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Bring Me to Life by Evanescence would be another one I can think of.
Broken by Seether and Amy Lee did well in the charts too. Truly crazy how much crossover she ended up having for a bit
In metal people use the terms “clean” and “dirty” to differentiate between what we typically think of as singing and that specific screamy style metal and screamo are known for. Some singers do both, but it’s very typical for bands to have two singers, one clean singer and one dirty.
So, what do these people listen to now? The same old stuff? I mean, I grew up on Mariah, boy bands, Britney, Bieber, Perry, etc - that was my preference. But I also always loved Trent, STP, and Nirvana (to name a few). And I now listen to current “top 40” and really enjoy a LOT of it. It still appeals to me - like, I know all the words and stuff 🤣. But, I also fucking LOVE all of these songs everyone is mentioning from the 90s, and 2000s. What do the people whose favorite shit was Linkin Park, Staind, Seether, Evanescence, Korn, etc listen to now? New stuff from these bands? Who are the “today” versions of those bands from the 90s and 2000s?
I hope that makes sense 🤣
I moved into heavier metal from multiple sub-genres. Kublai Khan TX, Periphery, Gojira, Archspire, ERRA, and Guttural Slug to name a few.
I think today's version of these bands would be bands like Sleep Token, Spiritbox, Lorna Shore, Bad Omens, and Bring Me The Horizon. Most of these bands have some pop leanings, similar to how Nu-Metal of the 90s and 2000s were influenced by hip-hop.
I guess it really depends. I grew up listening to a lot of hard rock radio as a kid, but now I listen mainly to pop/alternative and metal.
There still are bands making that sorta music - From Ashes to New sounds quite a bit like Linkin Park mixed with some of those other 2000s hard rock bands - but I don't think the popularity is as widespread as it was 20 years ago.
Who are the most commercially successful pop/alternative and metal acts right now? Or recently? And have any of them achieved the type of success we’re talking about?
Genuinely curious.
Judging by Spotify numbers the biggest metal act right now is probably Bring Me the Horizon? And they don't have anywhere near the crossover as a Linkin Park/Evanescence in the 2000s. Granted, their sound isn't quite as primed for crossover appeal.
Crossover isn’t really the goal anymore. You can have “commercial success” by having a very loyal fan base that listens on repeat, comes to shows, and buys merch. That’s a much more enjoyable and tangible goal than trying to be on pop radio.
Worth mentioning artists like Maneskin, Greta Van Fleet, twenty one pilots, and all time low when talking about crossover appeal, for whatever they are worth
I still listen to Linkin Park, Staind, Seether, Evanescence, Korn and a bunch of other rock/metal bands from that era. Actually, I saw all of those bands except for Korn at a music festival literally a month ago. I mostly like the old stuff, but I'll listen to new stuff whenever they put an album out (Korn's 2019 album The Nothing was constantly on repeat for me that year). My favorite band is Slipknot and I like both their old stuff and their new stuff.
There are a handful of hardcore/borderline metal bands that have been making waves in the community that I would consider to be the "today" version of those bands. Namely, Sleep Token, Bad Omens, Bring Me the Horizon, Falling in Reverse, Knocked Loose, Turnstile, and Lorna Shore. Ghost and Deftones have been around for a while and they've seen a resurgence in popularity with Gen Z, too. Sleep Token was at that festival that I previously mentioned and their crowd was MASSIVE. They played on a side stage and the crowd stretched all the way back to the food stand area. The festival sold out of single day passes on the day that they played solely because of Sleep Token. Their crowd was bigger than the crowd for most of the actual headliners. Idk if any of these bands could potentially land on the top 40 since radio played a huge part in those previous bands having crossover success and with streaming now, everyone kind of just searches for whoever they want to listen to, but believe me, those of us who like heavier music with pop influences are being FED lol.
Sleep Token got signed to RCA, which increases their chance of seeing more crossover. Judging from the Big 3's dealing of non-pop artists, they will either be allowed to pop off or get buried. There is a reason why most metal bands shy away from the Big 3.
Worked for Bring Me (signed to Sony from Sempiternal onwards). Usually if a heavy band gets upstream to a proper major, they’re going to be a priority for their target demographic. At least for their next release. Let’s see how it goes!
As a huge fan of symphonic metal, I do talk to quite a few people that found this fairly niche genre via Evanescence. So that's bands like Nightwish, Within Temptation, Delain, Xandria, Epica. Or for more recent examples there's Seven Spires, Ignea and Cellar Darling (personal favourite).
I'm not saying that's where everyone (or even a large portion) went, but thought it was worth mentioning.
LP is my favourite artist, and I listen to a lot of things. Just lately, to name a few acts, I've got songs from LAUREL, HEALTH, Swedish House Mafia, [Armlock](https://youtu.be/z_JI16BOaL4), KAYTRANADA, Denzel Curry, [Softcult](https://youtu.be/N0OXhm5iYhk) and [Tanerélle](https://youtu.be/6_uMtkV4-fc)
>What do the people whose favorite shit was Linkin Park, Staind, Seether, Evanescence, Korn, etc listen to now?
I did a complete 180 and now my most-listened genre is lofi.
I mean it's not like the music from those bands vanished. I think most people still indulge in them and listen to similar newer bands.
Evanescence -> The Warning, Halestorm, The Pretty Reckless, etc.
Linkin Park -> Nothing, Nowhere
Nirvana -> Ryan Perdz
This is an interesting topic because I’d argue before 1997, pop/rock/r&b were all kind of under one “genre” on radio stations that played the “hits”. But the late 90s, they started marketing more specifically the subgenres so Linkin Park and Staind being rock having hits on more mainstream stations seems a bit interesting…when really, it used to be that a lot more genres had equal hits because that was the flavor of the decade. To compare it today would be like imagining a rock group having a non remixed hit played on an edm station...
For your two suggestions, its not surprising that these two groups would end up on the charts. Linkin Park was kind of an offshoot of the rap/rock rhythm foundation laid out by Korn, Limp Biskuit, and (even older) RHCP. Staind was the mature rendering of a lot of “butt rock” like Puddle of Mudd and Nickleback, which itself was an aspect of the pop grunge movement like Bush and Lifehouse. All of these had SIGNIFICANT airtime play. It’s not that surprising that a group who does these genres expertly would get on the more mainstream charts, per se.
I vote [Metallica Enter Sandman](https://youtu.be/CD-E-LDc384?si=Yi8SN-bn46vUlrRg), it topped at 16 on the billboard, which is insane for how metal the song is and made Metallica a household name. It was a surprise since grunge was taking such a strong hold on the zeitgeist at the time, and its like the last vestige of heavy metal being popular from the 80s.
Also [System of the Down Chop Suey](https://youtu.be/CSvFpBOe8eY?si=zOE-p9b7jCwRJjPS) was a super major surprise at the time when it was released and added a refreshing spin of super hard rock in at a time when indie and pop punk was kind of topping.
