Metal Genres

Birmingham, February 1970, a factory town band and a detuned tritone.

Four bands in the Bay Area, four more in Germany, and then 1986: Master of Puppets, Peace Sells, Reign in Blood and Darkness Descends inside twelve months.

Thrash with the melodies cut out and the tempo left running.

Venom printed the words on a sleeve in 1982 without playing anything like it.

Black Sabbath's first riff, held down and refused permission to hurry.

Speed metal in a major key, with a chorus built to be sung back by ten thousand people.

Metal that went to music school and came back with the odd time signatures.

Therion hired an actual choir in 1996 and Nightwish found a soprano the year after, and metal has been paying orchestra invoices ever since.

Skyclad put a fiddle player in a thrash band in 1990 and the idea escaped.

Birmingham, 1987: Napalm Death welded hardcore's politics to the fastest drumming anyone had yet attempted and called the record Scum.

Hardcore's breakdown crossed with the Gothenburg guitar lead, worked out in Massachusetts and Ohio basements through the nineties and sold worldwide in the two thousands.