Teach me to appreciate Metal?

Cafe Society
41

They’re very theatrical all the time, IMO, but as I said: I’m not a fan. Bruce Dickinson has a helluva voice and he loves to use it; so do his mates and Iron Maiden’s fans, so he does. His voice is definitely one of the standout things for the band, but he never stays too long in power metal territory, thankfully.

In my head, Iron Maiden and Judas Priest are indelibly linked as pretty much the top of NWOBHM bands, and I like that I hear so much similarity and so much difference in their music. They’re shufflers for sure, but their songs that I like get turned up when they start moving air.

How about some history? Let’s talk about proto-metal!

Back in 1969, a young guitar player named Richie Wise met a couple of even younger teenagers who could play bass and drums, Kenny Aaronson and Marc Bell. They formed a band called Dust that released 2 albums, an eponymous debut in 1971 and a follow-up called Hard Attack the next year. They broke up soon after, tho, because Wise wanted to write songs and produce records rather than perform; Aaronson would join him in this endeavor and a short time later they helped usher in KISS by producing their first two albums and writing a few of the songs therein.

The drummer liked performing tho and continued his career with a number of acts for another 5 years, including a stint with Richard Hell & the Voidoids, playing on their first album. In 1978, tho, he became known to all as Marky Ramone, a name he would carry for the next 15 years and the name he is still best known by today.

Anyway, Dust was known for being heavy and fast. Marc Bell says on the 2013 re-release liner notes that Richie just kept making him play faster and faster with every take; he couldn’t believe how fast he was playing! This was 1971, mind. They don’t hold a candle to a lot of metal acts today, but for their time, they are pretty up-tempo. The songs are good, too; Richie Wise is a capable tunesmith and player. Aaronson’s bass playing is solid, too. Check out Dust - Love Me Hard.

42

That was really cool!

Ok. So I get what you are saying about maybe not being ready. Fiddles and acoustic instruments were awesome, then the produced stuff came in… It’s a little slick for my taste but yeah good stuff, then the vocals came in and my brain broke. It’s not even that I dislike it, but it’s like it went from being music that I understood to being something entirely different with no transition. Not bad but very confusing.

I see those Lost in Vegas linked to above guys did a reaction to the track, I’m going to see if they felt the same way.

43

“Wild Bill” Hickok
“Buffalo Bill” Cody
“Fuckin’ Bill” Clinton

Part of a proud tradition. Sort of. :slight_smile:

44

I recommend Tiamat’s The Astral Sleep as an introduction to death metal and Summoning’s Stronghold as an introduction to black metal.

45

Ok, so I moved on to The Number of the Beast by Iron Maiden and I am liking it less than Killers. It’s a lot more polished and is missing the teeth in the musical sound that the previous album had. Still not bad. Invaders was pretty fun but I didn’t like Children of the Damned at all and Prisoner I wanted to like but it went too far over the top for me. I’ll finish up the album I have a lot of time to listen to music today and will report back. Dio is next after this unless someone wants to shout out a suggestion for something else first.

46

Once you’ve cut your teeth on classic metal and are working your way up, try on Opeth for size. Definitely prog-metal, sometimes even crazier prog-metal-jazz. Start out with their album Ghost Reveries, or Watershed.

47

Maybe a bit more accessible is Symphonic Metal.

Nightwish

Within Temptation
48

Hush! I’m saving Opeth for him :D; he’s still a few weeks away tho, IMO.

49

So reading up on it, Killers had a different vocalist than Number of the Beast which might explain why their sound seemed to get so suddenly operatic. Number of the Beast also has a problem of me liking the first half of songs a lot, but then not finishing as strong. Everything turns into arena rock at the end. I loved the first half of The Prisoner, Total Eclipse and Hallowed be Thy Name but after that all of them went in a pretty disappointing direction.

So, maybe I’m not actually an Iron Maiden fan. They get to be a little too 80s movie soundtrack metal sounding. I did like the title track and Gangland and mostly liked Run to the Hills and Invaders.

