The Importance of Being Metal: Megadeth-Peace Sells...But Who's Buying?

1986; Capitol Records

http://www.megadeth.com/home.php

1. Is It Any Good?

Fans will argue until they're blue in the face about the merits of Megadeth over Metallica, and vice versa, but with the possible exception of Metallica's first two albums, there's never been any question that Megadeth has always thrashed harder. Peace Sells...But Who's Buying may not be Megadeth's masterpiece(that honor has to go to Rust in Peace), but it's probably the most consistently solid album in Megadeth's discography, and maybe of the mid-'80s thrash movement in general.

Things start off at a nice gallop with "Wake Up Dead", the best song about infidelity not to come out of the American south, with the last minute transforming the fairly standard thrash tune into diabolical sounding war march. The beginning of the album suffers far more than the end, due to the clunky and dated "The Conjuring" and the outright boring "Devil's Island". That said, sandwiched between these two songs is "Peace Sells", an anthem that ranks up with "Ace of Spades", "Balls to the Wall" and "Raining Blood" as one of the defining heavy metal tracks of the '80s. Hilarious lyrics, intense guitar work and possibly the greatest metal bass riff of all time ensure it'll be a song remembered long after people stop playing "Rock Band 2".

Side 2 of Peace Sells is pure gravy. "Bad Omen" starts off slow but features a guitar solo that literally makes the guitar sound like it's melting and has to be heard to be believed. "I Ain't Superstitious" is a hilarious attempt at mixing thrash metal with the blues that, in a turn of events that you'll see becomes a pattern with this album, goes utterly apeshit in the last third. And "My Last Words" is an exhilarating ode to Russian Roulette and a fine way to cap off the album. It's a good chunk of music, and many lesser bands of the era would've killed to have a run of songs so excellent on one album.

But the centerpiece of the whole album has to be "Good Mourning/Black Friday". Starting out with a moody, haunting atmosphere, launching into a guitar solo that can only be described as "desolate" and progressing into one the most off-the-walls-insane-with-energy odes to mass murder ever recorded in the realm of metal, this song is easily one of the most underrated of Megadeth's entire canon and should have come to be known as one of the defining tracks of the thrash era. "Blistering" doesn't even begin to describe the last two and a half minutes of this song, as the drums start pounding like thunderclaps and the Dave Mustaine and Chris Poland's guitars start swirling around each other like they're eating each other from the inside out. Not until "Grand Theft Auto III" came out were killing sprees this fun.

The lyrics deserve a passing mention, as well. From infidelity to the occult, from global war to good old fashioned every day nihilism, Mustaine and company never stay on one subject for too long. While lyrics often took a backseat to the actual musicianship in thrash music, and still do on this album as well, it's refreshing that Megadeth decided to mix it up for this release, and it gives the music a freshness that's lasted to this very day.

Peace Sells...But Who's Buying is an essential recording from the thrash period. Funny, whip smart and as intense as all hell, any metalhead's discography is incomplete without this, one of Megadeth's finest efforts.

2. Is It Influential?

It was an album released by one of the Big Four, and one of their most well known ones at that. Even Megadeth's later guitarist, Jeff Young, was inspired by the playing on this album. I have no doubt that it served as a firm benchmark for quality metal for many future metal musicians, as well.

3. Is It A Good Starting Point For Beginners?

Absolutely. Peace Sells is a great microcosm of the entire thrash movement: From lyrics to lightning-fast musicianship, everything you need to know about thrash metal is right here in 37 minutes. Guaranteed to blow a newbie's lid off without sending them running away.

-CJ

ONE LAST THING:

I know this was a couple of days ago, but on Sunday Ronnie James Dio passed away. While I was never a fan of his solo work or his tenure with Black Sabbath, he did some good things with Rainbow, had an impressive voice and seemed like a great guy besides. And hell, the dude gave us The Horns. So even if I wasn't a particularly huge fan of his music, he inspired close to every metal group I enjoy, and that by itself is worth honoring, I think.

This installment of The Importance of Being Metal is dedicated to the memory of Ronnie James Dio. Here is a totally silly picture in his honor. Keep on rockin' in the Underworld, Dio!

The Importance of Being Metal: Iron Maiden-Somewhere In Time

September 29, 1986; EMI; Compass Point Studios, Bahamas and Wisseloord Studios, Netherlands

http://www.ironmaiden.com/

1. Is It Any Good?

Iron Maiden's golden age is often put on the same pedestal as those of Metallica, Slayer and Black Sabbath, and with very good reason. While they didn't innovate as much as those three bands, they made up for it with hair-raising, swashbuckling fun that generations of metalheads have reveled in, and these albums don't show any signs of losing relevance anytime soon. Somewhere In Time has the dubious distinction of being the album that started to move Maiden away from that golden age, and while it's maybe the weakest of their best albums, that's still an honor that a lot of bands would kill for, especially with Iron Maiden's pedigree.

One of the most controversial aspects of this album, and the one that takes the longest to get used to, is the use of synthesizers. They haven't aged particularly well, and while Iron Maiden has always excelled at making goofy music, the synths push "goofy" into "cheesy" much of the time and threaten to spoil the party.

Luckily, Maiden was smart enough to not let the synthesizers completely dominate their sound, a common sense move that many metal bands trying to move into "relevance" during the '80s didn't take into account. The title track is arguably the best song on the album: It puts the "speed" into "speed metal" and gallops with an intensity and sense of purpose that rivals some of the best material from Number of the Beast. "Wasted Years" suffers a little bit from overly-'80s production but remains a fun singalong anthem nonetheless. "The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner" is the closest that Maiden gets to a sincerely moving song since "Flight of Icarus" on Piece of Mind, and if "Heaven Can Wait" isn't in the running for Iron Maiden's best song, it's certainly a top contender for their most delightful.

Unfortunately, there are definite drags in Somewhere In Time that weren't present to the same extent on their earlier albums. "Sea of Madness" seems to plod along despite its jaunty pace, "Stranger in a Strange Land" has a memorable riff but fails to evoke a reaction otherwise, and "Deja Vu", without skirting the issue, blows. Three crappy songs wouldn't ordinarily be a huge deal, but this is an eight song album, and those songs take up around a third of the albums 51 minute run time. "Alexander the Great" is an appropriately theatrical epic and a great way to end the album, but by then the damage of the weak links has already been done and you're left feeling like a lot of potential was flushed down the drain.

Still, while it doesn't flow amazingly well as an album, on a song by song basis Somewhere In Time has a lot of worthwhile content and a few songs that rank as some of Iron Maiden's best. Put it on an MP3 player and hit shuffle and you'll notice the quality of the album go up significantly. It doesn't live up to past glories, but in the context of casual listening, Somewhere In Time succeeds as a fun collection of anthems.

2. Is It Influential?

It proved that a metal band could add synthesizers to its repertoire and still be considered legit. During the '80s that was no small feat, so I would say this definitely has a significance of a sort.

