Is all metal influenced by early Black Sabbath?

[Texas King]

Do you believe in the premise that all metal music (with all subgenres) is influenced by early Black Sabbath?
Personally I don't, because I think power metal is not influenced by Black Sabbath at all. Also prog metal is generally not influenced by BS.

 

[The Butt]

Poser

 

[PrincessHades]

Generally I'd say pretty much all of it is, but not necessarily in a literal sense. There's likely a fair amount that is influenced indirectly, but you'd be hard-pressed to find metal from later than the early 70s that wasn't influenced by Sabbath in one way or another, even if they never directly heard the band. They directly impacted the music sphere in immense way, basically a massive butterfly effect.

Others may not agree with me here, but I believe that metal existed before Black Sabbath's formation. It was ill-defined, but you could definitely find some stuff from the late 60s that I'd personally consider metal. Sabbath were instrumental in bringing that style to global attention, and they were so big that once they released their first few albums, the metal sphere and the music sphere at large would never really be the same again.

This is pedantic, but I guess it's possible for a band in some 3rd world country with limited internet access to hear The Yardbirds or Steppenwolf without having ever heard anything newer and be like "i want to make this, but louder". Similar could happen on an alien planet, if you want to get really out there with it. Would we call it metal? Who knows, maybe.

For all intents and purposes, everything out there now that's labeled as metal has probably been impacted appreciably by Sabbath in one way or another. Even then, I would imagine that the vast majority of metal bands have heard Black Sabbath before.

 

[PrincessHades]

Just an addition:

Gently, the idea that power metal is not influenced (directly or indirectly) by Sabbath is ludicrous. It may be hard to see in the very polished modern European stuff, but that was inspired by 80s speed metal, which was in turn inspired by NWOBHM, and in turn, Sabbath. Most of those guys are also probably not Sabbath-naive either, even DragonForce,

The same goes for prog metal, although a lot of what gets called prog metal is just heavy prog. Queensryche and Dream Theater are prog-metal, and very Sabbath-conscious imo. Tool is a heavy prog/alt rock band, but even then, they're pretty Sabbath-influenced. I'd suggest doing some digging, try Wikipedia's page for "heavy metal music" and start from the beginning, if you really want to understand in depth.

Also check out Running Wild, Grave Digger, Scanner, Manowar, Helloween, Jag Panzer, Blind Guardian etc. if you want some more metal-loyal power metal.

 

[Texas King]

Just an addition:

Gently, the idea that power metal is not influenced (directly or indirectly) by Sabbath is ludicrous. It may be hard to see in the very polished modern European stuff, but that was inspired by 80s speed metal, which was in turn inspired by NWOBHM, and in turn, Sabbath. Most of those guys are also probably not Sabbath-naive either, even DragonForce,

The same goes for prog metal, although a lot of what gets called prog metal is just heavy prog. Queensryche and Dream Theater are prog-metal, and very Sabbath-conscious imo. Tool is a heavy prog/alt rock band, but even then, they're pretty Sabbath-influenced. I'd suggest doing some digging, try Wikipedia's page for "heavy metal music" and start from the beginning, if you really want to understand in depth.

Also check out Running Wild, Grave Digger, Scanner, Manowar, Helloween, Jag Panzer, Blind Guardian etc. if you want some more metal-loyal power metal.

I just can't trace European power metal back to the 70's Sabbath, it's a vastly different form of metal music. For example Helloween's "Eagle Fly Free" has zero music elements from early BS. Black Sabbath definitely heavily influenced the darker, heavier and more extreme forms of metal, but the lighter and more melodic, upbeat, faster styles of metal are barely influenced by BS, they're much more indebted to classical music traditions, Deep Purple, Dio-era Rainbow, Thin Lizzy, UFO and Uli-era Scorpions than 70's Sabbath.
I can't even link Iron Maiden's "Killers" to Black Sabbath's "Paranoid" because Killers sounds vastly different than Paranoid. Iron Maiden in general is barely influenced by 70's BS, they're much more influenced by some other 70's bands as I mentioned above.

