Theres at least a billion metal genres, most of which aren't even that different to me.

*agrees fully*

The obscure genres are generally only for elitists. When I split up metal, I normally divide it this way:

Heavy, Power, Prog, Death, Thrash/Speed, Doom/Goth/Atmospheric/Post/Sludge, Industrial, Black, Folk/Viking and nu-metal.

I suppose you could add metalcore and grindcore if you wanted, but I group metalcore with nu-metal and stick grindcore under death metal.

After that, I divide it on another level. Drone doom is going to sound very different to traditional doom. Brutal death is very different to melodic death... etc.

lol that's almost every metal genre out there besides metalcore. I know you metal pureists like to deny that it exists or is part of metal but it really is.

And by you I mean you in general, not you specificly.

Haha, I was still writing/editing my message when you posted. Anyway, metalcore is a part of metal. But since I don't have much metalcore/nu-metal, I group them together in my collection.

I do like some popular metalcore but I've never really delved into the genre because I imagine it would get pretty repetitive after a while. So it's not high on the priority list.

Look you said Athiest sucked. I disagreed. They are a Technical Death Metal band. Why not just a Technical Metal band? Or a Death Metal band? because they sound nothing like PsyOpus(a Technical Metal band) or Morbid Angel (a Death Metal band).

I agree that sub genre's sometimes are too much, saying that they don't have their uses or that it doesn't give people a fuller understanding of the style of music played is rediculous.

Stop being a twat.

But theres much more than needed, some of the distinctions between one metal genre and another can be incredibly broad to the point of there being only subtle differences... I agree it's useful to have subgenres, just not as many as metal does, I just don't see it as being diverse enough to warrant having so many of them.

I've said it before and I will say it again:

The best rap was pre 1990

:)

Sugar Hill Gang = Pwn

To be honest, I'd say any genre can get as clustered as metal. Take prog rock for example - progarchives.com has plenty of subgenres as they are a bit liberal with genres. Italian symphonic prog rock is a bit extreme I think (4 tiers).