Mudvayne’s Chad Gray says all new metal bands “sound the same”

Mudvayne frontman Chad Gray has said that the current wave of metal bands all “sound the same”, unlike when he was starting to make music.

The singer was speaking recently to The Underground Australia, where he was asked about his views on the influence of nu-metal and his generation on the current music scene.

“Dude, maybe I shouldn’t say this, but I don’t give a fuck. Because I’m me, and I’ve got stuff to say, and I’m going to say it. Music now to me — God bless them, new bands — but they sound the same. All new music reminds me of the same fucking thing,” he said.

“I was on Ozzfest 2001,” he continued. “So you had Slipknot, [Marilyn] Manson, Papa Roach, Disturbed, Mudvayne, Drowning Pool… Every fucking band, every band I just named, none of them sound the same. None of them. And I think that’s why it was such a special time in music because everybody was bringing what they were bringing to the table. You had System of a Down and shit-tons of bands, man. And all very original and all doing their own thing. We were part of that.”

Mudvayne played together again in 2021 for the first time in 12 years. The nu-metal band, who formed in 1996 and is made up of Chad Gray (vocals), Greg Tribbett (guitar, backing vocals), Matthew McDonough (drums, synthesizer) and Ryan Martinie (bass), went on hiatus in 2010, a year after the release of their self-titled fifth studio album.

Since then, vocalist Chad Gray has been fronting the band Hellyeah, of which Mudvayne guitarist Greg Tribbett is a former member.

Continuing on his tirade against new artists, Gray added: “What bands do when they look at this new band, and everybody follows that new band, it’s not even an influence really because they’re current. … Even when I came out in 2001 … my influences were from 1981 [or] 1983. Like 20 years, almost 20 years prior [to] me dropping my first album. I wasn’t ripping off a band from 1999 and releasing my album in 2001.”

Gray was a victim of circumstance in 2022 when he involuntarily fell off the stage during a performance of Mudvayne’s song ‘Not Falling’.