This is a collection of my write-ups on classic, formative heavy metal albums and the albums that led to heavy metal. It is limited to one album per year and one album per band. The project stretches from 1969 to 1985.
Rush - A Farewell To Kings
Genre: Hard rock / Heavy Prog
Label: Mercury Records
Year: 1977
One could probably argue that I am cheating just a bit to include Rush in this. I would argue that, while a lot of Rush's material is plainly not heavy metal, Rush was still one of the heaviest bands around at the time. Except when they weren't. Rush really take a liking to exploring different sounds. Early adopters of synthesizers, the band liked to explore a bass heavy sound as much as they do odd time signatures and neoclassical influences in subtle ways. It is all tied together by the mystical lyrics of Neal Peart and obviously his drumming that is hard to imitate in his endless inventiveness and, for the time, crazy technicality.
What makes Rush special in my eyes was always how they managed to write both simple, anthemic rock songs like the opener or "Cinderella Man" while also producing epics like "Xanadu" or the closer. The progressive songs flow with an ease that can make it easy to forget how complex they are and the usage of synths and atmospheric ideas is clearly ahead of its time. Conversely, there is a lot of hidden complexity to the simpler and shorter songs on A Farewell To Kings. The sudden tempo changes that never feel forced and the fluidity with which the band not only plays with each other, but with the song on "Cinderella Man" is a great example of this. It is probably evident that A Farewell To Kings is one of my favorite albums, but I really view it as the first half of a double album, with Hemispheres being the second. Rush might not have been metal per sé, but the influence they had on especially progressive metal bands (often sadly a negative one), is hard to overstate.
Rating: 9/10.
Judas Priest - Stained Class
Genre: Traditional Metal
Label: Columbia Records
Year: 1978
I had always believed Stained Class was one of the favorite records of Judas Priest fans, as I have often heard it named as a favorite. A quick glance at metal archives tells me that the album isn't wholly uncontroversial and that some even believe it to be among JP's worst. I find that hard to believe, frankly - intuitively, I can probably name 5 that are worse at least. Stained Class certainly has an interesting history beyond even the quality of the album. The famous backmasking court case which happened years later and is in many ways more interesting than the album itself. It might set up people for an unhealthy expectation - the album is far from being risqué. While it is probably the most heavy metal album I have done for this series yet, it is ultimately rather tame in the greater context of it.
Not that Stained Class is a bad album, in fact it is a quite enjoyable heavy metal record. The most aggressive cut is the first, "Exciter". A prototype for later heavy metal messiah's like the famous Painkiller or the Angel of Retribution (or the wonderfully cheesy Mower, a Rob Halford solo invention). The controversial "Better by You, Better than Me" supposedly told young impressionable kids to commit suicide, but doesn't appear demonic in the slightest. This version is quite pleasing compared to the Spooky Tooth original that no one remembers - how a cover could hold subliminal suicide messaging is also quite dubious. "Invader" is also a nice cut, which often reminds me of the Maiden track "Invaders", if only for the title, although I do find Maiden might have taken some inspiration here. The only real criticism I can find is that the album maybe shouldn't end with the longest, quietest cuts but even that is a matter of taste. Stained Class is maybe not the best JP record, but a good one at least.
Rating: 7/10.
Van Halen - Van Halen II
Genre: Hard Rock
Label: Warner Bros
Year: 1979
It is an often cited fact that musical decades often start a bit earlier than the actual decade. This is certainly true to a degree, even when some acts try to cling to the last decade as long as possible. If you ask me, what started the musical decade of the 80s was Van Halen's self-titled debut record. At the time, Eddie's guitar theatrics were so extreme that many critics doubted the authenticity of it, believing the material to be sped up. Rhythm parts often are very simple for Van Halen, opting for a lot of simple chord riffs over pedal tones in the bass and it is really the intense soloing, involving a much more developed use of tapping and neoclassical flourishes than what was common at the time - particularly in the famous instrumental "Eruption".
Van Halen II is basically more of the same. Now closer to the actual 1980's than the debut record, the album can proudly be viewed as a continuation of the original sound. The shred obsessed guitar hero worship started here. Fascinating is the inclusion of the acoustic "Spanish Fly" (my theory is that the acoustic nature of it was supposed to prove the material isn't sped up). As a metalhead, I perceive the A-side to be much weaker than the B-side, when the cuts get heavier than before and less chorus oriented. Particularly "Beautiful Girls" is a really good track that can stand on its own, even if the soloing was taken out - a fact that makes me overlook how much the lyrics are of their time. Van Halen II sadly mostly works through a historical lense for me, as the material has been done better by the band on the debut. Not to mention that other bands were better at melding the guitar hero mentality with some actually ripping riffs and some needed grit.
Rating: 6/10.
