The trend in recent interviews with lead singers of Nü Metal bands is disturbingly clear: "I am more screwed up than any rock star ever, and I'm going to tell you about it." Their logic states, "The more dysfunctional my past, the more claim I have to street credibility."
A friend recently told me of a Midwestern metal band whose singer had his own special tale. As the story went (using 'story' deliberately - when it's used as a marketing tool, can we really believe that all of these stories are true?), the lead singer's dad was shot and killed in a confrontation with the police, and it drove him to be a rock star. Does B necessarily follow A? Could you explain please?
Another friend recently joked that we are on the short path to Pedo-Metal (Pedophilia Metal), where one is worthy of rock superstardom only if he's been repeatedly sodomized by Uncle Ernie as a child! It would be a much funnier statement if it wasn't so true...
The lyrical content of Nü Metal reflects this wayward attitude - everything is graphically literal, confessional, and bonehead simple. Lest I be misunderstood, I do not advocate censorship in any way, and the Nü Metal meatheads may sing about their past as graphically as they wish for all I care. But the literal, simplistic lyrics of this genre quickly become old. There is no effort to use the simplest artistic tools: simile, metaphor, or sublimation. One can listen to the screaming for only so long, when there is so little behind it!
Let's look at Staind's modern masterpiece "Come Again," from the aptly titled Tormented:
What the fuck
You push yourself on me
You force yourself on me
You free yourself through me
You'd better save yourself from me
Everytime you want me to be
Something I can never be
You'll just have to wait and see
Til the next that you have to come again
Come again
This time you will come again
Come again
I hate myself for you
I break myself for you
I kill myself for you
I'd better save myself from you
CHORUS
If you have to walk my way
Have something to say
Get the fuck away
Can't take one more day
I can not conform
Come again
This time you will come again
Come again
Kill me
Kill me
Fuck me
Save me
Brilliant, boys. Do I need to comment on such mastery of the English language? Is a copyright notice really necessary for such preschool artistry? Contrary to the idea that "[you] can not conform," you have served up the most generic Pedo-Metal possible, buddy.
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