12 LANDMARK ALBUMS IN 20TH CENTURY HEAVY METAL
written on 15-10-2002 by Foob of Dakka Dakka.
This text was found on the website of the Dakka Dakka radio show.
For more details about Dakka Dakka visit http://www.foob.be/dakkadakka

1. JIMI HENDRIX: Are you experienced? (1967)
2. LED ZEPPELIN: Led Zeppelin 1 (1969)
3. BLACK SABBATH: Black sabbath (1970)
4. JUDAS PRIEST: Sad wings of destiny (1976)
5. IRON MAIDEN: Iron Maiden (1980)
6. MOTORHEAD: No sleep 'til Hammersmith (1981)
7. VENOM: Welcome to hell (1981)
8. DISCHARGE: Hear nothing, see nothing, say nothing (1982)
9. METALLICA: Kill 'me all (1982)
10.SLAYER: Hell awaits (1985)
11.POSSESSED: Seven churches (1985)
12.PANTERA: Vulgar display of power (1992)

1. JIMI HENDRIX: Are you experienced? (1967)
Apart from Jimi Hendrix I should also mention Jeff Beck, The Who and Cream,
who were at the same time doing similar sonic experiments (in fact, their 
albums even predate this one). It's however this album, more than any other 
of the era, which, from the Hard Rocker's point of view, stands as the most 
important release of the Psychedelic Rock era of the seventies, because 
guitar distortion never sounded this dirty before.

2. LED ZEPPELIN: Led Zeppelin 1 (1969)
By taking the distorted sounds of Hendrix, Cream, and Jeff Beck to extremes,
Led Zeppelin took Rock onto the path of real Hard Rock with this varied 
debut album, containing everything from Folk and Psychedelic Rock to the 
frenzied Hard Rock attack of 'Communication breakdown'.

3. BLACK SABBATH: Black Sabbath (1970)
Contrary to their peers of the time (Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple,...), Black 
Sabbath completely threw overboard the Blues aspect in Hard Rock and 
delivered this dark sounding, pounding debut. Of all albums mentioned in 
this list this album might be the most important of all for it took heavy 
rock into an entirely new direction. In fact, this album is considered by 
many as the first real Heavy Metal album. Although not recognised as such at
the time, this album was genius and years ahead of it's time. Many will not 
realise this but Black Sabbath probably is the most influential band for 
20th century Metal, Grunge and Nu-Metal. Without Black Sabbath the history 
of Metal might have looked quite different and Nirvana (to name but one 
band) would not have existed². This album also marks the introduction of 
dark mysticism in lyrics.

4. JUDAS PRIEST: Sad wings of destiny (1976)
This album took the heavy tones of Black Sabbath to a higher level of 
complexity, with intricately crafted songs, more varied sonic textures and 
an overall more brilliant sound. Playing was tight and the often high 
pitched vocals were "athletic". All later Power Metal bands and Progressive 
Metal bands would continue to build on this approach, but also to the Heavy 
Metal genre as a whole, this album is definitely a landmark album. There is 
a second group of people who consider this album to be the first true Heavy 
Metal album, as opposed to Black Sabbath's debut six years earlier. Of 
course everything depends on your point of view of what Heavy Metal exactly 
is (there are even people who call Jimi Hendrix Heavy Metal).

5. IRON MAIDEN: Iron Maiden (1980)
Although not as influential as the two previously mentioned albums and 
although it is not their best album, this debut album is important in this 
sense that Iron Maiden was the most important band of the so-called 
N.W.O.B.H.M. (New Wave of British Heavy Metal) movement which revived the 
Heavy Metal genre when it started to show signs of stagnation. More 
importantly the N.W.O.B.H.M. movement (with bands like Diamond Head, 
Holocaust and Blitzkrieg) would be of great importance to the emergence of 
more extreme Metal genres because of the influence these bands had on 
Metallica and a few other proto-Thrash-bands.

