Why is the metalness of Black Sabbath questioned but not 80s Priest or Dio?

[CiG]

Plenty of metal bands take a lot of their sound from Motorhead, a fundamentally very rock & roll band.

 

[challenge_everything]

Nope, I didn't mean that. I mean generally the vast majority of metal that came after Sabbath, in the next decade (Priest, Maiden, Accept, Dio, Metallica, Slayer, Helloween, Savatage, Celtic Frost, Death, Bathory, etc.) had no blues/acid rock roots in metal and that's a big difference compared to 70's BS style.
So I think Priest changed metal a lot, because they discarded blues elements from metal.

I don't think you'll get any argument that "Priest changed metal a lot" but you are confusing everyone by saying things like

So I think they gave a pure definition to heavy metal with that album.

 

[Texas King]

70s Black Sabbath had plenty of non-metal moments.
At least the half of their debut's stuff is not metal, at least the half of "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath" stuff is not metal and "Technical Ecstacy" and "Never Say Die" are generally unmetal.

 

[PrincessHades]

It's all marketing. From a music history perspective, I personally believe that Black Sabbath was the first successful band that was inarguably metal. Sir Lord Baltimore wasn't as successful. Deep Purple played quite a bit of metal, but it was only an aspect of who they were as a band. Led Zeppelin dabbled, and also contributed heavily by adding more classical and folk inspired elements to a bluesy, hard-rocking sound, which was likely instrumental in the development of metal as something distinct from more stripped down hard rock. There were many others that dabbled, but no sense in listing them all. Sabbath, on the other hand, were mostly metal. They had a few lighter songs, but I don't think there's a lot of room to argue that Master of Reality isn't a metal album, unless you want to play semantics.

The problem is that during Sabbath's heyday, "heavy metal" wasn't well-defined. It was more of an adjective than a genre, used to describe the louder, more "obnoxious" kind of music that was becoming popular with the youth in the late 60s and early 70s. It really wasn't distinct from hard rock and what would become punk, but again when you look at it from a musician's POV, Sabbath were one of the biggest driving forces that changed this. They were not hard rock. They took a heavy, dark blues sound, combined it with some more folk and occult aesthetic, which differentiated them from the more straight forward, hard-rocking music that was getting big around the same time (take The Who for example, loud as fuck, but not metal for the most part).

Judas Priest were really one of if not the first to openly embrace the heavy metal label, effectively using it as a brand for themselves. Sabbath looked like a bunch of hippies, whereas Priest were out on stage in BDSM gear. Metal everywhere. Shortly thereafter, a lot of acts followed in JP's footsteps, including NWOBHM acts like Maiden, and some American bands like Motley Crue and W.A.S.P that played heavy and sang about more relatable themes. Dio (and Dio-era Sabbath) updated their sound to be a bit more modern as well, while still retaining their character. These ended up being the bands that the generation that grew up in the 80s would most associate with "heavy metal", simply because they're the bands that were marketed to them as metal. Some of it isn't even metal (e.g the hair metal band called Poison, Warrant, etc) but it's widely known as metal because that's what it was sold as.

We're seeing a similar pattern nowadays, with kids born after the 90s being more likely to associate the "metal" moniker with bands like Slipknot or even bands like Linkin Park or Limp Bizkit, despite the latter two being decidedly not-metal by the standards of those who are more dedicated to the genre.

What's metal to us will always, to us, be metal. It doesn't matter what future generations come to think, so long as there's a loyal and cohesive fanbase, the phrase "heavy metal" will always be useful in relation to the style of music that was popularized by Sabbath and continued with the NWOBHM and extreme metal of the 1980s and onward.

 

[Texas King]

We're seeing a similar pattern nowadays, with kids born after the 90s being more likely to associate the "metal" moniker with bands like Slipknot or even bands like Linkin Park or Limp Bizkit, despite the latter two being decidedly not-metal by the standards of those who are more dedicated to the genre.

Linkin Park labeled as metal is silly. Their style is just not metal, their main influences are not from the metal world, their music background is not related to metal.
I could accept Slipknot and System of a Down being labeled as metal because their background is somewhat metal-related, but Linkin Park no way.

 

[PrincessHades]

I definitely agree. Nu-metal and glam metal sometimes feel more like marketing terms or movements than they do cohesive genres. Nu-metal is basically just used to refer to the large contingent of bands in the 90s onward that took alternative rock and kind of revitalized it by adding more hip hop, metal, and hardcore elements. It's really not one particular style. A lot of it is just as influenced by hardcore, alt rock, and hip hop as it is metal. This isn't to say that all nu-metal isn't really metal. Most of Slipknot's work is pretty rooted in extreme metal.

SOAD are really unique and they've definitely thrown around a handful of metal and even thrash riffs, but in their case, I feel like it's more of a complement to their experimental alt rock sound than it is their actual identity. There's a big difference between playing metal as a genre and just using it to accentuate your style.

