History of Heavy Metal Thread
 

The plan here is to explore each stage of the development of heavy metal, on a year-by-year basis.

To get things started, we need to identify what it is that makes the Heavy Metal sound/style, and that is different things to different people.

It makes sense to me to have Heavy Metal defined as the music produced by the NWoBHM bands of the late 1970s. Although the acronym stands for "New Wave of British Heavy Metal", there was no clear "Old Wave" - that is, most bands, with very, very few exceptions, that played "metal" before the NWoBHM are also widely described as "Hard Rock", "Heavy Rock" or even "Progressive Rock", and the music is decidedly different.

With that definition, we have some boundaries by which we can identify traits in earlier music as being a precursor to metal, and formulate the history more successfully than the often ludicrous attempts you read elsewhere!

How often have I read that the term "Heavy Metal" is derived from some old book title (as if to try to lend it some sort of literary creedence!) and that it "originated in bands of the 1960s, such as The Kinks", or in the lyrics of some song or other.

Sorry, but this won't do - I mean to explore the 1960s and before in order to find out where the roots are, look at hard rock bands other than the usual suspects (Blue Cheer, Steppenwolf, Iron Butterfly, Vanilla Fudge, Purple, Zep and Sabbath) and really get intimate with the musical development.

In order to keep things as interesting and readable as possible, I'll put this analysis into the next post.

Defining Characteristics
 

So, firstly, the defining characteristics of the music;

Iron Maiden are cited over and over again as the spearleaders of the NWoBHM, but it's also widely acknowledged that Judas Priest and Black Sabbath are key innovators in the genre. Yes, there are lots of other bands who made important contributions (Motorhead, etc) - but this is about getting a definition, not making a boring laundry list. More bands can be added to the mix if these three don't produce a useful and working definition of the music.


Black Sabbath are the earliest of these 3, so let's pick 3 tracks that typify their sound and style;








Yeah, there are loads more Sabbath tracks I could have used - but there are some important bits and pieces here;

This is NOT the blues. Despite the proliferation of pentatonic scales in the solos, the music is not rooted in I-IV-V progressions. This is only a clue - plenty of bands had moved away from blues-based rock and roll by 1970.

Natable Characteristics

1. The music is riff based - the riffs are even more prominent than the vocal melodies.

2. These riffs are almost entirely played with a very distorted guitar tone that is given high importance in the mix. The type of distortion goes way beyond mere "fuzz", this is the peculiar high gain sound produced by valve amps - notably Marshalls that Hendrix was very keen on.

3. The intros, verses and choruses seem like preludes to the guitar solos.


So far we've desribed "Hard Rock" - so what are the REAL differences?

1. The riffs are styled to sound as "dark" and aggressive as possible. This is something fairly new, compared to "standard" hard rock.

Much of this is due to the incorporation of the tritone, or diabolus in musica - again, not new, as Hendrix did this, as did Gustav Holst in Classical music, decades before, and composers before him - it's simply that this interval occurs so frequently in Sabbath's music that it is a defining feature of it.

2. The lyrics are dark and nihilistic, with references to "underground", "(oc)cult" and even anti-social activities, apparent agonised pleas for help and other material clearly intended to be emotionally disturbing.

3. The album art work is also part of the package - and here the words "dark" and "disturbing" and everything else ties in with the whole image that the bands' music portrays.

4. The music, as in Classical Sonata Form, depends on a climax point towards which the whole piece builds.

In the case of simple songs, such as "Paranoid", this is not the case - the guitar solo becomes a simple interlude or bridge, as is the case with other rock/pop songs (which "Paranoid" indisputably is).

In "Black Sabbath", however, there are several "climax points" (don't be confused by my use of the term "Sonata Form" - people always think that this is about developing themes, although themes do not always develop, especially in early sonatas. The main feature of the old form to me is the climax and resolution brought about in the development and recapitulation sections - and this we see in the track "Black Sabbath".

Tension is continually built and torn down - not by the predictable technique of ever-increasing aggression, but by the more experimental technique of pulling the "exciting" distorted guitar sound right back for the vocal sections, then unleashing it at the moment the vocal sections end, only to strip everything back again for the next vocal section, unleash, strip down and rebuild towards the faster instrumental section, which builds towards the climatic ending.

The NWOBHM certainly brought Heavy Metal to the masses and turned it into a true genre and for that reason I think Judas Priest were probably the most important group prior to that movement and one of the first. Not only did they develop a true heavy metal music sound but also the leather and chains/studs look that would become essential to that movement, the group also displayed at times a quiet sound as oppossed to their jaw breaking heaviness, thus showing the variation of the HM sound. I think Stained Class to be one of their best. I think the movement really starts here with them, but of course there were other groups such as the Scorpions who were doing similiar stuff just as well and running parallel to them.

Going back further though, then look no further than Black Sabbath, if Judas Priest was the father then Black Sabbath the grand-father. Black Sabbath introduced the riffs that most groups still play variations of, the impending doom of HM and they were precursors of speed metal and also doom metal that many thrash groups would incorporate into their sound after slowing down. They also introduced the satanic imagery and of course like Judas Priest they were from an impoverished area of Birmingham.

Not necessarily going back further but there were a whole host of other groups that as you said above who displayed a heaviness in their sound such as Iron Butterfly, Blue Cheer, Vanilla Fudge etc but I just think these groups just played loud and future HM bands would have just taken influence from these groups.

Groups like Led and Purple were distinctly hard rock but it is here the problems start especially with Purple. I always regard Purple as hard rock but when frontman Blackmore formed Rainbow, is this hard rock or HM because early Rainbow dislplayed the swords and sorcery and fantasy imagery that is associated with HM, also Dio has always been regarded as a classic HM Vocalist but then again his background is distinctly blues (just listen to his stuff with ELF) Then groups like Blue Oyster Cult displayed what has been described as a proto metal sound in the 70`s.

Running parallell to the NWOBHM were their American counterparts, first Kiss and then Van Halen, groups that had the imagery (glam as opposed to the British model) and the riffs fom Van Halen BUT they were distinctly tame compared to their British counterparts and had a commercial sound to their music before 80`s commerialism arrived.

Thanks for the additional info. You're right, there is the issue that many bands are in a grey are, in that they played heavy metal, although not as a general rule, and also that there are many different styles of metal, including the hybrids you point out.

Image is certainly something I left out - and this is a crucial part of the genre (as opposed to the music), although I did mention the album covers.

The sole point of going back before Sabbath is to trace the roots more accurately than other studies have done. I think the roots lie before the Kinks - indeed, the Kinks are not even related to Sabbath except via the riff, and the fact that Van Halen covered them. Does this mean that Metal is rooted in Holst, since "Am I Evil" by Diamond Head is rooted in "Mars, Bringer of War" from The Planets suite?

Possibly - and I have already noted a potential Classical root in Sabbath's formal approaches - but I really want to limit the exploration into Rock music.

Sabbath themselves use something similar in "Children of the Grave" - hence my link to the vid, which shows a faster, less doomy side of Sabbath that was left largely untapped until "Heaven and Hell".

Before Sabbath, there was a band called "Spooky Tooth", who played riffs very similar to those Sabbath played, and were undoubtedly the bands' main influence. Spooky Tooth also wrote "Better By You, Better Than Me", (in)famously included on "Stained Class", which brought Priest a huge amount of publicity, even though it was, on the whole, very unwelcome and unpleasant. Spooky Tooth can't have been alone in playing that style - hence I really want to dig into the harder rock music of the late 1960s - but I also want to find out where that came from.

