whats the history of Heavy Metal lyrics?

silverharp

Just watching an Iron Maiden concert that was on BBC4, awsome btw, better than Iron Maiden in the 80's in someways. Anyway a lot of heavy metal lyrics are very different to your "baby baby..." type songs and I am wondering which bands started writing lyrics which were influenced by fanstasy or science fiction fow want of a better term? or developed a kind of story telling style of lyrics.
Hope the question makes sense?

nyarlothothep

Using my limited knowledge I would state that bands like Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath in addition to artists like Jimi Hendrix wrote lyrics inspired by sci fi and fantasy so these types of lyrics predate metal, with the exception of Black Sabbath which is often considered the first metal band. It would be interesting if there were sci fi/fantasy themed lyrics from the 50s or 40s. Of course there were good artists then but the counter culture which really took off in the 60s allowed alternative music to flourish and therefore alternative themes perhaps? JRR Tolkien certainly popularised norse mythology, sci fi was in its ascendancy in the 50s, so maybe that's why sci fi/fantasy themed lyrics arose in the 60s.

mike65

Hawkwind and Michael Moorcock is the starting point for fantasy lyrics, Rush also have a claim. Okay neither are actually "Heavy Metal" but certainly influential.

RayCon

Watch the documentary Classic Albums : Black Sabbath "Paranoid" - Geezer Butler talks fairly in depth about his lyrics, how they came about - what inspired him, what he was trying to say etc ... at one point he actually says "we werent the "baby I love you" type of band - yet he says Caravan is a love a song about floatin in space / the stars with your loved one.

Like a lot of metal bands (actually not just Metal) the use of sci-fi / fantasy worlds are used as a place in which to set stories that make a social commentary

Cill94

I don't think Zeppelin are metal but they influenced a lot of metal artists so I suppose you could start as far back as them. 'Immigrant Song' was the first time I remember hearing lyrics with epic and fantastical themes. Interestingly this might be one of the first instances of Vikings being used in hard rock/metal lyrics :P It was probably due to the large amounts of psychedelics these guys were on!

Banjo

If you look back far enough you'll see that music has always had 3 distinct purposes : To relate epic tales of legend and mythology, to comment on the times, and to charm your intended into bed (or a pile of hay, depends how far back you look i guess...) This is not a new thing. Singing about Vikings didn't start with Led Zeppelin. The vikings were singing about themselves over a thousand years ago, we even have some lyric sheets and setlists* from the 13th century to prove it. And they didn't invent it either, putting great stories and tales of epic deeds to music has been going on for about six thousand years. The content hasn't changed much, just the style of the music it's set to and the instruments it's played on. We have yet to find evidence of a mesopotamian Jimmy Page, but the search continues.

The other thing that hasn't changed is the catholic church's attempts to suppress such music, though it's only really in the last 100 years or so that they failed and were stricken down to the ground - you can't kill the metal!

The "Baby I love you" songs are a new thing - it's only recently that methods of distribution existed that allow songs about ordinary people loving other ordinary people to go beyond the end of their street. Even about 150 years ago the closest you'd get is "Your highness I love you, and did I mention I'm the prince who cut the head off 10,000 turks" or "Baby I love you and I'm the court composers so the whole world has to listen to me. Also, long live the king, he's awesome".

Cill94

Banjo wrote: »

Singing about Vikings didn't start with Led Zeppelin. The vikings were singing about themselves over a thousand years ago, we even have some lyric sheets and setlists* from the 13th century to prove it.

I was only referring to Viking themes in rock/metal music specifically, which is sort of what the OP was searching for. But yes of course fantasy and mythological based lyrics go back much further than that in time.

Panzer Paddy

To be honest metal bands never wrote 'baby baby...' lyrics or poncy flavour of the month lyrics. alot of bands have released themed albums like iced earth- gettysburg or something wicked this way comes, etc... i have always found great education in metal lyrics, especially iron maidens or if you like warfare and modern wars etc, i suggest you go listn to and read sabatons lyrics. they have written all their songs about particuler wars or battles, for example, the song gallipoli is about the battle of gallipoli in turkey during the first world war, and gohst devision is about a particuler devision of german panzers during the second ww that were knicnamed the gohst devision because they only made headway at night and slipped past allied lines. very interesting stuff.

we need more of these types of bands in todays music scene coz its all just full of plastic meaningless crap...

Lawrence1895

Cill94 wrote: »

I was only referring to Viking themes in rock/metal music specifically, which is sort of what the OP was searching for. But yes of course fantasy and mythological based lyrics go back much further than that in time.

Not 100% sure, but weren't Bathory the first Metal act, who had lyrics about the Vikings?

paddyandy

O.P Murder & Mayhem .