Talk:Attack Attack! (American band)/Archives/2023 1

Genres again

AllMusic says that the band is "screamo/metalcore Christian rockers".[1]

Opposing this genre label is Second Skin who cited https://web.archive.org/web/20110706182516/http://www.hardtimes.ca/attackattack09 as proof against the Christian label. In the link, the band says they are "not a Christian band." But Wikipedia is based on WP:SECONDARY observers, so we are not ever going to be erasing AllMusic by the band saying they hate the label given to them by AllMusic.

Secondary sources say the following things about the band's genre:

• The Guardian said in 2009 that the band calls their genre "crabcore", which the Guardian says is some kind of "boyband screamo-eurodance blend" with "Auto-Tuned emo vocals".
• Altpress said in 2009 that the band was screamo, post-hardcore, with trancecore synths. "The group decided to throw metal, pop-punk and electronic music together in a sound fitting of their moniker."
• The New York Times said in 2009 that the band was "synth-screamo".
• Dance Music Northwest, a sort of regional music blog with a team of writers, said in 2014 that the band was electronicore.
• Loudwire said that the band was influential in the metalcore genre around 2010.
• Dallas Observer asked Andrew Wetzel about genres in 2011, and the newspaper reporter said the band was frequently labeled Christian, emo and metalcore, that their music was certainly a combination of electro-pop and metal. Wetzel says he hates certain genre labels, especially Christian and emo, but his opinion is not definitive because it is a primary viewpoint, not secondary.
• The PRP reported in 2010 that Johnny Franck left the band to "refocus on God."
• Grammy.com said "Caleb Shomo is a true original in Christian Metalcore. Having started with Attack Attack! in his teens..."
• All-Campus Radio Network wrote in 2018 that the band was metalcore at their introduction, "Widely known for their glittery synth breakdowns, heavily auto-tuned clean vocals and lyrics regarding the Christian faith", which led to a wave of electronicore bands.

With these sources, it looks to me as if we list four of the six following genres: screamo, metalcore, Christian rock, emo, electronicore, and post-hardcore. I say four because the instructions at Template:Infobox_musical_artist#genre say we should show two to four genres in the infobox. Binksternet (talk) 00:58, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

I think it’s best if we keep the infobox very simple to avoid genre warring. I think the term “screamo” and “emo” have become so convoluted over time that as genres it’s best to leave them out of the infobox even if sourced if it’s commonly disputed. The term screamo is very poorly used as recognized on the screamo music page and in my opinion it’s best we don’t include it, even if sourced. Dekai Averett (talk) 17:44, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Screamo was listed by four of the above sources, and they include three big ones: AllMusic, The New York Times and The Guardian UK. I don't know what you mean by "convoluted over time" unless it's really a version of "just about every screamo band complains about being labeled screamo." I don't share the aversion to the screamo label—it's just another label for a style of music. Attack Attack! has surely been described as screamo. Binksternet (talk) 19:00, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

It’s not about bands disliking the label, it’s about the label being commonly falsely applied to any band with screaming in it. There is a reason why bands like Attack! Attack! aren’t included on the list of screamo bands page despite them being sourced. The general consensus is that the term was applied to them falsely and loosely and that it shouldn’t be used. Dekai Averett (talk) 17:54, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

I would like to see how you arrived at the "general consensus" that the term was applied falsely. Let's start with a couple of reliable secondary sources that talk about how the screamo label was wrongly plastered on the band. Binksternet (talk) 21:24, 29 December 2020 (UTC)