Heavy metal, from the outside in. Each step is a genre and the single record this encyclopedia would put on first. Play them in this order and the last one should sound like a next step rather than a wall.
- 1 What you asked about
Heavy metal 1970
It split off from hard rock and blues rock when Black Sabbath tuned down and wrote riffs on the tritone. Volume, riff and a code of its own - every branch below starts here.
Sung. Melodic singing throughout.
Put on
Black Sabbath - the song Black Sabbath. The first thirty seconds are the genre's birth certificate.
Black Sabbath, Black Sabbath (1970) - 2 Where to go next
Glam metal 1981
Hard rock with hairspray, a radio chorus and a mandatory power ballad. It ruled MTV until 1991.
Sung. Melodic singing throughout.
Put on
Skid Row - Slave to the Grind. The genre's heaviest album, released exactly too late.
Skid Row, Skid Row (1989)
Assembled from the tree: every genre Heavy metal descends from, in order. The last step is the gentlest of Heavy metal's 20 subgenres - least harsh vocals first, then least heavy.