Your point about Priest is also noted - but note also that the self-titled Sabbath song has this quiet/loud structure, and that the Sabs were also prone to even quieter and far heavier moments (as in "Children of the Grave", "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath" and many more).

As I've noted in another thread, Priest's heavy sound and style has definite precedents in the music of groups like The Scorpions, UFO, The Sweet and Queen - showing the close links between Metal, Glam and Prog.

I want to trace the coming together - as well as the growing apart - of the roots, so we can show how groups as diverse as Bon Jovi and Slayer are essentially playing the same music. If, indeed, they are.

First I want to get at the defining characteristics that link all metal bands, by the simple process of examining the music of the bands that defined the genre, and getting a series of traits - or failing that, a combination of traits that uniquely identify the music and get away from silly, flowery descriptions such as the ones on Wikipedia which are mostly untrue, and almost entirely linked heresay rather than thoroughly researched (since Original Research is banned from Wikipedia articles!).

I've crippled myself for time again... back later! Thanks again for the useful points. It's contributions like this which are going to make this thread a success!

Just the other day I was thinking about the cover songs that certain bands do, most notably metal Bands. For example, I was listening to "Your Arms, My Hearse" by Opeth and on it (My extended version) were two covers, one by Celtic Frost and the other By Iron Maiden, which to be fair are the type of covers you`d expect them to do. If you look at Slayer or Metallica and their covers stuff, often it includes punk bands again obvious choices and all stuff that would`ve have influenced them, but a lot of the time, metal groups do covers which seemingly are quite surprising! Van Halen in their early days were a good example of this, the Kinks cover was a good choice and they did it well, because the original song had the riffs ready made for a HR or HM outfit. But how do you account for their version of Dancing in the Street my Marvin ***e, not exactly material for a HM outfit! I think the US metal groups certainly had a pop sensibility that their British counterparts at that time didn`t. Saying that though, Judas Priest did a cover of the Joan Baez song "Diamonds & Rust"!!! in their early days.

As for the quiet moments, yes you`re correct as Sabbath did them to startling effect especially on "Master of Reality" Probably their best album.

I think anybody can go back and look at groups like Spooky Tooth and Budgie etc and like Sabbath they were playing a brand of HM/HR that was largely undefined in its era, and it was only years later that their music would receive its correct label. The reason people say that metal started with Sabbath, is that they were quite simply one of the biggest bands in the world and nearly all current metal outfits would`ve grown up listening to them, whereas other groups like Spooky Tooth and Budgie were far less known and largely forgotten by all, except of course for the hardcore enthusiast. It`s kind of like saying Britpop (Oasis, Blur etc) began with the Beatles and the Kinks etc. But any enthusiast could go back further, therefore some kind of line has to be drawn.

I think to say HM started with Sabbath and that Judas Priest were the first proper HM band to be fairly correct, from the viewpoint that there has to be some kind of defined starting line. Metallica and some of the other thrash bands of the time were credited with creating thrash, but anybody can go back further and point to Motorhead or Venom, point being there has to be some kind of starting position otherwise you can keep going back.

The comparison between Bon Jovi and Slayer is very valid. Bon Jovi like most of the glam metal/rock groups of that era had largely based themselves on Aerosmith (distinctly hard rock) and picked up metal riffs thanks to Van Halen and trashy glamour thanks to the New York Dolls and they along with Guns n Roses, Def Leppard, Whitesnake, Motley Crue etc constantly crossed the HM/HR line from time to time (Def Leppard you could say were from HM roots whereas Guns n Roses distinctly HR roots) but in general the same type of music fan that liked one would probably like the other.

Slayer on the other hand, were largely a reaction to the trashy west coast metal 80's scene and helped HM restore its agressiveness and masculinity if you like, and they were certainly a world away from Bon Jovi, their influences would have been Sabbath, Priest, Maiden and any other logical groups but they also would`ve have largely been influenced by punk as well, and this in some respects is the link between them and groups like Bon Jovi. Slayer and groups like them took the masculine parts, the agression and the hardcore whereas Bon Jovi and groups like them, took the feminine parts, the glamour etc.

This is the point really - there are accepted lines, and I'm not disputing them, just using them as the base to explore; The thing with Spooky Tooth is that they were not a minor band - they released several albums and worked with a Classical composer (Pierre Henry) who was pretty influential in pop music himself.

Anyone could go back, and plenty have in the many histories that are dotted about on the Internet and a very few books - but none are specific, except by mentioning particular bands, like The Who and The Kinks, Blue Cheer and so on - but with little real exploration, and little credit to the bands that really paved the way.

Anyone could say that Venom played thrash first, yadda yadda, although it's clear to me that they didn't. You cannot keep going back - someone played 16th note "tremolo" riffs first (probably Brian May of Queen), like someone played with both hands on the neck of the guitar first (the latter was Steve Hackett of Genesis, not Eddie Van Halen, as many like to think! Even Les Paul only played one-handed hammer-on licks, IIRC).


The stuff that happened in the 1980s is reasonably well documented, but again, the histories depend on people who were "there", and "there" was different places for different people, so it tends to be a jumble, with everyone claiming to be an authority but not really being able to describe the music except in exaggerated terms which are and often inaccurate as a result of the exaggerations.

There are loads of loose ends in there to tie together - if you want to accept established histories, then fine. It's possible that all that will happen here is that we'll confirm everything in them - but I doubt it!

There's no point in regurgitating other people's scanty histories - I'm looking to create something with some meat in it and uncover maybe controversial stuff.

Like possibly "Spooky Tooth were the true creators of Heavy Metal" or something along those lines.

I think anybody can challenge the accepted lines of thought and there is always going to be sufficient proof and examples to do so. The accepted lines are there as a guideline only and if somebody wants to say that Spooky Tooth, were the first real HM band with sufficient evidence then its a valid opinion, but people will still constantly dispute that. I think as far as genres go, HM does well in that it has so many sub genres that are constantly being created but of course people will always argue about what fits into which sub-genre, a good example of this is progressive metal (on another thread here) in which there is a wide debate as well. As said above, HM does well with its sub-genres compared to the bands that are usually dumped say into the alternative rock genre, where most of the time half the bands don`t sound very much like each other at all.

I`ve got a metal genealogy where the metal sub-genres are issued like a family tree, since then I`ve really got into metal, as before this it really wasn`t my scene as it were. I disagreed with many of the groups included in each sub-genre on this genealogy back then. Now after several years of listening to metal, I still equally disagree with this family tree, point being its all so subjective.

To be honest with you my knowledge of Spooky Tooth is limited and will now make a point of listening to more of their stuff, but a quick look on wikipedia has them as Progressive rock primarily with not too much mention of HM!!!

A lot of focus has been placed on Spooky Tooth. I think a decent case has been made for their influence on Sabbath, but being a major influence on Priest is much more problematic. First of all, Spooky Tooth had no influence on the speed and dexterity that Priest played at. You have to look at two other sources...blues rock bands that pushed the envelope of musicianship and speed, as well as rock based prog. bands with exceptional musicianship who also experimented with recording and jazz techniques . Both had the desire to be very loud.