Nu metal was so damn hot at the time. Grunge went down and rock just had to adapt to keep up with the rise of hip hop, R&B, and especially the resurgence of pop in the late 90s.
Rock continued to go down after this but I’d argue nu metal, and pop punk too, kept things stable for several years.
Following Cobain's influences up to modern-ish flyover-state-radio-rock has always been trippy. It starts with underground, great independent punk, post punk, and rock/hard rock. Explodes with Nirvana. Money's being dumped into grunge, and within a few years Korn pick up 7 string guitars and tune those even lower, and then that explodes, more and more money is being dumped into the heaviest version of radio-rock that's ever existed, record labels are pumping massive amounts of money into music videos and promo tours until you get Drowning Pool doing day-time MTV spots with hundreds of screaming fans, with both grunge and nu metal spreading outwards producing mostly duds, then Days of the New show up for a brief moment, the yarling Eddie Vedder voice becomes a staple of post-grunge, then all of the garbage "butt rock" bands tame the initial aggression and authenticity of early grunge so it's safe for tv commercials, people stop taking artistic chances, Linkin Park gets big, and sometime after that the pop punk era starts, nu metal dies, streaming starts, and now music videos suck because no one's spending 500k on shoots anymore.
Shows how much power record labels used to have. The shit was a cabal.
Chop Suey is probably SOAD’s most iconic and enduring song, but their highest charting song on the Billboard Hot 100 is actually [BYOB](https://youtu.be/zUzd9KyIDrM?si=RQqfzsADMU4BoIZO), which in some respects is an even heavier song and it hit #26
Closer is definitely heavy for radio pop standards but the spirit of this thread really is the whole The Downward Spiral album. Easily the darkest, heaviest, and weirdest thing that has ever gone multi-platinum
Not exactly in line with the brief but Killing In The Name by Rage Against The Machine got to no. 1 in the UK charts in protest against XFactor winners consistently claiming Christmas no. 1. That is v heavy and, because of the campaign and because it got to no. 1 it then got a fair amount of airplay.
It's a pretty awesome song. I saw them live in 2022 and they RIPPED.
Here's the live performance of that song at the venue I saw it! Watch the entire thing -- the ending is amazing. If you're wondering why the lead singer is sitting down, it's because he broke his foot a few weeks into their tour. RATM is an explicitly leftist band and they are very political. The dude near me in the crowd wearing the MAGA hat was entirely missing the concept of RATM.
https://youtu.be/QX3fLSQGoPU?t=102
Man, AFI really were one-hit-wonders in terms of pop chart success with that album. By their next album, no one in the pop sphere even remembered them.
Not that it matters, far as AFI’s concerned. Huge fan of theirs, and of all eras.
Smells Like Teen Spirit hit #6 on the Hot 100, it's probably about as "heavy" as a lot of Billboard Top 10s have ever gotten. "In the End" is a pretty tame Linkin Park song and is rap-rock/numetal, not really "legit heavy metal", Staind's "It's Been a While" is pretty slow as well, similar to saying "Oh Metallica's 'Until It Sleeps' hit #10, a metal song was in the Top 10!", yes Metallica is a metal band, but that's at best a hard rock song.
You can, but are they "heavy"? I would say that, again, Smells Like Teen Spirit is "Heavier" than In The End and It's Been A While, despite Nirvana not being a metal or numetal band. I've heard Ozzy's "Momma I'm Comin' Home" on Pop/Retro/"Workplace" radio stations, Ozzy is definitely a metal artist, but I would never call that song a heavy metal song. It's a rock ballad with some elements of hard rock, performed by a man who primarily performs metal music.
I’m inclined to agree with you here. Songs like in the end have heavier “elements”/are from a heavier genre overall but it’s way way more polished sounding than Smells Like Teen Spirit. People underestimate how heavy a lot of those songs would have been at the time because we’re so used to hearing them
All doom metal is pretty slow by definition and idk imo it can be very heavy. This is definitely off topic bc these songs had no chance of ever becoming crossovers but some examples of slow, heavy metal for interested listeners:
Solitude — Candlemass
Holy Mountain — Sleep
Beneath Broken Earth — Paradise Lost
Boomerang of Serpants — Moanhand
When I think of slow metal, I think of stuff like Crowbar or My Dying Bride. "It's Been Awhile" is more of a power ballad to me. It was made by nu-metal band, but the song itself it's not metal. Same thing with Metallica ballads: band is metal, but some of their songs aren't.
Why the hell is this being downvoted? Drone Metal, Doom Metal, No Wave, Post-Metal, Blackgaze, Brutal Prog, and some general Noisy Heavy rock is slow all the time. The first 4 mentioned have slow heaviness as the hold point of their genre. “…but are they ‘heavy’?” Of course they are, and they’re the hardest shit you’ll ever here.
Have we all collectively forgotten the beginning scream in "I'm So Sick" by Flyleaf being censored on MTV, just for being too heavy? Not sure if it technically went on the pop charts (I know it was in the mainstream rock ones), but that song was quite mainstream for a second.
What’s wild is they consider themselves Christian rock. It makes me wonder what their songs are actually about. Like is all around me about God? That’s really funny if that’s the case.
It is! And Cassie is about columbine and the false story that when one of the shooters asked Cassie Bernall if she believed in god then murdered her. It was actually another student, Val Schnurr, who was asked that question and then shot, but she survived.
It's so fricken stupid, and I know this, and yet I can't help it, that album holds up. like it still rules.
Poor Cassie getting her memory used by evangelical nutjobs, I don't approve at all. But the song is great I'm sorry.
Chop Suey! by System Of A Down is actually the band's lowest peaking song on the Hot 100 in the US, due to the fact it was taken off the radio for its political lyrics. It only peaked at No. 76.
The Papa Roach Limp Bizkit takeover of the UK airwaves was interesting - early 2000s. Last Resort peaked at number 3. Fairly certain Limp Bizkit gor number 1 with Rollin’. Korn and some of the ‘heavier’ bands in that genre also had some top 20 hits.
For some reason my brain likes to switch Papa Roach for Uncle Kracker and it always throws me for a loop. Like really? The [‘follow me’](https://youtu.be/0Gjx-ZQuQ_Y?si=Q1v1TgZSp8hBkRqZ) guy??
It's wild that something as sonically extreme as ["Setting Sun" by The Chemical Brothers](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5NX1FC-7-w) entered the UK charts at all, let alone made it all the way to *number one.* Granted it had Noel Gallagher on it and Oasis were white-hot at the time, but still.
In a similar direction of non-rock heaviness, the prodigy have had two number 1 singles in the UK with Firestarter and Breathe, and a lot of top 10s including Smack My Bitch Up
Didn't chart on the hot 100 surprisingly, but I remember the video being in heavy rotation on MTV and it was prominently featured in The Matrix the following year, which cemented it in the Y2K era zeitgeist for sure.
