I need opinions....

[MuGen]

I was reading a forum somewhere else that is ultimate pointless in search of good emo bands. I found an arguement in the process about whether Emo/Punk is musc or the lyrics. So i'm asking what you guys think...

I personally think that Emo isn't the music, but it is the lyrics inside the music. Because without the emotion driven lyrics behind the gutwrenching guitar riffs, we wouldn't be able to classify it Emo. If Emo is the music, then what defines it to be Emo? The sound of a guitar, bass and drums playing together can be easy to classify in terms of the mood, but I say Emo is created utilizing emotionally spillying lyrics.

Punk is the universal term I would use for all kinds of music that use that kind of driving force behind their music, but Emo is the sub cat of Punk that places the music with emotional lyrics.

Emo = Music or Lyrics?

[GameMaster]

Emot (pronounced uh-moat) is all about the lyrics. And also the way they are expressed contributes to classifying a song as emot. For example, if I sing something really fast and cheerfully, it might not be as meaningful or emotional as if I sang slow and passionatley, kind of like the first half of Stairway to Heaven.

[Acebot44]

It has got to be the lyrics. Nothing expresses emotion more than words...at least IMO.

[DeathsHand]

All lyrics are emotional, but emo is just the wah wah cry cry kind, BUT... It's not the ONLY wah wah cry cry kind of lyrics...

There are other songs that have the same style of lyrics, but with a different sound and are not classified as "Emo"...

As for punk, punk is all about dressing up and being a 14 year old getting your parents to buy you stuff from hot topic while rebelling against them...

And for that matter, emo is about going to 50 billion shows a week, wearing thick black-rimmed glasses, and having the same hair style as everyone else in school... And writing poetry that is sad, but not to the point of it being really dark... That stuff's for the goths, man...

[Typhoid]

i dont know what EMO is short for, but ill take a stab in the dark at expressing my opinion, sice i have too many.

If its a certain style, i would say it is music in stead of lyrics. Think about it, if you put rap lyrics in a country song, is that song rap, or country? Like look at Punk music, thats a sound of music, the lyrics just fit the style so they go hand-in-and.

IMO you cant classify music by the lyrics. It has to be by the style of the music.