3. Is It A Good Starting Place For Beginners?

As an album not really, as it tends to drag in places, but songs like "Heaven Can Wait" and "Wasted Years" would definitely be very palatable for someone just starting to get into metal. Put your two or three favorite songs off of Somewhere In Time on an '80s metal mix and see how it turns out.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Judas Priest-Hell Bent For Leather

1978; Utopia and CBS Studios, London, England; Columbia Records

http://www.judaspriest.com/

1. Is It Any Good

metalrules.com's pop metal fetishism ends with this gem of a Priest album. Sitting comfortably between their New Wave Of British Heavy Metal and Arena Rock phases, Hell Bent For Leather is an essential part of any metalhead's discography, from the title track to the iconic album artwork.

Things start off at a nice rip with "Delivering The Goods", where Rob Halford can barely contain his joy at the prospect of a grisly beatdown. It's wonderfully energetic, almost giddy with malicious glee, and it's an ingenious way to begin an album about biking and street fights. Indeed, this is probably Judas Priest's most straightforward album in terms of lyrical content: Gone are the heady meditations on death and the supernatural that were abundant just one album prior, on Stained Class. Hell, if you were to simply read the lyrics without having heard any of the music, you might think that this was an AC/DC album.

Of course, one place where Judas Priest has always excelled is in their ability to switch tone, and this is the album where they really master the technique. As opposed to the unnatural transitions from balls-out heavy metal to subdued progressive rock that dragged down Sad Wings of Destiny, here the changes feel natural as the somewhat generic anthem "Rock Forever" switches into the quietly heroic, optimistic "Evening Star" and the raucous "Runnin' Wild" flows into "Before The Dawn", perhaps their first true ballad. Lyrically the songs may be consistent, but I'm hard pressed to think of a Judas Priest album that has so much variety in terms of tone.

To be sure, the album does have a few duds-the aforementioned "Rock Forever" is pretty forgettable, and there are a few more songs where I'm hard pressed to even remember what they sound like. That said, the quantity and the quality of the good far outweighs those of the bad. How much so? If it wasn't for "Ace of Spades", the title track may have stayed as heavy metal's standard "badasses on the road" staple. You literally cannot listen to it and keep still, and the simple, speedy catchiness of the main riffs have a lot to do with it. "Take On The World" is an obvious prototype for "United", a song off one of their later albums, and while it's not an amazing piece of work it does have a goofy, fist pumping sort of charm to it. "Killing Machine" is a stomping anthem to contract murder that's second only to "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap", and like that infamous classic it's the kind of song that makes you feel cooler for having heard it. Perhaps most notable of all is their cover of Fleetwood Mac's "The Green Manilishi(With The Two-Pronged Crown)" ,a grooving, snaking, simmering work that's not quite like anything else in the Metal Gods' discography. It's almost strip club-worthy in the way it slides around the listener's ears. And speaking of strip clubs, "Evil Fantasies" is probably the best metal song about BDSM ever written...and considering that this was before the Hair Metal movement took off, that is saying quite a lot.

Hell Bent For Leather isn't Judas Priest's greatest album-that honor will always stay with Stained Class-but it's certainly in the conversation. Abandoning the progressive aspects of their previous works while adapting the polished, studio-driven charms of their later albums and never losing a hint of edge in the process, this may be the greatest underground-to-mainstream transitional metal album ever released. Highly recommended, no matter what your taste in metal may be.

2. Is It "Influential"?

That's sort of hard to say at this point. It probably wasn't as influential to metal as a whole so much as it was a giant step in a different direction for Judas Priest. So, maybe? In a roundabout way, I suppose.

3. Is It A Good Starting Place For Beginners?

Absolutely. Heavy without being too abrasive, fast paced without being too quick to keep up with, catchy riffs and cutting vocals...what we have here is the perfect storm of introductory metal elements. Safe for neophytes and satisfying for seasoned veterans, Hell Bent For Leather is truly a heavy metal work for all moods and seasons.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Motley Crue-Too Fast For Love

1981; Hit City West, Los Angeles; Leathur Records

http://www.motley.com/

1. Is It Any Good?

I'm not going to lie to you: I've been putting off this entry of The Importance of Being Metal for a reason. Here's a quote from the very first installment of this series:

"...[Motley Crue is] sort of like a parallel-version of Guns 'n Roses, in that instead of being the kind of trashy guys that pee off the roof, punch cops and basically make kickass parties, they're the sort of dudes who'll fuck the drunk girl on the couch when she's passed out. And then puke on her."

Do you know the significance of that quote? The significance is that it shows that I think that Motley Crue sucks, in a big way. For the most part, I still do.

Fuckin' A, man, did you read that last bit? "For the most part". What does that mean? Yeah, you know what that means, don't pretend you don't. Here's the worst thing ever, and I'm about to type it:

Too Fast For Love, an album by Motley Crue, is not actually that bad. It's sort of good.

Wow, I think I just disowned myself.

Here are the bullet points:

• The bass is really consistent throughout, giving most of the songs a nice stomp.
• The lyrics are ridiculous a lot of the time, but honestly? They're no more ridiculous than a lot of Rolling Stones lyrics a lot of the time, also.
• "Live Wire" fucking rips.
• "Merry-Go-Round" is catchy.
• "Come On and Dance" is an awesome strip-club song.
• "On With the Show" is just cheesy enough to work.
• Vince Neil's voice is endearing, if not actually good.

Here's the crux of the matter, I think: This album was completely self-financed. While later albums had a completely obvious, repulsively superficial sheen to them that rocked about as hard as a cat with osteoporosis, this one was made by a bunch of young, sleezy assholes who quite honestly didn't have a Goddamn clue about what they were doing. While every other album they made could be described the same way, this is the only one that really keeps that spirit of authenticity, that swagger that says "I'm drunk, I'm horny, let's fuck and can I sleep at your place, I left my keys in Tyler's car". It's as far from necessary as you can imagine and it has close to no staying power, but it's more than possible to squeeze some fun out of Too Fast For Love.

I should qualify by saying that this is still not really a "good" album, per se. Most of the album drags along, and even the stuff that doesn't is offensively stupid. When you've got lyrics like "When she laughs, she's got the power of a child in her eyes/And when you cry, now/She'll hold you like a man's supposed to be held", well...a good bassline doesn't really help that. See the cover? This album sounds like that cover. That's the problem of the whole thing, is that you're never unaware of what you're listening to, and it makes you feel like a jackass. In a very real way you do kind of get stupider listening to this music, and I'm not sure if that's worth a few good anthems.

If there was ever an album that needed a "proceed with caution" label attached to it, it's this one. Like the cheap sex and cocaine that it talks about, Too Fast For Love's pleasures are fleeting, and like the above mentioned vices as well, when it's over you might either feel like you have a disease or like you need to get your stomach pumped. That said, it's not a completely unrewarding venture, and if you're feeling brave it might be worth checking out just to add a few songs to your workout playlist.

2. Is It "Influential"?

I think it was one of the albums that spearheaded the glam metal movement. So in that regard, fuck this album completely, and forever.