50

the first concert I ever saw was Ronnie James Dio, back in 1985, so I know a little bit about this. Definitely start with Blackmore’s Rainbow Rising, then listen to Blackmore’s Rainbow Long Live Rock and Roll. Then I would head over to the Black Sabbath Dio era albums with Ronnie James Dio: Heaven and Hell and Mob Rules. After Dio went solo he recorded Holy Diver and The Last in Line, which are great albums. Not really a fan of any of his subsequent follow-up albums, he tends to write the same songs about dragons and rainbows over and over again.

51

Start with Rainbow Rising: for me it’s kind of a bridge between Sabbath/Purple/Zeppelin 70s hard rock and later, harder 80s metal, but probably still stands outside the NWOBMH: anyway, a killer band - they degenerated into squabbling and Blackmore firing everybody and went south fast - but not a weak track on the album. If you found later Maiden a little overblown, this may be the stuff for you.

52

To clarify, Rainbow was the band Blackmore formed after he left Deep Purple, with Ronnie James Dio as vocalist: Rainbow Rising was their second album, and Dio left after that to form, well, Dio.

53

I’m enjoying Rainbow Rising. As advertised it feels like it’s a bridge between Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden. I can dig it. I’m kind of surprised I have never heard of them.

I listened to Holy Diver and didn’t finish it. I found it to be a bit of a chore. It feels, to me, exactly like Survivor or Journey or any of those other 80s rock groups I was basically raised to hate. It’s everything my teenage punk self assumed all metal was. Sorry. I can’t listen to it and not picture a sports training montage. Decidedly not for me.

54

Earlier you asked about old Scorpions. I will always recommend The Sails Of Charon featuring guitar master Uli Roth. Considering that this is from the late 70s it has quite an innovative/progressive guitar sound. Scorpions lyrics tend to be awkward in English, as they are German, and it shows here.

55

It’s funny. It feels like every YouTube link I have gone to has put a Lost in Vegas reaction to the same song in the play next lineup.

This is very different than the “Rock Me Like A Hurricane” Scorpions than you hear on the radio. You can hear some Kurt Weill and eastern European folk music influence. It’s pretty cool. I’ll track down more. Consider my mind blown.

I also spent time listening to more Motorhead yesterday listened to Overkill and Bomber which really felt like a breath of fresh air after Holy Diver (again, sorry. I get that people love that album. I don’t understand). Motorhead all sounds the same but when you have a long drive there is something kinda nice about that. Those three albums are absolute keepers.

Who else should I be listening to before moving on to Thrash (thanks map of metal!) Right now I have Metallica Megadeth Anthrax and Slayer lined up to listen to. I am also planning to circle back to Judas Priest Screaming for Vengeance. Am I missing a step?

56

Screaming for Vengeance is awesome, Electric Eye is my favorite Judas song I think. For me, Judas’ first step into the over-the-top, frankly ridiculous awesomeness of Painkiller (the song (What, like three solos? Four?), the album has both hits and misses. Apart from Painkiller I like Night Crawler, All Guns Blazing and Between The Hammer and The Anvil the most, as far as I remember. I can’t stand A Touch Of Evil!).

Slayer is a must, I think. Lots of great albums to choose from. I’d personally skip anything from Metallica after Ride The Lightning, but maybe go as far as Master of Puppets. Thrash will probably play more to your hardcore sensibilities I think. I think it’s time you check out my favorite metal album of all time: Ministry - Psalm 69

As far as further recommendations, have you begun to figure out what elements of metal you like?

57

This is an interesting question. I can’t quite put my finger on what I disliked about Number of the Beast or Holy Diver. On the surface what makes them that different than Killers or Rainbow Rising both of which I liked a lot or for that matter British Steel?