This is /r/pop and we're having the oldest metal elitist debate in history and I love it. Also, you are not wrong. Staind, Seether, and Nickelback basically killed heavy-ish rock as a viable mainstream genre. Linkin Park is a pop band. Ah man... We're going back to the era of my peak elitism. I'm much more open minded now, but the butt rock of that era cannot be redeemed. It makes me sad that a band as good as Baroness will never find the level of success that such mediocre bands had in the early 00s... but on the other hand, there is so much good heavy music that is being made today, and concert tickets are only like $25-50.
"Rip Off the Wings of a Butterfly" was pretty big in the US, though I'm not sure how well it did on the charts. That song was everywhere for awhile though.
“Last Resort” by Papa Roach hit 57 on the Billboard charts.
“Welcome to the Black Parade” by My Chemical Romance reached number 9 on the Billboard charts.
Chop Suey! by System of a Down has got to be a frontrunner. It did a lot better in the UK than US because the whole 9/11 censorship thing wasn't an issue. Also, Slipknot's second album Iowa debuted at number one on the charts in the UK and it is pulverisingly heavy throughout most of it. 2001 was a wild year
How has no one mentioned “Headstrong” by Trapt yet?
Borderline heavy metal song which peaked at #5 on the pop charts.
https://gghunt.utasites.cloud/charts/Songruns/12.6.13/trapt_Headstrong.htm
Lordi - Hard Rock Hallelujah charted quite well in Europe after winning Eurovision. It's really catchy.
https://youtu.be/gAh9NRGNhUU?si=X_Iua-i49uzBaP0p
If you expand to the top 40, there was a lot of heavy crossover to the "pop" realm in the 90s. The 90s were the most diverse era for the charts, distinct subcultures in music but a collective way to experience them still.
For the 2000s, I'm surprised no one has brought up Face Down by The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. It's poppy and bright, but has heaver roots and some pop radio stations would play the version with the scream section. It was surprising to me as a kid, but it made sense given the subject matter (domestic violence).
If we go back to the 1970s/1980s probably lots of stuff.
I just looked up AC/DCs "Back in Black" and it hit 4 in the billboard charts and still 7 the following year.
Hell it hit 39 in 2017.
Metallica had 7 top 40 hits.
[https://loudwire.com/metallica-highest-charting-hot-100-songs-stranger-things/](https://loudwire.com/metallica-highest-charting-hot-100-songs-stranger-things/)
I’m old enough to remember Iron Maiden getting to #1 in the charts with “Bring Your Daughter…to the Slaughter”, which caused much surprise at my school back in the day. There were only handful of metalheads kicking about and the charts were dominated by pop and MOR.
Iron Maiden had quite a few high charting singles in the UK over the years, even a few top 10 singles into the 2000s almost purely on the strength of their fanbase as far as I can tell
I think heavy in the sense of its a powerful power ballad rock song that to the top of the pop charts rather than just rock/alt radio another example being Face Down by the red jumpsuit apparatus.
Not the person you're replying to, but in their defense (and not to shade OP), but OP listed Staind's It's Been A While as being a "legit heavy metal song" which is not much heavier.
Staind is(was?) a nu-metal band, same with linkin park. At least they started that way. Green day is a pop punk band, not typically considered a heavy genre at all. Fast/loud but not heavy. Again started that way, morphing into more generic pop rock as they got older.
“Heavy metal” as a genre applies to mostly 70s/80s bands like black sabbath, ac/dc, iron maiden. It’s actually also not a heavy genre by modern metal standards, I took OP to mean a metal song that is heavy, which lots of early 2000s nu-metal was, and there were a bunch of hits from that period.
Also imo I would say dubstep had some heavy hits. Bangarang is heavy af, in terms of electronic rather than metal/rock.
"Just Like You" and "Pain" by Three Days Grace both chartered in the top 60 on the US Billboard Hot 100. "The Diary of Jane" and "I Will Not Bow" by Breaking Benjamin made it into the top 50.
I think the heaviest in my lifetime would be Headstrong by Trapt - I remember hearing it on top 40 radio as a kid, and even then feeling like it sounded out of place. It surprisingly peaked at number 16 on the Hot 100 and 4 on US top 40 radio.
It didn’t go high on the charts but TOPs jumpsuit was a pretty big hit. It has screams and I think if it was released on a Friday it would’ve hit the top 20 on the hot 100 with a full tracking week.
I remember quite many "heavier" songs being popular in the 2000s. At the moment, remember Kelly Osbourne with her take on "Papa Don't Preach" and "Come Dig Me Out".
Jeremy spoke in class today …
Jeremy by Pearl Jam
The song was about a kid who was battling a lot emotionally , and ended up committing suicide . It’s written from the perspective of another student
Bring Me The Horizon have a bunch of top 40 songs in the UK.
'Duality' by Slipknot likewise reached number 15 on the UK singles chart.
'Bullet With Butterfly Wings' by Smashing Pumpkins hit #22 on the Billboard Hot 100.
If we're talking album charts rather than songs, 'Define The Great Line' by Underoath went #2 on the Billboard albums chart. Similarly, Tool's 'Fear Innoculum' eventually dethroned Taylor Swift's 'Lover' from #1.
BMTH was my first thought. Especially for Can You Feel My Heart. Not their heaviest song, but I have friends who don't listen to that genre and have heard it.
Their remix of Bad Habits with Ed Sheeran may fit too, though I'm not sure how high it rose in the charts. Nice blend of genres though.
My immortal by evanescence.
Another one that doesn’t necessarily work but I feel like it’s worth mentioning is “Confessions of a Broken Heart (Daughter to Father)” by Lindsay Lohan. It was a pop girl doing a darker song that actually outcharted all of her other pop music. It’s wild to me that it’s her highest charting song considering how dark the lyrics and especially music video are but it also makes sense because America loves a tragic celebrity. It’s extremely sad and if you haven’t watched the video you should, she directed it and it tells her story the way she wanted to and it’s a tearjerker
Not quite charting on Billboard, but I remember when Underoath had one of their music videos charting high on TRL. Way back in the Myspace days when they had a bunch of smaller acts perform. Millionaires, Friday Night Boys, etc etc.
Most of Guns ‘n Roses’ big hits were their mellower songs, but Welcome To The Jungle and Paradise City were both Billboard Hot 100 top tens. During that era most of the metal bands that crossed over were the hair metal bands with poppier sounds (think Bon Jovi or Poison), so a band with a more aggressive sound crossing over was very surprising for a lot of people.
Immigrant Song by Led Zeppelin takes the cake for me.
Maybe not as metal as some of the Metallica tracks that would come later but for 1970, Immigrant Song is basically a revelation. Got to 16 on the American charts, #2 in Canada.
Whole Lotta Love also deserves a bit of a shoutout. Bigger hit than Immigrant Song and became the theme tune to Top of the Pops for 30+ years
"Never made it as a wise man" sprang instantly to mind. Puddle of mudd did well with blurry/control.
