"The Roots of Metal" Project
Bluesy and proggy, but not heavy enough for a metal tag.
A very hard rock approach to prog.
How about "Keep Going"? Metal or not? Subgenre?
This one's not straight forward either. The doom sections sound like they could have been ripped straight off a Soundgarden album & are metal as fuck. There's a psychedelic feel to the deeper clean parts though & the rest of the track is so clearly hard rock based. I think I'd have to suggest that it sits most comfortably in the heavy psych/stoner rock space.
I had a listen to 1970's "Kirikyogen" album from Kuni Kawachi & Friends yesterday which is essentially a collaboration between a little-known Japanese psychedelic rock artist & two of the members from Tokyo's seminal Flower Travellin' Band. It's listed on Metal Archives so I thought I'd better explore it in the interest of being thorough/comprehensive. There's nothing that even resembles metal on this record though. There's not even any hard rock or heavy psych to be honest. It's purely a psychedelic rock release as far as I can see so there's no need for us to bother with it.
At the moment the next release we'll be investigating is Budgie's 1971 self-titled debut album. Please let me know if you think there's justification to cover Sir Lord Baltimore's self-titled sophomore album, Flower Travellin' Band's "Satori" or Thin Lizzy's self-titled debut though as I'm open to everyone's ideas. I might try to give those three a listen/revisit before we get through "Lucifer's Friend" to see if I think they're worth exploring too.
There's definitely early doom influence here, but as a full on song, it's mostly typical 70's hard rock.
Hard rock, bit of prog, bit of psych.
Catching up again:
"Kingdom Come" - Yeah this more in line with what Sabbath were doing, sinister vocals and all. Even though the production might not be all the way there for Metal, I'd be willing to throw Heavy or Doom Metal onto this. There's too many similarities to what Doom Metal or more Classic Heavy Metal is doing nowadays.
"I Got A Woman" - Rock, I'd hesitate to even call this Hard Rock.
"Hell Hound" - Daniel hits it outta the park, Zeppelin worship. If Zeppelin ain't Metal, then this ain't either.
"Helium Head" - I think it's close in some places but I still have to say Hard Rock.
"Ain't Got Hung On You" - More Bluesy Hard Rock.
"Ride The Sky" - Heavy Metal easy.
"Everybody's Clown" - I think this is too close to some Zeppelin or Rush in the sections that Daniel talks about for me to say Heavy Metal, the first track had a different energy about it. Hard Rock.
"Keep Going" - Man...it's so close...I think I have to go Heavy Psych here. Begrudgingly.
How about "Toxic Shadows"? Metal or not? Subgenre?
I've got it down as hard/progressive rock.
There seems to be an early "taditional heavy metal" backdrop in the production in some places, but it can be easily compared to the metallic backdrop of 80's metal into hair metal, so I'm not gonna call this metal. But it sure kicks some fuckin' ass.
Hard/prog, easy.
How about "Free Baby"? Metal or not? Subgenre?
It's hard/psychedelic rock for mine.
I checked out Sir Lord Baltimore's self-titled 1971 sophomore album yesterday &, much like their debut "Kingdom Come", found it to offer just the one track that I regard as being genuine metal. The rest sits mainly in the hard rock space so I'd suggest that we skip "Sir Lord Baltimore" unless anyone is aware of it & feels very strongly about us including it.
I didn't tag it metal when I put it on my chart. Skip it.
As for this song, just plain heavy psych to me.
I'll just swing back myself on Sir Lord Baltimore when I have the time, since it probably won't hold up to scrutiny.
Free Baby gets a hard rock/psych rock vote from me. The long interlude is psych while the rest is hard rock.
Both are Hard Rock / Heavy Psych to me.
I checked out Thin Lizzy’s 1971 self-titled debut album this morning too & there’s nothing even slightly resembling metal there, although I did get the feeling that a young Judas Priest might have been influenced by the beautifully organic guitar tone. Boy, Thin Lizzy were a classy & creative rock band though. It’s definitely worth a few listens.
By the way, the Hall of Judgement entry for “Deep Purple In Rock” is now sitting at 3-4, presumably off the back of our latest review.
What does everyone think of “Baby You’re A Liar”? I’ve got it down as hard rock.
I can’t provide YouTube links today as we’ve had a major internet outage in Australia & I can’t do YouTube links from my phone.
Also, I revisited Flower Travellin’ Band’s 1971 sophomore album “Satori” this morning. It’s certainly fucking heavy but there’s really only one track that I regard as being genuine metal in opener “Satori Part 1” which I consider to be an early example of stoner metal. The rest of the tracklisting is seriously psychedelic & is the benchmark for heavy psych in my opinion. I’m suggesting that we move past this release but are open to it if others want us to investigate it.
I checked out Thin Lizzy’s 1971 self-titled debut album this morning too & there’s nothing even slightly resembling metal there, although I did get the feeling that a young Judas Priest might have been influenced by the beautifully organic guitar tone. Boy, Thin Lizzy were a classy & creative rock band though. It’s definitely worth a few listens.
With Thin Lizzy, we should probably just ignore everything until the late '70s/early 80s. It was a change in guitarists that brought them a metal sound on Thunder and Lightning and possibly some of their other albums. Kind of like Olympic or some other band M-A lists but only because they had some random album in the late '80s which was actually metal.
Baby You're a Liar, eh, I think contrary to my earlier opinion, this one might just be hard rock/heavy metal.
Hard rock
How about "In the Time of Job When Mammon Was a Yippie"? I've got it down as hard rock personally.
Stereotypical hard rock
Straightforward hard rock.
And finally, Lucifer's Friend's title track. Metal or not?
It sits somewhere between hard rock & heavy psych for mine which leaves my overall result at just the one genuine metal song on "Lucifer's Friend" & an emphatic "No!" as far as qualification for Metal Academy goes. Anyone come to a different result?