Finally, if influence is based on hommages made by younger bands to their elders, I'd point out Megadeth's remake of Jeff Beck's 1969 classic "I Ain't Superstitious".

I've never really thought of them as a part of it to be honest, while all of the NWOBHM stuff was going on they'd basically buggered off to the U.S. to crack that market. Plus they had like a 5 album head start on all the other bands of that era.

Spooky Tooth are fairly clearly a strong root of metal, it doesn't matter how they're classified on Wikipedia - as I noted above, there are many borderline cases and overlaps in all types of music.

Wikipedia is notoriously awful when it comes to its music definitions generally, as it frowns heavily on Original Research, and the links are mostly to fansites who present opinions which are far removed from fact.

This thread is intended as an exploration for amusement, research (and possibly education), not as a direct challenge to the status quo (sic).


Spooky Tooth's second album "Spooky Two" is particularly interesting to me as proto heavy metal. It's not a Prog Rock album at all, it's blues based rock that, for the time, is very heavy, features high voices, and musical aspects that can be heard not only in Black Sabbath, but also other bands of the time, such as Blue Oyster Cult (who formed in 1967, while the Spookies, as a band, formed and toured years earlier), and probably Uriah Heep.

To have influenced those three giants should not go overlooked, IMHO.

This post concentrates on the album "Spooky Two", but their earlier work provides even stronger evidence that this band not only influenced the most influential bands of early/proto metal, but coined the term "Heavy Metal" in the first place. More on that later;


Spooky Two opens with "Waiting For the Wind", a heavy organ drenched riff fest, that has clearly made a break from the blues, and plays about a bit with the structure.

The heavy drum opening is the first unusual feature - remind you a little of Zep?

When the organ kicks in, there are hints of Uriah Heep (Heep were another important proto-metal band... don't believe what you read, and don't get misled by the Roger Dean Covers, Heep were never a Prog Rock act!) and possibly early Yes, with that fat rolling bass sound (again, Yes, in their early days, were a heavy sounding pop group, not Prog like King Crimson!).

Mike Harrison's vocals are very similar to the popular blues rock style singers of the time; Stevie Winwood, Steve Marriot and later Paul Rodgers or even Joe ****er, and the lyrics are decidedly "down", but notably different from the blues;

Lonely is the night
Now that darkness has fallin'
Nothing seems right
And the world is callin'




"Feelin' Bad" is the next track, apparently continuing the "down" theme, but in fact is an uplifting gospel/blues song, strongly reminiscent of The Small Faces, with some proggy and psyche vibes, and "I've Got Enough Heartaches" is another uplifting blues based song, rich in harmony that is quite obviously not even vaguely related to metal.

However, "Evil Woman" (didn't Sabbath record a song with the same name?) is contender for first Metal song, with its long, snaking riffs and ridiculously high voices. that remind me of some of Rob Halford's worst moments. The main riff is suspiciously similar to "Sweet Leaf";




"Lost In My Dream" evokes Prog and Space rock - and I've definitely heard the riff in Blue Oyster Cult's "Before the Kiss, A Redcap" from their debut album.






"That Was Only Yesterday" is another blues number with an uplifting backing, but "Better By You, Better Than Me" is legendary - the main thing that's "wrong" with it is that it lacks the heaviness of "Evil Woman" or "Waitin' For The Wind".

The album is wrapped up with "Hangman, Hang My Shell Upon a Tree", continuing the darker edge of the Spookies music.





No, it's not a pure proto metal album at all, but one or two songs are clear roots and direct influences. I see these as seeds, given their straight tie-ins.

It's not like Van Halen covering "Dancing in the Streets", or Deep Purple adapting "Bombay Calling" by It's a Beautiful Day to create "Child in Time" - Spooky Tooth demonstrably wrote heavy music that other bands probably carried with them in their subconscious rather than making a direct rip-off, and created entire albums or carreers from the offshoots of a single track.

These are the kind of "seeds" I'm looking for, not superficial passing resemblances, incidental covers or hearsay, but stuff we can listen to and acknowledge as part of the growth of metal.

The Spookies history with Heavy Metal goes back further than this album too - most sources cite it as having been released in 1969, but I think that's the US import. The UK edition (or at least, mine!) has 1968 on the label. But there's even better stuff than this in their back catalogue, if you're not already aware of it... :D

On the one hand, yes they were well before the explosion of NWOBHM. But their album "British Steel" Is in many ways one of the pivotal releases of this movement, even though people could argue that its not.

One band that hasn`t really been discussed on here is Budgie, who in many ways were seen as one the major influences on the NWOBHM scene.

I think this is a superb idea, to start at some sort of beginning and assess it from there. Given that you are something of an authority on this subject, its up to you to fire away. In the meantime I`m going to catch up on Spooky Tooth and Budgie.

I think the above point is very valid and for that reason Judas Priest were very unique.

Indeed - there are all these to consider and more.

As far as speed and dexterity are concerned, look no further than Gary Moore and his band Skid Row, who released their debut in 1969 (and yes, they did sell their name to the 1980s hair metal band!). Talking of jazz techniques, there's John McLaughlin and Mahavishnu, not to mention the likes of Allan Holdsworth and a large number of fusion artistes.

First (probably), there's the Progressive Jazz pianist, Lennie Tristano, who invented novel (and advanced) ways of approaching jazz in a structured form - totally unlike Miles Davis "Cool" jazz approach which inspired so many.

Tristano is notable because he and Bill Evans (who worked with Tristano) taught Joe Satriani, who we all know taught a huge number of influential metal guitarists.

As I said, there's a huge amount that has never really been explored in this area, and that's what I want to explore. I'm not an authority on the subject -and that's kind of the point. I'm a bit fed up with "authorities" who babble on about metal but don't really know what the frick they're talking about.

To be perfectly honest, that incudes me, so I really do welcome all the additional input, as it helps keep me on track. I'm so easily sidetracked, as that Spooky Tooth post proves... :D

One immediate problem when people are trying to define heritages and relationships like this is that you don't know how many times a particular trait has appeared on it's own in the history of music. If that sounds confusing, what I mean is that a particular style of playing may have appeared independently in several groups.

Maybe dexterous playing in a metal band could have been inspired by someone like John McLaughlin, but maybe it wasn't. Unless the members have admitted such influence, there's little to go on. People tend to think these things are homologous - that such musical traits can be traced to a common ancestor - but it may often be the human fault of tending to see patterns even where there is none. This is not to say that music doesn't build on the foundations of what comes before it, but it makes sense that if slow playing is the norm, then people are bound to try and play faster. The commonly imagined scenario is then that someone does it first and everyone who does it later takes their inspiration from that pioneer. Of course that's not necessarily the case, they could get the idea on their own - just like the pioneer did.

Anyways, going by actual influence isn't the only option if you want to make a family tree over metal. You could do more of a similarity analysis and just group things together based on how much they're alike in sound and technique. When people try to unravel stuff like this, it's likely a combination of both approaches but I think it could be smart to have in the back of your mind - what are you trying to do here? I think a family tree over metal that included actual influences (if that was possible) would contain a lot of surprises whereas one based on similarity wouldn't. The actual influence tree isn't really possible so you're probably gonna make a similarity tree and correct it with known influences when you can.


Hope I'm not promoting a feeling of futility here, I think such analysis is quite interesting and, of course, coming from a biology background, I would love to see something like a "phylogenetic tree" over music genre(s). In biology, we try to construct these so that they represent actual relationships between organisms but I've yet to see one for music!

