by Ian Christe
The parental-warning stickers marked the start of a long cat-and-mouse game between the record industry and moral watchdogs, creating a cynical symbiosis with which it was always easy to find bands willing to play along for publicity value. Though the vanguard of metal attempted to stay above the smears, the taint of misunderstanding would continue to plague the music. “The conservatives are still there, but they’re just quieter,” adds Dee Snider fifteen years later. “The censorship is everywhere, but it is more insidious. Big chain stores are doing most of the dirty work themselves.”
VIII
Rattleheabs:
The Mental Metal Reaction
September 3, 1984: Metallica signs to Elektra Records, Raven to Atlantic, Anthrax to Island
April 1985: After a one-year delay, Exodus releases Bonded by Blood
May 17, 1985: Megadeth debut album released, featuring Nancy Sinatra cover
August 17, 1985: Metallica performs at Monsters of Rock in Castle Donnington, England
Needless to say, as far as heavy metal was concerned, none of the presumptions of the PMRC and its allies had any basis in reality— least of all allegations of Black Sabbath practicing astral projection. The PMRC and its by-product businesses had taken on metal as the junk culture they saw presented on MTV, full of fake blood and exploding codpieces. All the while, a smarter new breed of bands was on the verge of making its commercial impact. Continuing the lyrical seriousness of classic heavy metal, the increasingly popular power metal bands were grazing on profound subjects, tackling the big themes of nuclear war, crime and punishment, and social injustice.
Previously Metallica had not shied from the demonic tendencies of heavy metal. Though the demo version of “Jump in the Fire” was a sexual boast, just before recording Kill ‘Em All, the band changed the lyrics to the more brimstone-scented “Down in the depths of my fiery home—the summons bell will chime.” Furthermore, in a nice display of music-company opportunism by the group’s British label, Music for Nations, the UK release of this catchy single depicted a horned orange demon emerging from a wall of flames. While writing its second album in 1984, though the PMRC was still merely a proposal, Metallica was already eager to put distance between itself and devilish gimmicks.
A world advanced from its precursor, Metallica made Ride the Lightning with producer Flemming Rasmussen at Sweet Silence Studio in Lars Ulrich’s homeland, Denmark, a natural choice for a band that identified so closely with its European roots. Bereft of odes to headbanging, Ride the Lightning abandoned the metal vacuum of Kill ‘Em All for more difficult and insightful lyrical themes. Thwarting accusations that the band had slowed down, the album opened with a brief acoustic intro interrupted by the megaton blast of “Fight Fire with Fire,” a stunning admonition against nuclear war, specifically the Cold War-era defense strategy of mutually assured destruction.
Elsewhere on Ride the Lightning, the title track tackled capital punishment, and the introspective “Fade to Black” offered a plea against suicide. On the pounding “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” James Hetfield paraphrased writer Ernest Hemingway to summon a powerful battleground scene witnessed through the eyes of a young soldier. For the first time, Kirk Hammett poured his fluid guitar style into the songwriting, as well as injecting a few bits of repertoire. Relaying the Old Testament story of a vengeful God sending plagues to Egypt to punish the pharaohs, “Creeping Death” took its entire hypnotic bridge from “Dying by His Hand,” an old Exodus number.
An instrumental, initially named “When Hell Freezes Over,” underwent great internal scrutiny. “There’s only one thing that I’m kind of against with that title,” Lars Ulrich told Kick Ass Monthly. “There’s one word in there, it’s spelled H-E-L-L, which we try to stay away from as much as possible, because we don’t want to be associated with any kind of Satanism or that shit. We think that ‘When Hell Freezes Over’ is probably non-satanic enough for us to live with, since there’s no lyrics saying ‘I wanna suck Satan’s dick’ or anything like that.” The moody instrumental retained its icy overtones but appeared on Lightning with the H. P. Lovecraft—inspired name “The Call of Ktulu.”
