When you can't go forward,you must go back to the roots and reinvent them.I'd rather have a new Sabbath or Priest type metal band than some nu metal,psuedo metal crap.Metal has always been about the feeling,the rush,the excitement,the power.That has nothing to do with speed or technicality.Metal is famous for being extremely tight.if a band could incorporate that tight but loose feel of a Stones or Zeppelin into pure metal,that would be a good step.
Vektor and Fog of war are some good new thrash bands. However, almost all of them are ripoffs of Slayer or Anthrax. I think we'll see a renaissance in folk, melodeath, and power metal.
Tech death is going to be the new big thing along with djent. Djent has a certain appeal to it...look at how big bands like Periphery, Veil of Maya, and Meshuggah got.
Jazz Metal. A combination of jazz and metal. I say this because we've reached the peak for heaviness. Noisegrind is the heaviest music will get. Edit: I believe that some will take what Atgeist and Cybic have done, and take it one step further. They will incorporate actual brass instruments.
I believe that in the future, bands are going to take it to a whole new level progressively, not brutally. Right now you're seeing many Djent bands slowly growing on the underground Metal scene, and various Progressive Metal and Tech Death Metal bands releasing albums (The Faceless, Periphery, Haken, Andromeda, etc). So, Metal is slowly progressing. Not for the more heavy, but for the more experimental. I'm sure years later bands will try to fuse with other genres and add more instruments not common in Metal. Now that I mentioned that, Folk Metal might reach it's peak in a few years also, excellent Folk Metal bands playing right now. Also, I'm not saying that it's going to be ALL Progressive Metal. I say progressive as in progress and innovation.
