I started thinking about this after hearing an interview with rob halford claiming that priest along with sabbath were the first bands to play metal. Sabbath was obviously the first true metal band, but priest?...the first priest record in 1974 was a rock/blues album that had no impact on the metal world, it wasn't until 1976 that priest released their first real metal album. By that time Queen already had their share of heavy songs like orge battle, great king rat, and stone cold crazy which were some of the heaviest music of it's day. Makes me Question why Queen arn't mentioned more as an influence on metal music?....
pittrek · Member since
[QUOTE]
[b]mike hunt wrote: [/b]
I started thinking about this after hearing an interview with rob halford claiming that priest along with sabbath were the first bands to play metal. Sabbath was obviously the first true metal band, but priest?...the first priest record in 1974 was a rock/blues album that had no impact on the metal world, it wasn't until 1976 that priest released their first real metal album. By that time Queen already had their share of heavy songs like orge battle, great king rat, and stone cold crazy which were some of the heaviest music of it's day. Makes me Question why Queen arn't mentioned more as an influence on metal music?....[/QUOTE]
Because most of the people know Queen as a pop band, since they know only the 80's stuff. I always say that Queen started as a heavy metal band, even when some people look strangely only me.
BTW Sabbath and heavy metal ? BS were also a great blues band in the beginning, the same as Judas Priest, they just went heavier and heavier with each album
mike hunt · Member since
my only issue with rob halford is when he say's priest along with sabbath were the first metal bands. I idolized priest as a kid, and still consider them my second favorite band of all time, but rob is full of himself sometimes. Bands like maiden, priest, metallica, anthrax, among others were influenced by queen, but the general public and media still don't bring them up as a big influence in that type of music. I think they had a bigger impact on metal than the average Joe realizes.
pittrek · Member since
Definitely. Just watch ANY documentary about ANY heavy metal band where they talk about their influences. They mention Queen and they mention them with real respect
Micrówave · Member since
[QUOTE]
[b]mike hunt wrote: [/b]
I started thinking about this after hearing an interview with rob halford claiming that priest along with sabbath were the first bands to play metal. Sabbath was obviously the first true metal band, but priest?...the first priest record in 1974 was a rock/blues album that had no impact on the metal world, it wasn't until 1976 that priest released their first real metal album. By that time Queen already had their share of heavy songs like orge battle, great king rat, and stone cold crazy which were some of the heaviest music of it's day. Makes me Question why Queen arn't mentioned more as an influence on metal music?....[/QUOTE]
Because when Queen came out, Heavy Metal was already in full swing.
Jimi Hendrix's debut album, Are You Experienced (1967), was the first true Metal, I think. Purple Haze is identified by some as the first heavy metal hit.
In 1968, the sound that would become known as heavy metal began to coalesce. That January, the San Francisco band Blue Cheer released a cover of Eddie Cochran's classic "Summertime Blues," from their debut album Vincebus Eruptum, that many consider the first true heavy metal recording. The same month, Steppenwolf released its self-titled debut album, including "Born to Be Wild," which refers to "heavy metal" in the lyrics.
Saif · Member since
[QUOTE]
[b]Micrówave wrote: [/b]
[QUOTE]
[b]mike hunt wrote: [/b]
I started thinking about this after hearing an interview with rob halford claiming that priest along with sabbath were the first bands to play metal. Sabbath was obviously the first true metal band, but priest?...the first priest record in 1974 was a rock/blues album that had no impact on the metal world, it wasn't until 1976 that priest released their first real metal album. By that time Queen already had their share of heavy songs like orge battle, great king rat, and stone cold crazy which were some of the heaviest music of it's day. Makes me Question why Queen arn't mentioned more as an influence on metal music?....
[/QUOTE] Because when Queen came out, Heavy Metal was already in full swing.
Jimi Hendrix's debut album, Are You Experienced (1967), was the first true Metal, I think. Purple Haze is identified by some as the first heavy metal hit.
In 1968, the sound that would become known as heavy metal began to coalesce. That January, the San Francisco band Blue Cheer released a cover of Eddie Cochran's classic "Summertime Blues," from their debut album Vincebus Eruptum, that many consider the first true heavy metal recording. The same month, Steppenwolf released its self-titled debut album, including "Born to Be Wild," which refers to "heavy metal" in the lyrics.[/QUOTE]I don't think any of the records you mentioned are metal at all. Hendrix and Steppenwolf were hard rock. Blue Cheer was IMO proto-punk/psychedelic rock. I know bands like Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin were considered metal by many in those days but even then there was a noticeable difference between their sound and that of a real metal band like Black Sabbath. Black Sabbath introduced the use of tritone, down-tuning, stuff like that...
[/QUOTE]And as much as I love Queen, I don't see how the influenced Iron Maiden. True, Queen is a huge influence on progressive metal and power metal and also some heavy metal and thrash bands, maybe even melodic death metal. But Iron Maiden never admitted to nor showed any influence of Queen in their music. The only thing remotely connected to Queen in their music is their use of the Keep Yourself Alive riff during early tours which they often played at the end(or was it the beginning?) of their song "Sanctuary"(it goes "give me sanctuary from the law"...something like that). I know Bruce Dickinson is a big Queen fan and he mentioned that he cried when he first heard Who Wants To Live Forever. He also recorded an operatic cover of Bohemian Rhapsody with Montserrat Caballe on one of his solo albums but keep in mind that most of Maiden's music is written by Steve Harris, who isn't probably as big a Queen fan as Bruce. So the influence is null at best.[/QUOTE]
thomasquinn 32989 · Member since
"Steppenwolf" was described by critics as "metal" ("it's harder than rock; it's metal"), making them the first instance of the application of the name metal. Hendrix was much more blues and soul-oriented than the music we tend to describe as metal is. If we start counting him as metal, then Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin and basically every other hard-rock band is suddenly transformed into "metal".