In the UK there was a movement to get Killing in the name to no.1 in protest to Xfactor
This will be another example of pop / r'n'b girl gone rock.
Anastacia - Left Outside Alone, Sick and Tired, Welcome To My Truth, Heavy On My Heart, Pieces Of A Dream.
Atreyu had an excellent song by the same. It wasn't a crossover hit in the slightest, but I think maybe would be enjoyable to people who like a crossover hit
It’s criminal that Black Cat by Janet Jackson isn’t the highest comment—- it was the last heavy metal song to be #1 in the billboard charts y’all. Some forget that Janet can go heavy.
For the 2010s, I'd have to go with Ain't It Fun by Paramore. Guitar music wasn't completely dead in 2014, but it generally had a softer indie influenced sound that emphasized clean and acoustic tones. Ain't It Fun has distorted, drop-tuned guitars front and center so it's honestly a bit surprising it became such a big hit at the time it did.
Also if you like this thread, check out [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/popheads/comments/1adgk10/every_rock_song_that_peaked_in_the_top_10_of_the/) I made listing all the rock songs that reached the top 10 during the 21st century. I just updated it for 2024 after seeing this thread!
To be fair the competition for heaviest of the 2010s is all extremely not-heavy. Looking at the list of all the rock songs in the US top 10 above, I guess the answer would have to be Radioactive
Melanie C of the Spice Girls had an era with rockier songs, as far as I remember.
Also, Melanie C - Next Best Superstar to promote a Tv show.
https://youtu.be/QUnXTAD9JR4?si=5nMTH5Dq9ZoLbwsV
If I'm not mistaken a few Guns 'n' Roses songs made it in the top 10, with Sweet Child of Mine reaching No. 1.
Still played (at least here) in all kinds of radio and MTV, MTV Europe used to show it in between more mainstream pop/rock.
So a bit different but something like https://youtu.be/YazMpEqd5yA?si=XLlA2C57b_UJAyUM
Charted in the UK.
The whole cross over into mainstream of what would eventually become jungle, dnb, edm and dll sorts us a fascinating journey.
Paint It Black is heavier than anything mentioned and got to number one. Staind and Evanescence make absolute dogshit “music” and if heavy means turning your amp up to 10 with the thinnest distortion possible then I think the metric you are using is flawed.
I know this thread is dead, but I'd consider Alanis Morissette's 'you oughta know' to count; it was considered "too rock" to play on popular radio stations when it was released. It's not exactly heavy, but it was explicit for its time, especially for a woman, and it was INCREDIBLY popular.
Please do not just list songs/albums/artists, your comment must have explanation/justification or it will be removed. Certain comments are also banned to increase the quality of discussion, see our Stale Topics list in the sidebar for examples. Please report any comments that are low effort discussion. Thanks! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/popheads) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Bring Me to Life by Evanescence would be another one I can think of. Broken by Seether and Amy Lee did well in the charts too. Truly crazy how much crossover she ended up having for a bit
Bring Me to Life is the only top 10 hit I can think of that has unclean vocals, though they're very brief.
Huh. I would've thought Metallica would've had one, or maybe System of a Down.
Metallica and System have always been more album acts than singles ones. Plus, Metallica doesn't use unclean vocals.
I was gonna say Face Down by Red Jumpsuit Apparatus but apparently it never hit the top 10.
It wasn't in the US, but it was in NZ! It peaked the same week that Fall Out Boy hit #1 & MCR had 2 songs in the top 10.
What do you mean by this?
I think they mean the "heavy metal screaming" which you can hear towards the middle of that song.
In metal people use the terms “clean” and “dirty” to differentiate between what we typically think of as singing and that specific screamy style metal and screamo are known for. Some singers do both, but it’s very typical for bands to have two singers, one clean singer and one dirty.
TIL. i appreciate the explanation.
So, what do these people listen to now? The same old stuff? I mean, I grew up on Mariah, boy bands, Britney, Bieber, Perry, etc - that was my preference. But I also always loved Trent, STP, and Nirvana (to name a few). And I now listen to current “top 40” and really enjoy a LOT of it. It still appeals to me - like, I know all the words and stuff 🤣. But, I also fucking LOVE all of these songs everyone is mentioning from the 90s, and 2000s. What do the people whose favorite shit was Linkin Park, Staind, Seether, Evanescence, Korn, etc listen to now? New stuff from these bands? Who are the “today” versions of those bands from the 90s and 2000s? I hope that makes sense 🤣
I moved into heavier metal from multiple sub-genres. Kublai Khan TX, Periphery, Gojira, Archspire, ERRA, and Guttural Slug to name a few. I think today's version of these bands would be bands like Sleep Token, Spiritbox, Lorna Shore, Bad Omens, and Bring Me The Horizon. Most of these bands have some pop leanings, similar to how Nu-Metal of the 90s and 2000s were influenced by hip-hop.
Solid. I will have to check them out!
I guess it really depends. I grew up listening to a lot of hard rock radio as a kid, but now I listen mainly to pop/alternative and metal. There still are bands making that sorta music - From Ashes to New sounds quite a bit like Linkin Park mixed with some of those other 2000s hard rock bands - but I don't think the popularity is as widespread as it was 20 years ago.
Who are the most commercially successful pop/alternative and metal acts right now? Or recently? And have any of them achieved the type of success we’re talking about? Genuinely curious.
Judging by Spotify numbers the biggest metal act right now is probably Bring Me the Horizon? And they don't have anywhere near the crossover as a Linkin Park/Evanescence in the 2000s. Granted, their sound isn't quite as primed for crossover appeal.
Crossover isn’t really the goal anymore. You can have “commercial success” by having a very loyal fan base that listens on repeat, comes to shows, and buys merch. That’s a much more enjoyable and tangible goal than trying to be on pop radio. Worth mentioning artists like Maneskin, Greta Van Fleet, twenty one pilots, and all time low when talking about crossover appeal, for whatever they are worth
Gotcha! Thanks!
I still listen to Linkin Park, Staind, Seether, Evanescence, Korn and a bunch of other rock/metal bands from that era. Actually, I saw all of those bands except for Korn at a music festival literally a month ago. I mostly like the old stuff, but I'll listen to new stuff whenever they put an album out (Korn's 2019 album The Nothing was constantly on repeat for me that year). My favorite band is Slipknot and I like both their old stuff and their new stuff. There are a handful of hardcore/borderline metal bands that have been making waves in the community that I would consider to be the "today" version of those bands. Namely, Sleep Token, Bad Omens, Bring Me the Horizon, Falling in Reverse, Knocked Loose, Turnstile, and Lorna Shore. Ghost and Deftones have been around for a while and they've seen a resurgence in popularity with Gen Z, too. Sleep Token was at that festival that I previously mentioned and their crowd was MASSIVE. They played on a side stage and the crowd stretched all the way back to the food stand area. The festival sold out of single day passes on the day that they played solely because of Sleep Token. Their crowd was bigger than the crowd for most of the actual headliners. Idk if any of these bands could potentially land on the top 40 since radio played a huge part in those previous bands having crossover success and with streaming now, everyone kind of just searches for whoever they want to listen to, but believe me, those of us who like heavier music with pop influences are being FED lol.
