Light in the tunnel afterall
American metal died a while back. I am a progressive metal guitarist and metal is doing very well - outsidce of the US. Even good US-based metal bands find their musical home overseas.
Iced Earth, Nevermore, Savatage, Dream Theatre, Fates Warning, and even Type O Negative has built a strong overseas following.
Other bands with female singers that do very well are Nightwish, After Forever, and Therion.
Other bands to check out are Shadow Galley, Metalium, Blind Guardian, Angra, OSI, Sinner, Hammerfall, Evergrey, Threshold, and Spiral Architect to name a few. Maiden, Helloween, and Preists have all boasted headlining tours of nearly the same proportions as back in the day.
The difference between "Euro Metal" (for lack of a better term) and American Metal is that it takes more than half a brain to listen to the music overseas. The musicians can play. The lyrics are deeper than "My life sucks and it's everyone else' fault but mine".
The days of "sex in the backseat while buzzed on JD" metal is a by-gone day though. If you dive off into Prog or Power Prog, don't expect the days of hairband or classic metal feel. It's grown....it's orchestrated. For most bands, it's about the song, not the riff or the amoun tof riffs that can be crammed into a song
As far as MTV....well, MTV hit suck shortly after grunge. You can also blame MTV for reality shows. Had it not been for that show "The Real World"......sigh.
You most likely will hardly ever hear the above mentioned bands on the radio. They are not sucked up to the corporate giants in a Capatilistic way which means they are not favored by Clear Channel Comm's. Yet they survive, they write, record, and some perform to upwards of 68,000 fans at a single concert.
Metal isn't dead - it moved back home to Europe where it originated in the first place. And by "originated", I mean the British metal invasion that got the whole ball rolling before Metallica ever though tabout being called Metallica
