The Metal Academy mission

Hey Daniel, I was very interested reading your comments in your latest post in the slam death metal thread:

 "Many of you are probably aware that one of the main reasons that Ben & I started the Metal Academy brand in the first place was to combat the atrocious bias displayed by the global metal market, particularly towards specific sub-sections of the metal audience."

 I am especially intrigued by what you perceive as this bias as I am not sure what you are referring to. I myself on several occasions have railed againt the music press and their hand-in-hand relationship with label marketing departments, but it doesn't sound like that is what you are getting at.

As you went on to say "RateYourMusic is a prime example of this with their charts tending to be dominated by particular subgenres while others are unanimously panned more for being associated with their subgenre than for being a poor example of its type" I am assuming you also mean music fans themselves are at fault, as the rym charts are aggregated from members' ratings (with a small amount of weighting involved). Are you also saying that some bands just get panned for playing a certain type of metal, irrespective of whether it is written and performed well or not?

Please don't think this is a dig of any kind as I am genuinely interested by this discussion and luckily I think this is the best place to have it as most other forums, such as the rym official metal board, have such shallow interactions as to be virtually worthless amounting to little more than:

"Have you heard album x" 

 "Yes it's great" or "yes it's shit"

Whereas Metal Academy has posters who put a bit more thought and substance into what they post thus engendering a deeper level of interaction.

Sadly, I don't have any offline friends into metal so very rarely get to have a decent, substantial discussion about a subject I actually love to talk about so I would really appreciate it if you could expound on your points from the aforementioned post. Also, how successful do you feel Metal Academy has been in countering this bias? 

Of course if you would rather not elaborate then that's fine too.

What I'm saying is that sites like RYM & Metal Archives are inherently biased towards & against certain subgenres & they therefore aren't inclusive of all music fan's opinions. Say for example you are a huge fan of nu metal, slam death metal, gorenoise, melodic metalcore, etc. If you use RYM as a guide then you have absolutely no decent releases to choose from because they're all unanimously down-rated for being... well... exactly what they're trying to be! How can a nu metal fan distinguish the good nu metal releases from the bad nu metal releases when all & sundry seem to go to town on their releases when they weren't ever a fan of nu metal in general. Also, RYM is synonymous with down-rating releases that are deemed as being generic. For example, if a band releases a very high quality straight-down-the-line blasting old-school black metal record, more often than not it'll receive average ratings at best whereas avant-garde/progressive versions of the black metal model will inevitably score more highly regardless of quality. Then we have Metal Archives & Metal Reddit that don't even consider many subgenres to be metal at all when they so clearly are (see alternative metal for example) & subsequently won't allow them on their site. The Metal Academy clans configuration was devised entirely to combat this sort of stuff by creating an environment where fans of any metal subgenre can have their say via the use of clan ratings.

On the RYM topic, you'll also find that certain genres take enormous priority over other on the site in general i.e. not just in metal circles. For example, hip hop absolutely dominates the charts (particularly the more experimental/avant-garde stuff) along with indie rock, post-rock, folk, etc. Mature dance music receives almost no coverage whatsoever & for a techno fan like myself I've always found it to be next to useless. It's to do with the fact that RYM is very much an American thing & also the age & cultural groups it attracts. In metal circles, you'll see your more commercial styles of metal receiving significantly less attention than death/black metal. That's not the way the scene works in reality though with the Five Finger Death Punch's of the world being far more popular than the Vektor's or The Ruins of Beverast's out there. It's simply the demographic that RYM attracts.

Right, thanks Daniel, I understand exactly what you mean now and I wholeheartedly agree. Whilst rym does have it's uses there's no denying, I have long thought it is a bit sniffy towards a lot of music. Look at how many people claim to be massive jazz nerds on the site, when in real life how many people do you know who actually listen to jazz that much? Metal Archives is notorious for it's bias against certain genres and how it can possibly  claim to be an encyclopaedia whilst ignoring many bands for not being their kind of metal I don't know. 

Metal is sufficiently diverse to be able to produce some albums that genuinely do take your breath away with their originality and complexity. There is no doubt these will always garner decent ratings and be fully deserving of it, but may not always appeal to all metal fans universally. In real life a lot of metal fans (possibly the more casual fans) are quite conservative in their tastes and often stick within a quite narrow set of genres and aren't necessarily interested in the more experimental or diverse releases. A site like rym (and maybe any online music rating site) is, by the nature of the beast, going to appeal more to music "nerds" and so, as a consequence, will favour the more "nerdy" (for want of a better word) releases and artists.

