User Reviews

The late 70s and early 80s gave birth to one of the most important movements within the metal scene, that being the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (shortened, NWOBHM). Its importance is primordial because the sound that bands such as Iron Maiden, Saxon, Diamond Head, Raven or other major contributors of this genre subsequently gave birth to a whole new palette of metal genres.

While the bands that promoted this genre are at the center of attention, the contribution of several 70s bands or artists to the sound of the NWOBHM is primordial as well. Motorhead with its 1979 albums Overkill and Bomber presented a sound with a punk edge and attitude, aspects that could eventually be heard in the music composed by the main contributors to the NWOBHM (much to Harris' dismay).

The punk rock movement has thoroughly been stereotyped, same like the 90s grunge movement for its attitude of going against trends and displaying an anti-social behavior. While most of the metal bands representative of this movement emulated the attitude of punk, we can safely say that bands such as Motorhead were clearly inspired by this movement, frequently citing Ramones as a primary influence. Sex Pistols' contribution to punk is noteworthy, but Ramones did not only display earlier the attitude of punk better than Sex Pistols, but as musicians they were far more capable than Pistols ever were. At least they did not play with band members that did not know how to handle their instruments just for the sake of that rebellious punk attitude (yes, talking 'bout Sid Vicious).

Another band that is both credited for laying the foundation of speed metal and NWOBHM is Judas Priest. Priest laid the foundation of these two genres on their two 1978 records Stained Class and Killing Machine. Judas Priest has been the oddball of the 70s blues based heavy metal movement, especially after they released Sad Wings Of Destiny in 1975 and their sound developed in the 70s was the logical step to reinvigorate the identity of heavy metal. While parallels with the punk rock sound are few and hard to notice, the speed of their last albums of the 70s was indeed a trait present in the punk rock scene.

One thing we can say about the NWOBHM is that those who brought it in the spotlight are also the ones who buried it for quite a few decades. Iron Maiden is the Black Sabbath of this genre, as their sound was innovative for entire generations of traditional heavy metal bands, however, they set the bar so high with releases such as The Number Of The Beast in 1982 and Powerslave in 1984 that made it almost impossible for the rest NWOBHM bands to keep up, quality wise. As such, most of them did not last longer than 1985 or those who did made some slight adjustment to their sound.

The "slight" adjustment to the sound of some NWOBHM acts brings us to the debate that if we should include Def Leppard in this whole movement. Def Leppard was the kind of band with ambitions beyond the limitations of the NWOBHM. They did not want to sound heavier, punkier, more metallic, they wanted to make music that would click with a big audience. Unfortunately, for their time, the edgy sound of NWOBHM was not really fit for commercial success outside of Europe, and in order to 'make it big', you would have to focus on breaking the US charts. Thus, Pyromania came in 1983, and 5 years later, Hysteria. While these two records were anything but metal, we cannot say the same thing about the first two, with an emphasis on the debut. On Through The Night had a sound that bordered metal and hard rock, a mixture that many NWOBHM bands took and promoted. Def Leppard's music might not be in the play list of someone that wishes to hear more "intellectual" music, but more like in the play list of those that know that rock and metal music are also about celebration and having fun. Def Leppard had a vision, and the fact that they followed it through the end and achieving it does not make them less intelligent than other bands. And it surely does not take their spot within this movement. They may not have been a great contributor to the NWOBHM, but they started as a band within this movement. Period.

Other than the classical side of this genre, we can see the early inception of doom metal in the music of bands such as Witchfinder General or Pagan Altar, a tinge of folk infused in metal, a precursor of folk metal in Golgotha, signs of progressive metal in bands such as Omega and of course the very beginning of extreme metal represented by Venom. If there is anything good about this music genre is that it was varied and even the bands that would emulate the sound of the pioneers would prove to be challenging.

Other notable NWOBHM representatives: Tokyo Blade, Cloven Hoof, Angel Witch, Satan, Grim Reaper, Tygers Of Pan Tang, Chateaux, Quartz, Tank, Holocaust, Legend, Blitzkrieg, Samson, Demon, Tytan, Hell, Jaguar, Rock Goddess, etc.

Even though NWOBHM, i.e. what I refer to as "traditional heavy metal", doesn't count among my favourite types of metal, I enjoyed this episode the most. Part of the reason might be that by its very definition the show features almost solely British acts, which means that all these colourful and amusing English characters such as Dickinson, Halford, Scabies, McAuliffe, or Harris were featured. Another reason might be that NWOBHM that was the last big step that had to be taken before thrash reared its head just a few years later: the most important of all of metal's sub-genres, because of the high number of excellent bands it produced and the impact it had by helping spawn nearly every major new genre that appeared later.