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...h_hans.svg.png

Just an idea .. if you want to elaborate on it, I could help. :)

Instead of McLaughlin, I would think Ritchie Blackmore would be the direct link to Priests style. Deep Purple also would strike some catastrophic fear deep in the roots. IE 1974 Burn as well as...

I think a tree, although tempting, is a pretty futile idea - it would never be complete, and you couldn't hope to create all the branches (or twigs, come to that, let alone the individual leaves!). I'm not looking for "patterns", but direct, demonstrable links - like the Spooky Tooth one.

I'm not claiming McLaughlin as an influence on Priest, that was just an example of someone who was already playing electric guitar quickly. I could just as easily have picked Les Paul, who influenced every electric guitarist under the sun.

Black Sabbath, though noted for their slow numbers, also played some uptempo ones, as "Children of The Grave" demonstrates - I picked that piece for a reason.

Priest themselves played some very slow songs on their early outings too - it wasn't all uptempo. Indeed, the real energy didn't come until they got a new drummer, Simon Phillips who filled in on "Sin After Sin", and then Les Binks, of course.

Recall that Sabbath and Priest are very closely linked - Priest were managed by Iommi's management company from around 1974, and Sabbath's producer, Rodger Bain, produced their first two albums.

In 1974, The Scorpions, UFO and Queen were already playing "dextrous" high-energy heavy rock music that is really the "First Wave of Heavy Metal". Uli Roth, Michael Schenker and Brian May all had unique styles - not forgetting Mr Blackmore and the earlier generation, who were also capable of high speeds. "Highway Star" is a particularly energetic Purple track, with that solo rhythm consisting mainly of "chugging" 8th notes, which I've seen constant references to as "proto-thrash".

Purple, of course, sounded very different in the late 1960s - amazingly similar to Spooky Tooth in many ways, as if by co-incidence... the strand leading back to psychedelia is, of course, a very short one, as psych only "started" in 1965.


It's clear that jazz styles have caught on in more recent times, and the influence from jazz runs in a direct line from Tristano to Satriani, even though the music of Satriani and his pupils generally has very little to do with Tristano. To get that link, we'd need to look at more modern metal bands and trace it back.

For now, I'm sticking with Sabbath, and what gave rise to their music before moving on to Priest full time. My main research interest is the mid-late 1960s, although I actually grew up with Glam, NWoBHM and Thrash. The 1960s are particularly interesting to me because they were a kind of melting pot, full of incredibly innovative musicians, most of whom disappeared without a trace, yet left an indelible stamp on modern music.

That's true in a way, you could never include all metal bands in this. You would either have to analyse the relationship of a fewer selected ones or you would have to analyse the relationship between different groups like subgenres.

I think there's a lot of consensus that Sabbath was the first metal band. They were indeed heavy, incorporated dark nihilist themes, and as you stated also played fast and complex. What better time sig. is there than War Pigs? Finally, evolution is often propelled by mutations and in the case of heavy metal, one must mightily factor in Tommy Iommi's finger tips, or lack there of.

Another example of 1969 dark and heavy psychedelica, also covered by Priest.

I Haven't heard you give any credit to The Beatles for their great contribution. The Beatles brought the whole concept of distorted guitars and singing about world issues

I'm trying to think of a Beatles song that predates "Keep On Running" by The Spencer Davis Group - and check out the heavy bass too! It was recorded in 1965, and kicked "Paperback Writer" off the #1 slot in early 1966;



...and, of course, though not as mega-distorted, credit is always given to "You Really Got Me" by The Kinks, released in 1964 - and much "heavier" than anything by The Beatles at the time. Not sure I really agree that it "Opened the Door to Hard Rock", but there's no denying the rifferama;




The Animals were just as important IMHO, as were The Who and The Stones, particularly the latter, with the "Bad Boy" image, which is central to Metal's attitudes.




Check this cover of "Leaving Here" by The High Numbers in 1964 (The High Numbers went on to become The Who!)



(The above is another example of Rock covering Soul, to fuel the earlier implication that Soul plays a part in Metal's history - the earlier citation was Van Halen's cover of "Dancing In The Streets". The original of "Leaving Here" was by Motown artist Eddie Holland, yet it was covered not only by The Who, but 10 years later by Motorhead).


Bad boys The Rolling Stones in 1963, riffing away, with Mick headbanging;




Even badder boys, and root of one of the heaviest sides of metal - The Pretty Things in 1964;




The original Heavy Metal riff, one year before The Kinks (check out the 3rd Sabbath track I posted, "Children of The Grave"!). The music was an original composition, realised by Delia Derbyshire in 1963;




Montrose were mentioned earlier - here's the original of "Good Rockin' Tonight", from 1945 (before the "invention" of Rock and Roll!) by Roy Brown, sounding a bit like Elvis...



No, it's got nothing to do with metal, except that it's at the very foundations of Rock and Roll, the genre that eventually gave rise to metal - and we can comfortably skip over Elvis and all that nonsense. This was first!

Elvis had a some "bad boy" mixed in with the wholesomeness, which was more potent back then, especially against his entirely good boy UK "rival", Cliff Richard, and I think that's got a little significance - but there were far badder guys in rock and roll, especially Gene Vincent.




But it's obvious that 1963/4 was where rock and roll became something a bit darker and harder, and from 1965-9, it got darker still, culminating with Sabbath in 1970.

Around the time of Sabbath, there are plenty of bands that get overlooked or miscategorised as "Prog" - like Uriah Heep, High Tide, Harsh Reality, Bakerloo, May Blitz, Warhorse and Wishbone Ash (and plenty more besides), but it's the period 1963-5 that's really interesting here, as there are many, many bands that recorded demos and did not make it who are well worth a listen as formative to the heavy metal style and sound.

Maybe there's something pre 1963 that I've overlooked here?

I don't mean a song that a metal band covered - there are 1,000s of those, and we all know the huge influence of the likes of Chuck Berry, Eddie Cochran and so on - I mean something with a distinctly Metal attitude or style.


...and I'm going to be the one that posts this;




Am I Evil?

:D

So I was trying to think of a song that predates "Keep On Runnin'" - I mean DUH!!!

The Rolling Stones' "Satisfaction" (1965) is the first big hit to use the Maestro FZ-1 Fuzz Tone, from one of the biggest contributors to the Metal tone, Gibson (Faster than you can say Steven Tyler!).




I had an interesting bout of archeology here, unearthing the earliest use of fuzz;

Turns out that session guitarist Grady Martin plugged into a dodgy channel in the console during the recording of Marty Robbins (best known for his "Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs LP, which is a must-hear) hit "Don't Worry";



Interestingly, it turns out that Pete Townsend is a bit of a Marty Robbins fan - but more of Pete later...

Later that same year (although the Robbins track was recorded in 1960!), Ann Margaret released this rather tasty ballad, with deliberately fuzzed guitar;




...and the year after, The Ventures released this, using the first Fuzzbox;



- a good 2 years before The Kinks :D


Mind you, plenty of hits come up referring to Johnny Burnette's interpretation of the classic "The Train Kept a-Rollin'" (also later covered by Motorhead);



It has to be said, though, that you can search further back and find "fuzzy" guitar sounds from bluesmen playing through overdriven amps...


Talking of overdriven amps, the big name in Metal is, of course Marshal.

