THE HARD R: GOD FORBID’S DALLAS COYLE BLOGS ABOUT THE MEANING OF “METALCORE”

Metal-Core (R.I.P) 2001 – 2008

Metalcore: Corn Flakes or Shoprite Corn Flakes?

It is over! The revolution is over!

I hate the term Metal-Core with a passion. I hate it when people say we helped create a genre of music that has an expiration date. Are we responsible for mathcore too? Or is that The Dillinger Escape Plan’s fault? I hope you’re following me. Another stupid statement: We’re starting a movement of black metal heads. No. Being black in a metal band was never weird for us, until we played Kansas for the first time. New Jersey is the shit!

I’m sick of people marginalizing every thing. When we first started back in 1996 and when we became GF in 98 this labeling BS wasn’t very important to us. We just thought we were a metal band. And guess what? We still think we’re a metal band. When I look at our coverage on YouTube for our videos there are many things that make me laugh. Yes, of course I look at what you people are saying! The whole ‘are they metal or metalcore?’ question takes the short bus cake.

When I go to the supermarket I like to buy Nathan’s or Sabrett hot dogs. Not the supermarket’s brand of hot dogs. I would like to hope that I have enough money to buy the higher quality product. Hence Metal to Metal-Core. Metal-Core to me is the poor mans choice for heavy, aggressive music.

Let’s bring up the ‘breakdown’. Most like to say metalcore is metal and hardcore put together but it’s more about the ‘breakdown’ that gets real metal, like God Forbid, labeled with this bullshit term. If that’s the case, let’s go back in time to Sepultura’s Chaos AD which has breakdowns galore. Is that then the first Metal-Core record? Everyone says of course not. I say ‘fuck you’ ’cause if we’re metalcore then Sepultura’s Chaos AD is too. For the record, Chaos AD is metal as fuck.

One of the ideologies that I live by is: Everything relates to everything. Metaphors are infinite. The Metal to Metal-Core debate relates to everything in art; torture porn horror versus horror, cheap tricks versus real strategy, etc. Where’s the beef?

Obviously Metal-Core has none. I don’t fault the supporters who describe us as Metal-Core but I do fault their support of ‘journalists’ to try and reinvent the wheel that wasn’t broken in the first place. God Forbid isn’t doing anything but trying to make good metal for true metal heads. We’re not reinventing the wheel and we’re not responsible for that dump in the pants genre called Metal-Core. Can we please move on from re-labeling music that already has a label?

Is the label of Metal-Core supposed to guarantee some new form of ‘awesome’ metal?

I can think of one quote: ‘Why do they put a guarantee on the box? Because they know all they sold ya was a guaranteed piece of shit.’

Go metal. Goodbye and good riddance Metal-Core!