Reply to: Who Invented Heavy Metal?

[Fred Bloggs]

I was watching Mountain (Nantucket Sleighride) on the Woodstock DVD the other day and they came over quite metal to me - particularly the vocals. I'm guessing they were around some time before Sabbath, Led Zep etc.

A great band! Nantucket Sleighride is a true classic amongst classics!

The Wikipedia page says- "They were influential during the development of hard rock and are considered a forerunner to heavy metal music"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_(band)

[darmstadt]

In fact I invented what would be commonly termed 'Heavy Metal' back in the late 70's/early 80's. I had been playing in a punk band and was getting a bit bored of what we were doing. By playing the tunes a lot faster and a lot louder it sounded quite good and we did quite a number of gigs around the country. One gig saw a fledgling band called Discharge come to see us and liked the way we played and basically copied us. They in turn were seen by members of Metallica (or whatever they were called then) who took the sound back to the USA and there you have it. I could have been a contender me

[threaded]

Long running discussion point this.
IMO it's Black Sabbath. Remember we're talking METAL not ROCK.

Iron Butterfly

[expat]

This is an interesting discussion - but. Does it hack anyone else off how so many spods and spotters insist on precise definitions of genres of popular music? I'm thinking more of dance music than rock, and although some of the definitions are hilarious, there are some real saddos arguing about whether some track/band is one genre or another.

Uh-huh: classification is supposed to be a help, not a problem in itself.

[BlackenedBiker]

Steppenwolf: Born to be wild: First coining of the phrase "Heavy Metal" is popular moosak.

True fact

[Peoplesoft bloke]

This is an interesting discussion - but. Does it hack anyone else off how so many spods and spotters insist on precise definitions of genres of popular music? I'm thinking more of dance music than rock, and although some of the definitions are hilarious, there are some real saddos arguing about whether some track/band is one genre or another.

[DS23]

love with "7 and 7 is" in 1966

[darmstadt]

Black Sabbath were originally called Earth and there is another band called that, one of the single note grunge merchants very much in the vein of The Melvins.

[DaveB]

Maiden still going?

They are indeed, headlined Download two years ago IIRC.

Steve Harris's daughter is a real cracker too

[MrMark]

Chuck Berry surely? Otherwise Hank Marvin...

[ace00]

I think you can generally tell the state of Black Sabbaths minds from their album, or should I say what they were smoking as a lot of their stuff is fairly mellow.

I guess if you think about it from a slightly different angle you could probably get back to the doors.

What is impressive is how strong Metal still is - Iron Maiden are as strong as ever (new album this year I believe ), Metallic probably stronger than ever, ozzy is still just about going. Megadeth have reformed yet again. ah so far so good...

Maiden still going? I think "the kids" these days are quite into it - aren't AC/DC playing bigger gigs than ever?
Sabbath were completely off their heads for all their early career.
Check the vid here : http://www.fallingblade.com/
Ozzy is biblically off his nut - and it is awesome (War Pigs live 1970)

[DSW]

I think you can generally tell the state of Black Sabbaths minds from their album, or should I say what they were smoking as a lot of their stuff is fairly mellow.

I guess if you think about it from a slightly different angle you could probably get back to the doors.

What is impressive is how strong Metal still is - Iron Maiden are as strong as ever (new album this year I believe ), Metallic probably stronger than ever, ozzy is still just about going. Megadeth have reformed yet again. ah so far so good...

[The Lone Gunman]

Gibson?

[ace00]

Interestingly, Sabbath did without doubt invent "Death Metal" although it didn't really exist until 20 years later I guess with Slayer, Megadeth.

I think Black Sabbath actually started as blues-rock until they saw the movie,
Black Sabbath and apparently decided to go full Gothic right there. So they invented Goth too.

[wurzel]

I was watching Mountain (Nantucket Sleighride) on the Woodstock DVD the other day and they came over quite metal to me - particularly the vocals. I'm guessing they were around some time before Sabbath, Led Zep etc.