shadow behind LP.
Everyone who accuse a band of "selling out" , they're just butthurt that they have to share their favourite bands with others.
All That Remains is a contender when they dropped their unique style of melocore for a more popcore, KSE-clone approach on "The Fall of Ideals". Honestly though its kind of impossible to tell the difference between passionate evolution and experimentation and straight up selling out at times.
I get what you're saying but I think that ATR has gone through transitional periods that comes with age. They remind me of how Darkest Hour seem to reinvent themselves with every release.
@gutsgonebad I dont know
enough about the band history although things got quite different on that album... very reminiscint of the KsE formula and general pop metalcore of the 2000s in contrast to the more technical and sparse-cleans based approach of ths first two albums
Wait. Doesn't TH-cam show likes? Did they erased like count?
You cannot see dislikes anymore on TH-cam, but you can see likes! (And I can see dislikes in TH-cam studio) viewcount should be there though!
@TheMetalTempestYT yeah. I thought a new update or something
I hate the term selling out. The problem I have ran into is I have genuinely heard the argument "If a band is well known and successful they sold out" In reference to slipknot,soad,slaughter to prevail,etc. And that makes no sense,if you like a band would you not want them to be successful? Do you not want them to get the profits from their work?
Biggest seelouts are definitely linkin park, i loe them to death, but over time, they have become a lot more radio friendly, and more mainstream.
bro they literally have always been incredibly radio friendly. Hybrid Theory is one of the best POP albums of all time...
? I thought they were always mainstream
Let an artist do what they want to. Its art and art has no rules. So if a metal band wants to suddenly sound like Taylor Swift, i wouldnt care i probably just would never listen to their new music again but its art so i dont see anything too bad about "selling out"
I'll bring this up again. A band is bound to blow up eventually, hell, a band is bound to land a huge deal with a record deal eventually too. You gotta make that bag and you gotta get yourself out there! If anyone gets their panties in a knot over it, then were they really fans in the first place?
I've seen KISS so I know selling out is real, but I always give the artist the benefit of the doubt when they change sounds because in my opinion 99% of the time it's just a new creative direction. It is a different story if they are constantly railing against corporatism and then start shilling for corporations but that one also doesn't affect the music, so I may still listen to it if it's good.
And where is a view count?
It's not real if you're already playing radio friendly music
well let me play devils advocate , let's look at something like say Metallica .., I mean the black album I think was ok , not really a sell out , just going more polished , more commercial , but then to chop your hair off , start wearing make up , and try to fit in and compete with the grunge wave ????., erhmm sell outs ;) .., and as a 53 year old having lived this thing of tape trading , discovering thrash and sharing it , living the culture with my pals and sharing bootlegs and all of us looking the part .., what they became in the 90's was a slap in the face ..,
You sound like someone who wants to sell out
lmao nah. if I wanted more popularity I'd present much differently and fit into the norm of most metal youtubers and not hate on certain popular figures. or at least critique.
opinions that matches hairstyles
I say if you're like Metallica or Kiss where you slap your logo on ANYTHING, that's selling out. But that's just my opinion
I disagree, if you act like you don't care that certain band sold out it means you don't care... and you probably don't care about the scene enough to have an opinion. What would happen if everyone would just say, hey they sold out, good for them! How many more bands would sell out because of that? I am sure a lot more. Therefore criticism and negative opinion about selling out is part of what makes underground scene connected and why it exists in the first place, once no one cares about self-preservation it dies off. And yes it might be entitlement but who cares? Why do you even care about feelings of the band that sold out? They clearly don't care enough about being called sellout? So how exactly are they hurt? Selling more records? If you think selling out does not exist then you think exactly like the bands who sellout, big deal. And if you think it does exist then to you it might seem they are afraid to sell out, but in reality they just do what they enjoy the most.