Do you think that a band that writes exemplary music that strictly conforms to a specific genre can be held to the same level as a band that writes original music even if it doesn’t exactly fit a predefined style?
For those of you with a background in metal, take Origin and The Faceless. Both are technical death metal bands, but whereas Origin creates textbook tech death (and they do it brilliantly), the Faceless adds traces of progressive metal, and makes use of innovations like keyboards and vocoders in a way new to the genre in order to craft their own original sound.
Are bands that play great music within a set style worthy of equal artistic recognition as bands who carve their own creative niche?
In a separate but related query, how long does a pioneering band get to play within the style they created before the become stale and lose their originality?
Example: Darkthrone helped pioneer black metal, but have since evolved to incorporate elements of crust punk. Would your impression of the band be different if they were continuing to play the same black metal as when they started?
Nice answers, Erik and Loki.
