Kill 'Em All - the most influential metal album of all time?

[I-Oblivion-I]

Anyone agree with me here? If you look at it metallica paved the way for the evolution of extreme metal with this album. They were the first band to incorporate a sort of metal song structure and styling with a more aggressive, punchy punk sound. They not only created the thrash metal genre, but also set the way for extreme metal in general, particularily death metal.

When i listen to an album like altars of madness, or scream bloody gore, i hear massive amounts of thrash influence, and where did this sound originally come from? Kill em all.

I honestly think that without kill em all, it would have taken metal much longer to evolve into the state it is in now simply because all modern day metal bands have many thrash influences. I dont mean that a band like bullet for my valentine, avenged sevenfold, or even bands like the faceless, necrophagist, beneath the massacre etc... sounds anything like thrash at all, but you can still see where bands like these have taken at least some of their "core" sound from.

I'd almost consider kill em all to be like one of the roots of a giant metal tree that spawned the branches of thrash metal, death metal, a lot of black metal, melodeath, metalcore, even some grind as well.

 

[unknown]

yeah because there wasn't thrash before Kill em All. You also have to take into consideration that album was incredibly influenced by bands like Diamond Head (with "Hit The Lights" almost blatantly ripping off a Diamond Head song).

there was metal long before Metallica released their first album. if you want to look at the most influential metal album, you have to look back further to bands like Black Sabbath and others of that era...bands that Metallica and others who came out during the 80s listened to. Without those influences, there might not be influential 80s albums

 

[SentinelSlain]

Metallica's sound, especially early on like that, was a pretty obvious progression from that of a few NWOBHM bands, I think it's possible that metallica's influence is slightly overrated as such.


edit, Ninja'd

 

[Krow]

O lawd. A metallica thread.

 

[I-Oblivion-I]

Metallica's sound, especially early on like that, was a pretty obvious progression from that of a few NWOBHM bands, I think it's possible that metallica's influence is slightly overrated as such.


edit, Ninja'd

Alright I agree they were obviously influenced by other bands and that without other bands, they wouldn't have had the specific sound they did on kill em all. However I still think that if you look at how many bands they influenced from their first 2-3 albums, they easily take the cake on most influential band in developing the sort of modern metal that you hear today.

I mean sure you could say led zeppelin were the most influential, but I personally dont hear much led zeppelin in the vast majority of metal albums being put out today. Also, in hindsight, their sound progression might have been obvious, but back nearly 30 years ago, i doubt it was so obvious.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Venom's Welcome to Hell and Black Metal say otherwise, in the realm of punky aggressive metal alone. The first half of Kill 'Em All is hardly thrash at all.

(with "Hit The Lights" almost blatantly ripping off a Diamond Head song)

You mean Seek & Destroy? Hit the Lights is more worshippy of that Weapon song, although aside from the introduction and title I don't think it can be called a ripoff.

 

[I-Oblivion-I]

Venom's sound was still different from early metallica though. On top of that they were no where near as influential, maybe in the underground, but to put any of their albums on the same level as kill em all is crazy

 

[Krigloch the Furious]

the more influential metallica albums are RtL and MoP. especially MoP

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Venom's sound was still different from early metallica though. On top of that they were no where near as influential, maybe in the underground, but to put any of their albums on the same level as kill em all is crazy

Define "the underground", because every extreme metal band worth a damn in the 80's certainly was familiar with Venom, which is why you can find Bay Area bands crediting them as the first thrash band, Chuck Schuldiner crediting them as the first death metal band, and Quorthon discrediting-them-like-a-school-girl-insults-her-secret-crush as the first black metal band.

the more influential metallica albums are RtL and MoP. especially MoP

This.

 

[Saparmurat_Niyazov]

Take Motorhead plus Iron Maiden's first 2 albums and you have KEM. Hardly groundbreaking.

 

[I-Oblivion-I]

Underground wasn't the best term to use in this case. I'd say they were able to bring that raw, thrashy sound to a more accessible, polished level not seen in venom albums. As a result, metallica managed to reach a much larger audience and in doing so really sort of helped the genre take off in a way that venom would have never been able to.

In other words metallica managed to reach more people, thus having a much bigger impact on the metal scene as a whole.

 

[Satanstoenail]

Anyone agree with me here?

No

 

[Blind Guardian]

If anything, Ride the Lightning provides a better case (for progressing the genre that is, not for anything more). At the time there was of course already a plethora of melodically adventurous heavy metal bands and agressive thrash metal bands, but there weren't yet any bands that combined violent frenzy with melodic sensibility the way Metallica did on that album.

 

[The Butt]

Kill Em All sucks.

 

[Kara-Shehr]

 

[Der Morgenstern]

More like Sucktallica.

 

[Lateralus14]

Kill Em All sucks.

Yea bro I'd rather listen to Children of Bodom.

 

[PlasmaShock]

Love Metallica's first two albums, but I tend to ignore everything about the band to keep my sanity.

 

[Lateralus14]

^ That

 

[Hubster]

^ Double that.