3. Is It A Good Entry Point For Beginners?

That's tough to say, because even though it's definitely accessible, it's also extremely grating at points, and as you may have been able to figure out, it's completely retarded in every way. Vince Neil also sounds like a baby sometimes, and that'll probably piss you off no matter how entrenched in the genre you are. Best to help a newbie sidestep this one, just to be sure.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Accept-Balls to the Wall

1984; Portrait Records
http://www.acceptworldwide.com/

1. Is It Any Good?

Check out that album art. Is that part of a gimp's buttcheek hanging out? Is he squeezing a rubber ball? Yeah, and yeah. Is one of the songs on this album called "London Leatherboys?" Is the name of the album "Balls to the Wall"? Once again, yeah, and yeah. Does the lead-singer's dude choir try to sound British when they chant the chorus, even though they're from Germany? Yes, once again.

Let's quit sidestepping it: Is Balls to the Wall gay as hell? That's hard to deny.

Is Balls to the Wall metal as hell? Well, that's even harder.

Udo Dirkenschneider looks like a baby and he sings like the guy from AC/DC was kicked in the throat every day as a child. He sounds ridiculous, as you can probably intuit, but he also sings like his vocal chords are being processed by a cheese grater, which means that he sounds completely awesome. He sings with all the operatic bravado of Bruce Dickinson and mixes it with a big dash of straight up, down-on-the-street mean. He doesn't sound quite like anyone else in metal, except for maybe Brian Johnson, and even at that, that dude can only dream of Dirkenschneider's range and snarl. Even if the rest of the band wasn't up to par, his over-the-top howls would stay in your head for weeks.

Luckily, Accept is an anthem machine, and that's as much of a compliment to guitarists Herman Frank and Wolf Hoffmann as it is to Dirkenschneider, if not moreso. If you were a metal band in the '80s, you had two options as to the kind of music you could make: You could make the audience want to smash their faces through glass and punch people, or you could make them pump their fists and march on their school or workplace or parents or whatever was pissing them off. Balls to the Wall falls into the second category, and among it's contemporaries it was one of the best of the era. Most every riff is going to get stuck in your head, and not a single song doesn't serve as a great rallying cry for something or another, whether the subject is workplace rebellion or BDSM. The title track is just generally a great "stickin' up for the little guy" kind of song, and with an amazingly catchy guitar line and Dirkenschneider's increasingly psychotic vocals, it serves as a headbanger anthem for the ages. Likewise, "Losing More Than You Ever Had" serves as a surprisingly understanding ballad from a guy trying to tell his friend why his ex left him and why he should stop crying over spilled milk. It's weird subject matter for anthemic metal but it doesn't lose a shred of impact, thanks to the speedy tempo and loopy growls.

Balls to the Wall is an album that's often compared more with albums like the Scorpions' Love at First Sting and Twisted Sisters' Stay Hungry, but it's in the interesting position of being too fast and abrasive to really be called party metal, and not quite relentless enough in it's subject matter and speed to be regarded among more extreme efforts like Slayer's Reign in Blood and Kreator's Pleasure to Kill. Rather than alienating itself, though, this aspect of being not quite here and not quite there creates an album that can be enjoyed by metalheads of all kinds, as long as they're not in the mood for anything terribly serious. It's a ton of fun and it's heavy and catchy enough to stay with you for a while after you turn it off. It's essential for your understanding of the '80s metal scene, since you're getting a little bit of everything with this one.

2. Is It "Influential"?

Wikipedia defines this as being one of the first power metal albums, which is a hideous thing to be regarded as and is also probably wrong. That said, it was pretty instrumental in setting up the Teutonic thrash scene that would scream out of Germany a few years later, to the same extent that Motorhead's Ace of Spades helped make a blueprint for American thrash. That means that, interestingly enough, while not technically an "extreme" metal album, it was very important to later thrash, black, power, death, etc. releases that would come out in the next decade.

3. Is It A Good Starting Place For Beginners?

Absolutely. Dirkenschneider's voice is just abrasive enough for newbies to balk but not run away completely, and the guitars are practically engaging enough to be the musical equivalent of black holes. As stated above, this album offers a little bit of almost every kind of subgenre that was around at the time, so this would be a fantastic way to introduce a new listener to '80s metal.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Black Sabbath-Sabbath Bloody Sabbath

1973; Clearwell Castle, Gloucestershire, England; Vertigo Records
http://www.blacksabbath.com/

1. Is It Any Good?

A bunch of people like this album a lot because of how different it is from the rest of Black Sabbath's golden age material, and honestly, to me, the things that make this album different from stuff like Master of Reality and their self-titled debut are also the things that make it kind of lame in a lot of places.

First of all, and this is big, the guitar work on this album is really sloppy when compared to other records. Maybe it's just the fact that I don't have a remastered copy, but my copy of Paranoid is one of those bunk-ass editions that have the "may expose the limitations of analog recording equipment" on the back as well, and it wasn't anywhere near this squeaky. Seriously, at a certain point you're left wondering if Iommi dipped the neck of his guitar in butter while he was in the recording studio, because the chord transitions are extremely obvious and, in some places, very distracting. It's a shame, since Tony Iommi is pretty much a riff genius and the sliding really detracts from some killer hooks.

When there are killer hooks to be had at all, that is. See, for a good portion of this album, Black Sabbath decided to include orchestral arrangements and keyboards because, I dunno, that's what a "serious" band has to do, at some point? The point is, it misses far more than it hits. As a matter of fact, the best track by leaps and bounds, "A National Acrobat", is the only one that's straight-up, no nonsense guitar, bass, drums and vocals. Truthfully, it's a spooky, doomy, haunting song that stands as one of their absolute best on any album.

Likewise, the title track, while very different from the usual Sabbath fare, is a pretty excellent underdog anthem, and "Sabbra Cadabra" might be the only Black Sabbath song you could feasibly dance to-trust me, it actually works. The horns, keyboard and barroom piano all coalesce nicely to make one of their most jumpin' tracks, and it's honestly a lot of fun.

Unfortunately, the rest of the album doesn't hold up nearly so well. "Fluff", while kinda pretty, is precisely what it sounds like-instrumental filler, and besides which, "pretty" probably isn't what you're looking for when you turn on a Black Sabbath record. "Killing Yourself To Live" works in places, but it displays Sabbath's fundamental misunderstanding of what makes for a good psychedelic song(hint-it's not Ozzy randomly proclaiming "Smoke it...GET HIGH!!" during the bridge for no discernible reason), and after a certain point it gets too goofy to really pay much mind to. "Looking For Today" can actually be described as being upbeat, which is basically, like...fuck that completely for a song that shows up on a Black Sabbath album.

None of those songs, though, match the goofy, embarrassing failure of a song that is "Who Are You?" This is the most keyboard heavy song on the album, and to answer your question, no, they are not the tasteful sounding kind of keyboards. They're the "wom-zee-wow-bee-wom-pychuu" kind of keyboards, and they turn what should be a foreboding, ominous dirge into the band's silliest fuckup next to the entirety of Technical Ecstasy. It's not a freethrow that bounces off the rim, it's an attempted dunk that somehow manages to miss the net completely, give you a wedgie and kill your grandparents in midair.

