"The Roots of Metal" Project
This morning we close out Black Sabbath's 1978 eighth studio album "Never Say Die!" with "Swinging The Chain", a track that I regard as being a blues rock number:
This sees "Never Say Die!" finishing with only the one metal tag & (despite what many people seem to think) falling way short of the minimum requirements for metal qualification.
Tomorrow we're going to take a look at another more underground release in the one-off 1978 "Welcome To My Paradise" album from California's Alkana, a release that not many have heard of but one that might hold a few surprises for the unsuspecting metalhead. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on that one.
Today we kick off a new release in Alkana's "Welcome To My Paradise" with opening track "California Rock 'n' Roll Queen" being an early example of glam metal in my opinion:
This morning's track is Alkana's "Montezuma's Sweet Revenge" which I'd suggest in hard rock with it's cool Led Zeppelin-ish, behind-the-beat swagger:
Today's track is Alkana's "On Our Own" which I'd suggest sits somewhere between heavy metal & glam metal:
This morning's track is Alkana's "Freedom Lady" which I would suggest is hard rock:
I've been thinking that this track-by-track investigation has run its course now as there's not much interaction going on any more. I might just post the full albums as I finish my analysis of each one instead. I've just finished investigating every metal-related release I could find from 1978 & have a few to add to our running chronological list. Here's a couple that didn't make the cut though:
Sorcery - "Stunt Rock" (1978)
This is a different Sorcery to the one that released "Sinister Soldiers" in the same year. This one's from Los Angeles with this being their lone full-length. It's actually the soundtrack to a theatre performance strangely enough. There's a little bit of metal here, primary in the tracks that bookend the tracklisting, but it's a long way from being a genuine metal release.
Centaurus - "Centaurus" (1978)
Another one-off American album that's obviously more hard rock than it is metal. In fact, "Centaurus" really only has the one heavy metal number included in its nine tracks so I'm baffled as to how people can justify any claims for metal being a primary genre here.
To cut to the chase on Alkana's "Welcome to My Paradise" album from 1978, I've surprisingly found that it contains enough metal to qualify for inclusion in our chronological list & would describe it as a combination of hard rock, progressive rock & heavy metal. The A side only included the one track that I tagged as being legitimate metal but all three songs on the B side hit the mark which saw it finishing with a metal ratio of 66%. Interestingly, a couple of tracks on the B side are bordering on progressive metal but don't quite get there as the prog rock components are generally kept separate from the heavy metal ones rather than being combined to form progressive metal.
Here's a link to our chronological list of legitimate metal releases so far:
For transparency's sake, it's impossible to determine when the last two successful entries into the chronological list (i.e. the 1978 Zarpa Rock & Alkana albums) were released as there's simply no information available online. For that reason, I've decided to take an even bet by placing them right in the middle of the year with the Zarpa Rock one coming first simply because it sounds more primitive.
That leaves the next release to successfully qualify as a genuine metal release as Judas Priest's 1978 "Killing Machine" fifth album which, despite being a touch more commercially focused & Priest's least metal release since their debut "Rocka Rolla", came in with a metal ratio of 49%.
Here's how I tagged "Killing Machine":
A1 Delivering the Goods (4:16) - Heavy metal
A2 Rock Forever (3:20) - Hard rock
A3 Evening Star (4:05) - Hard rock
A4 Hell Bent for Leather (2:39) - Heavy metal
A5 Take on the World (3:02) - Hard rock
B1 Burnin' Up (4:00) - Hard rock
B2 Killing Machine (3:02) - Heavy metal/Hard rock
B3 Running Wild (2:57) - Heavy metal
B4 Before the Dawn (3:22) - Progressive rock
B5 Evil Fantasies (4:14) - Heavy metal/Hard rock
Here's the updated chronological list:
And the final 1978 release to qualify for our list has come from Sweden with Stockholm trio Heavy Load's debut album "Full Speed at High Level" being released in November of that year.
Once again this isn't a straight down the line metal record like we see so regularly these days & I've tagged it as follows which has resulted in a 41% metal ratio:
A1 Full Speed at High Level (4:14) - Heavy metal
A2 Midnight Crawler (3:53) - Heavy metal
A3 Moonlight Spell (4:33) - Heavy metal
A4 Storm (11:33) - Progressive rock/Blues rock
B1 In Two Minds (5:39) - Heavy metal
B2 Rock 'n' Roll Freak (5:18) - Hard rock
B3 Caroline (8:17) - Progressive rock
B4 Son of the Northern Light (4:43) - Heavy metal
Here's the updated chronological list:
https://metal.academy/lists/single/271
I've kicked my exploration of 1979 with a couple of less obvious ones in the "Doomsday" debut album from Germany's Gravestone & Plasmatics' "(Meet the) Plasmatics" E.P., neither of which offered anything in the way of metal. "Doomsday" is progressive krautrock while "(Meet the) Plasmatics" is punk/hard rock.