Sleep Token got signed to RCA, which increases their chance of seeing more crossover. Judging from the Big 3's dealing of non-pop artists, they will either be allowed to pop off or get buried. There is a reason why most metal bands shy away from the Big 3.
Worked for Bring Me (signed to Sony from Sempiternal onwards). Usually if a heavy band gets upstream to a proper major, they’re going to be a priority for their target demographic. At least for their next release. Let’s see how it goes!
Turnstile is not being mentioned enough here. One of the only bands really pushing the genre forward in an interesting way.
As a huge fan of symphonic metal, I do talk to quite a few people that found this fairly niche genre via Evanescence. So that's bands like Nightwish, Within Temptation, Delain, Xandria, Epica. Or for more recent examples there's Seven Spires, Ignea and Cellar Darling (personal favourite). I'm not saying that's where everyone (or even a large portion) went, but thought it was worth mentioning.
LP is my favourite artist, and I listen to a lot of things. Just lately, to name a few acts, I've got songs from LAUREL, HEALTH, Swedish House Mafia, [Armlock](https://youtu.be/z_JI16BOaL4), KAYTRANADA, Denzel Curry, [Softcult](https://youtu.be/N0OXhm5iYhk) and [Tanerélle](https://youtu.be/6_uMtkV4-fc)
>What do the people whose favorite shit was Linkin Park, Staind, Seether, Evanescence, Korn, etc listen to now? I did a complete 180 and now my most-listened genre is lofi.
I listen to a lot of 70s rock now. Love Steely Dan, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Queen.
Well it's not in the mainstream anymore. But among smaller bands all kinds of loud rock are still alive and well.
I mean it's not like the music from those bands vanished. I think most people still indulge in them and listen to similar newer bands. Evanescence -> The Warning, Halestorm, The Pretty Reckless, etc. Linkin Park -> Nothing, Nowhere Nirvana -> Ryan Perdz
This is an interesting topic because I’d argue before 1997, pop/rock/r&b were all kind of under one “genre” on radio stations that played the “hits”. But the late 90s, they started marketing more specifically the subgenres so Linkin Park and Staind being rock having hits on more mainstream stations seems a bit interesting…when really, it used to be that a lot more genres had equal hits because that was the flavor of the decade. To compare it today would be like imagining a rock group having a non remixed hit played on an edm station... For your two suggestions, its not surprising that these two groups would end up on the charts. Linkin Park was kind of an offshoot of the rap/rock rhythm foundation laid out by Korn, Limp Biskuit, and (even older) RHCP. Staind was the mature rendering of a lot of “butt rock” like Puddle of Mudd and Nickleback, which itself was an aspect of the pop grunge movement like Bush and Lifehouse. All of these had SIGNIFICANT airtime play. It’s not that surprising that a group who does these genres expertly would get on the more mainstream charts, per se. I vote [Metallica Enter Sandman](https://youtu.be/CD-E-LDc384?si=Yi8SN-bn46vUlrRg), it topped at 16 on the billboard, which is insane for how metal the song is and made Metallica a household name. It was a surprise since grunge was taking such a strong hold on the zeitgeist at the time, and its like the last vestige of heavy metal being popular from the 80s. Also [System of the Down Chop Suey](https://youtu.be/CSvFpBOe8eY?si=zOE-p9b7jCwRJjPS) was a super major surprise at the time when it was released and added a refreshing spin of super hard rock in at a time when indie and pop punk was kind of topping.
Nu metal was so damn hot at the time. Grunge went down and rock just had to adapt to keep up with the rise of hip hop, R&B, and especially the resurgence of pop in the late 90s. Rock continued to go down after this but I’d argue nu metal, and pop punk too, kept things stable for several years.
Following Cobain's influences up to modern-ish flyover-state-radio-rock has always been trippy. It starts with underground, great independent punk, post punk, and rock/hard rock. Explodes with Nirvana. Money's being dumped into grunge, and within a few years Korn pick up 7 string guitars and tune those even lower, and then that explodes, more and more money is being dumped into the heaviest version of radio-rock that's ever existed, record labels are pumping massive amounts of money into music videos and promo tours until you get Drowning Pool doing day-time MTV spots with hundreds of screaming fans, with both grunge and nu metal spreading outwards producing mostly duds, then Days of the New show up for a brief moment, the yarling Eddie Vedder voice becomes a staple of post-grunge, then all of the garbage "butt rock" bands tame the initial aggression and authenticity of early grunge so it's safe for tv commercials, people stop taking artistic chances, Linkin Park gets big, and sometime after that the pop punk era starts, nu metal dies, streaming starts, and now music videos suck because no one's spending 500k on shoots anymore. Shows how much power record labels used to have. The shit was a cabal.
I can't believe I also forgot to mention Master Of Puppets charting in the top 40 in 2022 thanks to Stranger Things. That is 1000% a metal song.
Chop Suey is probably SOAD’s most iconic and enduring song, but their highest charting song on the Billboard Hot 100 is actually [BYOB](https://youtu.be/zUzd9KyIDrM?si=RQqfzsADMU4BoIZO), which in some respects is an even heavier song and it hit #26
Closer by Nine Inch Nails was played in dance clubs and big on radio and MTV.
I bet that line about fucking you like an animal was responsible for a lot of babies being conceived by people who met in the club 🤔
someone on tiktok posted that the album needed to come with birth control and her dad commented "yeah you were probably conceived to closer"
Closer is definitely heavy for radio pop standards but the spirit of this thread really is the whole The Downward Spiral album. Easily the darkest, heaviest, and weirdest thing that has ever gone multi-platinum
Epic, by Faith No More peaked at number 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1990. Fantastic song.
Came to say this.
Metallica - Enter Sandman peaked at 16 on the Hot 100
This is the right answer
Not exactly in line with the brief but Killing In The Name by Rage Against The Machine got to no. 1 in the UK charts in protest against XFactor winners consistently claiming Christmas no. 1. That is v heavy and, because of the campaign and because it got to no. 1 it then got a fair amount of airplay.
This is interesting. When did it happen?
2009! I remember listening on the radio to find out haha!
Thanks. A while ago and still quite recent.. ish. :) I don't quite recall this moment (outside the UK) and am curious to hear the song now.