Sabbath Bloody Sabbath has some great moments, but ultimately can't live up to the metalness of the album title or the cover art. Keyboards and strings had worked for Black Sabbath in small doses on earlier albums, but this album proved that the band couldn't structure an entire record around anything outside of their core instruments.

That said, they would keep trying to do so anyway for a few more albums until they imploded and started sucking for the next decade or so. LSD, folks: It fucks with the mind.

2. Is It "Influential"?

A surprising number of people have covered the title track, and like I stated earlier a lot of people seem to like this album for some reason, but their days of being a full-blown inspiration were behind them at this point.

3. Is It A Good Starting Point For Beginners?

A lot of it is listenable, but very few songs on it could be called exemplary and even fewer could be called a good example of the genre, or even a good example of Black Sabbath's style, for that matter. Look elsewhere.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Motorhead-Ace of Spades

1980; Jackson's Studios, Rickmansworth, UK; Bronze
http://www.imotorhead.com/


1. Is It Any Good?

Fuck Buttons, huh? That's pretty cool, all cerebral and metaphysical and shit. If you're a dude, though, you'll probably want to listen to this. As a matter of fact, they drafted it into the constitution that you're not officially a full-fledged adult male if you haven't listened to this album three times. There is a time for learning and deepness and there is a time for manhood. Ace of Spades is a time for Kickass.

A lot of things will happen while you listen to this album. Lemmy is going to tell you to fuck him like you were a lizard. He's going to talk about how awesome it is to travel across the country and hurt people and get hurt in fantastic ways. He's going to threaten to bone your wife and then kill you with a hammer just because he is sick of your shit.

He will, in no uncertain terms, detail how much he likes to screw teenage girls.

Gambling is a big part of this album. Drinking is too, along with murder and driving fast. While all of this is going on, you are going to have no less than four parts of your body exploded from Eddy Clarke's solos. Phil "Philthy Animal" Taylor behind the drums is no slouch himself. He doesn't really do much more than show up and do his job, but he does it well.

You're going to want to hit people after listening to this album. Not because you're angry or anything, just because it will seem like the right thing to do. You can dance to a lot of this album as well, but it has to be really sleazy and the chick has to look like something you found in the garage.

Ace of Spades is something of an anomaly in the metal world-it is something that all metalheads can unite behind and praise to the high heavens. I'm pretty sure Iron Maiden is the only other band that can pull that off. Music? Fuck that, dude, this is a way of life. And you're not a part of it, no you are not sir, but for 45 minutes you can pretend that you are. You can throw on the title track or "(We Are) The Road Crew" or "Please Don't Touch" and you'll feel like you're exactly as awesome as the people making this music. And what's great about that is that unlike power metal, which is supposed to give you the same feeling, this shit is something you could technically pull off. That fine-ass elf lady and that big sword and that scary motherfucker of a troll are always just going to be sitting around in your brain, or if you're ridiculously committed to this idea, they might be on a poster or in a book, and you can always visit them there.

Cars, though? Cars are real. Beer is real. Loose women are things you can actually put your hands on. And your fists? Those sonsabitches are attached to you! If you really wanted to, you could quit your job, steal some gym equipment, hook up with every sleazy bitch in town and in no time flat, you'd be living it up Lemmy style. Is it realistic, is it something that sounds like it could be maintained for all that long? Is it even something that'll be fun once you start doing it? Probably not.

But doesn't it sound like it could be?

Basically, what I'm saying is that from a conceptual level, metal doesn't get better than this. Nasty, dirty, low-down and mean. Ace of Spades. Get it.

2. Is It "Influential"?

The title track is basically the Headbanger's Siren: "Stop whatever you're doing and just rock the fuck out for a couple of minutes". If you're in a metal band and you don't follow this code...well, you're probably Slipknot. This album inspired the thrash movement, which inspired basically everything else that has to do with metal. If you're in a metal band and you ain't up for the Ace, you had best order some kind of extra-strength genetically modified diaper, because no human being could possibly be that full of bullshit.

3. Is It A Good Starting Point For Beginners?

Yes.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Judas Priest-Sad Wings of Destiny

1976; Rockfield Studios, Wales; Gull Records
http://www.judaspriest.com/

1. Is It Any Good?

This is one of the consummate Judas Priest records for fans in the know to point to as their "heaviest" record, setting it as an example against Judas Priest's later "pop shit". In other words, it's sonic proof that sometimes a hardcore fanbase doesn't have any fucking idea what it's talking about.

To their credit, this is their second album, so because it's early that does automatically make it cooler than later releases according to the Rules of Music. And there's an interesting conflict going on with this one because it contains a few songs that are arguably among Priest's greatest works-"Tyrant" is an absolutely blistering anthem, which stands to this day as one of their most ripping songs. "Genocide" has one of the coolest, most sinister grooves this side of Black Sabbath, and "The Ripper" is pure fun-try to keep from mouthing the words yourself as Halford purrs out "I'm sly and I'm shameless, nocturnal and nameless/Except for The Ripper, or, if you like, Jack the Knife."

The real standout here, though, is "Dreamer Deceiver", a big middle finger to anyone who refers to metal as being "artless"-psychedelic, haunting and dramatic as all hell, it's an absolutely gorgeous song. Not quite a ballad and not quite a straight-up metal song, it stands as a testament to Priest's early progressive tendencies, and what's more, it stands as an example of artistry that metal rarely reaches outside of a purely technical definition of the word.

Unfortunately, the only two words I can think of to define the rest of the album is goofy and forgettable-"Epitaph" in particular stands out as a huge WTF moment, a piano ballad about a sad old man in his twilight years. No, the old man in question is not a general, a king or a wizard, and yes, it is probably the least metal song you can imagine outside of Elton John making a soft-jazz concept album about bridesmaids. "Victim of Changes" starts out well enough and has some really interesting passages but unquestionably wears out it's welcome after 8 minutes. "Genocide" sees Rob Halford really milking that goofy voice thing he does where he tries to sound like an intense black woman-it's kind of neat when he does it in songs later in the band's career, but here he sounds like he's trying to take part of another dude out of his butthole(which is not the most implausible of scenarios, really). Worst of all, "Deceiver" follows right on the heels of "Dreamer Deceiver", and next to such experimental beauty the dependable zippidy-doo riffs come off sounding like cold shit, and it turns out to be a really lame way to end the album.

There are some really amazing aspects of this album, and in some ways it's worth investing in just to see the early roots of a band that would eventually become a metal juggernaut, but this is an album where the sum of it's parts definitely turn out to be better than the whole. In other words, buyer beware.

That is one fuck of an album cover though, isn't it? Shit.

2. Is It "Influential"?

This is, for all intents and purposes, the album that really kicked off the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal movement, which was one of the principal components of creating thrash metal along with punk. It might also technically be the first progressive metal album, which is a little bit of a blessing but mostly a gigantic, horrible curse.

