For me growing up in the late 80s and 90s, I was listening to just random stuff I found at the record store. I didn't get into metal until about 2000 when I discovered Halford's "Live Insurrection". I bought it because of the cover, and it's still my favourite live album. I knew of bands like Kiss and Motley Crue, Metallica...but it wasn't until I bought that Halford album that I was hooked. THEN I got really into Motley Crue, Kiss, Judas Priest, etc.

Metallica's "One" song is what instantly drew me into the metal genre. I'd heard heavy stuff before, but that song just clicked with me and I've been hooked ever since.

One is an intense song and the music just added to the atmosphere of it. For a lot of years it was the only Metallica song I liked.

A story concerning metal health
 

I got into heavy metal via Blue Öyster Cult. Here is my weird story:

In 1972, when I was 18 years old, I came down with schizophrenia. I was committed to a mental hospital in Sweden for a period of 15 months. I was released from the mental hospital in January of 1974. I was beginning to recover. My recovery from my psychosis was accelerated by a habit which I developed during the first months of 1974. I began listening to my sister´s two BÖC albums for hours on end, every single day of the week! I developed an obsession with the tripped-out metal music of those heavy metal kids from Stony Brook University!

I believe that the music of BÖC was actually good for my "metal health". What happened was that my fascination with the songs on the first two BÖC albums, which I learned by heart, motivated me to focus on something "out there in reality" - namely those weird songs. Instead of spending all my time cooped up in the useless daydreams brought about by my psychosis. So the music of BÖC weaned me off of my habit of daydreaming and induced me to focus on "reality out there".

A couple of years later I developed an interest in other heavy metal bands - primarilly Budgie, Led Zeppelin and Kiss. Later still I began listening to Van Halen, Motörhead, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Deep Purple and other stuff.

But Blue Öyster Cult remains my favorite heavy metal band. I have every single one of their albums as CDs excepting some of the compilations (there is so much overlap on the compilations).

:clap:

When I was 10 years old (1989) I got up at 5am on Saturday morning to watch cartoons. In a bit of amazingly perfect timing when I switched on the TV it faded up from a black screen to the opening of the video for One by Metallica. Completely scared the crap out of me and blew me away. Before then I'd only seen Metallica t-shirts and wondered what they sounded like. Perfect introduction to metal.

Judas Priest was the first band that had a distinctive metal tone and sound to the electric guitar(s) for me.

Black Sabbath.

That was the first metal band that simply blew me away, and that's where my journey started. A bit cliche, but true. I don't specifically remember a song, I think probably War Pigs, and then I purchased a Greatest Hits album from the Ozzy era, and my obsession has been going ever since.

No particular album but several songs.

Slayer - Seasons in the Abyss
Metallica - Damage Incorporated
Death - Spiritual Healing
Sepultura - Dead Embryonic Cells
Napalm Death - Hiding Behind

When I was a kid there was a rock station that had two hours of late night metal once a week. This was back in the early 90's before real metal went mainstream so I was curios back then to what real metal was all about, and NOT Poison and Motley Crew which you could hear anywhere, and I hated. They mostly played early Alice in Chains, Anthrax, and mostly thrash and power metal but a few times they threw in some songs that completely blew my mind. The five above were those songs, and they were the heaviest most insane **** I had ever heard until that point. Growing up in a religious environment the way I did these songs blew my mind. They scared the crap out of me, it was 1992 and I was a kid, but I also could not get enough of them. And the rest is history. :band:

Mom and dad gave me a mix cd when I was a kid and I got stuck on Queen and Deep Purple when I was about 7-8 years old :)

The band that got me into metal? Or, specifically death metal? Probably Cab Calloway's Minnie the Moocher...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mq4UT4VnbE

My favorite performance of the song...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZ5gCGJorKk


:yeah:


Sometimes I wonder why I have the taste in music I have. I don't recall my mom ever listening to that much music. My dad...? He has like one burnt CD that I made for him. Does he listen to it? Nope.

In fact, I can hardly cope without some music in the background. Either that, or I have to have a fan blowing. My dad? He can drive us up to see my brother and he will be in silence for over five hours. I have my mp3 player with me, so it's not monotonous. I cannot believe he can be in such silence for so long without going insane :bonkhead:

I was, definitely, by no means gently ushered into the world of metal. My dad was always a massive metal head, and he used to have Maiden, Metallica, Motorhead and Priest among others blasting out over this old CD stereo type thing he had installed in the corner. I started out hating it and soon turned to bands like Green Day which had a more upbeat vibe and more of a melodic tune; only because it easier on my less experienced ears than a Slayer thrash metal song would.

At the age of about 5 I received my first albumn, American Idiot. I was in love with it but of course, at that age, I wasn't a die-hard fan of any genre. I listened to music spanning many genres like Gary Numan and the Black Eyed Peas.

One day, when I was around 7, I was listening to the stereo in my room and my dad came in and gave me a CD. It was Pearl Jam - Ten. His very words were 'It's good to enjoy different types of music but just try this out, its what got me into what I love'.
I'm sure I can remember those words off by heart solely down to the fact that was the very moment I fell in love with rock, metal and grunge. Alive and Even Flow were the first songs and I was instantly intoxicated. This lead onto bands such as Alter Bridge, Alice in Chains and Nirvana, (AIC is my everlasting love).

Further expanding on this I came across bands like System of a Down, which I adored, which then lead onto Metallica. Now Metallica is really the band that rocketed me off into the world of metal. I found a real love in Metallica, and I think this is due to their melodic tunes and real passion in their songs. After Metallica thrust me into the world of heavier metal, I soon found Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and Anthrax. These three bands were also heavily enforced by my father.

Now my passion took a new course into thrash metal like Slayer, Mastodon, Megadeth and Anvil.
I continue to find new bands and new interests today, and the never ending pathways of metal and rock are what I mostly indulge my free time in these days!

But if I had to pick a single band out of there, that really got me into metal?
It'd have to be Metallica - without them I probably wouldn't have found most of the bands that I know and love today.

My favorite band. Good job, dad!

But don't simply flow down the stream of metal. I always look back onto bands that caused the metal genre to grow: The oldies.

probably The Kinks when I was a little kid in the 80's and oldies radio played You Really Got Me.

that got me into metal. I just didn't know it yet. Punk too

Megadeath.

I guess the first metal band I've heard was Dream Theater. Previously, I'd heard an acoustic tribute album by Pipo & Elo, I think it was Scenes From a Memory. This led me afterwards to the original album and that's how I got into the band. Later on (or maybe at the same time, don't remember so clearly), I began to listen all the classic stuff such as Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Judas Priest, Dio, Iron Maiden and so on.