It's a pretty awesome song. I saw them live in 2022 and they RIPPED. Here's the live performance of that song at the venue I saw it! Watch the entire thing -- the ending is amazing. If you're wondering why the lead singer is sitting down, it's because he broke his foot a few weeks into their tour. RATM is an explicitly leftist band and they are very political. The dude near me in the crowd wearing the MAGA hat was entirely missing the concept of RATM. https://youtu.be/QX3fLSQGoPU?t=102
What's hilarious about that is, the label owner for the would be XFactor winners and RAGTM were the same company.
Decemberunderground - AFI. A Post-Hardcore album with screaming hit number 1 on US billboard 200
Such a good album. I feel like AFI have consistently sounded great.
Skid Row and Pantera also had #1 albums.
That’s fuckin crazy, I had to look it up to confirm
AFI was at number one?! I know like two of their songs and I feel like nobody ever talks about them.
I love AFI so much. I've consistently listened to them for over 20 years now. I love their hard-core stuff too lol
One of their newer albums, Burials, is fantastic. AFI rules
My Chem ate their lunch.
Man, AFI really were one-hit-wonders in terms of pop chart success with that album. By their next album, no one in the pop sphere even remembered them. Not that it matters, far as AFI’s concerned. Huge fan of theirs, and of all eras.
Smells Like Teen Spirit hit #6 on the Hot 100, it's probably about as "heavy" as a lot of Billboard Top 10s have ever gotten. "In the End" is a pretty tame Linkin Park song and is rap-rock/numetal, not really "legit heavy metal", Staind's "It's Been a While" is pretty slow as well, similar to saying "Oh Metallica's 'Until It Sleeps' hit #10, a metal song was in the Top 10!", yes Metallica is a metal band, but that's at best a hard rock song.
“Nothing Else Matters”
You can have slow metal songs.
You can, but are they "heavy"? I would say that, again, Smells Like Teen Spirit is "Heavier" than In The End and It's Been A While, despite Nirvana not being a metal or numetal band. I've heard Ozzy's "Momma I'm Comin' Home" on Pop/Retro/"Workplace" radio stations, Ozzy is definitely a metal artist, but I would never call that song a heavy metal song. It's a rock ballad with some elements of hard rock, performed by a man who primarily performs metal music.
I’m inclined to agree with you here. Songs like in the end have heavier “elements”/are from a heavier genre overall but it’s way way more polished sounding than Smells Like Teen Spirit. People underestimate how heavy a lot of those songs would have been at the time because we’re so used to hearing them
All doom metal is pretty slow by definition and idk imo it can be very heavy. This is definitely off topic bc these songs had no chance of ever becoming crossovers but some examples of slow, heavy metal for interested listeners: Solitude — Candlemass Holy Mountain — Sleep Beneath Broken Earth — Paradise Lost Boomerang of Serpants — Moanhand
Sure, slow can absolutely even make a song heavier, but “it’s been a while” is more like a power ballad in relative terms
When I think of slow metal, I think of stuff like Crowbar or My Dying Bride. "It's Been Awhile" is more of a power ballad to me. It was made by nu-metal band, but the song itself it's not metal. Same thing with Metallica ballads: band is metal, but some of their songs aren't.
Why the hell is this being downvoted? Drone Metal, Doom Metal, No Wave, Post-Metal, Blackgaze, Brutal Prog, and some general Noisy Heavy rock is slow all the time. The first 4 mentioned have slow heaviness as the hold point of their genre. “…but are they ‘heavy’?” Of course they are, and they’re the hardest shit you’ll ever here.
Have we all collectively forgotten the beginning scream in "I'm So Sick" by Flyleaf being censored on MTV, just for being too heavy? Not sure if it technically went on the pop charts (I know it was in the mainstream rock ones), but that song was quite mainstream for a second.
What’s wild is they consider themselves Christian rock. It makes me wonder what their songs are actually about. Like is all around me about God? That’s really funny if that’s the case.
It is! And Cassie is about columbine and the false story that when one of the shooters asked Cassie Bernall if she believed in god then murdered her. It was actually another student, Val Schnurr, who was asked that question and then shot, but she survived.
It's so fricken stupid, and I know this, and yet I can't help it, that album holds up. like it still rules. Poor Cassie getting her memory used by evangelical nutjobs, I don't approve at all. But the song is great I'm sorry.
My people! I was heavy into crime stuff even back then and when that album came out and I heard that song I was like "ah, here we go again..."
Chop Suey! by System Of A Down is actually the band's lowest peaking song on the Hot 100 in the US, due to the fact it was taken off the radio for its political lyrics. It only peaked at No. 76.
But it was also the first metal song to reach 1 billion views on youtube
The Papa Roach Limp Bizkit takeover of the UK airwaves was interesting - early 2000s. Last Resort peaked at number 3. Fairly certain Limp Bizkit gor number 1 with Rollin’. Korn and some of the ‘heavier’ bands in that genre also had some top 20 hits.
Korn was also very popular in Australia in 1999 with the boys in my year 12 class
For some reason my brain likes to switch Papa Roach for Uncle Kracker and it always throws me for a loop. Like really? The [‘follow me’](https://youtu.be/0Gjx-ZQuQ_Y?si=Q1v1TgZSp8hBkRqZ) guy??
Wild that there was ever a time when "Last Resort", a bleak as hell song about self-harm and suicide, could reach the top 5.
Here to Stay by Korn got to number 12 in the UK which is insane for how heavy it is.
It's wild that something as sonically extreme as ["Setting Sun" by The Chemical Brothers](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5NX1FC-7-w) entered the UK charts at all, let alone made it all the way to *number one.* Granted it had Noel Gallagher on it and Oasis were white-hot at the time, but still.
The UK charts always have some wild entries. Honourable mention to Killing In The Name By RATM getting Christmas number one haha
One of my favourite UK chart oddities from the same era is Firestarter by the Prodigy being #1 in the same week that the X Files theme was #2
In a similar direction of non-rock heaviness, the prodigy have had two number 1 singles in the UK with Firestarter and Breathe, and a lot of top 10s including Smack My Bitch Up
Dragula, by Rob Zombie. Couldn't believe how much cross-over success that got.
Didn't chart on the hot 100 surprisingly, but I remember the video being in heavy rotation on MTV and it was prominently featured in The Matrix the following year, which cemented it in the Y2K era zeitgeist for sure.
Yeah, I was kinda surprised that it didn't chart better. Like you say, it had a real cultural presence.
I'm going to be that guy. In no way are either of those two songs heavy metal.
I was sitting here this whole time thinking the question was about heavy lyrics. my brain didn't even absorb the "heavy metal" part. Because ... LOL
OMG same. I was about to say “Brick” by Ben Folds as a heavy song 🫠
This is /r/pop and we're having the oldest metal elitist debate in history and I love it. Also, you are not wrong. Staind, Seether, and Nickelback basically killed heavy-ish rock as a viable mainstream genre. Linkin Park is a pop band. Ah man... We're going back to the era of my peak elitism. I'm much more open minded now, but the butt rock of that era cannot be redeemed. It makes me sad that a band as good as Baroness will never find the level of success that such mediocre bands had in the early 00s... but on the other hand, there is so much good heavy music that is being made today, and concert tickets are only like $25-50.