I completely agree with your observation that rym downrates so-called generic releases. I have many times wondered exactly how some people can claim to be a fan of a particular genre when they are shitting on albums only for sounding like other great albums, irrespective of the quality of the songwriting or performance. RYM's comment boxes are notorious for such assholery. It has got to the point where I sometimes even doubt my own ears as to what I have heard as some of these comments make me feel stupid for thinking what I do about some perfectly good, albeit generic, releases.

In respect of Metal Academy, the clan set up is a great way to remove some of these inevitable biases against certain genres. For example, it is becoming increasingly obvious that I will probably never get to grips with The Revolution, but my lack of understanding and appreciation for the clan's releases is countered on the site by the fact that my ratings can be discounted via the clan-only ratings, thus allowing the true and more knowledgable fans of the clan's style to have more of a say in the releases' ratings. The more I think about it, the more ingenious a solution it seems.

The ironic thing is that there is no objectively right or wrong way to think about or appreciate music of any sort, yet some of these sites perpetuate certain views as dogmatically as any religious or political zealot and openly ridicule or persecute anyone who disagrees with their dogma. At the end of the day, it's all just shit that helps us get through life so let us all enjoy what we like without some asshole telling us we're wrong all the time!

I have very little to add to what you guys have said. I have noticed though, now that I'm spending more time with modern releases, that the problem is getting worse on RYM. I keep being stunned by the ratings of albums. I've listened to a number of albums recently that I know would have been highly praised and rated had they been released 15 years ago, that are now trounced on and left to flounder at the bottom of the barrel. It used to be that if an album rated under 3.5 stars on RYM, it probably wasn't worth my time. For anything released in the past decade, I reckon I can lower that to about 3.2. I've totally got into albums by Nocturnal Triumph, Wiegedood, Vorga, Celeste, Det eviga leendet, Negativa, Nameless Mist and Druid Lord in recent weeks. These albums all range from 3.2 to 3.4 on RYM. So while I've been a bit critical of people that spend their time listening to every single new release that comes out once or twice before moving on, I'm starting to see that there might not be any other way to discover the good stuff anymore. Well, I guess I can just listen to the good folk at Metal Academy!

To be honest Ben, a lot of the reactions to releases on rym makes me wonder if some of these people even actually like music or not. It seems that a few people just get a kick out of shitting on anything and anybody, which is a pretty sad way to live your life if you think about it.

Another factor to take into consideration is the "positive rating system" that seems to be gaining favour with an increasing number of people on rym. For those who don't know, this involves rating everything you don't particularly like 0.5/5 and thus giving a wider range of scores to rate the stuff you do like. So for these people a 2.0 is more likely a 3.5 for normal people. Now whilst I can see why some people may like to use such a rating system, it fucks things up for everyone else unless all members use it.  So, even though it is still a minority who use this method, this may too contribute to the lowering of ratings on rym. 

The great thing about Metal Academy is the trust that has been built between members that if someone rates something highly then it is probably at least worth checking out. It may not eventually be your sort of thing but the rating will be an honest one as we are thankfully free of trolls and edgelords! Most importantly is that most regular members back up a significant proportion of their ratings with words, so you can get an idea of how they think about music and so are able to understand where they are coming from, which is more in keeping with a normal human interaction than spewing random bile in a comment box. I have discovered much more interesting stuff and releases from outside my own comfort zone (well outside sometimes) since joining Metal Academy, mainly because of this trust in the other members views. Long may it continue!

So, in terms of RYM, I have never had any time to really use it and because it is not specific to metal I have not really had the inclination to bother really.  I do not doubt that any of what is said is correct though as my overall experience of the internet in general is that the less reviews, ratings or general opinions on music that I read the better.  There’s things I read everywhere that annoy me, even on here and I have learned to pay less attention overall as I discovered and grew my live of metal all by myself and that’s still how I best enjoy it.  

Whilst I accept the criticism of EM, if the intent of the site was to set its own boundaries of what it considered to be metal then I personally have no issue with that.  I am not really well-versed in core related sub-genres and if I have to go elsewhere to find out about them then I am fine with that.  I kind of like that consistency to it and that assurance of what to expect from the site.

