This should be quite easy for heavy metal & hard rock fans to do & should be really interesting to compare lists. Pick your favourite hard/heavy/metal album of each year. Start in 70, end in 80.
1970 - Paranoid (BS)
1971 - LZ IV
1972 - Demons & Wizards (UH)
1973 - Space Ritual (Hw)
1974 - Rocka Rolla (JP)
1975 - Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow
1976 - Black Rose (TL)
1977 - News of the World (Qn)
1978 - Trouble (Ws)
1979 - Saxon
1980 - Glory Road (Gillan)
1970 - Paranoid (BS)
1971 - Who's Next (The Who)
1972 - Lonesome Crow (Scorpions)
1973 - Montrose
1974 - Phenomenon (UFO)
1975 - Sabotage (BS)
1976 - Sad Wings of Destiny (JP)
1977 - Foreigner
1978 - Strangers in the Night (UFO)
1979 - Gamma I
1980 - Heaven and Hell (BS)
Wow, that got difficult in the last half of the decade because it was tough to choose between a lot of really great music.
It always bothers me when people use the term "heavy metal" to refer to any music from the seventies. IMO, it was not yet a fully formed genre. For me that's like asking what are your favorite prog albums from the sixties?Black Sabbath and maybe a few other bands but it imo there was no real metal scene(nor was it a full blown genre) in that decade.
I hope you're comfortable in that annoyance, because the term was in use then, and is consequently a viable term now. You might as well be annoyed about people using the term "Americans" to refer to United States Citizens, because there are two whole continents of America, meaning that Canadians to Chileans can lay claim to the term.
Favorite prog album of the sixties? Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
Wake up to find out that you are the eyes of the world.
1970: Black Sabbath - s/t
1971: Led Zeppelin - IV
1972: Scorpions - Lonesome Crow
1973: Black Sabbath - Sabbath Bloody Sabbath
1974: Robin Trower - Bridge of Sighs
1975: Budgie - Bandolier
1976: Judas Priest - Sad Wings of Destiny
1977: Judas Priest - Sin After Sin
1978: Judas Priest - Stained Class
1979: UFO - Strangers in the Night
1980: Black Sabbath - Heaven & Hell
1970 Paranoid - Black Sabbath
1971 Whos Next? - The Who
1972 Argus - Wishbone Ash
1973 Queen I - Queen
1974 Slow Flux - Steppenwolf
1975 Toys in The Attic - Aerosmith
1976 Give Us A Wink - Sweet
1977 Alive II - KISS
1978 Live and Dangerous - Thin Lizzy
1979 Strikes - Blackfoot
1980 Heaven and Hell - Black Sabbath
How can I be comfortable and annoyed at the same time?Originally Posted by notallwhowander
I hope you're comfortable in that annoyance, because the term was in use then, and is consequently a viable term now. You might as well be annoyed about people using the term "Americans" to refer to United States Citizens, because there are two whole continents of America, meaning that Canadians to Chileans can lay claim to the term.
Favorite psychedelic album of the sixties? Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club BandNow that you mention it I do think people from the US should be referred to as United States citizens(for the reasons you mentioned) but that is a whole other issue don't you think? As for HM being used in the seventies that might be the case but how would you explain the compilation album released in 1974 or so that was labeled heavy metal but had bands like YES and the Allman brothers and other bands who were obviously not heavy metal on it. I'm ok with the term proto metal for most of it but other than a few scattered bands such as Scorpions, BS, JP, Motorhead and possibly UFO and Budgie I don't think there were many true heavy metal bands in that decade and certainly not a full blown scene which didn't happen until the first Iron Maiden and Ozzy albums. That is all my opinion of course. Oh and I agree Sgt. Pepper's was a great psych album.
Replace Sabs s/t with Budgie's s/t , replace Scorps with DP's Macinine Head and JP's Stained Class with UFO's Obsession & you have perfect list!
The term "New Wave of British Heavy Metal" was coined in 1979 for a new movement patterned after a genre that, according to you, didn't yet exist.It always bothers me when people use the term "heavy metal" to refer to any music from the seventies. IMO, it was not yet a fully formed genre.
Just because the music press used it doesn't mean it was a full blown genre no. By todays standards Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin are not really heavy metal don't you think? Proto metal yes full blown metal no not really. Sorry. TO me metal is about black leather, anger, machismo etc. It's not just the volume or heavy guitars. So yeah metal existed but before the NWOBH it was still in it's proto form IMO.
