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Metalcore

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Metalcore

Metalcore is a broadly defined fusion genre combining elements of heavy metal and hardcore punk, originating in the 1990s United States and becoming popular in the 2000s. Metalcore typically has aggressive verses and melodic choruses, combined with slow, intense passages called breakdowns. Other defining traits are low-tuned, percussive guitar riffs, double bass drumming, and highly polished production. Vocalists typically switch between clean vocals (melodic, emotional singing) and harsh vocals (including shouting and screaming). Lyrics are often personal, introspective and emotive. It is debated whether metalcore is a subgenre of metal and hardcore, or a genre of its own. Many metalheads do not regard metalcore as a heavy metal subgenre.

In the late 1980s to early 1990s, pioneering bands were founded such as Integrity, Earth Crisis and Converge, whose hardcore punk-leaning style is sometimes referred to as metallic hardcore. These bands took influence from a range of styles and genres such as hardcore punk, thrash metal and death metal. During the decade, the genre diversified, with Converge, the Dillinger Escape Plan, Botch and Coalesce pioneering mathcore, while Overcast, Shadows Fall and Darkest Hour merged the genre with melodic death metal to create melodic metalcore.

During the early 2000s, melodic metalcore bands such as Killswitch Engage, All That Remains, Trivium, As I Lay Dying, Atreyu, Bullet for My Valentine and Parkway Drive found mainstream popularity. In the subsequent years, the genre saw increased success through social networking on Myspace and internet memes such as crabcore. During this time, artists began to draw influence from a wide variety of sources, which led to genre cultivating a plethora of fusion genres including electronicore, deathcore, Nintendocore, progressive metalcore and nu metalcore. In the 2010s and through to the 2020s, the genre saw even greater commercial success, with albums by Bring Me the Horizon, Architects, Asking Alexandria, the Devil Wears Prada and Of Mice & Men penetrating the top 10 of international albums charts.

Like most genres, [metalcore is] not an easy term to define; even saying “metal meets hardcore” doesn’t really do it. Hardcore and metal’s relationship long predates metalcore; hardcore bands inspired metal bands to invent thrash, and in turn thrash bands inspired punk bands to start crossover thrash, both genres influenced grunge, and the cross-pollination just kept spiraling from there. I don’t know the exact year that “metalcore” entered the vernacular, but some of the earlier bands [...] probably would have just been called “metallic hardcore."

The term "metalcore" is a portmanteau of the words "metal" and "hardcore", and was originally tongue-in-cheek. During the 1980s, Maximumrocknroll had used early variations of the term, referring to Richmond band Black Pyramid as "heavy-metal core" in February 1985; Oxnard band False Confessions as "metal-core" in December 1985; Mesa band Desecration as "death metal core" in May 1986; and Austin band Last Will as "ghoulish metal/core" in December 1986. When the metalcore genre began in the 1990s, it was largely known as "metallic hardcore".

Phillip Trapp of Loudwire states that Shai Hulud guitarist Matt Fox is widely credited for playing a role in "popularizing" the term. However, in a 2008 interview, Fox claimed the term had already been in use before his band began releasing music. He recalled: "There were bands before Shai Hulud started that my friends and I were referring to as 'metalcore.' Bands like Burn, Deadguy, Earth Crisis, even Integrity. These bands that were heavier than the average hardcore bands. These bands that were more progressive [...] my friends and I would always refer to them as 'metalcore' because it wasn't purely hardcore and it wasn't purely metal [...] so we would joke around and say, 'Hey, it's metalcore. Cool!' But it was definitely a tongue-in-cheek term." Alternatively, Jorge Rosado of Merauder claimed in 2014 interview that he and his band coined the term.

Luke Morton of Metal Hammer stated that the word "means different things to different people," highlighting the fact that the tag has been variously applied to stylistically dissimilar bands such as Killswitch Engage, Earth Crisis, Asking Alexandria and Parkway Drive.

The word "metalcore" is one of the few subgenres of music that conjures up an incredibly different range of sounds depending on who you ask. For old heads, it brings up a moment in time when the worlds of heavy metal and hardcore punk combined to a new underground genre, a grassroots movement and [an] exciting time for punk. For others, big room metal anthems pitted with poppy choruses are conjured, riffs descended from the Gothenburg school of metal contorted into music with a sense of bounce.

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