Both James Marshalls, in fact.


What?


Jim Marshall began tring to pedal his wares in the early 1960s, essentially by copying Fender gear, but ending up with a "hotter" sound. This was noticed by Pete Townsend (see how it KEEPS coming back to The Who?), who had the first "Marshall stack", and used it from 1965-67 - see and hear it in this footage :D



The other BIG famous early adopter of the Milton Keynes amp maestro was Eric Clapton, who, together with his Gibson Les Paul, brought the big sound to The Bluesbreakers in 1966;



Clapton's more famous metal link is through his group, Cream, that he founded after leaving The Bluesbreakers the next year. Gotta love Cream;




Of course, the guy who (technically!) jumped on the bandwagon, but really made Marshall Amps (and fuzzboxes!) famous - as well as working with manufacturers to improve the products (allegedly, all Hendrix's roadies were given training in maintaining Marshall amps - and Lemmy was one of Hendrix's roadies, although I have yet to ascertain whether Lemmy did, in fact, get this training - nice solid link if it's true!) was Jim's namesake, James Marshall Hendrix.

The clip I chose doesn't show any Marshall amps, it shows mostly Jimi - but hey, it's a mind-blowing clip!




There's an additional link here to my earlier post - in the beginning, Hendrix was managed by Chas Chandler, manager of The Animals - but let's not get into later links with Hendrix. Just about everybody in rock at the time either jammed with or was inspired by Hendrix, because he was that sort of guy and loved to spread it around.

He even covered Cream's "Sunshine of my Love" and several Beatles' numbers, including performing (and improvising around) Sgt Peppers' Lonely Hearts Club band one week after the album was released - such was his genuine admiration for his contemporaries.

Jimi didn't play metal as we know it (too cheerfully coloured, and not quite fantastical enough - too "Blues Rock" of the "up" variety and too improvised), but his influence easily and tangibly stretched into the NWoBHM and beyond, before Black Sabbath became such a major root in Metal (they were actually quite a minor influence on NWoBHM bands).

Certifi1ed asked:
"Maybe there's something pre 1963 that I've overlooked here?
... I mean something with a distinctly Metal attitude or style."

Schubert's 'Erlkoenig' and 'Tod und das Maedchen' - 2 classic doom metal songs! Seriously though, I just wanted to say that reading this thread has been quite educational.

Can't say I know Doom Metal well enough as a genre to comment - the 16th note tremolo drone is kinda thrashy in flavour, but the lyrics of Erlkoenig are Prog Rock, surely? There is a little-known Krautrock band from the early 1970s called Erlkoenig - and their one and only album is actually rather good.

Tod und das Machen is largely in D minor - for centuries, traditionally the key of Death (and used by Mozart for both his haunting Requiem and his "horror story" Don Giovanni), so I guess it kinda qualifies...

After all, it was metal uber-God Nigel Tufnell who said "I find D minor to be the saddest of keys..." as he demonstrated his incomplete trilogy "Lick My Love Pump" to Marty DiBergi.

Seriously - it's always good to dig out the Classics - can you provide a stronger link? Is there a particular Doom band whose music directly links back to Schubert, or is this a more generic thing?

I wasn't being completely serious about Schubert's music being metal. However, neither of those two songs would be out of place on a doom metal album. The themes (especially in Erlkoenig) are completely metal: riding through a storm at night, menacing supernatural beings, and death.

Cirith Ungol had 'Toccata in D Minor' on their King of the Dead album.

I remember listening to someone's record by Erlkoenig (the band) a long time ago. Good, but I don't remember much else.

I still think that sounds like Prog Rock - although Prog tends to be more convoluted, with stories about little boys being accidentally beheaded, then coming back from the dead to rape the little sister that decapitated them (Genesis - "The Musical Box"), mythical giant plants that wreak havoc on the homelands of their captors (Genesis - "The Giant Hogweed") or mysterious robed figures that walk across the lawn pre-empting the apocalypse (sorry, Genesis again - "Supper's Ready").

Whatever - I'm not really arguing, just stating what I think... I know, it looks like the same thing :o:

You mean J. S. Bach's Toccata? The one that Ekseption covered?




Then Sky?



:D


Cirith Ungol are an incredibly underrated metal band - Fire and Ice is a lost classic, IMHO. I'll have to track down King of the Dead, as I don't know it.


I can go earlier than J. S. Bach (but admittedly by cheating) - how about Carl Orff's "Carmina Burana" (specifically "O Fortuna")?

I know Orff wrote it in the 20th Century, but the songs were written in the 13th Century, and deal with life, luck and death - one is even written from the point of view of a swan roasting on the fire, witnessing all the champing teeth and suchlike. Fine fayre for metal, despite having been written by monks.

However, Ozzy and a host of other metal bands have used it as opening music, ever since its appearance in 1980s cult horror film "Omen".

French Prog Rock band Magma got a lot of mileage out of Carmina (couldn't find the clip I wanted, but this is just excellent and may turn metal fans onto this great if somewhat wierd band;




Personally, I think that Verdi's Requiem has a lot more mileage in it than has so far been exploited by the metal community;




...and no-one has ever come close to the raw scariness of Penderecki's "Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima"




...well, maybe the film that gave Black Sabbath their name...




Films are another good source of inspiration for metal - Metallica's "One", which launched them into superstardom, had a video based around the film "Johnny Got His Gun", which in some ways reminded me of scenes from Pink Floyd's "The Wall".

There must be plenty of old horror flicks to dig into :eek:

I remember seeing a dvd many years ago about Sabbath, where I think Ozzy or Tony Iommi stated that the band were sat in a cafe in Birmingham one day thinking about ideas and names for the group, when one of them remarked on the queue for the nearby cinema that was showing old horror flicks, the group then discussed the importance and influence of horror films on the general public and from there the image of the group was developed, point being that the whole thing seemed rather spontaneous.

Black Sabbath, the name of the 1963 Mario Bava horror film.

So far I've backtracked from Black Sabbath a little - but I think that their debut album needs a bit of exploring, because nothing appears in a vacuum. Spontaneous as much of it was (as with almost every band in the mid 1960s-early 1970s), there must have been some kind of darker undercurrent that culminated in Black Sabbath.

However, as I said earlier, Sabbath didn't really have that much of a direct influence on the NWoBHM, which is where the rise of Heavy Metal as we now know it starts.

NWoBHM bands typically had a gritty, street brawler type of sound, many bands featuring covers of Rock and Roll classics in their sets, and the pentatonic scale being the one of choice for guitar solos.

Conversely, this was the time when that tradition was being broken away from, and most metal bands I can think of from that time included songs that verged on Prog Rock, particularly on their debut LPs - the music really was very exploratory, before bands began to have chart hits.

The example band I chose to represent the NWoBHM, Iron Maiden, are the best depiction of this process at work;

Their first two LPs are chock full of intricate compositions, some even suggesting Classical connotations, yet the music is downright dirty - the music of a down to earth street level band, not some pretentious Prog Rock noodling.

It's notable that the minor pentatonic is still there in the solos, although these feature more experimentation with deep whammy dive bombs, but the blues is conspicious only by its absence in the riff structures - and the speed quotient is up several fold.

Maiden's cues seem to be Judas Priest and the energy of Punk Rock, and the lyrical subject matter is aggressive - as is the band's image, with the leather jackets and heavily studded wrist bands that were synonymous with Metal in the late 1970s-early 1980s.