I checked out the 1979 "Slay The Dragon" E.P. from British outfit Holocaust (not the Scottish band that were made famous through Metallica) yesterday which was their only release & is often touted as an early NWOBHM record. Spoiler alert: It's not. Of the three songs included, only the title track is metal with the other two clearly falling into the hard rock space.
This one-off 1979 live album from Texas-based hard rockers Impeccable displays quite a bit of metal influence. In fact, two of the seven songs should qualify for a heavy metal primary in my opinion. I don't think it's quite enough to justify a dual primary tag overall though so I'm gonna suggest that this is predominantly a hard rock record with heavy metal influences.
The 1979 "Slaughter House" third album from Germany's Mass is once again nothing more than a hard/boogie rock record with no metal on offer whatsoever.
I checked out the 1979 self-titled debut album from Spanish outfit Medina Azahara this afternoon. There's no metal whatsoever here. It's a symphonic prog-focused Rock andaluz record for mine.
Despite what I might or might not have said about the one-off 1979 "Fröm the Fjörds" album from US trio Legend in the past, upon listening to it with fresh ears now I can't see that there's enough genuine metal here to qualify for this exercise. It's predominantly a progressive/hard rock record for mine with heavy metal & jazz fusion only playing supporting roles.
I checked out the 1979 "Which Platform Please?" debut album from France's Silvertrain today. There's definitely some metal influence on this mothafucka but I don't think it's enough to qualify as a heavy metal release overall. I've gone for a hard rock primary with heavy metal & progressive rock secondaries for this one.
I explored the 1979 "Let It Roll" debut album from Seattle outfit TKO this morning but found no metal whatsoever. This is a commercial hard rock record built for US radio.
The 1979 "Recept za Rock 'n' Roll" double album from Bosnian trio Vatreni poljubac has a legitimate claim to being a hard rock/heavy metal hybrid & I feel should qualify for inclusion here with a metal ratio of 50%. I haven't been able to identify a release date as yet so I may need to take a punt on exactly where to place it in the list.
I revisited the 1979 "First Investment" debut album from Birmingham's Money yesterday but, despite it often being claimed as an early NWOBHM release, found no metal whatsoever. It's a hard rock record with progressive rock influences as far as I can see.
I just investigated the 1979 "A golpe de látigo" sophomore album from Spain's Ñu. There's a little bit of metal there but nothing like the proto-folk metal claims seem to indicate. It's primarily a progressive rock record with hard rock & progressive folk influences in my opinion.
I checked out 1979's "The Soundhouse Tapes Part 2" E.P. from NWOBHM band Praying Mantis this morning but found no metal whatsoever. It's purely a hard rock record.
I revisited the 1979 self-titled sophomore album from Liverpool outfit Marseille today. There's certainly a little bit of metal here & there but I couldn't help but, more often than not, it's presented in a glam metal format. In fact, I'd suggest that this sounds so much like Motley Crue that it seems almost impossible that they didn't borrow their sound from Marseille. It's a glam metal record with hard rock influences for mine & is certainly not a NWOBHM release in my opinion.
Despite Lucifer's Friend, Night Sun, Scorpions & Mass all producing the odd metal track prior, this 1979 debut album is where you can find the true birth of German heavy metal. Well.... in truth it's more of a hybrid of heavy metal & hard rock but there's easily enough genuine metal material to warrant a dual tag. Here's how I tagged the album:
A1 Lady Lou (3:03) Heavy metal
A2 Tired of Me (3:14) Heavy metal
A3 Seawinds (4:29) Hard rock
A4 Take Him in My Heart (3:29) Hard rock
A5 Sounds of War (4:35) Heavy metal
B1 Free Me Now (3:00) Speed metal
B2 Glad to Be Alone (5:12) Heavy metal/Hard rock
B3 That's Rock 'n' Roll (2:53) Hard rock
B4 Helldriver (2:42) Hard rock
B5 Street Fighter (3:28) Hard rock
That amounts to a metal ration of 53% overall & sees "Accept" taking up the number 15 position in our chronological list of genuine metal releases:
I revisited Scorpions' 1979 "Lovedrive" sixth album this morning & had my prior opinion validated as there's only two metal songs included here. It's a hard rock record with heavy metal influences in my opinion so unfortunately it's a "no cigar" result for yet another release from these Germans.