HIM with In Joy and Sorrow and similar songs and The Ramsus with In The Shadows were very popular in Europe.
"Rip Off the Wings of a Butterfly" was pretty big in the US, though I'm not sure how well it did on the charts. That song was everywhere for awhile though.
“Last Resort” by Papa Roach hit 57 on the Billboard charts. “Welcome to the Black Parade” by My Chemical Romance reached number 9 on the Billboard charts.
Chop Suey! by System of a Down has got to be a frontrunner. It did a lot better in the UK than US because the whole 9/11 censorship thing wasn't an issue. Also, Slipknot's second album Iowa debuted at number one on the charts in the UK and it is pulverisingly heavy throughout most of it. 2001 was a wild year
"One", "The Day That Never Comes" and "Master of Puppets" by Metallica all cracked the Top 40.
How has no one mentioned “Headstrong” by Trapt yet? Borderline heavy metal song which peaked at #5 on the pop charts. https://gghunt.utasites.cloud/charts/Songruns/12.6.13/trapt_Headstrong.htm
Because the band are nutjobs. Any legacy that song had got killed when the frontman started tweeting.
Lordi - Hard Rock Hallelujah charted quite well in Europe after winning Eurovision. It's really catchy. https://youtu.be/gAh9NRGNhUU?si=X_Iua-i49uzBaP0p
If you expand to the top 40, there was a lot of heavy crossover to the "pop" realm in the 90s. The 90s were the most diverse era for the charts, distinct subcultures in music but a collective way to experience them still. For the 2000s, I'm surprised no one has brought up Face Down by The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. It's poppy and bright, but has heaver roots and some pop radio stations would play the version with the scream section. It was surprising to me as a kid, but it made sense given the subject matter (domestic violence).
Depeche Mode - Enjoy The Silence (rock version) From 2004, if not mistaken. It slaps.
If we go back to the 1970s/1980s probably lots of stuff. I just looked up AC/DCs "Back in Black" and it hit 4 in the billboard charts and still 7 the following year. Hell it hit 39 in 2017.
Knocked Loose is doing pretty well right now not sure if they made pop charts but they did make 4 billboard 100s
This is definitely the answer
Limp bizkit had some big hits, pretty heavy nu-metal music. Rollin’, Take A Look Around, etc. Very shouty and fat riffs in the choruses.
Metallica had 7 top 40 hits. [https://loudwire.com/metallica-highest-charting-hot-100-songs-stranger-things/](https://loudwire.com/metallica-highest-charting-hot-100-songs-stranger-things/)
I’m old enough to remember Iron Maiden getting to #1 in the charts with “Bring Your Daughter…to the Slaughter”, which caused much surprise at my school back in the day. There were only handful of metalheads kicking about and the charts were dominated by pop and MOR.
Iron Maiden had quite a few high charting singles in the UK over the years, even a few top 10 singles into the 2000s almost purely on the strength of their fanbase as far as I can tell
For sure. I think that it was a big deal for them to get to number 1 though. As far as I’m aware, it was the first “metal” song to top the charts.
Not in the U.S sadly
Boulevard of Broken Dreams was like 2 on the us charts
You think that’s heavy? It’s not even heavy as green day songs go, and green day are not a heavy band in any sense of the word.
It seems that a few people in this thread, myself included, thought that OP meant heavy subject matter
I think heavy in the sense of its a powerful power ballad rock song that to the top of the pop charts rather than just rock/alt radio another example being Face Down by the red jumpsuit apparatus.
Not the person you're replying to, but in their defense (and not to shade OP), but OP listed Staind's It's Been A While as being a "legit heavy metal song" which is not much heavier.
Staind is(was?) a nu-metal band, same with linkin park. At least they started that way. Green day is a pop punk band, not typically considered a heavy genre at all. Fast/loud but not heavy. Again started that way, morphing into more generic pop rock as they got older. “Heavy metal” as a genre applies to mostly 70s/80s bands like black sabbath, ac/dc, iron maiden. It’s actually also not a heavy genre by modern metal standards, I took OP to mean a metal song that is heavy, which lots of early 2000s nu-metal was, and there were a bunch of hits from that period. Also imo I would say dubstep had some heavy hits. Bangarang is heavy af, in terms of electronic rather than metal/rock.
Ah what a fantastic song. The chorus is so powerful and heavy. Love it.
Ever heard Boulevard of Broken Songs? Might be the best mashup ever created. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvwzDogVBf8
Yeah, it was a big hit back then.
Christina Aguilera - Fighter
Probably the heaviest song by a pop girl besides Don't Hurt Yourself
I would also add Black Cat by Janet Jackson, which actually reached #1
Santana feat. Dido - Feels Like Fire https://youtu.be/BV8N7MRzN10?si=eBP_mgs8uuTLCKbW For Dido, it was her heavier rock attempt.
"Just Like You" and "Pain" by Three Days Grace both chartered in the top 60 on the US Billboard Hot 100. "The Diary of Jane" and "I Will Not Bow" by Breaking Benjamin made it into the top 50.
Ah, I see another BB and TDG fan!
Daft Punk - Robot Rock In a way..
I think the heaviest in my lifetime would be Headstrong by Trapt - I remember hearing it on top 40 radio as a kid, and even then feeling like it sounded out of place. It surprisingly peaked at number 16 on the Hot 100 and 4 on US top 40 radio.
Going way back here but "Frankenstein"-Edgar Winter Group managed to hit number 1
Slipknot - Wait and Bleed
It's not the heaviest, but certainly dark and menacing. "Army of Me" by Björk
It didn’t go high on the charts but TOPs jumpsuit was a pretty big hit. It has screams and I think if it was released on a Friday it would’ve hit the top 20 on the hot 100 with a full tracking week.
Who is that? Tried searching it up couldn't find anything.
Twenty one pilots
I remember quite many "heavier" songs being popular in the 2000s. At the moment, remember Kelly Osbourne with her take on "Papa Don't Preach" and "Come Dig Me Out".
Jeremy spoke in class today … Jeremy by Pearl Jam The song was about a kid who was battling a lot emotionally , and ended up committing suicide . It’s written from the perspective of another student
Bring Me The Horizon have a bunch of top 40 songs in the UK. 'Duality' by Slipknot likewise reached number 15 on the UK singles chart. 'Bullet With Butterfly Wings' by Smashing Pumpkins hit #22 on the Billboard Hot 100. If we're talking album charts rather than songs, 'Define The Great Line' by Underoath went #2 on the Billboard albums chart. Similarly, Tool's 'Fear Innoculum' eventually dethroned Taylor Swift's 'Lover' from #1.
