18 Bands Big Artists Have Shouted Out As Rock + Metal's Future

Here are 18 bands big artists have shouted out as being the future of rock and metal.

Torchbearers, flag carriers, leaders of the next generation, future headliners... whatever you want to call them, it all means the same thing — the artists who will be performing to the rock and metal masses once all of the legendary bands from decades past retire... or, perhaps, even sooner than that!

One big question that is always asked as the rock and metal community looks to the future is who is the next Metallica or Led Zeppelin?

But this type of retrospective thinking is flawed — rather than looking for the "next" band that measures up to previous eras of music in a radically different music industry climate, we should simply be trying to identify the ones that are owning the modern era they populate. The rules are different now, so the idea of expecting multi-platinum, overnight success is as dated smoking on an airplane and the voicemail being a big innovation in communication, two signposts of the time this type of success in rock and metal music was possible.

Rock and metal is enjoying a nice resurgence these last few years and we're not the only one who have noticed. The likes of Corey Taylor (Slipknot), Brent Smith (Shinedown), Joe Elliott (Def Leppard), David Draiman (Disturbed), Ronnie Radke (Falling In Reverse) and many others have been keen on shouting out the artists they see as the ones who have the potential to move this music forward for new generations of fans.

IMPORTANT: While rockers have been naming their favorite ascending new bands for a while now, this list features goes back through the last five years (2018-2023), which is why you won't see Metallica's Robert Trujillo naming Avenged Sevenfold and Gojira among the bands primed to take metal's crown back in 2016. But, now that we've mentioned it, you should feel even better about what you see below.

See all of the artists some of the biggest names in rock and metal have shouted out as being our future directly below!