Interesting observation, and some developing but unfinished thoughts:
I heard Rick Beato talking about Nu-Metal in a dissection of a Korn track and he mentioned that Nu-Metal lacked the overt blues influence of other hard rock and heavy metal sub-genres. I hadn't thought of that before, but I instantly knew what he meant. Yesterday, I watched a doc on 80-86 era hardcore punk and someone in it commented about how the hardcore scene wasn't "ripping off black music" (safe to assume they meant blues and rock and roll) like artists from the 70's (Zep). I started thinking about how Misfits can straddle the line between rock-n-roll driven horror punk and more hardcore sounding material with their later work, and what makes each style sound the way it does.
This got me thinking about what makes blues "blues" and how it fits in the/my musical world, particularly since I'd say a fair amount of ambient and electronic music doesn't sound bluesy. The swing feel, and heavy back-beat snare, and the use of the blues scale don't seem to present in the same way. I find that interesting because there clearly is a swing feel in electronic stuff (there's usually a swing setting on sequencers and in DAWs), and the flat five and minor third are certainly common enough in what I've listened to, but it still doesn't sound blues derived. Harder industrial stuff like Skinny Puppy seems pretty far removed, but then someone like Uncle Al comes along and pokes a harmonica in a Ministry track and it pops right out. Heck, this thread has our own @dukeorock posting things that don't sound like rock at all, and I wonder how or if he thinks about it.
I heard Rick Beato talking about Nu-Metal in a dissection of a Korn track and he mentioned that Nu-Metal lacked the overt blues influence of other hard rock and heavy metal sub-genres. I hadn't thought of that before, but I instantly knew what he meant. Yesterday, I watched a doc on 80-86 era hardcore punk and someone in it commented about how the hardcore scene wasn't "ripping off black music" (safe to assume they meant blues and rock and roll) like artists from the 70's (Zep). I started thinking about how Misfits can straddle the line between rock-n-roll driven horror punk and more hardcore sounding material with their later work, and what makes each style sound the way it does.
This got me thinking about what makes blues "blues" and how it fits in the/my musical world, particularly since I'd say a fair amount of ambient and electronic music doesn't sound bluesy. The swing feel, and heavy back-beat snare, and the use of the blues scale don't seem to present in the same way. I find that interesting because there clearly is a swing feel in electronic stuff (there's usually a swing setting on sequencers and in DAWs), and the flat five and minor third are certainly common enough in what I've listened to, but it still doesn't sound blues derived. Harder industrial stuff like Skinny Puppy seems pretty far removed, but then someone like Uncle Al comes along and pokes a harmonica in a Ministry track and it pops right out. Heck, this thread has our own @dukeorock posting things that don't sound like rock at all, and I wonder how or if he thinks about it.
