Metalution Part 3: The Origin of Traditions and First Taste of the Epic

Metalution Part 3:
The Origin of Traditions and First Taste of the Epic

Not every song discussed in this section will be embedded here. You are encouraged to check everything out if you are unfamiliar. It is highly advised that Paranoid is listened to in full as it is one of the most iconic metal albums ever recorded.

The Beginning of Tradition - Paranoid

Continuing the latter half of 1970, less than a year after recording their first album, Black Sabbath was back in the studio to record their second. Paranoid is one of the most iconic metal albums ever to be produced. It was a more refined sound compared to their first album and concretely established the foundation of metal. It was originally released September 18th of 1970 with the US release to follow January 7th of 1971.
The album begins with “War Pigs” which might be considered the first Traditional Heavy Metal song if not for the doom tenge of the intro as well as the chromatic riff that follows the verses making this song Doom Metal.
Following “War Pigs”, is “Paranoid” which was released earlier as a single August 7th of 1970. This song was written in a short time in the studio to fill some time on the album. The opening riff is extremely similar to a riff discussed in part one from Led Zeppelin’s “Dazed and Confused”. Tony claims no Zeppelin influence, however Geezer and Bill both do. In part one it was mentioned that this riff is possibly the first metal riff although the song itself is overwhelming non-metal and therefore the song isn’t classified as such using the dominance rule. “Paranoid” is strait to the point with no extra non-metal frills. Unlike many of Sabbath’s songs there is no tint of blues, jazz, or any other older style of music. “Paranoid” is a simple example of pure heavy metal and is the first song to be categorized as Traditional Heavy Metal.
Traditional Heavy Metal is defined as pure metal using the elements discussed in part one. It is a style lacking of any defining characteristics that would define later sub-genres of metal. Notably “Paranoid” also doesn’t use any alternate picking which would still be considered Traditional Heavy Metal when used at tempos above 145 bpm. This makes “Paranoid” and other songs in its vain a more pure form of metal than any other.

Following “Paranoid”, is “Planet Caravan”. It’s a jazzy psychedelic sounding piece. The album then kicks back into doom mode with “Iron Man” which is arguably one of the most recognizable metal songs in existence. With its dissonant bending and prodding main riff this song screams Doom Metal. This is followed by “Electric Funeral” which is pure doom with a jazzy middle bridge. If I made a collection of songs that are the most quintessential of Doom Metal, “Electric Funeral” would be possibly at the top of the list. Then “Hand of Doom” brings more doom although this one breaks with some more chipper sounding parts in the middle section.

Closing out the album with two non doom tracks, “Rat Salad” is the next song which is mostly a drum solo but is sandwich between some guitar, but none of it distinctively metal. It has the same heavy distortion as the rest of the album so it could be appropriate to call the song Heavy Rock, it has an obvious jazzy feel.
The last track “Fairies Wear Boots” is certainly heavy, and has heavy metal sections, the core of this one is blues rock. Again with the heaviness this would be a Heavy Blues Rock song.

More Dabblers

Atomic Rooster - “Death Walks Behind You”

Generally considered a progressive rock band, Atomic Rooster opens their second album with the title track “Death Walks Behind You”. This one has a psychedelic rock feel but jumps into a chromatic galluping guitar riff that gives this the Early Heavy Metal categorization.

Lucifer’s Friend - “Ride the Sky”

Lucifer’s Friend opens their debut album with “Ride the Sky”. It is a song with an up beat drive and a steading string ride typical for Traditional Heavy Metal. It is laced with hammond organ marking it as early metal. The verses are closed with a small alternately strummed part, but at 144 bpm this is given the speed exception, and classified as Early Heavy Metal.

Sir Lord Baltimore the Harbingers of Tradition and Epicness

Sir Lord Baltimore released their first album December of 1970 with six of ten tracks that can be categorized as Traditional Heavy Metal. A review of the album would be one of if not the first time the term heavy metal was used to describe music.
Sir Lord Baltimore had no hammond organ or any other instruments that would be abandoned by metal. Out of the six Traditional Heavy Metal songs, five would use the speed exception to sound more like a sped up raw hard rock band than playing the the more refined metal primarily being established by others at the time. Four of those songs would be “Hard Fallin' Rain”, “Lady of Fire”, “Pumped Up”, “Ain't Got Hung on You”.

The title track “Kingdom Come” would be a slower song following the more Black Sabbath style of metal.

The First Taste of the Epic

The one track yet to be mentioned “Helium Head (I Got a Love)” is one of the tracks using the speed exception to incorporate alternate strumming, but this song adds something making it the first of a new sub-genre of metal. At first glance this song is no more special than the others but adds a vocal part that will be used to denote Epic Metal by the Metology standards. This vocalization starts around 1:15 and again around 2:20. This type of vocalization would be picked up by later epic sounding metal bands and is the key component used in Metology to classify epic metal. Without this part the song would be Traditional Heavy Metal like the others, but with the addition of it the song would be Epic Traditional Heavy Metal.

Clarifying the use of Genre and Sub-genres

This closes out 1970, the first year of heavy metal. As probably noticed there have been sub-genres already marked, but keep in mind that a sub-genre isn’t really recognized as established until many bands pick up the style. At the time heavy metal wasn’t even recognized as anything different from hard rock, and hard rock really wasn’t all that established either. New genres of music take time to be commonly recognized as something lasting or new.
It should be noted that although the terms Early Heavy Metal and Traditional Heavy Metal are both used by Metology standards, in all technicality Early Heavy Metal could be considered a sub-genre of Traditional Heavy Metal, Early Traditional Heavy Metal. There may be times though when the term “early” is applied to other sub-genres of metal. So far Doom Metal has been established, and as we move into 1971 we will also see the birth of Speed Metal.
Lastly using the term Traditional Heavy Metal implies there is non-traditional heavy metal, and this is true. Such non-traditional heavy metal will simply be “Heavy Metal” as traditional heavy metal would technically be a sub-genre of heavy metal. Take note that the Traditional Heavy Metal style is at the root of the metal genre and also many sub-genres will no longer have the term “heavy” used when with them.
For now, Metalution is a full decade of music away from Heavy Metal dropping the “traditional”.