 

[PrincessHades]

I just can't trace European power metal back to the 70's Sabbath, it's a vastly different form of metal music. For example Helloween's "Eagle Fly Free" have zero music elements from early BS. Black Sabbath definitely heavily influenced the darker, heavier and more extreme forms of metal, but the lighter and more melodic, upbeat, faster styles of metal are barely influenced by BS, they're much more indebted to classical music traditions, Deep Purple, Dio-era Rainbow, Thin Lizzy, UFO and Uli-era Scorpions than 70's Sabbath.
I can't even link Iron Maiden's "Killers" to Black Sabbath's "Paranoid" because Killers sounds vastly different than Paranoid. Iron Maiden in general is barely influenced by 70's BS, they're much more influenced by some other 70's bands as I mentioned above.

I was talking more indirectly. Black Sabbath was a huge influence on the NWOBHM, which is what speed metal metal came out of. Power metal then derived from heavy and speed metal. Even the most polished and symphonic European power metal was at least indirectly influenced by Black Sabbath. They may not sound like Black Sabbath, but the bands that directly influenced the EUPM scene absolutely took Sabbath's sound and went in a new direction with it.

If you mean direct influence, then that's really broad. Even if it's not perceptible in the music (it probably is, just hard to see), I'm sure that pretty much any power metal band you can think of has listened to Sabbath and taken cues from their music, even if only to a limited extent.

"Influenced" is a very broad term.

 

[Texas King]

I was talking more indirectly. Black Sabbath was a huge influence on the NWOBHM, which is what speed metal metal came out of. Power metal then derived from heavy and speed metal. Even the most polished and symphonic European power metal was at least indirectly influenced by Black Sabbath. They may not sound like Black Sabbath, but the bands that directly influenced the EUPM scene absolutely took Sabbath's sound and went in a new direction with it.

If you mean direct influence, then that's really broad. Even if it's not perceptible in the music (it probably is, just hard to see), I'm sure that pretty much any power metal band you can think of has listened to Sabbath and taken cues from their music, even if only to a limited extent.

"Influenced" is a very broad term.

And Black Sabbath was musically indebted to Cream, Led Zeppelin, Hendrix, The Beatles and Blue Cheer. BS was not something 100% original. So we can say that heavy metal is indirectly influenced by those bands?

 

[PrincessHades]

You kind of have a point. Eventually, it gets very semantic, since you can trace music back as far as you want. I think there's a point of dissimilarity at which, while technically true, it becomes pretty silly to say that a band is influenced by another given band. There's no hard boundary, but I'd still say it's probably worth mentioning with a lot of EUPM bands that they were influenced by Sabbath to some degree.

I think it's also very important to credit Deep Purple here. They had some heavy songs, but played in a faster and more "rocked up" sort of way, which I'm sure was very influential to bands like Judas Priest, who in turn influenced the early power metal bands very heavily. They also had Jon Lord, a full-time keyboardist, which is of note when you consider European power metal's affinity for keyboards. The same goes for Gillan's singing style, which almost seems prototypical for Halford and the power metal guys who sought to emulate him.

Last but not least, Rainbow. They were very Sabbathy-y and brought a more "mystical" fantasy feel to early heavy metal alongside more melodic sensibilities, which was probably essential for the development of power metal.

So yes, I'd still say Sabbath influenced EUPM somewhat, even though some of the speed, melody, instrumentation and aesthetic came from elsewhere.

 

[Cronopio]

Maybe not, but every band is influenced by other bands who in turn may have been influenced by BS.

 

[PrincessHades]

Maybe not, but every band is influenced by other bands who in turn may have been influenced by BS.

Yea exactly. It becomes really hard to say definitively whether or not a band has had influence on another, when it's a band everyone has heard.

I still think OP is still missing a bit with regards to how Sabbath may have influenced PM, meant kindly. It's not a particularly Sabbath-worshipping genre, but they definitely played a direct role in a lot of cases. It becomes easier to see when you listen to Dio-era stuff, not so much what I was thinking about initially, but when you hear songs like "Neon Knights" and "Turn Up the Night", you can kind of see a similarity. I think Dio's involvement in Black Sabbath probably played a role in strengthening the relationship between metal and fantasy, which probably did help pave the way for bands like Helloween and Blind Guardian. Just a thought...

 

[fransisco]

Even though Black Sabbath's influence may not be direct, their approach to heavy riffs and dark atmosphere certainly paved the way for a multitude of different styles. There is a chain of influences in music, and each band or genre takes what it wants from its predecessors. That's what makes the music scene so rich and varied !

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