History of Rock/Metal Music

The instrument people most likely think of when they think rock music is the electric guitar, but other instruments such as bass guitar, acoustic guitar, drums, pianos, synthesizers and keyboards are also used. There is so much more to rock music than just electric guitars, rock music has “pioneered” so many sub genres that are still presently popular today.

Rock is a genre of popular music, in the 1950’s it started as rock and roll in the United States. Later on into the 1960’s it started to take different forms or subgenres such as blues rock, country rock, folk rock, and jazz fusion rock. These subgenres developed in both the United States and the United Kingdom. This contributed to other subgenres forming like psychedelic rock, later on came progressive rock as well as glam rock which was all about the visuals. Towards the second half of the 1970’s, punk rock became quite popular, this lead to even more subgenres developing such as new wave, post-punk, and alternative rock. Since the 1990’s alternative rock has dominated over other genres of rock music and is still one of the more popular sub genres of rock music today.

One of the sub genres that has become extremely popular is heavy metal music. Metal music has quite a few sub genres in itself, but heavy metal branched off of rock music. Heavy metal music started developing in the late 1960’s and 1970’s mostly in the United States and United Kingdom. It is said that the roots of heavy metal are blues rock and psychedelic rock. Heavy metal is characterized as music with a distorted, highly amplified sound. The lyrics as well as styles of performance are labelled as aggressive and associated with masculinity or violence. Though this is not always the case, lots of “metal bands” have released softer sounding sounds, they’re not just all about sex, drugs, and partying. The first heavy metal bands such as Led Zeppelin, and Black Sabbath, attracted large audiences even though they were often ridiculed by critics. This was the harsh truth behind metal music for a long time and is still the case today.

Some of these very popular rock/metal bands are still popular today.

During the 1980’s glam metal became a popular subgenre with bands like Poison and Mötley Crüe, these bands were very much about their presentation and style. The “underground scenes” were producing a more aggressive sound, this is where thrash metal came into the music scene with bands like Metallica and Megadeath. Since the 1990’s these styles have further expanded the genre, and still do today. Especially with some of the metal bands becoming more interested in “modern music” with pop elements instead of all thick, aggressive sounds. 

Today, some rock/metal bands have expanded their musical styling into more modern sounds. As a result they are receiving a lot of mixed feedback (often backlash) from their fans about the bands decisions. Some fans don’t seem to like the new “pop sounding” music, “they’re not the same band, and they’re not metal anymore”. In lots of cases the vocalists of these metal bands injure their vocal chords from all the years of “screaming” which causes them to not be able to make those sounds as much anymore hence the softer sounding music coming from some "metal bands" recently. Also some bands such as Bring Me The Horizon, just like other music so they want to explore that. As musicians they want to express themselves and they've decided to do that by changing their sound. They are still the same band, they may just have new or other musical interests.  

Pros and Cons of Technology in Music

It is a fact that music has evolved in so many ways over the past few decades. From the variations of genres that have developed, as well as the technology that has helped build and shape some of these genres. Music had taken a huge leap once technology came into use, things such as synthesizers, auto tuning devices etc. These have given new aspects to music but there’s been some debate about whether they’ve been a good or bad addition to the way music is made. I myself have a mixed opinion on this topic because of course there’s good and bad to everything. I think that these technological advances have had good and bad influences on the music industry.

I think that devices like the synthesizer have made a good impact on music because not only can they imitate the sounds of common instruments but also produce unique sounds that can’t be created in another way. Because of the ability to create new unique sounds, synthesizers are extremely popular with many artists. There are even genres specified towards artists that use synthesizers and other sound manipulating electronics as the main aspect of their music. Some of those genres are known as Electronic rock (synth-rock), and Electronic (dub step, house, etc). Without these synthesizer devices some for these genres may not currently exist.

Synthesizers have evolved an immense amount since 1920 when the first type was used. This version was called a Theremin, it was played and controlled by moving your hands by two aerials. These aerials controlled volume and pitch. From then on, synthesizer started to look more like organs, then piano, and now some models look very similar to an electric keyboard.

2015 Model of a Synthesizer

1920's Theremin

 Another device that plays a huge role in the music industry is the Auto-tune system. Auto-tuning is the process of being able to measure and alter pitch in vocal and instrumental recordings. Auto tuning has become extremely popular in the last few decades. The auto tune device was created by Andy Hildebrand (employee of Exxon at the time) and Antares Audio Technologies. Originally it was intended to correct off-key or inaccurate pitches in vocal recordings allowing vocal to be tuned perfectly. It was released spring 1997.  

There has been quite a debate on whether or not auto tune should be used in music or not. Some say it helps pick up imperfections so the artist can fix them. While others, including myself say that auto tune may not be the best thing because it takes away from natural talent. You can alter the song too much and when the artist goes and performs those songs in concert, they don’t sound the same. Some artists want their voices to sound auto tuned at times such as T-Pain or Lil Wayne and that’s what they’re known for is that auto tuned sound. But I personally don’t think all artists should use auto tune so much because it definitely takes away from natural talent. Some artists will use auto tune to have high notes in a song because their voices may not be able to do that, well when they go perform these songs in concert fans are expecting these awesome high notes (or other voice qualities) and the artist isn’t able to do it. Therefore making the song sound different.

 

This video shows the difference between singing with and without auto tune.