-
First Recorded Blues Song
By Blind Willie Johnson. -
Period: to
From the blues
Basic blues evolved into a structure made of mainly three instruments - Guitar, Bass and Drums. The 40s saw the rise of artists like Elvis Presley and Jimmy Preston who gave birth to rock and roll. They essentially wrote blues, bit took the tempo up and incorporated bass lines into his singing. Beatles are another band to front rock n roll. -
Period: to
The Age of Blues Rock
Jimi Hendrix and his use of distortion really paved the way for the creation of heavier music. He also introduced guitar solos in the context of a faster paced rock song. -
The Unholy Trinity
Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath and Deep Purple were often referred to as the "unholy trinity". They were very heavy for the time and paved the way for heavy metal, but was still largely limited to their blues origins. -
Period: to
Age of Hard Rock/Heavy Metal
These decades saw the rise of a new wave of British Heavy Metal. This also influenced similar bands in Europe and Asia. The social unrest in UK also powered bands like Iron Maiden, Motorhead, and Guns n Roses who took inspiration from the punk movement because of the anarchy. -
The birth of Glam Metal
It is during the late 70s and early 80s that bands like Motley Crue and and Poison rolled up with their extreme hair styles. This type of music took pop influenced hooks into their writing. -
Period: to
Age of Thrash Metal
Pantera, Megadeth, Anthrax, Slayer and Metallica rose to fame with their high gain distorted guitars and angry screaming vocals. Slayers "Raining Blood" was even condemned by the church. This was also. the time of weird guitar shaped from manufacturers like Ibanez. -
Period: to
The First Wave of Black Metal
The sound is characterized by chordal riffing and purposefully bad recordings. Bathory, Venom and Celtic Frost pioneered the genre before it existed. Their albums lead to the creation of the Norwegian Black Metal scene. Mayhem, Darkthrone and Burzum were the three titans of this scene. The scene changed when rock and metal publications got involved and controversies started building up. That is considered as the second wave. -
Death Metal
This type of music were made by bands that wanted to be heavier than thrash metal.The band Death is widely considered as the grandfathers of this genre. They started out in 1983 and released their first demo a year later called Death Metal. Morbid Angel and Possessed are other notable bands in the genre. -
Prog Metal
Bands like Fates Warning and Dream Theatre started experimenting with the heavy metal sound, making more technical alterations to it. They also brought in influences from different genres into this sound. -
Meshuggah
Even though they started out as a Metallica worship thrash metal act, their music quickly got heavier and stood out from the rest of the scene. They were the first to experiment with what is now called djent and technical death metal. -
Period: to
Nu Metal and Metalcore
Bands like Limp Bizkit and Korn were using beats and vocals from hip-hop. Slipknot and Linkin Park also made music in the genre and gained a massive following. Metalcore bands like Killswitch Engaged and Pierce the Veil also came into the scene focusing on double kicks and fast guitar. The guitar tone was also significantly grittier. -
Period: to
Deathcore
With the blast beats and down tuned guitars from death metal and breakdowns from metalcore, Deathcore became a thing in the early 2000s with Antagony, Despised Icon and The Red Chord pioneering the sound. -
Period: to
Present Day Metal
There are over 50 sub-genres of metal today and is the most streamed genre on Spotify. Genres have branched a lot, creating themes like Viking Metal and War Metal.