When John Tucker says that NWOBHM is "what I have been waiting for" – that's exactly what I thought about thrash when it arrived. This kind of traditional HM wasn't good enough to pull me into metal; in fact, I considered (and still do, to a lesser extent) most classic HM to be cheesy and uninteresting, with very few exceptions such as Iron Maiden, Saxon, and Ozzy (who isn't strictly NWOBHM but plays more-or-less HM), all of which made some great music.

The running gag with Steve Harris and his hatred of the punk scene provides the funniest moments in the entire series. Repeatedly Dunn presses the issue of punk's influence on metal, but each time Harris absolutely refuses to budge, denying punk any credit whatsoever for anything, stubbornly deflecting all of Dunn's attempts to get him to surrender by finally admitting that punk had some degree on influence on the NWOBHM. "I won't credit it with anything, we absolutely hated it".

What Kim from Girlschool says about punk is very true: "when you listen to punk, it's quite weak really, whereas HM has a lot more power". For example, the song featured here by The Damned sounds like the bloody Pogues! In fact, the Sex Pistols were the exception rather than the rule, having the distorted guitar-orientated sound they had, whereas the vastly overrated The Clash was a mere pop band with atonal vocals and a phony rebellious attitude. Strummer basically jumped on the punk bandwagon as soon as he sniffed its commercial potential, and straight away changed his image – plus he stems from an affluent background. (So much for punk's "street credibility".) So in a sense Harris is right: Iron Maiden's sound has pretty much zero to do with those soft punk bands that were mostly blues-based and had no real heaviness to speak of. Most punk bands were a paper tiger: all show, flash and fake menace, but very little substance to back up all the posturing with. The Sex Pistols were pretty much the only band of quality from that first punk wave.

Iron Maiden didn't have much to shout about either, initially. Their DiAnno albums were quite weak song-writing-wise. Harris even admits that "many people bought (the first album) just because of the cover with Ed". Since Maiden's early years I had always insisted that their huge success had a lot to do with Ed, their cheesy (and embarrassing) gimmick. Ed is a double-edged sword, of course; it helped them become huge but it also added to the HM's tacky/childish imagery – the reason why many 60s/70s bands who influenced metal hate being labeled "metal" or having anything to do with it even. Metal being labeled "stupid" (as pointed out by Leppard's Elliot) is quite unfair though. I assure you that EVERY branch of rock and pop music is "stupid", i.e. most of its musicians are more-or-less equally moronic. What separates various rock/pop genres, apart from the music itself, is most of all the varying degrees of integrity. Pop/rap/techno/glam: zero integrity. Thrash/death/industrial: more integrity.

Speaking of (a lack of) integrity, next up: Judas Priest. Musically dull (aside from the solos), their riffs and choruses being a collection of mediocre HM clichés, and always ready to hop onto whatever rock/metal trend was "in" at the time. JP was always more about making money than great music. Their albums "Turbo" and "Painkiller" prove this bandwagon-jumping, in case anyone failed to notice. So it was appropriate for Dunn/McFadyen to start off JP's introduction with their sing-along tune "Living After Midnight" whose poppy chorus – if you listen carefully – sounds like an ABBA song. (An excellent pop group, btw, and fairly popular among metal fans.) JP often played music on the edge of pop, sometimes blatantly commercial – and the forefathers of crap like Hammerfall. But at least Halford doesn't deny JP joining NWOBHM (for profit).

Dunn was correct: including junk-meisters Def Leppard on the list of NWOBHM bands IS controversial, or put more bluntly - it's outright nonsense; probably motivated by the fact that Dunn loved the "Pyromania" album as a kid. Leppard always sounded like the cheapest kind of pop to me, 90% glam and 10% metal, with absolutely zero ambition to provide music of quality to their listeners. Watch any interview or documentary and within minutes you get a sense of their greed and over-focus on fame and success. They are a truly worthless band that only ever cared about raking in millions and spending them on cheap sluts at the French Riviera. How desperately and angrily Elliot tried to bury the "myth" that they were badly received on the famous Redding festival when crowds rightly identified them as garbage, hence unloaded their canned urine onto the stage, onto the band's heads, as opposed to going to the toilet. They must have figured: if it sounds like a sewer, than it must be a sewer.

Another reason this was the best episode: no Deena Weinstein this time, telling us that "heavy metal was heavier than the rock music before it" or some such bleedin'-obvious hooey, pretending to be an "expert". Damn Marxist buffoon.