So while I've been a bit critical of people that spend their time listening to every single new release that comes out once or twice before moving on, I'm starting to see that there might not be any other way to discover the good stuff anymore. Well, I guess I can just listen to the good folk at Metal Academy!

Hey look it's me!

Seriously though, I've been feeling the brunt of this bias pretty heavily albeit in a more indirect way. I don't really interact with or care about the ratings/downvotes of certain sub-genres because I just listen to what I feel like listening to, write my own reviews and lists, and move on. But, I pretty much use the RYM current year Metal charts to scroll through and see what I can find that piques my interest pretty much all year. What I've found is that I end up listening to, like Daniel said, an extremely disproportionate amount of Black and Death Metal. I've found myself having to specifically search for and target Progressive, Power, and Heavy Metal (among other sub-genres) in order to even out what I'm listening to and get some variety, so the strain is still felt just from a music discovery standpoint even before getting into ratings/comments.

Seriously though, I've been feeling the brunt of this bias pretty heavily albeit in a more indirect way. I don't really interact with or care about the ratings/downvotes of certain sub-genres because I just listen to what I feel like listening to, write my own reviews and lists, and move on. But, I pretty much use the RYM current year Metal charts to scroll through and see what I can find that piques my interest pretty much all year. What I've found is that I end up listening to, like Daniel said, an extremely disproportionate amount of Black and Death Metal. I've found myself having to specifically search for and target Progressive, Power, and Heavy Metal (among other sub-genres) in order to even out what I'm listening to and get some variety, so the strain is still felt just from a music discovery standpoint even before getting into ratings/comments.

I find the best way to use the rym charts is to use genre-specific charts and I quite often just limit them to the ratings of people I follow on rym who's tastes are more closely aligned to my own than the membership at large. For example, whilst compiling the Fallen playlist I will generate a current year chart for doom, sludge, drone, stoner and gothic metal, include the sub-genres, exclude albums I've already rated and see what new releases come up that I can include in the list (after listening to them obviously). So there are ways to make the rym charts work for you.

As someone who continues to use RYM heavily, I totally agree with all that has been said. A lot of these issues are a product of more recent years - the website gained popularity with younger users within the past few years and grew exponentially, but the new userbase is almost entirely stemming from a younger (and American) crowd. As people have said there's a massive bias for hip hop, certain kinds of pop and and electronic due to the popularity of these genres with the younger American generation. Likewise metal is relatively shunned, with the exception of hyper progressive technical avant-garde stuff. There have been very, very few highly rated metal releases in the past 10 years - which is not because metal has gotten worse, but because whenever the current userbase sees it pop up on the charts, they vote it down. 

Back in the day, when RYM was more niche, it didn't have this problem so much. As it becomes more mainstream it understandably follows the trends of mainstream music and new generations of people. I still think RYM is great for what it is, and remains the best music cataloging and rating site out there, but sites like this that limit the catalog to just metal music are a much better representation of what actual metalheads like. This also allows for much deeper and personal discussion as we are having here... RYM, with its comment boxes and what not, is so very prone to toxicity, memes and trolling.

On the topic of remaining unbiased against certain genres of metal... that's another thing I love about this site. It has fostered that open mindedness that both the metal community and the music enthusiast community sometimes lack. 

So yesterday, the admin of Metalforum got it in his head that just because I was answering questions about this site on a forum where MULTIPLE metal websites came up, he thought I was "promoting this website" and locked the thread, which happened to be my reviews thread.  I asked him in a PM, "Did you have to lock the thread?  Why not just delete the sub-conversation comments?"  And he banned me.  Yeah, not happening.  The only reason his site has more people on it than Metal Academy is becasue the site's name is more likely to be googled.  So I'm gonna work on posting about this website on other non-metal websites.  Macabre didn't wanted promotion, now he's getting it.  I mean he literally raised no complaints when I told Metalforum, "Hey I wrote a book!" and posted my LITERAL BOOK COVER, with the name, my real name and everything, onto that same thread.  He didn't give me warning points.  And get this, he told me "my lack of self-reflection was astonishing."

Now I'ma rant.