There is never a clear divide between genres, but I would argue against including Hendrix under metal. Steppenwolf I would not include either, but I would mention them and add that the application of the term to them indicates the shifting meaning attached to genre-names.
Jjeroen · Member since
For Priest, I think it wasn't as much the music. It was the look of the band. With his black leather and stuff with pinns on, Rob Halfort kind of 'invented' the traditional metal-look. (How awkward, ey? How 'gay' styling became the image of the most masculine musicscene ;-)
Definition of Heavy Metal though, goes further then just the musical sound. Of course the term heavy metal was invented much later then when the first -now regarded as- metal albums came out. In hinsight, Sabbath indeed should be the first widely known 'metal' band. In those early days musically they were just heavy r&b (Just like Zeppelin, Purple - who in their turn got their heavy sound from the likes of Hendrix and Cream). But it were the lyrics that made Sabbath different. They were the first to combine heavy riffs with lyrics about the occult, death, desaster, mysticism, Satan, hell, religious extremism, etc.
john bodega · Member since
Yuck, genre discussion. A good band is it's own genre, fuck the rest of them!
The Real Wizard · Member since
Black Sabbath's Paranoid came out in 1970. This is one of many reasons why Queen aren't considered pioneers of metal. They are known as an incredibly successful pop band. It's the path they chose. But when you change your sound so drastically part way into your career, it can be at the expense of your roots. Were they aware of that possibility at the time, or is it a hindsight thing? Only they know.
With or without that popular success, the early Queen albums probably wouldn't be any better known. Consider this... if they had quit after A Day At The Races, would they be legends today, or would they be known for their five albums, perhaps only to a much smaller group of dedicated fans? There wouldn't be any stomp-stomp-clap at sporting events keeping Queen in the minds of tens of thousands of people every night, and there certainly wouldn't be Greatest Hits albums to acquaint new fans with the band so easily.
cacatua · Member since
[QUOTE]
[b]Micrówave wrote: [/b]
[b]mike hunt wrote: [/b]
I started thinking about this after hearing an interview with rob halford claiming that priest along with sabbath were the first bands to play metal. Sabbath was obviously the first true metal band, but priest?...the first priest record in 1974 was a rock/blues album that had no impact on the metal world, it wasn't until 1976 that priest released their first real metal album. By that time Queen already had their share of heavy songs like orge battle, great king rat, and stone cold crazy which were some of the heaviest music of it's day. Makes me Question why Queen arn't mentioned more as an influence on metal music?....
[/QUOTE]
Because when Queen came out, Heavy Metal was already in full swing.
Jimi Hendrix's debut album, Are You Experienced (1967), was the first true Metal, I think. Purple Haze is identified by some as the first heavy metal hit.
In 1968, the sound that would become known as heavy metal began to coalesce. That January, the San Francisco band Blue Cheer released a cover of Eddie Cochran's classic "Summertime Blues," from their debut album Vincebus Eruptum, that many consider the first true heavy metal recording. The same month, Steppenwolf released its self-titled debut album, including "Born to Be Wild," which refers to "heavy metal" in the lyrics.[/QUOTE]
I always thought that Steppenwolf's [i]heavy metal thunder[/i] referred to the heavy metal of Harley motorcycles and the thunder of their exhaust!
PauloPanucci · Member since
Yeahh.. i think jimi H. did 1º h.metal!! the people today have a bad image about havy metal!!
Micrówave · Member since
There is no clear definition of Heavy Metal, in the musical sense. Although I don't think "tritone, down-tuning, stuff like that" is the clincher.
If anything, Heavy Metal MUST have the use of the guitar as the LEAD driving force. What Hendrix did back in '67 was something so new, so undefined, that it INDEED WAS Heavy Metal. Listen to John and George's guitar... then listen to Jimi's. No, he wasn't playing "Heavy Metal music", but he had invented a sound that became the ignitor to a new genre. No, Mitch Mitchell was not a Heavy Metal drummer, but Ginger Baker was. No one was doing THAT to the bass drum like Ginger was.
So I must stand firm in my belief that Jimi Hendrix invented Heavy Metal... it just took a few years and some band evolution before it caught on.
With regard to the argument that Jimi, Steppenwolf, etc. are not Heavy Metal, but rather hard rock... I would refer you to Ian Anderson, who is still laughing his head off about that, while Lars Ulrich is still pouting. Zing!
ANAGRAMER · Member since
Being old enough to remember the NWOHM (new wave of heavy metal) in late 70's-80's, Queen were kinda 'lumped-in' with them, mainly on the strength of their early work which preceeded the emergence of Iron Maiden. Def Leppard et al
By that time, Queen had progressed beyond their 'hard-rock' phase although, as most of us know, there was certainly a token gesture to the genre on each of the albums at that time (Jazz-The Game-even Flash and Hot Space!)
In terms of actual influence on these acts, you really didn't hear that in the records made at the time although Joe Elliot/G'nR's/Metallica are cleary fans of the band
What does put Queen in the same genre as heavy metal acts is Brian's (sometimes) Hendrix-style approach to solo work even in some of the most pop-oriented Queen work
Queen's influence on actual recording artist comes, I think, much later: The Darkness. Jetliner, Extreme, even Scissor Sisters. And today, their work is referenced by current bands if you listen closely enough!
lalaalalaa · Member since
I think Stone Cold Crazy was a major influence on thrash. I even consider it to be the first thrash song.