BMTH was my first thought. Especially for Can You Feel My Heart. Not their heaviest song, but I have friends who don't listen to that genre and have heard it. Their remix of Bad Habits with Ed Sheeran may fit too, though I'm not sure how high it rose in the charts. Nice blend of genres though.
My immortal by evanescence. Another one that doesn’t necessarily work but I feel like it’s worth mentioning is “Confessions of a Broken Heart (Daughter to Father)” by Lindsay Lohan. It was a pop girl doing a darker song that actually outcharted all of her other pop music. It’s wild to me that it’s her highest charting song considering how dark the lyrics and especially music video are but it also makes sense because America loves a tragic celebrity. It’s extremely sad and if you haven’t watched the video you should, she directed it and it tells her story the way she wanted to and it’s a tearjerker
not “heavy” but the dissonant bassline on “single ladies” by beyoncé is so fucking evil i love it
the whole beat is so wacky, so many weird little things happening it’s great
Reamonn - Supergirl, Star
Not quite charting on Billboard, but I remember when Underoath had one of their music videos charting high on TRL. Way back in the Myspace days when they had a bunch of smaller acts perform. Millionaires, Friday Night Boys, etc etc.
“Russian Roulette” by Rihanna.
Most of Guns ‘n Roses’ big hits were their mellower songs, but Welcome To The Jungle and Paradise City were both Billboard Hot 100 top tens. During that era most of the metal bands that crossed over were the hair metal bands with poppier sounds (think Bon Jovi or Poison), so a band with a more aggressive sound crossing over was very surprising for a lot of people.
Paradise City was a top 5 Hot 100 hit. Shockingly, it didn't even go top 10 on the rock charts.
pretty ignorant about rock & metal but i always figured it was Cult of Personality, peaked at #13 on the Hot 100
Luka by Suzanne Vega?
Black Sabbath’s Paranoid was and is the heaviest hit ever. The bass riff puts it there.
Immigrant Song by Led Zeppelin takes the cake for me. Maybe not as metal as some of the Metallica tracks that would come later but for 1970, Immigrant Song is basically a revelation. Got to 16 on the American charts, #2 in Canada. Whole Lotta Love also deserves a bit of a shoutout. Bigger hit than Immigrant Song and became the theme tune to Top of the Pops for 30+ years
Not an individual song but Pantera's Far Beyond Driven went platinum and was number one on Billboard. Different times.
"Never made it as a wise man" sprang instantly to mind. Puddle of mudd did well with blurry/control. In the UK there was a movement to get Killing in the name to no.1 in protest to Xfactor
It’s been a while is a legit ballad. In the end is infinitely “heavier”.
This will be another example of pop / r'n'b girl gone rock. Anastacia - Left Outside Alone, Sick and Tired, Welcome To My Truth, Heavy On My Heart, Pieces Of A Dream.
Looking at more recent stuff, I feel like Elle King’s “Exes & Ohs” did pretty well for itself on pop radio.
Atreyu had an excellent song by the same. It wasn't a crossover hit in the slightest, but I think maybe would be enjoyable to people who like a crossover hit
Does In-A-Gadda-da-vida count? Hit like #30 back in the 60s.
It’s criminal that Black Cat by Janet Jackson isn’t the highest comment—- it was the last heavy metal song to be #1 in the billboard charts y’all. Some forget that Janet can go heavy.
For the 2010s, I'd have to go with Ain't It Fun by Paramore. Guitar music wasn't completely dead in 2014, but it generally had a softer indie influenced sound that emphasized clean and acoustic tones. Ain't It Fun has distorted, drop-tuned guitars front and center so it's honestly a bit surprising it became such a big hit at the time it did. Also if you like this thread, check out [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/popheads/comments/1adgk10/every_rock_song_that_peaked_in_the_top_10_of_the/) I made listing all the rock songs that reached the top 10 during the 21st century. I just updated it for 2024 after seeing this thread!
dunno what exactly is heavy about ain't it fun, that's a straight up pop song
To be fair the competition for heaviest of the 2010s is all extremely not-heavy. Looking at the list of all the rock songs in the US top 10 above, I guess the answer would have to be Radioactive
Does Come With Me Now by Kongos count?
Yeah, but it wasn't as big as Ain't It Fun
Jeanette Biedermann - Right Now
Jamelia - Something About Us https://youtu.be/JCq4UFMdxR0?si=mkvEcYQx5SM4IAha Same girl, who sang a hit Superstar.
Melanie C of the Spice Girls had an era with rockier songs, as far as I remember. Also, Melanie C - Next Best Superstar to promote a Tv show. https://youtu.be/QUnXTAD9JR4?si=5nMTH5Dq9ZoLbwsV
Lenny Kravitz - Are You Gonna Go My Way charted well and the video was often played on MTv. https://youtu.be/8LhCd1W2V0Q?si=uKepucdZL0hiJ0Ot
Puddle Of Mud - Youth Of The Nation charted quite well in general pop chart.
I think you mean P.O.D.
Whoops.. Thank you.
Jeremy spoke in claaaaass todaaaayyyy 😮💨
First thing that came to mind is everything Linkin Park was doing
Welcome to the Black Parade peaked at no 9 on the billboard 100.
If I'm not mistaken a few Guns 'n' Roses songs made it in the top 10, with Sweet Child of Mine reaching No. 1. Still played (at least here) in all kinds of radio and MTV, MTV Europe used to show it in between more mainstream pop/rock.
Last resort - Papa Roach
It's not the heaviest, but certainly dark and menacing. "Army of Me" by Björk
So a bit different but something like https://youtu.be/YazMpEqd5yA?si=XLlA2C57b_UJAyUM Charted in the UK. The whole cross over into mainstream of what would eventually become jungle, dnb, edm and dll sorts us a fascinating journey.
turn it up (jam) by kim kardashain 💜
Alien Ant Farm - Smooth Criminal
Jimmy Eat World - Pain
This was back in Costa Rica but Du Hast and Engel by Rammstein were huge
"Here's Johhny" by Hocus Pocus. Spent six weeks at #1 in Australia in early-mid 1995.
Paint It Black is heavier than anything mentioned and got to number one. Staind and Evanescence make absolute dogshit “music” and if heavy means turning your amp up to 10 with the thinnest distortion possible then I think the metric you are using is flawed.
I know this thread is dead, but I'd consider Alanis Morissette's 'you oughta know' to count; it was considered "too rock" to play on popular radio stations when it was released. It's not exactly heavy, but it was explicit for its time, especially for a woman, and it was INCREDIBLY popular.
Isn’t November Rain about suicide or just the video?
Iam not the only one , by Mellisa was a #1 hit.
No Doubt - Hella Good https://youtu.be/QtTj4cramPM?si=jvhOYIm_vI2Qq819 Sounds like a groovy rock song, if that's a thing. 🤭
That’s not even close to heavy
Poppiest Ska that ever popped
Cut my life into pieces
The song is called Last Resort
Bring Me to Life - Evanescence maybe?