Let's reflect then, Macabre, wherever you are, you are the first moderator in the eleven years Ive been on forums to flat out perma-ban me for anything, let alone punish me for questioning a mod's methods, even for saying worse things than that.  You raised no objection when I posted my book cover, so don't get all "promotion" on me.  You're smart enough to realize that disagreeing with you on your own website isn't gonna get people possessed, and you know that people have the right to be angry with your crazy decisions, so grow up before this anger issue eats you alive.  I used to be a guy like you and thank God I'm not anymore.  Now I don't even care that you invited me to Metal Academy.  I never see you here and you clearly aren't using it, so yeah, I'm gonna ACTUALLY promote this place.  Because unlike some simple forums that don't even have an album database, let alone unique features, this place deserves to be the most popular metal website.  And I've been on quite a few metal forums.

And if you are in fact here under a different username, tough.  It's your own fault that you were too overprotective to have a discussion.

Rex, let me be frank with you. Whatever your grievances with the Metalforum moderators are (& for the record I don't blame them for feeling that it's inappropriate to be promoting a competitor on a subject-matter specific website), Ben & I are on a mission to make Metal Academy the most inclusive metal website on the web. We hate the elitist/judgmental bullshit that goes on at other sites & want everyone to be able to express themselves openly here, safe in the knowledge that they can be themselves without fear of reprisal. With that in mind, I have to ask that you (& all of our other members) steer well clear of aggressive &/or attacking posts on the Metal Academy forums. Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate your passion for the site & are really hoping you'll continue to contribute regularly as we value your input but it can't be at the expense of anyone else's comfort. Please feel free to continue this conversation with me over private message if you feel the need to.

Rex, let me be frank with you. Whatever your grievances with the Metalforum moderators are (& for the record I don't blame them for feeling that it's inappropriate to be promoting a competitor on a subject-matter specific website), Ben & I are on a mission to make Metal Academy the most safe & inclusive metal website on the web. We hate the elitist/judgmental bullshit that goes on at other sites & want everyone to be able to express themselves openly here, safe in the knowledge that they can be themselves without fear of reprisal. With that in mind, I have to ask that you (& all of our other members) steer well clear of aggressive &/or attacking posts on the Metal Academy forums. Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate your passion for the site & are really hoping you'll contribute more regularly than you have as we value your input but it can't be at the expense of anyone else's comfort. Please feel free to continue this conversation with me over private message if you feel the need to.

Thanks.  I just needed to vent a little.  I'm done now.

I realize the meat of this topic is all a year old, but I find it interesting. Back when I used RYM, metal charts tended to be considerably more biased towards those very same generic releases, to the point that people were complaining about it. At least what I remember is that whenever I played some new release I couldn't tell you what was so special about it more than half the time. Seems like people over corrected in the opposite direction. Not withstanding that people who use RYM are going to at least pretend to have a deeper understanding of music than your average joe.

That said, it does seem like whenever I pop in here, to check new feature releases, certain sub-genres will get reviews consisting of two paragraphs of writing that could be summarized as "don't care for this genre, 2/5". It doesn't really make me eager to join in on the discussion.

My friends on RYM, thankfully, tended to know what they were talking about.  Not everyone did, but still.  But as a serious metal fan, I admit my favorite is power.  But the fun of music is trying to find something you think is absolutely incredible.  Ex. Going through all that horrible deathcore just to find Shadow of Intent's Halo-infused debut Primordial was totally worth it.

The trick is to compare it to other albums of it's type/genre first, then after deciding on a level of quality/rating, compare it to other albums of different genres and the same rating.

I realize the meat of this topic is all a year old, but I find it interesting. Back when I used RYM, metal charts tended to be considerably more biased towards those very same generic releases, to the point that people were complaining about it. At least what I remember is that whenever I played some new release I couldn't tell you what was so special about it more than half the time. Seems like people over corrected in the opposite direction. Not withstanding that people who use RYM are going to at least pretend to have a deeper understanding of music than your average joe.

That said, it does seem like whenever I pop in here, to check new feature releases, certain sub-genres will get reviews consisting of two paragraphs of writing that could be summarized as "don't care for this genre, 2/5". It doesn't really make me eager to join in on the discussion.

I agree with you that very little value can be taken from a review written by someone who was never going to like the album. Daniel and I have had this conversation many times, as he likes to delve into everything that metal has to offer, despite knowing that he'll hate a lot of it before he even listens. That is of course why I designed the clan system though and, in particular, the split between Release Rating and Clan Rating. In most cases, albums that are way out of your comfort zone will belong to a clan you're not part of, and so your scores will not have any impact on the Clan Rating for those albums. A quick look at the clans that a reviewer belongs to can also impact how much relevance the stance of the review should hold too.

