DBB
Member
- Dec 20, 2005
- 370
- 1
- 18
My Man Mahmoud said:My sense that the move came from the press and the labels has to do with the earliest evidence I've seen of the term. In the 85 zines I have, "thrash metal" appears more in the ads than anywhere else (along with "black metal" and "death metal" being applied pretty much without any rhyme or reason). At best, of course, this is anecdotal evidence, most of what I've got are old British rags, and not much in the way of the more fanzine type stuff.
That is what I thought. No evidence at all really. Power metal was the term most commonly used in ads in 1985 to describe what could be classified as speed or thrash, but that is something which cannot really be proven without resorting to scanners. What I have really found interesting is the almost absolute absence of ads in metal magazines from all different points of the compass (ranging from Kerranng's polished and "professional"Mega Metal to the rough around the edges digest fanzine Headbanger when compared to magazines today. It is really startling.
You are too far gone for me to be able to say anything to change your mind. Calling South of Heaven a "conventional speed metal" album (newsflash: They intentionally slowed down the pace on this album) is crazy and is an indication of how tenaciously you will hang on to these misconceptions.
In the end, it is not worth it. That thrash was something bands adopted and was not welcomed with the open arms by many (initially mind you and if you indeed have "British rags" from 1985 this should be as plain as the nose on your face) is something that has become apparent to me beyond a doubt as I've been reading many metal magazines from 1983-1986 of late. The term thrash originated from metalheads on the ground (playing in bands, listening to records, going to shows) is also more than clear. There is a reason why Dave Carlo vowed to be "Thrashing until he was 103"--it is because thrash had a meaning more profound than you will ever be willing to attribute to it, even if confronted with indisputable evidence.
I disagree. It certainly seems that there was no reasoning behind it. For awhile, I just thought these people were crazy and just throwing around terms in a willy-nilly fashion, but as I read more and more it became clear that people were using an entirely different method of employing these terms than they do today. Everything osssified in a sense (not totally, but damn close) in the late '80s early '90s to produce the accepted definitions of death, black, thrash. power etc. etc. that we use now. Take to long to explain, and I'm holding in reserve for something else and do not want to ruin any surprises.My Man Mahmoud said:(along with "black metal" and "death metal" being applied pretty much without any rhyme or reason).
In fact, I could even tell you about an individual (even where he worked, which is important--not in the industry) rarely mentioned who was greatly responsible for popularizing the adjective and noun "death" used with metal, but these are all stories for different days so some pieces of the big picture emerge instead of a triumphing in a game of message board trivial pursuit.