The Year in Nu-Metal 2022

Generation Z, generation strange, sun don’t even shine through their windowpane.

Of course the kids would be the ones to rescue nu-metal, unlike us old people shouldering the weight of memory, they weren’t there for the genre’s boom or bust years which means they don’t remember the genre at its over-saturated peak nor the nuremberg trials that followed in which everyone associated had to deny ever being apart of it. They just hear a lot of really cool, unique heavy music made by absurdly idiosyncratic weirdos and want in. Bands like Cheem - whose infinitely replayable Guilty Pleasure remains my personal album of the year - and KFC Murder Chicks may appear to be taking nu-metal in opposite directions (the candy store and hell itself respectively) but sit with them for a minute and see how the same zeal of discovery and lightness binds the two. When the former’s sour infiltrates its sweetness to mock bands that rely more on their bank account than talent on “Pay2Play” or the latter sampling Snot for a song called “My Ballz” you’ll know they’re on the same agenda.

The spirit of nu-metal is so alive in fact that ostensibly non-nu-metal artists such as The Callous Daoboys and BACKXWASH want in, broadening our tent to make room for more mathcore and industrial hip-hop elements. Fleshwater truly crossed the rubicon between shoegaze and nu-metal, forgoing easy atmosphere for real hooks and riffs. Tallah picked up where they left off with The Generation of Danger, blurring chaos and control even more viciously than Matriphagy did. HEALTH may have beat the nu-metal allegations it didn’t stop them from remixing an already stellar Korn track with Danny Brown and Meechy Darko guesting. Finally, Chat Pile - whose members all fall far enough into 30something king status that they still put on for the original generation strange - might have the album of the year with God’s Country. Imagining Godspeed! You Black Emperor signing to Roadrunner, tracks like “Why", “Wicked Puppet Dance,” and the equal parts harrowing-and-hilarious “Grimace_Smoking_Weed.Jpeg” take on modern devastation through nu-metal sturm-und-drang. The sound is massive, heavy as hell, and darkly funny, it will resonate well into 2023 and beyond.

The aforementioned KFC Murder Chicks are the brightest star shining from the developing constellation known as cybergrind. It’s music for a post-internet generation, created by and for a people whose relationship to the net developed after it stopped being something you could log off of. The Big Money Cybergrind compilation of 2021 announced the scene’s arrival but 2022 some budding stars began to emerge. Acts like Thotcrime, VoidDweller, ZOMBIESHARK! and KFC Murder Chicks wield nu-metal, house and grindcore like a weapon and every song is their finishing move. Cybergrind is still waiting to be smithed into something slightly more accessible - it is, in its current form, frequently unlistenable by design, using brick walled rock mixes and low-quality mp3 rips as a place of aesthetic reference - but it’s all but guaranteed to break out in a big way next year. Queer as fuck, absurdly heavy, funny as hell— cybergrind is the future of nu-metal.

When the poster for Sick New World fest hit the web back in November my side of the internet nearly caved in on itself. Unlike its emo/pop-punk counterpart When We Were Young there was no lead up in the form of “emo nite” events or a mainstream “revival” paving the way. If anything Sick New World’s dream lineup of nu-metal and nu-metal adjacent acts is the first time we’ve been acknowledged by big corporate festival interests. So it’s exciting, but troubling. Exciting because seeing this wide diaspora of bands collected in one place like this (Papa Roach! Orgy! Health! Death Grips!) validates both nu-metal’s place in the cultural pantheon and what I’ve been pushing at for so many years which is nu-metal is as much umbrella as it is one clear style of music. A place where seemingly disparate acts can be bound together by their common love of accessible heavy music. But it is troubling too in that the nostalgia machine may finally have us in their sights and, if we let them, will plow through our scene the way it did emo, leaving behind little else but themed brunches and TikTok music.

