Does this mean that Metal is dying of a slow death? Are we going to be stuck with Justin Bieber going forward?
Not necessarily. I think to a large extent market saturation means more mediocre art, versus less exceptional. It takes work to sift through the noise to find the good stuff, which in turn gets trivialized by everything else trying to emulate it. That's the way of popular art. There's no getting around that reality.
As far as this particular band goes, I'm already pretty sure I wouldn't like it, so I haven't listened to it. Thus, I really have nothing to add. But before anyone gets their panties in a wad that perhaps I'm not "open" to new experience, or whatever, consider the fact that aside from being a musician, I'm also a music listener and consumer. It just so happens that I am not a death/core/black/insert-dark-imagery here metal fan. It's not that I don't want these bands to be successful. It's that I would prefer my support go to music I care about. As a few have said, death metal is a niche genre. Apart from being highly distinctive and easily recognizable by most as to what it is (death metal), only a small percentage of the masses are dedicated fans. That's the reality. Absolutely no offense meant to death metal musicians and fans. But that's how it is.
If you have a small niche of consumers, you either need to find ways to increase your market share, or squeeze more support out of the base you have. Popular music, as much as we don't want to admit it, is disposable and replaceable, just like every other commodity. And with ease of reproduction and distribution, it's becoming increasingly so. Kudos to the bands who put all of their passion and investment into trying to make a living off of their craft. But the odds are simply not in their favor. Not even close. Nowhere outside of entertainment do people even think of going against such odds. Yet people continue to try.
Artists among the rich has been a blip occurring over the last 50-60 years. For most of history, artists have been below the working class, earning almost nothing.
This. This right here is the gospel truth. The historical reality is that musicians as rich and famous god heroes of excess is a very recent phenomenon. That anyone could make a living at art on their own creative terms, at or above working class wages, is an anomaly of the industrial age.
Metal is not cheap to play. Not by a long shot. I can take my acoustic, practice with it almost anywhere, play a gig with minimal sound reinforcement, and perhaps entertain enough coffee drinkers with expendable income to give me some tips. I can play my songs at an open mic for free. I can't do any of that with a drum kit, full guitar and bass stacks, and screaming, without paying A LOT of money to do it, and only in specific places that can handle the sound demands. Where anyone got the idea that having so much expensive loud gear would increase their chance of being paid as a musician is beyond me. But it is what it is.
The artists that have operated on their own level are usually very canny businesspeople who identify and fill a need, only their art happens to be their product. Hate on Taylor Swift all day long, but she is a businessperson first and an artist second and that is why she rules the world.
Identify and fill a need. Taylor Swift uses all of her gawd-given gifts to the umpteenth degree - looks, talent, sound, smarts/savvy. Like Dolly Parton, she appeals to just about every demographic, works every angle possible, and gets paid accordingly. She is no hack. She's the real deal, whether we want to admit it or not.
