the 70s prog scene's attitude to early metal

Toaster Mantis wrote: Well, in Denmark those professional critics who defended progressive rock weren't the same who defended early heavy metal either. Again I don't know that much how it was elsewhere. Didn't Lester Bangs champion both in the US though?

Edited by Svetonio - July 25 2014 at 03:18

^Good doc Dean. Even if it seems to make things a bit more confusing. I'm still sticking to my take that the metal tag was resisted in England in the early to mid Seventies. I recall that it did become more used toward the end of the seventies but by that time it was an afterthought after punk rock kicked in, and I recall that Brtitish music magazines like NME and Sounds ate it up (punk rock), much to my dismay.


Edited by SteveG - July 24 2014 at 19:18

SteveG wrote:  Just wanted to comment on something. I think early on that the British heavy rock groups were blues based such as Led Zep and Sabbath and that even though the blues influence in the 'metal' genre gradually wore off by time Judas Priest came around there may have still been a divide between the prog and metal fans due to a musical influence that was completely abandoned.

Edited by Dean - July 24 2014 at 19:46

Dean wrote: Anyway, as interesting as this is it's all distracting from the OP. As someone who was an avid music fan in the 70s and a follower of both Progressive Rock and Heavy Rock as I said I don't recall there being any particular bias in the British rock press (or among artists) in favour of Prog and against Heavy Rock. Sure there was a degree of delineation in fan-base between the two but it wasn't that prevalent compared to the negativity towards other more commercial or mainstream genres. If there was a split it would be between Blues-based rock and Rock'n'Roll based rock and not in how complex or erudite the music was, though even then there would be exceptions like Groundhogs, SAHB and Budgie. Both Progressive Rock and Heavy Metal tend to drop on the Rock'n'Roll side of that divide - there ain't a lot of Blues in either of them.  <span style="font-size: 12px; line-height: 1.2;">From what I remember (and from the contents of my own record collection) we were more eclectic than the stereotype image of the long-haired denim clad 70s youth would suggest. </span>Back then the Underground and "serious" music scene were so broad and varied that most music fans would be receptive to a wide range of musical styles - the explosion in music and styles of music that occurred in that era was unparalleled - if you look at the line-up of the 1973 Reading Festival the diversity of music presented is staggering: (£4.40 admission... it's a 100 times that now - thankfully the cost of buying albums hasn't gone up by that much) Of course by <span style="font-size: 12px; line-height: 1.2;">the (very) late 70s that had all changed, and I don't doubt the animosity between music fans was as bad as Doug described it - the declining Prog fans were on the defensive by then and the upstart Metal heads were of the younger post-punk generation who thought a mullet looked cool. </span>

Just wanted to comment on something. I think early on that the British heavy rock groups were blues based such as Led Zep and Sabbath and that even though the blues influence in the 'metal' genre gradually wore off by time Judas Priest came around there may have still been a divide between the prog and metal fans due to a musical influence that was completely abandoned.

Edited by SteveG - July 24 2014 at 15:50

Well, in Denmark those professional critics who defended progressive rock weren't the same who defended early heavy metal either. Again I don't know that much how it was elsewhere. Didn't Lester Bangs champion both in the US though?

Svetonio wrote: Atavachron wrote: I believe there was a brief period when the two were considered genetically related, at least from a certain perspective;"...Heavy Rock as a style grew out of Progressive Rock sometime in the early 1970s. The trend setters were Deep Purple and Black Sabbath"   -- from Philip S. Walker's notes in the Warhorse Red Sea reissue. I believe so. Well, I was too young to be a fan in early 70s when e.g. Uriah Heep were considered as a progressive rock band; I remember them as a melodic hard rock band. However, in the second half of the golden decade, I remember that New Hard Rock Champions undoubtely were AC/DC  - the band which I used to hate with a passion.

From what I remember of the 70s, both Sabbath and Heep were the objects of much derision in the music press at the time.

"Citizens of Gravity we are converting all out to Heavy Metal. Carbonic Plague of the Vegetable

People threatens our Heavy Metal State. Report to your nearest Plating Station. It's fun to be

plated," says this well-known radio and TV personality who is now engraved forever in gags of

metal." ~ William S. Burroughs - The Soft Machine (1962) 

The Who were heavier and louder at stage than many of 70s 'officially' heavy metal (hard rock) acts.

Edited by Svetonio - July 26 2014 at 06:49

Svetonio wrote: Toaster Mantis wrote: I think the first band to classify their own music as "heavy metal" was either Blue Öyster Cult or Hawkwind, adding to the confusion, (...) I recall that even Jethro Tull was accepted by many hard rock fans back then as a hard rock band because they did do pretty heavy at the gigs. Not "heavy metal" though.

I think the first band to classify their own music as "heavy metal" was either Blue Öyster Cult or Hawkwind, adding to the confusion, but not really as a genre classification until Judas Priest did so in the mid/late '70s when progressive rock was already declining in popularity.

So it seems like the rivalry between early metal and progressive rock, coming most one-sidedly from the prog circles, was indeed mostly a Scandinavian thing. There was a clear divide between the heavier and less technically proficient prog/psych groups like The Old Man and the Sea on one hand, and the music theory fiends like Secret Oyster on the other. The former ended up sharing more fans (and opening slots on tours) with Sabbath, Hawkwind, Zeppelin etc. than with Pink Floyd, The Soft Machine etc.

Interestingly enough Mercyful Fate drummer Kim Ruzz started out in prog-rock or at least had his music background there, but jumped ship to metal because of the prog rock movement shriveling up in the late '70s.