I can imagine a future time when there are hundreds of active members using Metal Academy, and I think the value of the Clan Rating system will really shine through at that time.

I realize the meat of this topic is all a year old, but I find it interesting. Back when I used RYM, metal charts tended to be considerably more biased towards those very same generic releases, to the point that people were complaining about it. At least what I remember is that whenever I played some new release I couldn't tell you what was so special about it more than half the time. Seems like people over corrected in the opposite direction. Not withstanding that people who use RYM are going to at least pretend to have a deeper understanding of music than your average joe.

That said, it does seem like whenever I pop in here, to check new feature releases, certain sub-genres will get reviews consisting of two paragraphs of writing that could be summarized as "don't care for this genre, 2/5". It doesn't really make me eager to join in on the discussion.

I agree with you that very little value can be taken from a review written by someone who was never going to like the album. Daniel and I have had this conversation many times, as he likes to delve into everything that metal has to offer, despite knowing that he'll hate a lot of it before he even listens. That is of course why I designed the clan system though and, in particular, the split between Release Rating and Clan Rating. In most cases, albums that are way out of your comfort zone will belong to a clan you're not part of, and so your scores will not have any impact on the Clan Rating for those albums. A quick look at the clans that a reviewer belongs to can also impact how much relevance the stance of the review should hold too.

I can imagine a future time when there are hundreds of active members using Metal Academy, and I think the value of the Clan Rating system will really shine through at that time.

Exactly.  The system only performs at a good pace the more people we have behind it, so things such as hall judgements get put on hold.  But the idea of separating the uninitiated from the converted is exactly what online metal communities need to finally belt out their "group mentality," so all that can really be done at this point is spreading the word.

My view is that instead of discouraging people from veering outside of their chosen lanes we should be encouraging it. The whole point of the site is to enable people to discover new sounds at their own pace & to allow them to express themselves in a safe environment that's free of slander & elitism. The key differentiator is that we use the clan system to minimize the damage on the more polarizing subgenres & to point their fans to the elite releases regardless. Sure, you're gonna get the odd review like you mentioned above Morpheus but how does someone know if they might come around to a specific subgenre if they don't give it a chance? I would never have gotten into subgenres like post-metal, dissonant death metal or deathcore if I hadn't let my initial impressions go & given them some time to evolve within my taste profile. Besides, the scenario you're referring to really isn't all that common here in my opinion & our members generally try to articulate what it is that makes them feel that way when they do.

My view is that instead of discouraging people from veering outside of their chosen lanes we should be encouraging it. The whole point of the site is to enable people to discover new sounds at their own pace & to allow them to express themselves in a safe environment that's free of slander & elitism. The key differentiator is that we use the clan system to minimize the damage on the more polarizing subgenres & to point their fans to the elite releases regardless. Sure, you're gonna get the odd review like you mentioned above Morpheus but how does someone know if they might come around to a specific subgenre if they don't give it a chance? I would never have gotten into subgenres like post-metal, dissonant death metal or deathcore if I hadn't let my initial impressions go & given them some time to evolve within my taste profile. Besides, the scenario you're referring to really isn't all that common here in my opinion & our members generally try to articulate what it is that makes them feel that way when they do.

I think it seems to be simply another form of "group mentality."  Someone chooses something, doesn't want to hear why someone doesn't like it, and as a result they don't want to get into other things.  At least that's the case when it comes to being a little more serious about music than the average joe.  In the modern age, side-picking is going a little too far.

Re-reading my recent comment, it might sound like I'm discouraging people from exploring outside their clans / comfort zones. That's not what I was intending. I was pointing out that the clan system allows people to do all the exploration they want, without necessarily having a direct impact on the Clan Ratings. That's one of the things that makes Metal Academy unique.

Re-reading my recent comment, it might sound like I'm discouraging people from exploring outside their clans / comfort zones. That's not what I was intending. I was pointing out that the clan system allows people to do all the exploration they want, without necessarily having a direct impact on the Clan Ratings. That's one of the things that makes Metal Academy unique.

The separate average rating for clan members is actually a strong indicator of this.  I got that vibe as soon as I noticed it.  Unfortunately, it doesn't really click well with so few user's.

I have an idea.  How about we have some sort of clan events involving picking a band with a minimum number of releases, say 5, and order our top five releases on this threads, encouraging the clans to rate the album pages themselves.  I mean, even if one reviews albums on the forums, the least they could do is post the reviews on the album pages.

