As the old adage goes: ‘tragedy plus time equals comedy’. This maxim once seemed relatively straightforward, however, in our fractured, ever-changing present it has taken on increasingly elaborate shapes. A strange and complex sense of humour permeates the internet-driven cultural landscape; where slabs of irony are stacked upon one another with such force that the causality of each layer twists back on itself in often convoluted fashion.
One of the most fascinating by-products of this current state of meta-ironic weirdness has been a reassessment of the nu metal genre. If any gen z’s are reading; it’s hard to stress just how reviled the genre once was. For every frosted-tipped and jort-wearing young acolyte, there was a vociferously-vocal rock or metal fan, musician or journalist that detested its rapping, scratching, knuckleheaded riffs, nihilistic lyrics and hip-hop-inspired fashions.
Trent Reznor called it “comical, a parody of itself”, while Megadeth ’s Dave Mustaine said he’d “rather have his eyelids pulled out” than listen to it. The ever-iconoclastic Billy Corgan was one of nu metal’s few contemporary defenders, calling it “fantastic” and prophetically claiming that “it not only has musical implications but cultural ones as well”. By accident or genius; time has proved Corgan right.
While many wrote the genre off as an annoying fad, the experimentation pioneered by Linkin Park and their electronic adornments and Deftones and their dense s.
