The Metal Forüm

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Never been a fan of Infant Annihilator. Too much in-your-face, over-the-top instrumentation. I get it's all part of their shtick, but it becomes boring quickly. From what I hear though, this is actually somewhat of a serious attempt?

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Probably going to give it a pass, still not exactly my cup of tea. Admittedly haven't heard much out of tech-death this year that I'd consider gripping. Fields of Elysium dropped an album some time ago and it was very solid and remarkable in its mastery of fundamentals. I wouldn't place it in any higher tier, however.

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It's what I would call tech-death for people sick of tech-death: not very technical, relies a lot on bread-and-butter as opposed to virtuosity, songwriting > soloing, etc.

Can lead to an experience not as engaging as possible, granted, but it's a breath of fresh air to me. Too many bands in the genre have become over-reliant on playing ability alone.

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Oh yes, naturally, that comes with the package. My issue is when talent at playing alone, by itself, is favored over constructing engaging songs. Someone can be very competent or even a wizard at using a guitar, but it's all for naught if their tracks serve no purpose.

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What's usually pretentious nowadays is saying "[x] genre is dead" because that's just simple ignorance.

Tech can be a hard genre to love, especially in the modern context.

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Depends on where you look my man. I'm a part-time volunteer reviewer myself, so I've had to wade through the modern music scene countless times.

My main takeaways:
1) The music market's barrier to entry is at its lowest point ever. Technology and methods of distribution--digital and physical--have become so much easier to access for the common musician. This is an incredible boost, since people that ordinarily would never be able to have a voice now have an avenue to do so, even in their own basement. Some amazing artists have emerged from the underground through websites like bandcamp, which I make common trips to to pick out new music.
2) I did say that anyone can enter the music business. That means ANYONE. Someone who just learned the chords to Wonderwall and wants to drop their 5-song acoustic EP about their last break-up can absolutely do so. There is incredible innovation or at least overall solid playing in modern music, but it has become undeniably saturated.
3) It's therefore very easy and understandable to conclude the current state of music is poor, because it DOES take digging to get to the good stuff most of the time. For many, that's a tall order, since it calls for sifting through mediocrity and simply poor quality. But it can absolutely be rewarding.

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Ah, gotcha. I was coming from the wrong interpretation and from a metal perspective. Rock's in a bit of a worse spot.

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Yeah, I should further clarify more voices =/= financial success. With low attention spans and the rise of streaming, I'd argue it's harder than ever to get to the top, let alone maintain the top for more than a week.