6. MOTORHEAD: No sleep 'til Hammersmith (1981)
This is not Motörhead's first album. Already important Motörhead studio 
albums predate this slab, but their live album, apart from being one of the 
best and most ferocious live albums in Rock history, is important because of 
the heaviness and agressiveness of the sound and the breakneck speed of some
of the songs. Indeed, for a period of time (roughly 1979 to 1982) nothing 
came even close to the wall of sound and the intensity of Motörhead. This 
extreme approach to music also explains why these Brits were respected even 
by Punks. Pinpointing one single album that gave birth to Thrash Metal is 
impossible, but any musician of the genre will certainly mention this 'No 
Sleep...' in his shortlist.

7. VENOM: Welcome to Hell (1981)
Combining the dark tones of Black Sabbath with the velocity of Motörhead, 
Venom released this primitive sounding debut. Despite it's poor production 
it had instant appeal to the hordes of young Metalheads who welcomed this 
album as a new step up on the ladder of extreme music. The introduction of 
Satanic lyrics only added to their succes (after all, what's more fun than 
saying to your mother that you're into Satanic music). Even though Venom 
never took their Satanic image serious, they would become the first band in 
the long line of bands of the Black Metal genre. In fact, the genre even got 
it's name from Venom's second album title.

8. DISCHARGE: Hear nothing, see nothing, say nothing (1982)
Discharge (along with compatriots The Exploited) combined Metal sounds with 
high velocity Punk Rock. Therefore this is also a landmark album for the 
Hardcore Punk genre. The album is important because of the influence 
Discharge had on the first wave of Speed Metal bands such as Metallica, 
Slayer, Anthrax and Megadeth. In fact, Metallica's first album can be seen 
as a combination of N.W.O.B.H.M. riffing and Discharge intensity and speed. 
It would also give rise to another related genre, that of Crossover (or Punk
Metal Crossover), which was a cross pollenation of Hardcore Punk and Metal 
by bands like D.R.I., Agnostic Front, S.O.D. and (early) Suicidal Tendencies.

9. METALLICA: Kill 'me all (1983)
Taking the riffing from N.W.O.B.H.M. bands such as Diamond Head and 
Blitzkrieg and combining that with the power of Motörhead and the speed of 
Discharge, this was the first album to use speed as a sort of "hardcoded" 
formal building block throughout an entire album. On top of that, despite 
the velocity, playing was tight and the songs didn't sound muddy, setting a 
new standard in Metal.

10.SLAYER: Hell awaits (1985)
On this and all subsequent albums Slayer was darker and even more intense 
sounding than Metallica. Slayer's first album (essentially a normal speed 
metal album, but already with a slightly darker approach than Metallica), 
released only a few months after Metallica's debut, was nothing compared to 
their second full length album, 'Hell Awaits'. It's now seen as one of the 
true classics in extreme Metal. They released their masterpiece album 'Reign 
in Blood' one year after 'Hell Awaits', which got them even more respect, 
and as a result Slayer completely dominated the extreme Metal scene for a 
few years. They also were influenced by Venom (among others in their topics 
and darker atmosphere), but they were far better musicians than Venom and 
their sound was less muddy. 

11.POSSESSED: Seven chruches (1985)
Clearly influenced by Slayer, Possessed took Thrash Metal to new extremes. 
It was Possessed also who first introduced grunt vocals, which would become 
the standard for vocals in Death Metal and a few other Metal genres.

12.PANTERA: Vulgar display of power (1992)
Clearly influenced by eighties Thrash Metal, Pantera introduced 'groove' by 
slowing down the tempo. They kept the powerful sound of Thrash though and 
managed to bring their music to an even higher level of intensity at a time 
when Metal seemed to once again show signs of fatigue. 'Vulgar Display...' 
wis the "missing link" between 90's Thrash and newer Metal genres 
(Alternative Metal and the pop-influenced off-shoot of Nu Metal) headed by 
bands like Korn, Tool, etcetera.

This text was found on the website of the Dakka Dakka radio show.
For more details visit http://www.foob.be/dakkadakka