These are the 10 heaviest metal songs by The Troggs: Wild Thing (1966) Helter Skelter by The Beatles (1968) Communication Breakdown in Led Zeppelin (1969) Kick Out The Jams, MC5 (1969) Born To Be Wild, Steppenwolf (1968)V ( 1968) (Slight Return) – The Jimi Hendrix Experience (1968)I Want to Be Your Dog – The Stooges (1969)In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida – Iron Butterfly (1968)Mandrake Root – Deep Purple (1968)Old Man Going by The Pretty Things (1968)
Most people agree that Black Sabbath was the first heaviest metal band.
But that doesn’t mean they were the first to write the heaviest metal song.
took the concept of intense, ominous music performed by evil-looking guys to new sonic and visual heights, with plenty of unsettling sounds designed to scare listeners away long before Tony Iommi’s deadly Black Sabbath tritone riff signaled the end (or was it the beginning?) ) the musical world as we know it.
These are the 10 hardest metal songs
Wild Thing, The Troggs (1966)
Wild Thing was first recorded in 1965 in a folk tone by the American band The Wild Ones, but the following year in the hands of the British heaviest metal band, The Troggs, it became a proto-garage-punk rave-up, pounding, three-chord pattern, hypersexualized sound , and well, ocarina solo.
From Jimi Hendrix’s fiery (he literally set his Strat on fire at his peak) performance of the song at the ’68 Monterey Pop Festival, to the punk performances of The Runaways and X, to Bruce Springsteen’s stomping, arena-shaking live performance. This version became the most difficult metal template in the future.
This heaviest metal song is so massive and the riff so catchy that even comedian Sam Kinison’s dirty hair metal parody couldn’t undo it – not completely.
Read about 50 more easy acoustic guitar songs.
According to tradition, Paul McCartney was inspired to write Helter Skelter after reading an interview in which Pete Townshend described his own band’s I Can See for Miles as the “filthiest, filthiest” song ever made.
The song’s distorted, dissonant guitars, booming bass, and chopped-up vocals not only piss off Pete, but foreshadow and inspire the heaviness of decades to come.
Also, The Beatles’ alternate Second Version / Take 17 recording, released for the 50th anniversary of the White Album, is an even wilder ride.
Miscommunication in Led Zeppelin (1969)
To be honest, any number of songs – Whole Lotta Love, Dazed and Confused – could fill Zeppelin’s spot on this list.
But the award for bone-crushing intensity goes to Communication Breakdown, whose machine-gun heaviest metal shock riff has not only served as a model for a billion speed metal bands, but bears an eerie resemblance to the Sabbath that Paranoid made for it. in a year.
Moreover, while Zep weren’t the only group of the late sixties to take the blues into a darker world, with this piece they did it better – and not insignificantly – faster than their competitors.
Rob Tyner’s opening volley: “Get out of the jams, moms!” would be enough to get this proto-punk anthem onto the list.
Rather, it’s two and a half minutes of some of the loudest and most jagged riffing and electrifying soloing ever put to tape, courtesy of Wayne Kramer and Fred “Sonic” Smith.
What could be more metallic than that?
Steppenwolf, Born To Be Wild (1968)
Plus, singer John Kay follows it up with the word “thunder,” which adds to the badass factor.
That said, the title chorus is the heaviest metal in its own right, and while Steppenwolf have never been particularly “heavy,” this song brings it all together with a pounding low-E string riff, raspy vocals, and scream-scream. -loud chorus that foreshadowed the road-dog rockers that bands like Judas Priest and Motörhead would ride to glory years later.
Voodoo Child (Little Comeback) – The Jimi Hendrix Experience (1968)
Jimi’s massive, earth-shattering heaviest metal riffs and wails seem to pour down from the sky, leaving only a charred wasteland in their wake.
The song’s sheer sonic energy is stunning, and it’s an early testament to how far a rock musician can take the blues—which, in some ways and in other ways, was Black Sabbath’s intention in their early days.
I Wanna Be Your Dog – The Stooges (1969)
Even now, more than half a century later, I Wanna Be Your Dog feels incredibly gritty, nasty, and downright dangerous.
The song is one big drone-y, dirge-y death rumble that encompasses Iggy’s demented blues, from the dark, descending chord progression to the buzzing guitar of Ron Asheton (who, along with his brother and drummer, Scott was once referred to by Stooge head Iggy Pop as “the the laziest, most sinful pig shields were born”.
In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida – Iron Butterfly (1968)
People often make fun of In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida, but as any heaviest metal band worth their long hair, leather and pointy guitars knows, people often make fun of what they don’t understand.
Forget that the performing band is called Iron Butterfly.
The heaviest metal riff of the combined guitar and organ is as dark, menacing and downright groovy as anything laid down by Deep Purple, Uriah Heep or any other keyboard-drenched heavy band.
Mandrake Root – Deep Purple (1968)
The opening half of this early Deep Purple epic is quite muscular, at least in the late sixties British blues-rock style.
But Mandrake Root really picks up in the middle instrumental section, when drummer Ian Paice and bassist Nick Simper kick up the pace and set the stage for Ritchie Blackmore to close out proceedings with some full-on psych-metal licks, growls and howls. as well as a bit of a neoclassical feel.
Heavy enough to be one of the few early Purple cuts played by the famous MkII heaviest metal band of the seventies.
Old Man Going by The Pretty Things (1968)
The opening 40 seconds of acoustic strumming on Old Man Going sounds like Pinball Wizard before Pinball Wizard (and the concept album it’s from, S.F. Sorrow , also influenced The Who’s Tommy , though The Who didn’t mean one).
But after that, Old Man Going flourishes in its proto-Sabbathian beauty, most notably in Dick Taylor’s doomy power chord riffing and most notably in Phil May’s vocals, which upon its 1968 release, any listener would have quickly mistaken for Ozzy. like – except that Ozzy, at least as we know him, didn’t really exist yet.