The truth is they were, but now, it’s suddenly debatable. Is Thin Lizzy Heavy Metal? Depends on how old you are. But if you grew up in the 70s, you know that this was exactly how they were classified. The average 20-something Metal fan of today would laugh probably in your face if you referred to Aerosmith as a Heavy Metal band. If you’re aged 40 or under, you’re probably unaware of this creeping category shift to you, the Fast, loud, n’ hard music of the 70s is probably known to you as ‘Hard Rock’. Only someone who was a Metalhead in the 70’s would be aware of this subtle change in terminology. A funny thing happened on the way to 2020: As Metal evolved into new and different sonic and stylistic territories, it began to shed an entire era of it’s history a significant chunk of what was inarguably considered ‘Heavy Metal’ in the 1970s is being re-labeled as ‘Hard Rock’, a change that minimizes much of the heavy music produced during the first decade of Metal’s evolution and would leave modern fans’ understanding of the genre and it’s history incomplete and seriously skewed. So after fifty years of steady evolution, today’s Heavy Metal (or, as it’s more commonly referred to today as simply ‘Metal’) is so far removed from the Metal of 1978 that the fourteen year old inside me is often stunned whenever I put the ol’ iPod on shuffle, and hear Nazareth segue into Napalm Death Van Halen into Vader.īut can both Y&T and Carcass really inhabit the same genre? Well, yes and no. I’ve been lucky enough to witness the birth of several new sounds, styles, and significant sub-genres in realtime, while following Metal’s twisted path, and if you’re my age, you have too: NWOBHM, Thrash, Death, Black… Ok, yes, also Hair Metal and Nu Metal. That’s the thing about Heavy Metal if things get stagnant or stale, it re-invents itself. Maybe AC/DC’s ‘Let There Be Rock’? I, like many others, kept searching for records that would outdo those records on the Richter Scale. As a kid in ’78, the ‘heaviest’ record I had ever heard was Sabbath’s ‘Master of Reality’ possibly Van Halen’s debut. A lot of growth occurred in Metal’s first decade we went from The Yardbirds’ version of ‘The Train Kept a’ Rollin’ to Judas Priest’s pulverizing ‘Hell Bent For Leather’. In my view, 1978 was Heavy Metal’s tenth anniversary year. I understand that the rest of the world seems to have settled on Black Sabbath’s 1970 debut as Ground Zero for Metal. ![]() If I had to pick The First Heavy Metal Band, I’d choose Blue Cheer First Heavy Metal Album: Blue Cheer’s ‘Vincebus Eruptum’. My own tastes and personal understanding of the genre led me to the conclusion that Metal became a ‘thing’ in 1968. As I started to develop my tastes and buying records as they were released, I also started buying music that appeared before my Metal awakening. My Heavy Metal fandom started in 1978 I was 14 years old. What gives? Why do I now frequently find myself musing, ‘wait, is it Metal, or is it Hard Rock?’ The answer to that question may well depend on when you were born. I’m sensing some kind of shift has been underway in the historical understanding of Heavy Metal, and it’ troubles me. Using the term ‘Heavy Metal’ in a 1970s context used to come naturally and feel completely appropriate to me but lately I find myself questioning it’s validity in a 1970s context. Lately I’ve found myself hitting something of a roadblock when putting these articles together, usually when exploring a topic from the 1970s. ![]() For the last seven years or so, I’ve been writing about the music, musicians, albums & songs that I love.
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