3. Is It A Good Entry Point For Beginners?

As an individual album, no, probably not-they'll probably nod off about halfway through. If you expose them to individual tracks, though, there's a good chance they'll want to learn more, as what's good here is really good. If they already like Judas Priest, show it off, but if they're still iffy on the genre as a whole then it might be a good idea to keep this one tucked away for a little while longer.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Judas Priest-Stained Class

1978; Columbia Records
http://www.judaspriest.com/

1. Is It Any Good?

Imagine Black Sabbath by way of Queen and you'll come up with Stained Class.

...You need to hear more? What the fuck is wrong with you?! What do I have to say, that listening to this album will make you jizz gold? I guess I can say a little more, if that first sentence didn't convince you this album is worth getting(by which I mean, if you're a communist.)

In many ways this is the quintessential heavy metal album of the '70s-loud, fast, heavy, dark, and more than a little goofy. On the surface it's nothing really more than a fun time, and truth be told that's probably the best application for it. I'll be honest with you, I'm not a fan of the phrase "on the surface" because that's code speak for "what you dipshits fail to realize is...". I don't like condescending to readers, especially not if it's in a heavy metal article-there's a special layer of hell for dorks who talk down to other people for not taking heavy metal "seriously", and I hope it's the one where you have to watch your parents die forever.

The only reason I use that phrase in this case is because there are a lot of things that you miss the first time you play Stained Class. I don't mean nuances-Judas Priest has all the subtlety of a drunk pyromaniac on the fourth of July. I mean that it's possible to get so sucked into the songs, you miss some of the song construction or some of the flourishes that really make the album enjoyable.

Take the opening and arguably greatest track on the album, "Exciter." It's totally possible to not acknowledge how truly excellent that regal little guitar solo right before the end of the song is. It can skip by you how the opening drum solo sets the tone for the rest of the song in such a way as to subconsciously ready you for the rest of the album, and you can even miss the little grin that you yourself make when all the instruments stop for just a moment to allow Rob Halford to proclaim "Fall to your knees and repent, if you please!"

You might get so enamored with air guitaring the main riff to the title track that you miss what a cool lyric "Impaled with betrayal, the tourniquet turns" is. Halford's unearthly, echoing scream of "We are Saints in Hell" during the song of the same name might distract you so much that you miss how it wouldn't have nearly as much effect without Glenn Tipton and K.K. Downing's wraithlike guitars drifting through the background to create the atmosphere. And in the case of "Beyond The Realms of Death", you'll probably get so caught up in how masterfully that song builds and builds in such a cosmically emotional fashion that you don't even notice that the song is an incredibly moving, relatable morality play about loneliness and isolation.

This is primarily a headbanging album, I want that to be perfectly clear. It's function first and foremost is to entertain and provide a release, and in this it succeeds in spades. But there's an intricate, masterful craft running through the veins of Stained Class that's a remarkably rare trait of any album, much less a heavy metal one. I'm not saying that it's just a thrashing good time "on the surface" because you're an ignorant savage who doesn't understand music, I'm saying it because there are too many wonderful things going on with this album at once, so many parts that you might miss the even more excellent whole. If heavy metal is the musical equivalent of trashy pulp sci-fi books, Judas Priest, during the late '70s, was the H.P. Lovecraft of the genre, and Stained Class was their At The Mountains of Madness. No metal collection is complete without it-I might go so far as to say no music collection is really complete without it, if only for the fact that it encapsulates everything that works about this kind of music so very well.

2. Is It "Influential"?

A band named itself after the first track, Exciter. This was Judas Priest's first album to break the Billboard 200, enabling them to make later classics such as British Steel and Screaming For Vengeance. Oh, and it was not only considered the height of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal in the '70s, it was also one of the first albums to concretely lay the groundwork for thrash metal. It is one of the defining releases of all time and it doesn't get nearly enough credit for being so.

3. Is It A Good Entry Point For Beginners?

Everyone I've loaned this album to has been turned into a believer after hearing it-to continue with my earlier analogy earlier, there's a theatricality to every song that transcends normal likes and dislikes of heavy metal. Halford's vocals are so goofy and over-the-top as to actually cross the silliness barrier and become dramatic, and the guitarwork can only be described as "kingly" much of the time. Just about anyone can have fun listening to Stained Class, and if they can't they're generally not the kind of person who enjoys the heavier side of music to begin with. In other words, I can in good conscience recommend this to almost everybody and say it will turn them on to metal. And I do. Much to their annoyance.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Anthrax-Among the Living

1987; Island/Megaforce Records
http://anthrax.com/NFWS/

1. Is It Any Good?

It is good. It's not terribly interesting to talk about, because it's an incredibly straightforward collection of music, but it is worth listening to.

Here's the requisite part of any review when you talk about Anthrax: They're considered to be one of the Godfathers of modern American metal music, along with Metallica, Slayer and Megadeth. They don't get nearly as much respect or acclaim as any of those three bands, however, and in a lot of ways it's easy to see why. Don't get me wrong-this is a good album, in many ways it's probably better than anything Slayer has ever done. The problem is that it's not terrifically memorable.

There are, as I mentioned earlier, a lot of things to like about this album. The title track is a little uninteresting, but it quickly subsides into "Caught In A Mosh", Anthrax's signature anthem and one of the greatest metal songs ever released. Seriously, that song is a force of nature and it's one of the most appropriately titled pieces of music of all time-you're going to find it impossible not to jump around and scream and hit people once this song gets going. It makes the album worth owning all by itself.

"Eflinikufelsin(N.F.L)" is a song about Jim Belushi, of all fucking things, and it's a pretty good one at that, talking about the remorse the band feels for an obviously talented his guy who screwed his life away taking drugs and alcohol. It could be a Minor Threat song, honestly. That gives way to "A Skeleton In The Closet", a speeding tank of a song with an absolutely monstrous bassline and a blistering, driving drumline that launches the song into a league of it's own when it comes to intensity.

Aside from the songs mentioned, and the closer-"Imitation of Life", a funny sendup of the commercialization of metal-there's not too much to talk about with this one. The only outright stinker is "Indians", an embarassingly weepy song about the Trail of Tears. Don't get me wrong, it's a subject that's rife for metal, but when you have the singer crooning "Crrryyyy for the indians!" backed by a chorus of "CRY! CRY!" from his bandmates, pretty much any chance of being taken seriously is shot to hell. The rest of the songs aren't necessarily bad, but they're not memorable, which makes an album composed of 4 amazing tracks, 4 mediocre ones and 1 clunker.

All that being said, I'll take 4 incredible tracks out of 9 out of an album that's only okay the entire way through. The great stuff here is really amazing and memorable. The stuff that isn't so great...well, it makes you see why the only thing people remember about this band is "Bring tha Noise". I guess what I'm trying to say is: Get it used.

2.Is It "Influential?"

