Sound of the Beast: The Complete Headbanging History of Heavy Metal |
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Sound of the Beast: The Complete Headbanging History of Heavy Metal
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by Ian Christe
Sales Rank: 174732
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$5.00
At Amazon
on 6-22-2008.
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Features
Cover Type: Paperback with 416 pages
Published by: Harper Paperbacks February 17, 2004
Written in: English
ISBN 10 Number: 0380811278
ISBN 13 Number: 978-0380811274
Book Dimensions:
8.9 x 6 x 1.2 inches
Weighs: 1.4 pounds
From Publishers Weekly
Few books on heavy metal music can compare to Christe's thoughtful and passionate history of the music of the beast. There is little argument that heavy metal began in earnest with Black Sabbath (though the Beatles' "Helter Skelter" is considered by some to be the first heavy metal song), and Christe holds to convention and begins his metal timeline in early 1970. Following in the jamming, bluesy tradition of the Yard Birds and Cream, Sabbath (then called Earth) wrote "Black Sabbath"-a song that changed not only the band's name, but the face of rock and roll. Black Sabbath set the pace, but bands like Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple "fleshed out the edges and gave it sex appeal." The next wave, the new wave of British heavy metal, saw the emergence of Motorhead, Saxon and Iron Maiden among many others. The movement then spread through America and found most bands cropping up out of L.A. (although many migrated from the Midwest). Van Halen, Ratt and Motley Crue grew out of the then underground club scene. Christe doesn't get bogged down in anecdotes about bands and their groupies, but instead documents the music and its different genres. Each chapter contains helpful "genre boxes" giving a brief description of the style (e.g., Power Metal, Death Metal and Nu Metal). If Christe is to be faulted, it is on the grounds of hero worship: he's a metal fan, scribe (a music writer living in Brooklyn) and practitioner (in a digital metal band called Black Noerd), and readers might wish for more critical analysis about the culture of fans. But this is a minor point in a book otherwise worthy of having its dog-eared and beer-stained pages passed among friends and placed in motel-room bedside drawers. 94 b&w photos, and 16-page color insert not seen by PW.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From School Library Journal
Adult/High School-MTV's Headbanger's Ball, which debuted in 1987, was canceled in 1995-metal was officially "over." But it has returned to the schedule, and metal is making a comeback. In Christe's exhaustive history, readers watch metal rise, fall, change, and splinter into a massive number of genres (death metal, black metal, thrash metal, and more). As in David Konow's Bang Your Head (Three Rivers, 2002), the story begins with Black Sabbath (as if there would be any other choice); but while Konow kept to the well known, Christe gives just as much attention to the fringes. Also unlike Konow, he eschews gossip for almost scholarly explanations of the musicians' creative process and their works. Through it all, he shows the impact of competing forces (like punk, grunge, and rap). Chapters are arranged chronologically but also by genre, and each one is packed with black-and-white photographs and "genre boxes" that list the definitive recordings, ending with the author's choice for the 25 best metal albums of all time. The book is well indexed. New metal fans will run to the music store not only because of the knowledge gained from this volume, but also because of the enthusiastic (though sometimes a little overwrought) way the author shares it.
Jamie Watson, Enoch Pratt Free Library, Baltimore
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Reader Reviews
This review is from: Sound of the Beast: The Complete Headbanging History of Heavy Metal (Hardcover)
While this book is well written and relatively intelligent it has several major flaws: 1) The seventies are 'covered' within the first forty pages, which means that the precursors of heavy metal from the sixties, the classic bands who inspired the HM formula and many of the definitive 70s HM bands are hardly covered at all. This is due to the fact that HM didn't really take off in a major way until the 80s in America, despite the success of Zeppelin, Sabbath etc. For readers who know their rock history and those from the UK, the defining era of the genre is therefore largely ignored and the many interesting theories abounding regarding the origins and defintions of HM are missing. However, the author does correctly identify Judas priest as the definitie original HM band (good man !) 2) Once Metallica appear on the scene, virtually every event in the history of metal onwards is examined from within the context that metallica are the definitive and greatest metal band. As good and as important as they are, this is meant to be a history of HEAVY METAL, not Metallica. 3) Some poor research and overly US oriented misunderstanding of genres like Punk Rock and New Wave perpetuate myths about these other areas of rock that do not stand up to close scrutiny - no musical genre is as simple as these alternatives to metal are represented here. There are also factual gaffes, for example the notion that Budgie were English, when they are of course Welsh. Such a subtle cultural point might seem insignificant, but I'm sure if the author had labelled a Swedish band Norwegian, there'd be hell to pay.... Despite these points, the book is a good fun read, but what is really needed is a work of similar scope that spends more time on the seventies in metal, otherwsie younger listeners might go away with preconceptions about old school stuff. Ultimately, the fact remains that in a form of music as intrinsically modern as rock, the pioneers remain the most important artists and they are simply not represented enough here. I'll stick with Deena Weinsteen's 'Heavy metal: A Cultural Sociology' until a more balanced history of the most resilient of rock forms comes along. See you all on the Priest tour later this year !!!
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Sound of the Beast: The Complete Headbanging History of Heavy Metal
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Updated on 6-22-2008.
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