Hear, hear!
My exact reaction to Audioslave. Turned out to be a very good act with many great song. It helps that Chris Cornell was the best singer to slink out of the grunge scene.
I hear you - I just get frustrated when someone frames their taste as a fact. Folks are welcome to not like RAtM but to say “they weren’t very good” is simply incorrect from a number of perspectives: artistic, commercial, influential, etc…
I always thought System of a Down was the closest analog to RATM. Serj Tankian’s voice is pretty different from ZDLs, but he can scream with the best of them. And their lyrics shade into the political, moreso than the other nu-metal bands.
I can see the connection. Good one.
Just wanted to point out that all the other members (especially Morello) are pretty active politically.
Well then, a whole BAND of politically-minded dudes is near impossible to find!
It’s not threadshitting if it’s an honest answer to the question.
That said I disagree with the OP; I think lots of bands DID copy RATM, it’s just that you’re never really going to sound the same as RATM. Linkin Park, just to pick a name out of the air, is, to my mind, **really obviously **trying to sound like RATM. I mean, there’s just not a doubt in my mind. There would never have been a Linkin Park without a RATM. Limp Bizkit, too, who frankly can’t be told apart from Linkin Park without a field guide. Why aren’t those considered copcat bands?
Well, actually, I can answer that; for exactly the same reason there aren’t many U2 copycat bands, despite the fact that U2 is one of the most popular bands in history and has sold fourteen trillion albums:
- Because the lead singer doesn’t sound like anyone else, and
- Because the lead guitarist doesn’t sound like anyone else.
Limp Bizkit basically did RATM over again, but Fred Durst does not sound like Zack de la Rocha. Nobody sounds like de la Rocha, who combines the fascinating elements of (a) having absolutely no vocal talent whatsoever, even less than Fred Durst, but (b) being brave and opinionated enough to have something relevant to say. Fred Durst sounds just like any number of other rap metal frontmen, hollering about chicks and booze and whatever he was yelling about; I didn’t really pay a lot of attention because why would you? Zack de la Rocha sounds like a 19-year-old polisci undergrad at an open mike doing beat poetry and saying “fuck” because it excited him to not be around his Mom, but he was saying something different, and by God he was selling it. And Tom Morello, well, what can I say? Tom Morello’s guitar work is simply not something you hear much.
U2’s the same way. Logically everyone should be trying to be U2, and I suppose and rock band is, but Bono’s voice is just too unique to be easily equated with anyone else, and of course The Edge’s guitar work is so distinct that you can’t copy it without basically sounding like you’re just ripping U2 off.
After RATM made it big, there were a lot of bands in the mid- and late-90s that mixed rap and metal. They just weren’t as good, and a lot of them were written off pretty quickly as angsty suburban white boys. RATM had more going on than that: they could really play, Morello was an excellent riff writer and sound effects creator, their music hit very hard, and even if you disliked their politics, you had to admit that there weren’t a lot of other bands making songs about those kinds of things. Being extremely and specifically political usually limits a band’s appeal, and Rage got past that somewhat.