Cerebral Pop Field Guide to: Genre-Bending Metal

The Cerebral Pop Field Guides are an ongoing attempt to help introduce you to our favorite things within a respective category. It strikes at the very heart of what Cerebral Pop has set out to do, and will hopefully help increase awareness of things that are awesome and help define the new and better pop culture.
I'm not a huge fan of metal, but I've dabbled in the genre more than a few times and found bands that I absolutely love. Of course, this is a field guide to "genre-bending metal," which means metal bands that weren't/aren't afraid to put their own unique twists on their music and toss in some other genres for good measure while they're at it. Even if you aren't a long-haired headbanger with metal spikes on your wrists, you'll probably be able to find something to like about these three bands. If not, at least you'll be aware that not every metal band sounds like Slipknot. God, that would be horrible if they did, wouldn't it?

Refused

Refused might better fall into the hardcore category because of their devotion to the punk scene, if you really wanna get nit-picky, but stop being anal for a second and hear me out. Their final album, The Shape of Punk to Come, was easily their heaviest. Lead singer Dennis Lyxzen really put his pipes to the test, and the music roared behind him like never before.

But The Shape of Punk to Come wasn't just a shallow evolution from hardcore to metal, it was an attempt at reinventing musical genres. Whether you think they should fall into punk, hardcore, or metal, their last album was clearly pushing their sound forward. There are jazz and techno influences throughout, as well as haunting string arrangements and other borderline weird additions.

I consider the entire thing a masterpiece, and likely they do too. It was all a little overly dramatic and lead to their demise as a band, for whatever profound reason they had in their heads. Still, if the music can hold up to that sort of hyperbole then you can save your eye rolling, and in my mind it does.

City of Caterpillar

How would you go about marrying the barrage of guitars from an average metal band with the more atmospheric sound from a post-rock band? City of Caterpillar answered that question back in the early 2000s, blending the slow build of a post-rock song with the climactic wall of noise from a metal band at full gear. Just listen to the twists and turns the opening track to their only full-length takes. It's a musical journey encapsulated in a single song.

Animals As Leaders

When my friend recommended Animals As Leaders to me and a Google result turned up descriptions of Metal and Jazz Fusion, I was a little concerned, but they blew me away. Their real strength is the incredible skill. The guitarist sounds like Buckethead, which basically just means he's an amazing guitarist I suppose. There's also probably a bit of post-rock in their sound as well. And it's entirely instrumental, so you don't have to worry about any screaming if that's not your thing, just enjoy the amazing musicianship.