It seems quite a leap from Black Sabbath, but putting Priest into the equation, the progression makes a little more sense and some of Maiden's influences become clear;




Particularly when you consider what Priest were doing before "Sin After Sin";



Here the Sabbath connection is plain to hear.


However, the importance of UFO should not be underestimated;



OR The Scorpions;




...especially the latter - the Black Sabbath connection (if there is one) is very hard to hear - the influence on Uli's guitar work is plainly Hendrix - yet this is without doubt Heavy Metal from 1974 - look, there are the Marshall amps, Gibson guitars, fuzz boxes and everything!

And from 1973, The Sweet have everything that typified some NWoBHM bands - and the music is surprisingly complex and tribal sounding - reminding me very much of Iron Maiden (as posted above).




From 1972, Deep Purple demonstrate the crossover from Hard Blues-based Rock to chugging Metal - replete with Townsend-alike Marshall stacks;



1971 - the inimitable Pink Fairies, bringing the energy into metal. There's a very important link in a different metal chain that I hinted at earlier, rooted in the Pretty Things, but that's for a different post;



1970 - Wishbone Ash (any excuse!)



1969 - Colosseum's "Valentyne Suite" - very dark sounding, with fuzzed guitars and jazz tonality several miles away from the blues, with lots of chromatic movement.



1968 - Fifty Foot Hose



also 1968 - Blue Cheer




1967 - Pink Floyd




Before 1966 - "heavy" beat bands and the stuff I posted earlier - it all starts with Floyd. Or The Who. Or The Ventures.

Heavy Metal originating in Surf Music? I think not!.

I posted the Blue Cheer vid simply to show that while BC had the energy, aggression and volume, the reason I don't think they have anything to do with Metal is their lack of skillz - even though there were plenty of metal bands who started out like Blue Cheer, most learned how to play... :D

Here I want to tie up the Pretty Things link to metal - and it's a good one, no matter how tenuous. To be fair, the link is the scene that the PTs were part of, far more than the band themselves.

The Pretty Things were part of a notorious drug-riddled scene far removed from Swinging London and Carnaby Street - and very little to do with the Summer of Love - although the "Free Love" thing was always good.

The Ladbroke Grove area of London threw up some amazing characters, including one John Alder, who originally came from Essex, and had played in numerous bands - earning himself a nickname from his curly hair and the bottles of Twink lotion that people kept sending him, and a band name very early on - in 1964, his band was called The Fairies.

Twink played on The Pretty Things' Psych/Prog Rock Opera "S.F.Sorrow", psychedelic nutters "The Aquarian Age" and with Keith West's band Tomorrow (including on their most famous hit "My White Bicycle" before recording his own Space/psych album "Think Pink" in 1970.

For "Think Pink", the band re-recorded The Aquarian Age's number "10,000 Words in a Cardboard Box", which is well worth a listen, even if it's not metal, because it's at the very root of Space Rock;



The musicians that featured on this album went on to become the Pink Fairies, with Mick Farren and Steve Took of The Deviants.

Also wandering around in this scene, desparate to get a band together was a guy from Wales, with a priest for a father, who had been in a band called The Rockin' Vicars, and regularly borrowed money from people using the phrase "Lemme a quid" or "Lemme a fiver".

This dude got a slot roadying for Jimi Hendrix, who was a regular to the Ladbroke Grove area (sadly, Hendrix ultimately died there), then formed a very dark Indian Tabla styled group called Sam Gopal, who released an amazing album called Escalator.

You may recognise the vocal and bass styles :D




This dude then split Sam Gopal, and joined fellow Ladbroke Groovers, Hawkwind - whose contribution to metal is vastly underrated;






(Hawkwind are/were so much more than a Space Punk Prog band)


...and of course, I'm talking about Ian "Lemmy" Kilmister.





BTW, two of the Pink Fairies, Larry Wallis and Duncan Sanderson, teamed up with Lemmy when Hawkwind kicked him out in 1975. The band was going to be called "Bastards" - my understanding is that this was in reaction to Hawkwind - but UA wouldn't allow this. And neither would UA release the bands album. Much too scary.

Only when the band had success with Chiswick did Bronze sign them up, and UA cynically released "On Parole" in order to cash in on their mistake.




Of course, the classic Motorhead lineup was the one that appeared on their self-titled debut from 1977, which almost didn't get released.

Nice live track from 1979 here - I've always thought that bands who were "influenced by Motorhead" just didn't get what Motorhead were all about, and just where the "speed" lies in their music.




Note: In between The Pink Fairies and Motorhead's first lineup, Guitarist Larry Wallis joined UFO in 1972, before being replaced by an 18 year-old Michael Schenker in 1973. Schenker, of course, cut his guitar teeth with The Scorpions in the previous year with his brother Rudolph. He later joined Thin Lizzy briefly in 1977, to play alongside Gary Moore.

It all ties in very incestuously :D

I mentioned Gary Moore at the end of my last post, and in some other threads.

I'm giving him his own post not only because I've met him a few times, but because his is an interesting and linked past to that of the growth of Metal. I'll also bring in Jethro Tull and Andrew Lloyd Webber;

The heavier side of Blues rock plays an important part in metal, despite - or maybe because of - the move away from it by the more experimental NWoBHM bands, the kicking to death of it (and its highbrow cousin, Prog Rock) by Punk, and its death rattle in the aggressive hands of Thrash Metal.

As we saw earlier, Eric Clapton appears to rule the roost here, with his Marshall Stack and impeccable Blues credentials, having briefly appeared with the Bluesbreakers in 1966. In 1967, of course, he formed heavy/power Blues Rock trio Cream, whose style was a great influence on the basic musical style of Jimi Hendrix -the two groups fed off each other mutually in many ways.

Blues Rock bands sprang up all over the place, and "heavy" ones were not uncommon - the heavy sound and the Hendrix and Clapton styles became more and more popular, with even the Beatles succumbing to their charm ("Helter Skelter" being their heavy tour-de-force).

We famously get our first reference in a song to "Heavy Metal" in Canadian rock band Steppenwolf's "Born To Be Wild", recorded in 1968, but rising to fame in 1969 via the film "Easy Rider".

However, that is NOT the first reference to Heavy Metal in the context of rock music, as most people mistakenly believe. Nope. That credit belongs to Spooky Tooth, who used it in 1967. In 1967, ST had just changed their name from The V.I.P.s to Art, and recorded a fantastic Heavy psych album (probably THE heaviest) called "Supernatural Fairy Tales".

Well, the guys who designed their striking psychedelic album cover

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_YYPGjGon3Z...ytales%2Bf.jpg

(and many other album covers and band posters that exemplified the 1960s psychedelic scene) were a small team called Hapshash and the Coloured Coat, who decided they wanted to make a record. Sadly, they couldn't actually play, so they dragged the members of Art and a few other buddies into a studio, forced them to take lots of drugs and made this album;

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_5flo5SmVx-...ured+Coat2.jpg

Squint carefully, groovers - underneath Hapshash and the Coloured Coat is the legend "Featuring The Human Host and The Heavy Metal Kids". The Heavy Metal Kids was Art's pseudonym.

As I've been hinting all along, Spooky Tooth were the first Heavy Metal band - literally.


I nearly forgot - Gary Moore.