Far from being satanic overlords, Metallica was even a little spooked by the occult proclivities of some of its contemporaries. Rasmussen’s recording studio was located next to Mercyful Fate’s rehearsal hall—while in Denmark, Metallica relied on them for practice space and equipment loans. “James mentioned that they wrote some of the music for Ride the Lightning in our rehearsal room,” recalls King Diamond. “My book full of new lyrics was there, and he and Lars wanted to look at them, but they were kind of scared. They thought I was gonna put a curse on them, but they looked anyway. Then they heard us coming, so they quickly closed the book. They were so scared when I came in that I would know—and then I walked straight over to the book and looked in it. Years later James said it freaked them out so bad. I had no idea.”
Metal had crashed through commercial barriers and made great musical advances thus far in the 1980s. After the PMRC attacked this prominence, metalheads stepped into a cultural war that had been escalating since the 1950s. In the days of Elvis Presley many of the same fundamentalist preachers had begun burning rock and roll records— even though Congress at the time was more concerned with communists than Satanists. Now Metallica stood up to the challenge of social responsibility. If the improving quality of the music was not enough to keep opponents at bay, then at least the quarrel would be over the merits of the message. Most important, if national leaders were going to busy themselves with policing rock music, then it became the job of metal musicians to talk to young people about issues of substance.
As it turned out, this is exactly what the fans wanted to hear. Emerging from its metal cocoon, Metallica faced a world of bright prospects. The growing heavy metal world was clearing a path for aggressive new faces, breaking the bottleneck created by British metal giants and MTV sensations. The independent bands pledged they would never sell their souls to MTV in order to make friends with the marketplace. Yet as large numbers of substance-hungry listeners arrived, the music of independent labels was finally attracting the mainstream music business through sheer force of numbers.
Following a tour of Europe in support of Twisted Sister, Metallica joined Raven and Anthrax for an electrifying show at New York’s Roseland Ballroom on September 3, 1984. Though the crowd was rife with talent scouts, some were still a little unclear on the concept: Raven’s John Gallagher recalls a drunken Elektra employee backstage praising Metallica’s set, though the band had yet to hit the stage. No matter, there was raging good cheer aplenty during the heady night for all three bands and their shared label, Megaforce. After the swirling sweat and hair cleared in the large dance hall, label head Jon Zazula handed off his three prize catches to new majorlabel homes: Metallica went to Elektra Records, and Raven to Atlantic Records. Anthrax was soon signed to Island Records. The metal underground had met its moneymakers.
1984 Metallica Metal Militia fan club newsletter
The following day Zazula was shocked when Lars Ulrich called to announce that Metallica was also splitting with Megaforce’s sister company, Crazed Management, in favor of Q Prime Management, in a deal partially brokered by Kerrang! writer Xavier Russell over a pay phone. Q Prime partners Cliff Burnstein and Peter Mensch had previously worked for the hard-won success of AC/DC, and their canny instinct for exploiting metal talent also guided Def Leppard’s video-driven ascent from Sheffield bar band to pop metal whipping boys. With Metallica seizing the chance to realize its aspirations, Zazula had little choice but to reluctantly agree to release his rising star.
Thus far Metallica operated by its own rules, and even the band was startled by how well its back-alley approach worked. After the release of Ride the Lightning, Metallica tasted critical respect that transcended the taunts of born-again bigots. However, not every song on Lightning was a praiseworthy artistic triumph. In fact, the band later admitted that the oddly mundane “Escape” was a
contrived and fruitless attempt to write a radio-friendly tune. It was a concession that would soon prove unnecessary—though still justifiable during a time when even Judas Priest was employing professional songwriting help (Screaming for Vengeance’s “Take These Chains” and Defenders of the Faith’s “Some Heads Are Gonna Roll”) in hopes of achieving a radio hit.
Instead Metallica was gaining significant college-radio airplay for “Am I Evil?,” an eight-minute anthem found only in the import section of metal specialty stores. Following the custom of releasing nonalbum material that had proven immensely successful for Iron Maiden, Metallica’s UK label, Music for Nations, produced a limited Creeping Death EP that gave fans something extra without taxing the band’s creative wellspring. On the A-side was Ride the Lightning’s “Creeping Death,” while the B-side, subtitled “Garage Days Revisited,” presented cover versions of Diamond Head’s “Am I Evil?” and Blitzkrieg’s “Blitzkrieg.” With stampeding unison riffing by Hammett, Hetfield, and Burton, the peculiarities of these two overlooked NWOBHM standards made powerful sense to young audiences who might have never heard the originals.