I'm not absolutely positive, but this album is held in pretty high regard in some circles, and this is probably the most well liked release from one of the kings of thrash, so I'm sure it's gotten a small slew of musicians to try and make it to the big time.

3. Is It A Good Entry Point For Beginners?

I'm going to go with yes. This band's rhythm section is probably the most underrated in all of metal and the band can consistently make catchy, if not terribly original, riffs and hooks. The vocals aren't intense enough to scare anyone off and the instrumentation is intense enough to give a rookie a good idea about what good thrash should sound like. In many ways, it's almost a perfect place to introduce somebody to the big leagues of metal.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Van Halen-1984

Van Halen-1984
1984; 5150 Studios, Hollywood, California; Warner Records
http://www.van-halen.com/

1. Is It Any Good?

Listen, if you've turned on a classic rock radio station in the past 15 years, you already know if you're going to like this album or not. Your appreciation of 1984 hinges entirely on whether or not you enjoy the music of Van Halen. Does that seem kind of stupid and obvious? Well, it's the best you're going to get, because that's the same qualifier you have to keep in mind for the self titled album and II and Fair Warning and all the damn rest of them.

Look, you know what Van Halen sounds like, probably by the back of your hand at this point. It's brainless, jumpy party rock. If that's your thing than you need to own this album, but if that's your thing you probably already do own this album. "Panama" and "Hot For Teacher" showcase the best of this kind of music, "Jump" and "I'll Wait" show the worst. The synthesizers can make a lot of the songs pretty goofy, but if you listen to Van Halen you're probably not looking for a fucking concerto to begin with.

I hate reviewing albums like 1984 because it's like trying to review tire chains. You know what they are and you know what they do. Will they keep your car from getting stuck in the snow? They're probably good tire chains. Are you in the market for tire chains to begin with? If not then of course don't fucking buy them.

Here's the bottom line: I bought this CD today, for four dollars used. I'm okay with having paid that much for it. I don't think it's worth buying outside of those specific parameters.

2. Is It "Influential?"

Most of the influence would probably come from their first album, but you're kidding yourself if you don't think "Panama" has inspired a whole slew of kids to learn it on the guitar. Van Halen kind of created the hard rock/party hardy genre of music as we know it today, and this album was probably the apex of that formula, making it somewhat a blessing and largely a curse.

Is It A Good Entry Point For Beginners?

I have a really hard time wrapping my head around the idea of calling this album "metal" by any stretch of the imagination, so no, it's not a good entry point at all. If you give this to someone along with Master of Reality and The Jester Race you'll more likely than not just confuse the hell out of them.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Megadeth-Countdown to Extinction

Megadeth-Countdown to Extinction
1992; Capitol Records
http://www.megadeth.com/home.php

1. Is It Any Good?

No, not really.

I mean, okay: I'd be lying if I said it was an outright horrible album. It's not. It does a few things right. "Symphony of Destruction" is an intense, driving anthem for the ages that's likely to make the listener feel just a bit giddy, if they're of a sinister mind. "Skin O' My Teeth" has one of the best lyrics I've probably ever heard-"I need a ride to the morgue/That's what 911 is for." The title track is alright. And "Psychotron" is based off of a Marvel supervillain named Deathlok, so...there's that.

But aside from that? Here's the scoop: "Skin O' My Teeth" and "High Speed Dirt", as much as I enjoy the former, are the same fucking song. "Sweating Bullets" takes the growly, muppetesque vocals from "Peace Sells" and overuses them to the point where they turn from "funny and devilish" to "retarded and boring". "Captive Honour" is just dumb as fuck, straight up. Check out this little snippet of spoken-word genius:

"I hereby sentence you to be incarcarated with no possibility of parole for life."

"Life?! Whaddaya mean life?! I ain't got a life!"

Was reading that funny? That's probably because you didn't read the first line as being spoken in a southern accent and the second line as being spoken by Dave Mustaine not caring if he sounds like a lazy dipshit.

And the rest of the songs? I don't even remember what they sound like. I stopped listening to one of them not two minutes ago and I'm drawing a blank. That's the real problem with this album overall, is that it's just boring as fuck. It's exactly like their first four albums, just watered down to the point where it stops being heavy metal and starts being hard rock. And no matter what Wikipedia lists the genre as, you can be sure as shit there's nothing to thrash to here.

2. Is It "Influential?"

God, I certainly hope not. Although...chugging guitar riffs? Ham-fisted political statements? Goofy vocals?

Well, I guess we've found the inspiration behind System Of A Down.

3. Is It A Good Entry Point For Beginners?

No. This was one of the first metal albums I'd ever listened to in full, and even at 14 years old, when I didn't know anything about anything and couldn't tell you what "good" metal was if my life depended on it, this album still put me to fucking sleep. Countdown To Extinction is considered something of a classic, but in my mind the only notable thing about it is that it was the last Megadeth album ever released that wasn't so bad that playing it could be considered a threat equivalent to flashing a switchblade in a dark alley.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Black Sabbath-Master of Reality

Black Sabbath-Master of Reality
1971; Vertigo; Island Studios, London, England
http://www.blacksabbath.com/

1. Is It Any Good?

This is going to be a refreshing change of pace for me, because there are no qualifiers I have to place before I start talking about this album. No "While this has merit, it's downfall is" or "Many people look on this album unfavorably, but" or "It could be considered a masterpiece if only". No. None of that. Master of Reality is, as a matter of fact, a bonafide metal masterpiece. No ifs, ands or buts about it. This is the real deal, an enduring classic, a doomstomping Goliath trampling through the realms of popular music and into the imagination of the frustrated, the depressed, the just-plain-fed-up and it is a glowering signpost that states, "This is where heavy begins and this is also where heavy ends." This is the motherlode, folks.

It's incredibly difficult to single out one particularly wonderful thing about this album-even the two filler songs, "Embryo" and "Orchid", are entertaining songs in their own rights. I suppose if there was one thing you could single out about this album that makes it so masterful, it would be the unbelievable texture and weight that flows through every song. This album feels heavy. It has an ability to excite and crush simultaneously that is unlike anything I've experienced with any other piece of music. There's an energy in Master of Reality that subsequent doom metal bands have never been able to bottle.

I don't mean to say that this album is oppressive with it's weight, or that it creates a sense of dread. It does not. It excites. It fills the listener with a desire to run and scream and smash things. "Children of the Grave" is the best example of this phenomena of severity mixed with childish jubilation-an anti-war anthem that tops even the band's own "War Pigs", the lyrics and the grounded, rumbling bassline instill the feeling that the earth is about to crack open at the seams while the guitar line compells the listener to dive into the faultline and try to stop it. It's impossible to sit still while listening to this song, as it is for the majority of the album as a whole.