Gary bought his first "proper" guitar, a 1959 Gibson Les Paul, from Peter Green of the Bluesbreakers (later Fleetwood Mac), when Green famously quit FM.

In 1967, the 17 year-old Gary Moore joined a band called Skid Row in Ireland, with Brendan Shiels on bass and Noel Bridgeman on drums. Oh, and a guy called Phil Lynott did vocals for a while before Shiels decided that the group should be a power trio and booted Lynott out, taking on the vocals himself. By way of compensation, he gave Lynott some bass lessons...

Gary was VERY impressive - listen to his shredding;



I'm not sure what he did between 1971 and 1972, but in 1973, he cut an album called "Grinding Stone", (which is rather good, coming in somewhere between Santana, Spooky Tooth, Mahavishnu and Wishbone Ash on steroids);



He then joined Thin Lizzy, with his old pal Phil Lynott in 1974;




In 1976, he joined Colosseum II, successors to Colosseum I (see earlier post). This is some AWESOME shredding;




...and Colosseum II teamed up with composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, who had written a set of Variations on Paganini's Caprice in A minor (having lost a bet) and scored them for rock band. Now he needed musicians who were capable of doing justice to the name Paganini;



...check out the Variations in their entireity - they're amazing, and you get to hear more of Gary than the chugging rhythm and hot tones in the above clip - some real fireworks.


Moore teamed up with Phil Lynott again in 1978 - with Paul Cook and Steve Jones of The Sex Pistols (talk about Metal meeting Punk), in a collaboration called The Greedy Bastards. Unbelievablly, this collaboration had a Christmas hit (under the tamer name, The Greedies) with a medly called "A Merry Jingle".

This re-union was hugely fruitful, and Moore and Lynott (with Thin Lizzy this time!) produced the stunning album Black Rose in 1979;




Moore also put out his own album, entitled "Back on the Streets" (with the help of his pals from Thin Lizzy!), and had a hit with the stunning, stunning, stunning anthem (written by Phil) "Parisienne Walkways", with a legendary guitar solo;




1979 is as recent as I go for the time being :D

As a quick summary in bullet points, from the very beginning;

1. We've charted a little of the metal attitudes back to the beginning of Rock and Roll, and seen how metal music grew from this energetic interpretation of the Blues, thanks to the sudden growth of the underground music scene in the mid 1960s.

2. We've tracked the accidental "discovery" of fuzz back to 1960, and noted that the overdriven sound came originally from the Bluesmen that predate Rock and Roll, although the fuzzed sound notably did not become widely used until 1965, when The Rolling Stones used it in "Satisfaction".

3. We've seen that Marshall Amplifiers and the almost simultaneous introduction of Gibson's Fuzz box, together with Gibson's legendary humbucker-driven guitars are pretty much what made the metal sound in 1965 - and that The Who were first with this combination.

4. We've seen the music grow from seeds planted as early as 1963 (the insistend rhythms and dark tones of Delia Derbyshire's "Dr Who" theme) - or possibly earlier in Horror films (we haven't really explored those yet), but the earliest song I could find that sounds distinctly like heavy metal is probably Steppenwolf's "Born To Be Wild" (1968), or arguably some of the material put out by Cream and Hendrix. I think that The Bluesbreakers, The Yardbirds, The Pretty Things and The Who were absolutely instrumental in bringing this music about, but I don't think that any of their stuff was "it", so we can't pin this date any earlier than 1967.

5. We've seen the name and the style grow from Spooky Tooth to Black Sabbath to Judas Priest, via Blues Rock, Space Rock and Glam Rock, but also seen that the style was only loosely related to Black Sabbath for well over a decade. In fact, Black Sabbath's revolutionary tritone-based riffs which are now a commonplace feature of metal were almost non-existent in all but the wildest of Prog Rock bands. We need to move into the late 1970s-early 1980s to see the rise of the tritone in metal and the emergence of the Modern Metal sound.

6. We can already see that metal is made up of a whole variety of sounds and surface styles, not to mention lyrical themes and technical playing ability, ranging from completely unable to play right across the board to uber-virtuoso. This rules out most generalisations you will ever read about Heavy Metal - despite the familiarity of its sound, it cannot easily be generalised. This diversity deserves an exploration which will probably hit several posts.

7. We can also see how musicians from other fields of music (I'll avoid the word "genres" simply because I hate the word!) have come into metal and brought aspects of those fields into metal - but metal doesn't flow the other way. Once you bring classical or jazz music into metal, it becomes part of metal, not the other way around. This is peculiar, because composers brought jazz into Classical, and it remained Classical (Debussy), and Classical into jazz (Gershwin) without altering the jazz nature. This would be a very interesting aspect to explore further.

So we are more or less upto the emergence of Black Sabbath as a group that has taken on a large amount of some of the previous influences either knowingly or unknowingly.

I`ve still yet to listen to Spooky Tooth but will do this weekend.

As of yet, nobody has challenged your notion of Spooky Tooth as the first heavy metal outfit (I assume this is the notion that you are trying to put forward) So unless nobody challenges it, time to move forward.

I`m surprised Budgie hasn`t been mentioned as they are often regarded as a prime influence on the NWOBHM.

I'm not attempting to make any kind of formulations, this is a purely exploratory exercise, as well as a good excuse to listen to great music, while thinking about where metal came from.

I haven't gone into a lot of detail about Sabbath, mainly because, up to 1979 their influence is relatively minor; You can hear it strongly in Judas Priest, which could be explained by the fact that both bands were from Birmingham, had the same producer, and Iommi's management company looked after Priest (and mysteriously saddled them with Gull records, instead of getting them signed to the much more reputable Vertigo!).

I'm trying to think of a band, let alone an early metal band that shows their influence, apart from some of their immediate contemporaries, like Vertigo stable mates May Blitz, who split up after their 2nd album.

Among the NWoBHM bands, there simply don't seem to be any - except Dio and Blizzard of Oz, for obvious reasons!


I'll dedicate a post to charting Sabbath's emergence and influences, and another to exploring their possible influence on other bands - but Iommi's riffing style remained unique for at least 10 years. There really was no-one like Sabbath!

It might be better to look at the other, less obvious bands first, and look at the bands that they influenced up to 1979.

It's just something that seems to leap out as you listen to music from that time.

I'm not saying Spooky Tooth were first, just noting their creativity and direct influence on the style. I'm trying hard here not to form opinions or present opinionated nonsense - just factual nonsense...

What I did say in a kind of tongue-in-cheek way was that they were the first band to use the term "Heavy Metal" in the context of rock music, beating Steppenwolf, who are traditionally given that credit, by a whole year.

They also go back further than Art and Hapshash/Heavy Metal Kids, as far as 1964 and even earlier - so they're interesting from that point of view.

At the moment, there is a load of other stuff from the 1960s left to explore - and 1965-1970 is my favourite time in music, despite being too young to remember it.

I've only lightly touched on the use of fuzz, and exposed metals absolute roots in blues/rock and roll and psychedelia (no surprises, since most rock styles are rooted in psyche) - and the more surprising area of surf/garage, and plan to go into that in a bit more depth, as no metal history I'm aware of even considers that influence.

There's more, of course - Glam Rock didn't start in the 1970s, it started in the 60s, and it's a huge factor that most people gloss over.

