Britain has often been the home of the world’s most influential rock, punk, and metal musicians. It all started back in the late ‘60s, when Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin burst onto the scene with their slow but heavier psychedelic works. Once called ‘heavy rock’, these bands inspired a new generation of heavier, faster musicians in the ‘70s and ‘80s, and that’s who we’re covering today.
Enter the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (or the unwieldy acronym – NWOBHM), a generation set apart by their intense, aggressive tracks with lyrics that explored hard living, fantasy, and even cosmic horror. Here are three massively influential bands that owe parts of their sound to the NWOBHM.
Motörhead
Let’s start with one of the most controversial claims of them all – that Motörhead was part of the NWOBHM. This is often contested due to Lemmy’s pre-existing music career as part of Hawkwind, and this leads most to declare them half-in and half-out. So why are they half-in? After Overkill and Bomber saw diminishing returns, it was the Ace of Spades that put them back into the spotlight.
That album was, of course, spearheaded by the Ace of Spades single, which had a notably more chaotic, rawer sound when compared to their earlier outings. It would become their biggest hit, and in time, Lemmy grew sick of playing it so much on tour. Its success was undeniable, becoming a cultural icon, a popular backing track in media, and even the inspiration for a branded slot game. It can be played at some of the best online casinos in the UK, like Bet365, and the Ace of Spades track accompanies players while they spin. It’s one of the more sensible product tie-ins we’ve seen – the song is all about high-stakes gambling, after all. It’s an understatement to say the song struck a chord with the emerging British metal fanbase, and packed a serious punch that still echoes through music and media today.
Following this noticeable change in the band’s sound, many have retrospectively named Motörhead as an early NWOBHM band that was at the vanguard of its thrash metal sound. Lemmy didn’t necessarily disagree – he said that the wave “didn’t do us much good” and that the band were “a bit too early for it.” Others have argued that, if Motörhead hadn’t found its more chaotic sound, the wave might not have happened in the first place.
Slayer & Metallica
Having mentioned Motörhead’s gradual move toward faster, almost thrash sounds, we can’t ignore the NWOBHM’s role in forming thrash metal as a genre. The NWOBHM’s double-kick drumming met the aggression of Southern California’s hardcore punk scene, resulting in iconic bands like Slayer and Metallica.
As you might expect, their earlier works owe more to the NWOBHM than their later albums, as thrash further developed under the Big Four and other bands iterated on their sound. Metallica also carried over a lot of lyrical influence from the NWOBHM (which itself came from Sabbath/Zeppelin’s heavy rock). For example, they have written several songs inspired by the cosmic horror works of H.P. Lovecraft, like The Thing That Should Not Be. The same can be said for Slayer to a lesser extent; they leaned heavily on ‘satanic’ themes during their early years, in line with metal’s transgressive streak.
Together, you have three of the biggest, fastest metal bands that took some DNA from the NWOBHM. While Motörhead found their mainstream sound at the crest of the wave, that pacey, escapist sound was instrumental in forming our favorite thrash metal projects in the States.