"Sweet Leaf" and "After Forever" are fine album openers-they certainly set the tone for the rest of the album, the former song being slow and thundering and the latter being quick and thundering. (There is a lot of thundering on this album) The real meat, however, lies in the second half, beyond even "Children of the Grave". It lives in two songs, "Lord of this World" and "Into The Void". They are both equally important and impressive and both of them are two of the most stomach-rumbling, planet-crumbling songs ever put to tape. "Lord of this World" is a sneering, mocking anthem of hate and greed, a chiding speech from the Devil about what fools we mortals are to follow his ways. It's impossible not to feel some sort of looming presence hiding in the track itself-it is slow, it is crushing and it is an absolute leviathan of a song, the kind that can make it so that you're down on your knees screaming "LORD OF THIS WO-ORLD! EVIL POSSESSER!" along with Ozzy before you even know what's happening.

Separating this song from the last and most important song on the album is "Solitude", a ballad that's more than a touch indulgent, possibly weepier than is called for, but it is a kind of "we've all been there before" sort of lament about lost love, and it's despairing nature doesn't break very far from the overall feel of the album, so it can hardly be called something "amiss" with the work as a whole, even if it is somewhat unexpected. And it makes the following song so much richer due to the complete 180 it takes from this soft interlude.

"Into the Void". The centerpiece. The testament to human self-destruction, the cosmic space opera of despair and desolation. The holy beast, the golden chalice that rests at the top of an already magnificent album. "Into the Void" is, quite simply, a colossus. It is an enormous song. It takes up physical space in the room when it is played. The song is not about a rocket to the sun, the song is a rocket to the sun. It is a perfect piece of music, one of the very few, one where absolutely nothing can be changed to make it better-the lyrics, the drums, the guitar or that absolutely glorious bass line. It is a gut punch of a song, a wailing god to which all things heavy must pray and give tribute. It is doom, personified sonically.

Master of Reality is a Titan of music. It is a collection of anthems dedicated to the evil and deceit that presents itself as the Devil but shows up in every human soul. I haven't even talked about how amazingly, consistently wonderful the musicianship is, or how Ozzy's voice compliments the lyrics perfectly, or how Black Sabbath never really writes "good" lyrics, just engaging, enthralling ones that pull you into the song like a black hole. I won't talk about these things, because I've already gushed far too much, and this has already gone on far too long. Just know this:

This album will destroy you. In the best way possible.

2. Is It "Influential?"

Master of Reality is almost single handedly responsible for creating the genre known as doom metal. The bass lines and riffs launched thousands upon thousands of teenagers to try to reach the same depths of heaviness. Without this album, decades of metal music would have been irrevocably changed for the worse. It is unquestionably one of the most influential albums of all time, in any genre.

Is It A Good Entry Point For Beginners?

This is one of the places where it all started-this is the blueprint for almost every generation of metal to come after it. If you are to understand where metal comes from and what it's all about than you need to hear this album. It's nothing short of required listening for the novice metal listener.

If that's not enough of a reccomendation, than how about this: Master of Reality is the album that single-handedly turned me into a metalhead.

As if you couldn't tell from the first section of this post.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Led Zeppelin-IV

Led Zeppelin-IV
1971; Atlantic Records
http://www.ledzeppelin.com/

1. Is It Any Good?

I've talked about this in detail earlier, but the short answer is yes, it is very, very good.

2. Is It "Influential?"

Is Led Zeppelin IV influential? What kind of Goddamn question is that?

3. Is It A Good Entry Point For Beginners?

No, inasmuch that everyone on the planet has already heard this album and probably doesn't even regard it as metal. So it would be an even stranger place to start than AC/DC. This is part of the public consciousness almost 40 years after its release, it pretty much doesn't even have a genre at this point. That said, if you haven't heard it yet than for Christ's sake get on the ball.

NEXT TIME ON THIS LIST: More substance!(Seeing as how I'll be covering an album that I both love and that I haven't already covered extensively on this site like IV was)

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Black Sabbath-Volume 4

1972; Vertigo; Record Plant Studios, Los Angeles, California
http://www.blacksabbath.com/

1. Is it any good?

Not as well known as Paranoid, not as heavy as Master of Reality, not as musically complex as Sabbath Bloody Sabbath and not as crushingly dark as the self-titled debut, Volume 4 can only be referred to simply as "a Black Sabbath album". In many ways, this is probably it's best quality.

4 is the most dense of the original lineup's records next to Master of Reality. It's tempting to refer to this album as being "no frills", as nonsensical as that might sound-with the exception of the odd little piano ballad "Changes" and the filler piece "Laguna Sunrise", this is all pretty standard nose to the grindstone style heavy rock. This isn't an insult, mind you-Sabbath's workmanlike approach to song crafting has created some of the greatest songs of all time, heavy metal or no, and this album is by and large no exception. Volume 4 takes the bowel-rumbling heaviness of Reality, picks up the tempo a little bit and expands it. Ozzy's voice isn't quite like it is on any other album, either-it always had a somewhat ghostlike quality to it during the '70s(which reminds me-doesn't he look like such a fucking goblin on the album artwork? Jesus Christ!), but here it's more confrontational than it's ever been. Black Sabbath's lyrics have a theme of being somewhat above the listener; they're astral spirits, telling you that things are sure to go wrong if humanity doesn't change it's sinful ways. For Volume 4, every one of them is right down in the dirt with us-"Snowblind" is about cocaine addiction and, although it's never explicitly stated, one glance at the lyrics to "Supernaut" makes it fairly obvious that it's being sung from the perspective of someone who's high on LSD(Ozzy Osbourne, in other words). The band does drift away from the "war, violence and hate" themes from previous albums, and by the time Sabbath Bloody Sabbath rolled around these ideas would be almost completely absent from the band's music.

As I stated earlier, this is one of the only Black Sabbath works where nothing really stands out about the album as a whole. You'll get a few classics in the form of "Tomorrow's Dream", "Snowblind", "Supernaut" and "Wheels of Confusion/The Straightener", but as a whole the album coalesces into an incredibly solid but ultimately somewhat forgettable effort. That said, it's still absolutely worth listening to, as even a middling Black Sabbath album kicks the shit out of about 90% of other metal bands on a good day.

2. Is it "influential"?

Along with Master of Reality, Volume 4 helped pioneer what's come to be known as "stoner metal", which is a term that I hope explains itself. Plus, Frank Zappa referred to "Supernaut" as the greatest rock and roll song of all time. I'm not sure that anything anywhere has ever received higher praise than that.

3. Is it a good entry point for beginners?

Pretty much every Black Sabbath album is a good entry point for beginners, and this is probably as good a place to start as any, maybe even an exceptional place to begin: If the listener enjoys the style of this album overall, it'll probably be easier to introduce them to other Black Sabbath albums and even get them started on doom metal. Plus, once again-"Supernaut". I can't imagine any listener with a heavy bone in their body, first time or no, not absolutely falling in love with that song.

Are you calling Frank Zappa a liar?