 

[Malibuman]

Maybe it's partly because people underestimate how old the early Sabbath albums were and what else was around at the time? By the time Priest were doing 'Sad Wings' Sabbath were already up to their penultimate first period Ozzy album! What else can you point to between 1970 and 1974 that's total metal?

I must admit though when I relistened to Volume 4 a while back there was way more hippie nonsense on there than I remembered.

 

[CiG]

What else can you point to between 1970 and 1974 that's total metal?

 

[PrincessHades]

View attachment 37260

title please??

Maybe it's partly because people underestimate how old the early Sabbath albums were and what else was around at the time? By the time Priest were doing 'Sad Wings' Sabbath were already up to their penultimate first period Ozzy album! What else can you point to between 1970 and 1974 that's total metal?

I must admit though when I relistened to Volume 4 a while back there was way more hippie nonsense on there than I remembered.

I think the idea that certain artists "invent" styles is questionable at best. Black Sabbath, Metallica, Venom, Bathory, Possessed, Death etc are all great bands and they were incredibly innovative, but it's very hard to actually pinpoint the beginning of any style. For every big band like the aforementioned few, there will usually be a plethora of lesser-known acts who either get lost in history or become cult classics, if they're lucky.

I think of Black Sabbath as the Henry Ford or Thomas Edison of metal. They didn't invent metal, but they were among the earliest to play it and introduce it to the general public, and thus they went down in history as its progenitors.

 

[CiG]

title please??

Volcanic Rock by Buffalo.

 

[PrincessHades]

Oh awesome, that's metal asf and it's cool because it's less downtrodden, more rocked-up than Sabbath, predicting what would come later with NWOBHM.

Don't forget this:



SLB were unequivocally heavy metal in 1970. Also Bang is another one. Deep Purple had quite a few songs that are well over the line (Bloodsucker, Highway Star Fireball etc), Lez Zeppelin had a couple that straddle the line, and then Rainbow came a bit later but to me they're a cross between Sabbath and Purple, pretty metal.

 

[Texas King]

Oh awesome, that's metal asf and it's cool because it's less downtrodden, more rocked-up than Sabbath, predicting what would come later with NWOBHM.

Don't forget this:



SLB were unequivocally heavy metal in 1970. Also Bang is another one. Deep Purple had quite a few songs that are well over the line (Bloodsucker, Highway Star Fireball etc), Lez Zeppelin had a couple that straddle the line, and then Rainbow came a bit later but to me they're a cross between Sabbath and Purple, pretty metal.

How about High Tide, from 1969?



To me this sounds like heavy psychedelic rock turning into heavy metal. This was proto-metal at least.

 

[PrincessHades]

How about High Tide, from 1969?



To me this sounds like heavy psychedelic rock turning into heavy metal. This was proto-metal at least.

The blues and psychedelic roots were heavy in this, but that's early metal for you. The verse work is a bit more "proto", sounding more like heavier 60s rock, but the riffage is quite metal in many ways.

I reserve "proto" for stuff that's more decidedly not metal while stiil predicting metal (or any other genre/subgenre). Maybe Communication Breakdown by Led Zeppelin is proto-metal. It's more just stripped down rock in a style that would later be associated with punk, but it's really not a metal song (unlike Immigration Song or Achilles Last Stand, those are metal to me). Early Venom is proto-thrash despite being just heavy/speed with a tinge of black. Slayer's Hell Awaits is proto-death, despite being unequivocally thrash and not death metal. Possessed-Seven Churches? That's a death/thrash mix, maybe a bit of early black as well, but I wouldn't call it proto-death metal because it actually is death metal in a large capacity.

It's all semantic, but my stance is that metal was definitely around prior to the 70s. It wasn't big until the "big 3" of early hard rock/heavy metal showed the masses, and because there was no big cosmopolitan metal scene around before/during the early 70s, a lot of that stuff gets lost to history as "heavy blues rock". There's no one around today reminiscing on the history of late 60s/early 70s metal, but if you take a band like Poison (USA), you see a lot of people looking back at it as "hair metal" that they listened to during their wild days, despite it being pretty light.

 

[PrincessHades]

 

[Texas King]

I reserve "proto" for stuff that's more decidedly not metal while stiil predicting metal (or any other genre/subgenre). Maybe Communication Breakdown by Led Zeppelin is proto-metal. It's more just stripped down rock in a style that would later be associated with punk, but it's really not a metal song (unlike Immigration Song or Achilles Last Stand, those are metal to me). Early Venom is proto-thrash despite being just heavy/speed with a tinge of black. Slayer's Hell Awaits is proto-death, despite being unequivocally thrash and not death metal. Possessed-Seven Churches? That's a death/thrash mix, maybe a bit of early black as well, but I wouldn't call it proto-death metal because it actually is death metal in a large capacity.

I never figured out what subgenre of metal Celtic Frost (To Mega Therion) belongs to? Is it doomy thrash, is it proto-black? Hard to categorize.