Feel free to try that Rex. I don't think there are too many examples of people posting proper reviews in the forums but not on the album pages though. It's mainly just when people don't want to go to the effort of writing something comprehensive & only want to add some quick thoughts like I did on the Between The Buried & Me feature release thread yesterday.

Feel free to try that Rex. I don't think there are too many examples of people posting proper reviews in the forums but not on the album pages though. It's mainly just when people don't want to go to the effort of writing something comprehensive & only want to add some quick thoughts like I did on the Between The Buried & Me feature release thread yesterday.

It's not really worth trying unless multiple people are on board.  I mean I could just order releases on whatever lists I wanna make if at all.

I'm not necessarily discouraging people from trying things outside their comfort zone, but I'm just saying it can also be very discouraging to see only those kinds of people talking. At which point it can feel like there are no actual people from that clan talking about the release. I mean, would you want to be on a forum where it seemed like the doom metal discussion was dominated entirely by people who didn't care for the genre in the slightest? Its basically something that's only a problem because of the site's small number of active forum users, but at the same time encourages that in certain areas.

Well in regards to my current proposal, you and I would be two members for any Guardians or Pit "X-Band's Top 5" voter threads.  Of course, it can only work if enough people are active in the clans.  Going through the active users here, I do not think the Fallen or the North have anything to worry about.  It tempts me to join the Revolution until the FAQ's stated possibility of a fifth clan is called into action.

There is the possibility of a sub-rule in which, due to the low number of active posters, non-clan members COULD vote, but clan members give off more points, similarly to the user weightings on RYM.  Of course, this would only be until we have enough people in the Revolution and the Sphere.

So here is my proposal:

X-Band Top 5 Albums Poll

Each week a clan takes turns featuring a poll where a member of that clan gets to decide on a certain band and the rest of the clan posts their top 5, assigning points to the albums based on positioning,  and the album with the most points is the winner.

Only bands with at least 5 albums on Metal Academy can be nominated, and only clan members can vote on those threads.

The point system is as follows: #1 album gets 5 points, #2 = 4, #3 = 3, #4 = 2 and #5 = 1.

The clan's turns will be based on the ordering showing on the clans section of Metal.Academy: Fallen, Gateway, Guardians, Horde, Infinite, North, Pit, Revolution and Sphere.

Members part of multiple clans cannot nominate bands twice within any series of the nine clan's threads.

OPTIONAL RULES

Should the entire discography of the band be eligible for the votes, or only the albums that fit the clan?  And if they can, are we still excluding non-metal albums?

What will qualify a user to nominate a band?

And one more thing: if this interests the community, then I think a test run of three weeks would be more appropriate to help flesh it out.  During the test run, it might be appropriate to act as if enough users were involved in the game, which means ONLY for the test run, anybody can vote.  And we should stick with popular bands that we'll probably all have heard by now.  I mean, most of us have heard Slayer's classic era, so for the Pit, choosing Slayer for the test run would be the safest bet.

It sounds a little confusing so I'm not sure I completely understand but are open to contributing if I know the releases in question. My available time to fill in gaps is fairly limited with a new baby coming in five days time though so I'd agree with picking the biggest bands to begin with. If there were lesser known bands selected where I had to investigate several releases in a short period then I'd be unlikely to do that to be honest. Shall we just see how we go?

What I'm saying is that sites like RYM & Metal Archives are inherently biased towards & against certain subgenres & they therefore aren't inclusive of all music fan's opinions. Say for example you are a huge fan of nu metal, slam death metal, gorenoise, melodic metalcore, etc. If you use RYM as a guide then you have absolutely no decent releases to choose from because they're all unanimously down-rated for being... well... exactly what they're trying to be! How can a nu metal fan distinguish the good nu metal releases from the bad nu metal releases when all & sundry seem to go to town on their releases when they weren't ever a fan of nu metal in general.

Now I have one question about genre-distinction and bias.  I have very little interest and even less knowledge in this specific genre, but in the event that we get enough people what would you say in regards to the idea that Metal Academy is "biased" towards "trance metal?"  I know we recently kicked it out, but I think I've only heard one trance metal album, so I don't really have strong arguments for it.  But still.  Of course, maybe this question is better to be discussed by someone who actually listens to that genre.