I’m optimistic that this won’t happen though. For one we’re too weird, too shit to be fully manhandled by big money. For another there’s too much innovative energy still coursing through the scene to be neatly packaged yet. Not only are the younger acts in the scene striving hard the legacy bands are still at it too. Papa Roach’s Ego Trip is a headfirst leap into the arena of modern Octane metal that succeeds through Jacoby Shaddix’s youthful energy and some really big choruses. Korn’s Requiem was quick, quiet proof that Korn can still make this happen and aren’t ready to rest on their laurels yet. Mudvayne, despite not releasing any new music, may have had the most triumphant 2022 as their long awaited reunion found them aging backwards with every show, becoming the same beast with a few thousand more miles on the odometer. If anyone pulled up short it was Slipknot, whose leaden The End (So Far) at least gave them an excuse to remain a formidable live act. But make no mistake, the same powers that are responsible for Big Emo are coming for us now.

It figures the year’s best emo moment was My Chemical Romance making a farce of nostalgia festival When We Were Young by dressing up in masks resembling their younger selves. Emo rap has stagnated something fierce with its biggest ticket acts barely more than Lil Peep and Juice WRLD cover bands while any bands working in the scene either capitulate fully to nostalgic demands or be swept into the basement. It’s less a scene and more a marketing pitch, a vehicle for acts like Machine Gun Kelly to achieve market saturation and little else. Though, to be fair to Machine Gun Kelly, it isn’t so much his fault that the pop-punk revival is on its deathbed as much as it is Interscope’s. In a year when he didn’t put one single within shouting distance of the top 40 he got a vanity Hulu documentary and enough press to seem inescapable. He’s everywhere except your headphones, probably. Couple that with Blink-182’s big reunion which produced a hit single everyone hates and concert tickets that reached the 4-figure range with ease and everyone is either totally over pop-punk/emo or heading for the exit. (Willow, if you’re reading this…)

And then there’s… me! In April I launched crazy ass moments in nu metal history, which went from yet another gimmick account to a beloved institution and difficult thing to explain to family during holidays. And I owe it all to Twitter user @plvnetmimi embedding a video instead of ripping and re-uploading it.

In June I posted Alien Ant Farm’s “Smooth Criminal” video, then another account reposted it via Twitter’s embed feature with the caption “When things were simple.” That post proceeded to go megaviral but thousands of people found their way back to me through the embedded accreditation. Seizing the influx of attention I opened the floodgates, posting every single nu-metal moment I could think of. Thus some 3,000 followers became some 40,000 by the end of July. Something else that happened in July? I got laid off. With my employment officially terminated September 1st. Turned 30 years old a day later.

This is it for me. This is my moment. I’ve been waiting and striving and pushing for a decade for the thing that can define my life and it’s… a nu-metal gimmick account. Hey. Hey stop laughing. Knock it off back there I’m serious! Think about it now, really, it’s not just a matter of memes; I can actively promote the bands I love, new and old alike. The dream is to build this platform high enough that I can have serious effects on the careers of young nu-metal artists. Send a couple hundred new fans their way, sell out a show, run up their Bandcamp numbers. That is how we transform this from a fun lil moment into something that can last. That’s my vision for 2023, making this comingling of rock, metal, rap and industrial into something undeniable again.

Right now the priority is to get the Agenda off of Twitter and standing on its own two. By copyright strike or by Elon’s bad decisions. the continued existence of the nu metal moment Twitter account is not a sure thing at all and if I were to lose it now it would be devastating. Currently, the Agenda is also available on Patreon. Patreon is the best way you yourself can keep the flame burning. You get into our Discord, you’ll get free merch, Podcast exclusives and really so much more shit that I’m working on.

Speaking of Podcasts! After putting it off for no good reason I launched The Nu Metal Agenda podcast. Myself and co hosts ZZ, Cranfather, and Wolf Rambatz have already interviewed an incredible array of artists. Absolutely a highlight of this year. There’s also the Twitch channel. Twitch has been a real blast lately. The DJ sets are getting stronger, the community is fun, and watching feature presentations or music videos is a good time and way to discover new music. We’ve got some apparel for sale. Always fun. Aaaaaaaaaaaand there’s an Instagram account that’s worth your time. I also published my list of The 50 Greatest Nu-Metal Albums of All Time list and while that’s incredibly important in the current social swirl/rush to make a living out of this can feel like a bit of a footnote. It’s not though, go read that.

2022 was the greatest year for nu-metal since 2002. 2023 will be better. There’s a lot of good work to be done, we need to build a sturdy platform for deserving acts before corporate interests infiltrate the scene, but I’m confident we can do it.

Thank you all for joining me this far, see you in the nu year.