When I was a kid in the 70s in Ireland and England, all of the ofllowing were called heavy metal by fans and non-fans alike: Queen, Thin Lizzy, Judas Priest, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, Free, Uriah Heep, Status Quo, Led Zeppelin, Hawkwind.
It wasn't the case that it wasn't a fully formed genre. IT WAS, and it was called heavy metal, you can't change those facts of history. The fact is that as the genre developed and changed people started the revisionist taks of removing old heavy metal bands off the heavy metal list and reasssigning the definition of heavy metal.
I could list you several books on the subject that list all of the above as heavy metal. Starting with Vanilla Fudge, Blue Cheer, Cream, Hendrix, Steppenwolf, Free, Bad Company and so on. FACT: in the 70s heavy rock, hard rock & heavy metal were synonyms.
Last edited by PeterG; 05-15-2014 at 07:02 AM.
Well said Dave. The clue is in the name isn't it "New Wave of...."
Absolutely!!! 76 to 79 especially, were giving me heart palpitations......but in the end Black Rose just inched ahead of Sad Wings. Had Black Rose been another year then Sad Wings would have taken 76 hands down.
You clearly never visited any pubs or gigs in England in the 70s then, there were loads of metal bands (UFO, Priest, Heep, Tredegar, Gillan, Hawkwind etc.) and punky-metal bands (Iron Maiden, Motorhead etc.) playing gigs every week.
Total nonsense. It was called heavy metal then & there was a huge scene. What you chose to believe is irrelevant.
Had Demons & Wizards been 71 or 73, then Machine Head would have got my 72 slot in a heartbeat! Good call
1. Everyone used the term, not just the media.
2. Today's standards have nothing to do with this. This list is about 70s hard rock & heavy metal by 70s standards.
3. The clue is in the name NEW WAVE of Heavy Metal i.e. a new wave of a pre-existing genre.
Re the sixties: I was there, as they say. And from memory the first songs played on radio here that got people referring to "heavy metal" were Paranoid, by Black Sabbath, and Whole Lotta Love, by Zep.
Exactly!
Both quoted for truth. I already posted my thoughts on the other thread that Digital started. Since this is a "list" thread I won't post what I said here. I really can't do that list because the first few albums would all be Led Zeppelin albums. For example, in 1970 the three heaviest bands I was listening to were Led Zeppe;in, Chicago, and Santana. Now, after you've finished rolling your eyes guys, Santana was a heavy band in 1970. They were as heavy as Led Zeppelin. The sound was completely different, very American vs, very British. Chicago had one of the greatest, most influencial electric guitarists ever. So I really can't do that list unless I retroactivley listed all those British bands that I'm into now (Sabbath, Priest, etc.).
Yeah, I agree with that. There really was a distinction between the heavy rock being produced in the UK vs. the heavy bands in the US. I know I've read this somewhere on some other message board, where someone said the difference between Hard/Rock and Heavy Metal is Hard/Rock is American, Metal is British. I don't buy that. To me Mountain was just as "heavy metal" as Led Zeppelin. Throw "Blue Cheer" in there as well. All those early bands drank from the same well back then, but there was a distinction between the American vs. the British sound.and Whole Lotta Love, by Zep.
You'll get no argument from me there mate. I agree, back in the 80s their first 3 LPs sat on my vinyl shelf alongside Hendrix, Queen, Free, Zep, Heep, Purple, Lizzy, Hawkwind, Sabbath, Floyd etc.
No, I don't buy it either. That said, "hard rock" is an American term that I first saw used in the early 80s in Lilian Roxon's Rock Encyclopedia. The equivalent term in the UK was always "heavy rock".
In looking at some of the lists that have been posted so far I noticed no one has mentioned or included Rush on any lists. That's kind of my pet peeve. Rush was heavy metal in the mid 70s but everyone wants to label them "prog." I'd say from their first to Hemispheres it's hard/rock/heavy metal.
OTOH, I understand Digital's pov on this. The term Heavy Metal may have been in common use in the UK vs the US where it didn't really become a buzz word until 1980 or so (in the US). It became a common label for the new wave of HM. Then the whole thing started splintering with thrash, glam, punk, etc.
Rush are a victim of their own success in making their prog elemets so popular, in that because so many Rush fans over the decades kept banging on about them being a prog rock band the hard rock/metal fans after the first 2 albums basically ignored them. I know I did. I've only recently returned to Rush and started listneing to some of their later stuff.
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