Iron Maiden

Iron maiden was one of the pioneer bands of New Wave Of British Heavy Metal. Maiden originated from Leyton, London, England they started in the mid 70's by bassist Steve Harris, Paul Day, Barry Purkis and Dave Murray. Iron maiden has released 15 albums since they started in 1975 there is only two original band members (Steve Harris & Dave Murray). Iron Maiden' main influences are: Queen, Black Sabbath, The Who, Rush, Pink Floyd etc... they have also influenced bands such as: Slayer, Slipknot, Avenged Sevenfold, Trivium, In Flames etc... The rock music magazine Kerrang! released a tribute album to Iron Maiden with such bands like: Metallica,Avenged Sevenfold, DevilDriver,Dream Theater,Trivium, Coheed and Cambria etc...Iron Maiden has had there same mascot Eddie since they've started who has been on every single one of there albums with a different look each time.

Ronnie James Dio

Ronald James Padavona (Ronnie James Dio) was born July 10,1942 in Portsmouth Newhampshire. Dio's first band was called ELF where he met Ritch Blackmore while playing a show with Deep Purple. Dio and Blackmore started the band Rainbow whom he played with from 75-59. Dio joined Black Sabbath after kicking Ozzy out of the band.Dio and Sabbath made two albums before Dio quit and started his own band named DIO. Dio went back and forth between Black Sabbath and Dio for the next 30 years before his death in 2010 of stomach cancer.Dio was a main influence for bands such as:Nirvana, Alice and Chains and even influenced me into playing the drums and guitar because of how the band mates play there instruments all the solo's and drum roles.Dio was the inventer of the Devil Horns.

 (left)Dio showing the ­devil horn
and (below) Holy Diver by Dio

Black Sabbath

Black Sabbath was the first band that revolutionized heavy metal.They originated from birmingham,England in the late 60's.The 4 original members of Black Sabbath are (Ozzy Osbourne,Tony Iommi,Geezer Butler and Bill Ward) these 4 men are the fathers of heavy metal. Tony Iommi,Geezer Butler and Bill Ward used such sludgy sounds with there instruments and Ozzy with his occult and negative lyrics are what made metal what its is today. Black Sabbath as influenced many bands in there career such as (Pantera, Venom, Lamb Of God, Eyehategod(actual band name), Iron Maiden, Metallica, Blue Oyster Cult and many more). A lot of people think that Sabbath broke up when Ozzy was fired in the late 79's but Sabbath was joined by lead singer of the band Dio Ronnie James Dio until the reunion of Ozzy in 96-06.The band continue till 2010 when Ronnie James Dio passed away of stomach cancer.

origins of metal

Heavy metal is a genre of rock music that originated in the mid 60's to early 70's mainly in the UK and the US. Heavy metal music uses a lot of distorted guitars, crazy long solos and a lot of strong drum roles. The main influences for heavy metal are Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath and Deep Purple. Heavy metal often copies there sound from classical rock and the blues adding in there own special sounds.Over passed decades heavy metal has devided into many subgenres including: Black metal, Death metal,Groove metal,Stoner rock etc... Over the years heavy metal has lost its popularity to the subgrenres because of cultural diffrences in the styles also the massive popularity rap has gained since the mid 90's. Over the next couple weeks i will be talking about all the different subgenres and the most popular groups in the history of metal.