Heavy Metal: The Story in Pictures

About this book

Heavy Metal: The Story in Pictures is a colorful guide to this complex but enormously popular subject including a look at festivals fans and the heavy metal lifestyle. Over 350 photographs feature heavy metals cutting-edge bands on stagewith some candid behind-the-scenes shots too. Each chapter starts with a detailed chronological timeline of major eventsband formations and fold-ups; seminal album releases; important tours and gigsfollowed by a photographic coverage of the decade. Heavy metal developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s in the United Kingdom and the United States. With roots in blues progressive and psychedelic rock heavy metal developed a thick massive sound characterized by highly amplified distortion extended guitar solos emphatic beats and overall loudness. It did not take long before the first heavy metal bandsthe blues-based Led Zeppelin Black Sabbath and Deep Purple being the leadersattracted large audiences and significant album sales. Often critically and publicly reviledsomething that is true to this dayfew of these hard rock pioneers would continue on into the heavy metal genre. By the mid-1970s Judas Priest helped spur the genres evolution by discarding much of its blues influence. Motrhead introduced a punk-rock sensibility and an increasing emphasis on speed. Bands such as Iron Maiden Def Leppard and Saxon followed in a similar vein. Before the end of the 1970s heavy metal had attracted a huge following of headbanging fans. Behind the music ran a vein of anti-authoritarianism andmore insinuated than realSatanism and black magic that really got the pundits talking as did the aggression and violence implied by so many band names and song titles. Heavy Metal: The Story in Pictureslooks carefully at the ancient historythe 1960s through to the start of the 1980sbut the bulk of the book concentrates on the last 30 years that saw the splintering of the genre into a myriad forms: from the great thrash metal bandsExodus Metallica Anthrax Megadeath Slayer and then Kreator Sodom and Destruction and Brazils Sepulturato metalcore that combines various elements of extreme metal and hardcore punk by way of death metal black metal power metal doom metal gothic metal glam metal alternative metal nu metal folk metal Viking metal drone metal sludge metal extreme metal and even retro-metal. From Donington to Ozzfest Hard Rock Hell to Sonisphere festival-going has become a rite of passage in the metal world. With Heavy Metal: The Story in Pictures get an up-close look at Hellfest FortaRock Zwergenaufstand Open Air Eisenwahn Wacken and Jalometalli and take a stunning visual tour through the evolution of heavy metal.