With Motorhead I can tell you exactly what I like. The beat. They drive, they play with an energy that kicks you in your chest. The rhythm section lays it down the track and the rest of the band turns in to a propulsive engine that does not let up. It’s fun. It gets exhausting after a while, but it’s fun. I feel like Rainbow had a bit of that too. I think that it feels like, by focusing so heavily on vocals and guitar, Number of the Beast and Holy Diver sacrificed what made the other stuff engaging for me. It’s slick and it’s virtuosic. Both singers have great voices, but a great voice doesn’t matter that much to me honestly unless it’s being used to improve the song as a whole. A song that is about the singer having a great voice is sort of meh. Same with shredding for the sake of shredding on guitar.

If I gave them more time I might come to appreciate what is going on with the two albums I didn’t like because they are clearly classics. I’m almost embarrassed that I don’t like them (and I almost like the Iron Maiden one). But, yeah. More kick you in the chest, less opera. For now at least.

58

You could check out other NWOBHM bands.

I highly suggest you listen to Venom before you start listening to thrash because thrash prolly wouldn’t have been quite the same without Venom. Slayer in particular cite Venom as a major, major influence. They are the bridge from Motörhead’s speed rock to what we know as thrash music, not quite fitting into either category but obviously a part of both.*

King Diamond would be another good band to listen to, IMO.

When you start in on thrash, I suggest you listen to Anthrax first, then Metallica then Megadeth; save Slayer for last. Stick with OT bands (original thrash) and worry about listening to 2nd Wave Thrash after you tackle nü metal, industrial metal and stoner/doom. Trust me, you’ll appreciate the nuances that the new guys bring to the genre and you’ll be ready for a breath of fresh air after the other genres take up too much space in your head.

I agree that Metallica is best on their first 3 albums (Kill Em All, Ride The Lightning and Master Of Puppets).

After you listen to the Big 4, don’t forget to check out other bands, especially Exodus and Testament and Kreator.

For the record, in case people don’t already know, Slayer is one of my all-time favorite bands. I’ve seen them over a dozen times live. I own all their discography, AFAIK. I’ve watched every interview I’ve ever stumbled across, read every magazine article, etc. IMO they are far and away the best of the OT bands, which says a lot because I think a lot of the stuff recorded back then is still top-of-the-heap material.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t urge you to listen to '80s hair metal bands like Ratt and White Snake and Poison and Extreme and Dokken and Winger and Cinderella and even, yes, Europe. There are some good songs and some fantastic playing buried in there, but I also think it’s cool to see how the music diverged at that point. One fork in the road led to thrash and black and death other ‘extreme’ forms of metal and the other led to the glam rock/heavy metal mashup that was hair metal. And a lot of what happened in the '90s and '00s was a reaction to that, so I think it’s important to be aware of.
*Venom is an enormously influential band. Their recordings are crude (almost unlistenable at times, IMO), their playing is sloppy and the songs are only so-so 90% of the time, but they have an undeniable something that makes it all work somehow, to the point that not only are they influential, there’s a good argument to make that the entire genre of Black Metal owes itself to Venom; after all, they coined the term: Venom - Black Metal.

59

Ok. I had been planning to do Venom and Merciful fate after Thrash but if it makes more sense to go there first I will. Other NWOBHM I should care about? I see Saxon pop up on the map of metal along with Angel Witch and another witch band. Or just say no based on my reaction so far and cut straight to Venom.
If you think hair metal is important I’ll give it a shot. Suggestions of what’s actually important/good would be appreciated though.

60

Venom is fun, boarding on silly sometimes (“In League with Satan” and “Poison”) , but I like the raw feel to it. “Welcome to Hell” almost sound like it could be Dead Kennedys songs with a different lead guitar player, and “Live Like an Angel” and “Angel Dust” sound like they are straight out of Motorhead’s catalogue, other stuff feels like grimier versions of what Iron Maiden was doing. They have a full fledged funk breakdown in the middle of “One Thousand Days in Sodom” which I don’t know what to do with, and you are write some of their songwriting is not so great, but they are interesting. They probably would have been my favorite band if I had discovered them when I was 14 instead of finding Black Flag at the same time.