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Mercyful Fate-Melissa

Mercyful Fate-Melissa
1983; Roadrunner Records
http://www.covenworldwide.org/

1. Is It Any Good?

I'd like to paint a picture for you. Imagine that you are going to see an opera. You've bought your tickets and have gotten yourself either a balcony seat or a front seat or whatever is generally considered to be a good seat when you're watching an opera. The lights dim, the curtains open and the show starts. The set is a thing of majesty, an ornate background that must have taken the stage hands many weeks to build. The music of the orchestra swells and you feel your heart race in anticipation-this is one of the best arrangements you've ever heard. The cast walks out onto the stage, dressed in some of the most elaborate, striking costumes you've ever seen in a production. The actor who plays the protagonist steps forward, raises his hand, opens his mouth, then unbuckles his pants and takes a shit on the stage. He doesn't look apologetic, either: he MEANT to drop a deuce in the middle of the show- it's an integral part of the performance, as a matter of fact. And you think to yourself, "Well, I'm sort of enjoying the story, these are good actors, the singing is well done..."

But none of that makes a difference. You hate this, and you know exactly why you hate it. You saw the shit leave his body, you heard it plop onto the stage, but that's not even the worst part. The worst part is that you can still smell it. So you think to yourself, "Fuck this, I don't care if this is amazingly produced, I don't care if it's supposed to smell like this, that doesn't make it suck any less that I have to sit in a room with a shit on the floor."

If you haven't been able to guess by now, the stage is Melissa and the actors are the members of Mercyful Fate. And the shit?

The shit is King Diamond's Fucking Voice. Skip ahead to about 1:20. By about 1:35 you'd be about ready to drown your own mother just to make it stop.

And guess what? The whole album is like that. The whole fucking thing. The very first song, "Evil", is probably the most heartbreaking, because it has a great hook and some wonderful instrumentation all around, but King Diamond's voice could make you run into a blast furnace, as long as that blast furnace was somewhere where you couldn't hear King Diamond.

Have I made this clear? Am I being too subtle? Are some of you still on the fence about this whole thing?

KING DIAMOND'S VOICE IS A HATE CRIME.

So, with all due respect to the guitarist, the rhythm guitarist, the drummer and the bassist, no, Melissa is not any fucking good at all. To reuse the earlier analogy, it doesn't matter if you've put on the greatest production of all time-it there's a big shit smell wafting through the audience, everyone's gonna get the fuck out of there.

2. Is It "Influential"?

Well, this album is regarded by many to be the first black metal album. So that's an entire subgenre of music that wouldn't exist without one crappy album being released. I'd call that pretty damn influential. This was also one of the very first albums to have rampantly satanic themes, along with the music of Venom. Whenever an '80s politician wanted to decry metal as being harmful to children? That's on Mercyful Fate. Any time somebody makes a voice or a gesture making fun of metal as a whole? It's Mercyful Fate they're really thinking of. Every stupid, harmful cliche that has seemed to dog heavy metal since the dawn of time? Well, it's really only been since Melissa came out.

So, yeah. Influential. Like the Bubonic Plague. Or maybe Ayn Rand.

3. Is It A Good Entry Point For Beginners?

This is a true story. I have a friend who, a long time ago, was trying to get into black metal. She's really big on the genre now, but wasn't for the longest time. You know why? Because the very first black metal album she'd heard was Melissa. She thought it was one of the worst peices of crap she'd ever heard and it scared her away from the whole genre for a good couple of years. After all, she thought, if this was what great black metal sounds like, how mind-blowingly bad could the stuff that's worse than this be?

So, no, Melissa is not a good entry point for beginners. It's not a good anything for anything, really, but this is the absolute last album you want to show to anyone trying to get into heavy metal. If my friend is any indication, you might scare them off for good.

-CJ

The Importance of Being Metal: Deep Purple-Machine Head

Deep Purple-Machine Head
1972; Warner Bros.; Montreux, Sweden
http://www.deeppurple.com/

1. Is It Any Good?

A couple of nights ago, I was telling my mom that the next album I was going to review for this column was going to be a Deep Purple album. She informed me that back in the '70s, Deep Purple was pretty much universally regarded as being an awful band. "Even the kids with bad taste in music would make fun of the kids with Deep Purple albums", she said. "Even the Deadheads would make fun of Deep Purple fans." Imagine the guys who listen to Alkaline Trio making fun of the guys who listen to Good Charlotte and you'll sort of understand what that was like.

So: Is Deep Purple the Good Charlotte of their day? Christ no. Were they very good? Once again, no. With that in mind, is Machine Head any good? Well, third time's the charm!

No. It is not.

Until I figured that I should review this album for the column, I hadn't listened to Machine Head in a number of years, mostly because I thought it was one of the most boring, cheesy pieces of crap I had ever heard in my life. It's not quite that bad in the present day, but it's still not something I would listen to if I had a choice in the matter.

There is a group of people who consider Deep Purple to be in the same pantheon as Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin in terms of being one of the most important pillars of heavy metal. These people, to coin a phrase, are retarded. As a matter of fact, I would contend that Machine Head barely qualifies as a metal album. It's more like a jam record with heavier guitars. If there was anything about this album that could be considered influential, it would be it's propensity to wander off into Nowhere Land(which also goes by the name of Solo Town) for longer than the listener will be able to find tolerable, although Black Sabbath already did that better on their self-titled debut, along with being a good band to boot. So...yeah, I'm kind of at a loss with this one.

White-boy blues lyrical content crops up all over the place during this album, along with extended organ and drum solos. If that all sounds unpleasant and dated, that's because it is. This might as well be a Boston album. If the sad attempts at funk don't scare you off, the ambling pace and weedely-weedely-weedely keyboard solos will try the patience of even the most tolerant listener.

And before anyone brings it up, "Smoke on the Water" can go fuck itself.

There are two instances on this album where it resembles approaching quality-"Highway Star" and "Space Truckin'", the first and last songs on the album(and, coincidentally, both of which are about cars). There's a legitimate kick to both of these songs-"Highway Star" in particular rips along at a suitably rockin' pace- and the irritating "chill out and smoke a bowl" mentality that permeates most of the album turns into something sincerely charming and fun with "Space Truckin'". Maybe if we could just get a concept album from them that was all about vehicles, we would have something good on our hands.

But, we don't. We have Machine Head. And "something good" definitely does not qualify as an accurate descriptor for this album. I meant for this to be a more positive review than it turned into, but listening to it for a second time I simply can't bring myself to add any qualifiers-this album is cheesy, boring and dated as all hell. With output like this, it's easy to see why even the ABBA lovers of the early '70s were shit-talking Deep Purple fans.

2. Is It "Influential"?

Technically, I suppose it is-this is what everyone tells me-but if you were going to ask me what exactly it influenced I wouldn't be able to tell you. Maybe it, like...no, I really don't have any idea what people are talking about. There were plenty of albums out at the same time that did everything Machine Head did, only about a hundred times better. Like, say, Foghat's self-titled debut. And brother, I can't think of some sadder shit than losing a quality contest to Foghat.

3. Is It A Good Entry Point For Beginners?

Does the listener need to get to sleep? Alternately, is the listener somebody who you would like to leave you alone as quickly as possible?

Then no, keep this as far away from a new listener's ears as possible.

-CJ