Motörhead - Ace of Spades
Genre: Heavy / Speed Metal
Label: Bronze
Year: 1980
Motörhead was undoubtedly a band that had to be included in this project and it was clear immediately which album had to be included. Ace of Spades is not only the bands most iconic album, it also includes their most iconic song, the title track. The song "Ace of Spades" is a song that is synonymous with heavy metal as a whole, a monolith of a song that embodies what metal is. The speed, the straightforward but energetic nature, even the involved leads of Fast Eddy Clarke are all iconic not only for metalheads, but for the perception of what metal is for non-metal listeners. Not to say that the album only rests on the strength of this one song, of course. "Love Me Like a Reptile" and "(We Are) The Roadcrew" have also been live staples and for good reason.
Jokes have been made about how limited Motörhead's sound is, and it is undeniable that Motörhead songs all end up sounding a bit similar after a while. It is a smart choice for the band to have the album only be 36 minutes long. But even on that length, the similarities between songs become noticeable after a while. This issue is probably heightened by the fact that the album is immensely frontloaded, opening with the bands best song whereas some of the weaker tracks of the album are grouped at the end. It is also noteworthy that Motörhead contributed to the unfortunate trend of the sexualisation of underage women in rock music that was prevalent during the 80s with "Jailbait", which simply hasn't aged the best.
Rating: 7/10
Iron Maiden - Iron maiden Genre: Heavy Metal Label: EMI Year: 1980
In writing this list, the choice fell in favor of including Killers, to be able to include Motörhead's Ace of Spades. I wrestled with that decision quite a bit, as I always found Killers to be the inferior album - a fact I will be going into more detail about in my review of it. The self-titled album, however, I would rank among Maiden's best - not only because it occupies a very unique spot in their discography. That aspect of it is incredibly important, though. Iron Maiden never made an album like the debut again. The punk spirit of the early NWOBHM scene is embodied in this album like no other and the dirty nature of Di'Annos voice suits it perfectly. Hints of the more melodic tendencies of their later work are present in this album, but so is a raw energy and a bluesy tint that shows a band that is discovering themselves. It also features guitarist Dennis Stratton, who, according to a possibly apocryphal story, added Wishbone Ash style guitar harmonies to the album which the band had swiftly removed and later cited as a reason to have Stratton removed from the band altogether. Ironic, considering that the twin lead sound later became an absolute staple to the bands sound.
Iron Maiden is simple filled with bangers from start to finish. "Prowler" uses a subtly syncopated rhythm guitar line coupled with Wah Wah leads in a way the band would never replicate again. "Running Free" manages to make the endlessly repeating chorus line not suck and absolutely fucks live. "Phantom of the Opera" is progressive in a way that not even later Maiden managed to replicate, with variations on the main riff and a consistently changing rhythmic approach. "Charlotte the Harlotte" has an immensely catchy main riff and chorus and the self-titled track caps off the album perfectly. Iron Maiden is simply one of the strongest debuts in metal.
Rating: 8/10.
Iron Maiden - Killers Genre: Heavy Metal Label: EMI Year: 1981
I had originally thought that the reason so many tracks on Killers are underwhelming was a mixture of the sophomore slump and the deteriorating relationship between Paul Di'Anno and the rest of the band, caused by his unreliability and his issues with drugs and alcohol. While I am sure that this affected the recording in some way - you just work better with people that aren't annoying you and that are professional about their craft - having now done some research I realise that most of the tracks had been written even before the debut had released, excluding "Murders in the Rue Morgue" and the title track. It turns out the band isn't stretching their creative muscles thin in the way I thought but rather, most of the album is literally B-cuts. It is fitting that the best song on the album is the aforementioned "Murders in the Rue Morgue", which both has a catchy chorus and isn't too straightforward, thus being able to develop some momentum and intrigue. Conversely, a lot of the other material feels just a little underdeveloped, clearly written by a band in the past who had not honed their craft as much. Many of the songs have interesting flourishes, like natural harmonic leads or in rare cases some non-power chord harmony, but most of that cannot really salvage the fact that the songs themselves aren't very catchy, engaging or otherwise interesting. Knowing more about this album now makes me conclude that Killers simply sounds like what it is - a collection of material originally discarded. This is still classic Maiden of course, meaning these songs are stronger than what most bands would have dished out. But in the context of being a golden age Maiden record, Killers underperforms. Rating: 6/10
Manowar - Battle Hymns
Genre: Heavy / Trve Metal
Label: Liberty Records
Year: 1982
I could spend a lot of time and puff up my review with all the scandals, controversies and crimes committed by the band and it is questionable if I should even give a band like Manowar a platform, to be perfectly honest. At the same time, I think that Manowar's influence - be that influence good or bad - is noticeable and has shaped metal in some way or form. It is interesting that as early as 1982, people were yearning for the glory days of olde, when metal was simpler and hadn't yet lost its mojo. It is probably no coincidence that this album released so closely to the birth of thrash, which would ultimately end the era of traditional metal and slowly transform metal into something more extreme and even less marketable. Not that Manowar would ever admit that the easy listenability was a draw.