I will definitely explore Budgie, but they're a 1970s band, and there are loads of those who had an impact on modern metal. I remain unconvinced that they were a "prime influence" on the NWoBHM, but they were obviously an influence on Metallica, like so many others. There is the interesting link with Sabbath and Priest that Rodger Bain also produced Budgie's debut.

That's the point of this thread really, to discover who the real influences and influencees were, and look at solid links in the chain (rather than vague claims of being influenced by so-and-so) - as well as to check out some excellent music - even if it only confirms what you already know.

As I said above, I'm trying to present this in an exploratory, non opinionated way, and I'm bound to miss something - so these inputs are really useful.

I think exploration is vital to all types of things but at some stage its usually useful to have a direct reference point and probably Judas Priest are the most obvious for sound, image and impact on the general public whereas most HM groups will probably quote Black Sabbath as their primary inspiration (with caution)

It`s kind of like Hard Rock, most bands were influenced by Zeppelin and Aerosmith but we both know that the influences started long before that.

Of course it's useful to have reference points, and I've used Sabbath and Priest as the main kicking off points along with Maiden.

You say "most HM groups will probably quote Sabbath as their primary inspiration". This is not the approach I'm trying to take here - it's a speculative guess, and that's not what I'm trying to do here.

If I was to sepculate, I would wonder how much of that is true about the NWoBHM bands, many of whom were probably equally influenced by other bands, such as Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Hendrix and other proto metal bands.


Factually, but unsatisfyingly generally, the NWoBHM was a time of immense importance in the development of the metal sound we have now, and at the time that was Heavy Metal - and it's still called that, even though it sounds very different to Metal today.

The NWoBHM is very interesting because of the crossover between "Hard" or "Heavy" Rock and Metal. There was no actual borderline, yet there were distinct differences.

Sabbath and Priest were just part of the landscape of the NWoBHM along with fellow old-timers Motorhead, UFO, Rainbow, Whitesnake, Thin Lizzy et al - and all those bands trod the border between metal and hard rock.

The huge numbers of new bands and styles that sprang up during the NWoBHM had very little do do with Sabbath or their style, and plenty to do with the other "Old Wave" bands, but it was notable that the highly talented Diamond Head were cited as "The New Led Zeppelin", and would have drifted into obscurity without Metallica, and it ended up that the mostly talentless Venom were the most influential of all the NW bands after Maiden.

The NWoBHM gave rise to Metallica, who are mostly responsible for the sound and style of a large number of modern metal bands. Metallica cite many, many fairly diverse bands as influences, but certainly, Sabbath's tritonic approach and drop-tuning are notable in their overall style until Load.

You've reminded me that I've mostly confined my explorations to British bands... to be rectified :D

Certif1ed said:

"Cirith Ungol are an incredibly underrated metal band - Fire and Ice is a lost classic, IMHO. I'll have to track down King of the Dead, as I don't know it."

I continue to read this thread with interest. Yes, Cirith Ungol did a cover of Bach's Toccata. They are a very underrated band.

This talk of medieval things reminds me that I need to investigate some 'medieval metal': Corvus Corax, Subway to Sally, etc. Olden times have provided metal with quite a bit of imagery: plagues, crusades, castles, witchcraft, devils, knights, momento mori, etc. I'd bet some of those old monks could have created some great metal if given the opportunity! And what is doomier than Gregorian chants, gothic cathedrals, and old churchyards?

In the mid to late seventies as you say there was certainly a very thin line between HM and HR if any at all. With the exception of Motorhead all of the above were in many ways more hard rock oufits who long before the eighties arrived were bringing radio friendlly hard rock sounds to listeners along with keeping their core hard rock fans company. When looking at entries on these groups 90% of the time they willl have a hard rock and heavy metal entry next to them also add in the earlier Uriah Heep along with the Scorpions and you kind of have the principal groups 70`s hard rock,that at times were labelled heavy metal and certainly influenced nearly all the HM that would later follow.

Another point of note is the vocal delivery of singers at the time that ranged from shrieking, whaling and moaning for example Ozzy Osbourne, Ian Gillan and Robert Plant to the much cleaner delivery exampled by Dave Byron, Phil Lynott or Dio. For this reason Rob Halford is probably the best reference point for HM singers as he was neither of any of the above and fitted somewhere in between with his powerful and high speed vocal delivery. I don`t think it was until hardcore punk that we were really introduced to singers that you actually couldn`t understand a word they were singing about (maybe excepting AC/DC or Motorhead here but that`s very subjective) a style that would later go on and influence various thrash anddeath metal groups

I think Diamond Head are a good reference point here and in many ways were quite distinct to the rest of the NWOBHM outfits and certainly had an ability that many of their contemporaries didn`t, I think the new Led Zeppelin tag is in some ways correct but I think that has much to do with their third album Canterbury which like Led`s third was a change of direction.

I think the influence that they had on Metallica is also quite strange in many ways. Metallica the first wave of thrash metal who like most of the thrash bands were performing with a heavy dosage of speed, agression and shouted or growled lyrics whereas Diamond Head were really just the opposite of all this, great medium paced Heavy metal or hard rock!!! (again debatable as to what they were) songs with plenty of melody, interesting changes in sound and easy to distinguish lyrics basically a rock sound that was enjoyable to most that were exposed to it, very much like Zeppelin from that perspective. In fact the only song of theirs that hints of any real agression is "Am I Evil?" probably the DH song most played by Metallica.

This is a good thread to follow - and there's stuff like this from the 1960s that's well worth digging into, like the Jason Crest song below, which is not Metal, obviously, but damned freaky - a kind of horror version of "Tomorrow Never Knows";




I can't stand "labels" or "genres" - I'm trying to focus on reality as far as humanly possible.

As far as I can hear, both the Scorpions and Uriah Heep played some heavy metal, some ballads and some Prog Rock - and the Scorps played some Space rock.

Neither band fits a single category because their musical output was so varied - but certain things about the Scorpions, particularly the riffs and lead guitar playing, and particularly the style of Michael Schenker is fundamental to the NWoBHM style - more so than Black Sabbath.


Aye - I've only concentrated on guitar sound so far - there's a lot to consider with the various vocal styles.

Drummers and bassists too - and the notable absence of keyboards or instruments other than guitar from "traditional" heavy metal, or their role when they do crop up is another complete topic.


The Led Zep reference is not my own, it was in Sounds back in 1979, at a time when most of us hadn't even heard Diamond Head (their first LP was limited to 1,000 copies, so this isn't surprising!).

Obviously, this was significantly before Canterbury - and I can hear how it might apply to "Living on Borrowed Time", which in itself is a massive toning down and bluesing up from "Lightning to the Nations" (not the reissue that most people know, but the original limited pressing).

The original "LTTN" (The "White" album - it's telling that it's acquired such a prestigious nickname!) contains gems like "Helpless" and "The Prince" - both of which Metallica covered, and both of which are thrash metal before its "invention".

Not at all - "Helpless" and "The Prince" are both faster (actual thrash) and far more aggressive than "Am I Evil".




If you can, track down a copy of Lightning To The Nations (the original "White Album" version - I think it's been re-issued). It's the original side of Diamond Head that were the most direct influence on Metallica of any band.

Canterbury is an amazing album in many ways - the 50% that isn't radio friendly stuff is really cool and inventive.

I know Diamond Head`s history quite well and to be fair its quite laughable that so many misfortunes struck the band and denied them the success they really warrented.

Canterbury is an album that I really like as well.