It is undeniable, however, that Manowar do want their metal to be simple and effective. On the front of simplicity, they almost always succeed but the effectiveness is another question. Riffs often run too long on Battle Hymns and songs are often straightforward to a fault, where if you know how a song starts, you'll likely know how it will continue and even end. Manowar do look backwards in their metal instead of forward, but it is a warped, nostalgic interpration - just look at this series and it's evident that metal never really sounded like Manowar thought it did, which ironically birthed a scene of its own. I admit to liking it a lot, but I'll also say that a lot of that enjoyment is nostalgia and likely only nostalgia. Manowar was one of the first metal bands I heard when I was young, and at that age, I simply didn't have the context that material like this could be done better and with more creativity. If you don't have the same nostalgia I do, you can easily subtract a point or even two.
Rating: 7/10
Dio - Holy Diver
Genre: Heavy Metal
Label: Mercury Records
Year: 1983
Dio is probably the single figure most intertwined with classic heavy metal. While he wasn't in any formative acts in the beginning, he worked with some of the absolute greats. His albums with Black Sabbath are the stereotypical interpretation of heavy metal for many and even in Rainbow we can see him develop the mythological edge, the fantastical, that many metal genres would later turn to. Power metal, while musically actually quite dissimilar from anything that Dio ever did himself, would not exist without him and even nerdy black metal acts like Summoning owe it to him for setting the precedent that fantasy is a worthwhile topic for metal to discuss. With this band named after the man himself, Dio would be the driving force for the first time and Holy Diver is a legendary album without question.
Where in Black Sabbath or Rainbow, there was another personality to compete with - Blackmore or Iommi are strong artistic voices - Holy Diver is Dio almost exclusively. The instrumental section is much simpler than anything his preceding bands (and frankly metal as a whole) was doing before then, but in the context of Holy Diver, it doesn't feel like a regression. Simply put, this album is vocal driven and therefore, its succes will depend on how much you like Dio's vocals and lyricism. I think both are stronger here than on any other album with Dio on it. Dio's lyricism approaches crypticism at times, but is always evocative and manages to say things beyond the text he is singing. His delivery aids in it, of course, because you can tell what Dio feels and that he means what he sings, even if it might not always be evident what that thing is. Holy Diver is not an album I come to for guitar theatrics or the sick riffs (although the title track and "Rainbow In The Dark" certainly deliver on the riff front) but for a prime example of metal as mythology.
Rating: 8/10
Yngwie Malmsteen - Rising Force
Genre: Neoclassical Shred
Label: Polydor
Year: 1984
Who could have thought that instead of state surveillance and gigantic screens with political leaders speaking on them, the year 1984 would bring us the formative example of a pure shred album. Yngwie is mostly a meme or joke at this point ("More is More" and his weight being often mocked online or referenced in discussions), but there really wasn't anything like Yngwie at the time. Rising Force is almost exclusively focused on the shred and Yngwie's immense ego shines through at every point. It almost makes me think that he picked Jeff Scott Soto to sing the two vocal driven tracks because Jeff is not the best singer, if we are being honest.
I have listened to shred albums before and enjoyed them. Something like Marty Friedman's Inferno or Joe Satriani's Surfing With The Alien just go down easier because they're instrumentally more creative than Yngwie Malmsteen and also have a more interesting grasp on harmony. Malmsteen is a talented guitarist on a technical level, no doubt. But he is also the textbook definition of a one trick pony that almost always constructs solos out of arpeggios in baroque sounding chord progressions, often favoring harmonic minor over everything else. He just isn't very musically curious and it seems to me that every track is basically interchangeable with every other. This makes the album a chore even though it is not even 40 minutes long. The album also has an issue with pacing, putting a very sluggish cut up front that just feels like it never ends. Only in the last track, where Yngwie commits to some 80s synth cheese, does something happen that I actually find fun and not just draining. Maybe Rising Force was a "had to be there" case, but I cannot recommend it to anyone today - especially considering that in the field of shred, Yngwie has long been surpassed.
Rating: 4/10.
Fates Warning - The Spectre Within
Genre: US Power Metal
Label: Metal Blade Records
Year: 1985
The Spectre Within came out in 1985 and at this point, I feel confident in claiming that the original wave of metal bands has now passed. Even the press (and to a degree even the bands themselves) took to calling a lot of the bands "The New Wave of American Heavy Metal" at the time - a movement we nowadays would just call USPM. Similarly to European power metal, the USPM scene aimed to take the classic metal ideals and develop them further without losing the original spirit of it. On one end of the spectrum, there are bands like Manowar, who strip their style down to the absolute essentials. On the other end, are acts like Fates Warning.
Progressive metal as a whole was not yet a thing, but many acts have had progressive tendencies - often more as an exercise in excess than actual progressive curiosity. Fates Warning however did explore more complicated song structures, often in bigger proportions. With this comes experimentations in feeling, contrast, time signatures and the whole package of your average prog band. But where Fates Warning fall squarely into the USPM framework, is the vocals. I will be honest with you, Arch's vocals on this album drive me nuts and he is a little more than an acquired taste; he is something to overlook. Bad technique is neither here nor there, but being actively grading and being utterly devoid of charm and also not being particularly well written or memorable makes the vocals impossible to enjoy for me. They ruin what could be a solid release otherwise and maybe the rest just isn't great enough for me to put the work in to get used to them.
Rating: 5/10