Even as an import, mom-and-pop stores were able to get out 40,000 copies of the EP. Thousands of fans took up the quest, begging rides from their friends to out-of-the-way strip malls where metal hideouts were found. With a cover song full of weird, Oedipal lyrical turns—"My mother was a witch. She was burned alive"— resolving in a fatalistic chant—"Am I evil? Yes I am. I am man.”— Metallica found its version of a hit single. “Am I Evil?” became a Metallica trademark, performed thousands of times in the hard-gigging years ahead and tacked on to a successful Elektra Records reissue of Kill ‘Em All. On the other hand, the band’s more overt attempt at radio play, “Escape,” was barely ever mentioned or played again.
Riding the buzz of Lightning, Metallica joined friends and fellow Q Prime clients Armored Saint for a North American tour starting in late 1984. Though ostensibly a three-part package bill with W.A.S.P.— the latest and wildest band to crawl out of the Los Angeles clubs onto MTV—the days of underground bands coexisting with MTV groups were coming to an end. Dubbed by Kick Ass Monthly’s Bob Muldowney the “Two Out of Three Ain’t Bad” tour, the winter dates were legendary for the harsh treatment W.A.S.P. received at the hands of rabid Metallica fans. Due to a paperwork gaffe by his immigration lawyer, Lars Ulrich missed the first date in Boston. When Metallica picked up in Nova Scotia, they found that fans had already decided to play favorites.
There was a profound difference between the music-obsessed Metallica and the headline-grabbing W.A.S.P., who threw raw meat into the audience and tortured a scantily clad “virgin” onstage. “I have a lot of fond memories,” insists W.A.S.P.’s Blackie Lawless. “You had two bands that were young, enthusiastic, and had the same kind of take-no-prisoners attitude. It was like two boxers standing in middle of the ring staring each other down before it starts, but not only doing it to each other but to the audience, too. I’ve never been in the same situation. Even when we played with Kiss in 1986—they were already past their heyday, and as far as we were concerned, outdoing them wasn’t really a feather in our cap.”
The scope of the metal showdown varied wildly, playing to 400 fans in San Diego one night and 4,400 in Hollywood the next. While the venues were not sold out every single night, the tour successfully pushed Ride the Lightning—still the property of the metal indie Megaforce—to number one hundred on the Billboard album chart. By the time they got to Phoenix, where Flotsam & Jetsam bassist Jason Newsted viewed Metallica live for the first time, the tour had become a celebration on wheels. Metallica, the champions of underground metal, were officially on the high road to national popularity. “It was a great time,” John Bush of Armored Saint says. “Metal was raging, and all three bands were doing well.” As Metallica thrashed W.A.S.P.’s tired blood and guts on a nightly basis, its early decision to move away from Los Angeles was vindicated. Now Metallica’s allies were everywhere traces of metal could be found.
Ride the Lightning was one example of how the do-it-yourself approach could work for power metal in a big way. Florida’s Savatage signed to Atlantic Records after rousing headbanger approval with its pounding 1983 independent album, Sirens. With the help of Kerrang!, the Seattle act Queensryche sold 25,000 copies of its self-titled 1983 debut EP on 206 Records before signing to EMI Records six months later. After rejecting Jon Zazula’s offer, Metal Church sold 72,000 copies of its self-released debut album, then parlayed that success into a long-term deal with Elektra. When it came to supporting new talent, big record labels lagged far behind what fans had already discovered.
Without an established niche and a bankable fan base, however, signing to a major label could be painful. As a long line of Los Angeles locals went to major labels, the lesser-known Armored Saint signed with Chrysalis in 1984. Unfortunately, Armored Saint occupied a middle ground between Judas Priest and Metallica. It was hard enough for fans to classify them—let alone a record company looking for the next Ratt. “I think they weren’t completely aware of what we were,” says vocalist John Bush. “We never really fit in with the image bands in L.A. We always sounded like we were from Birmingham, England.”
Armored Saint instantly regretted the label’s decision to hire former Kiss producer Michael James Jackson for its debut. “March of the Saint was just way too polished,” says John Bush. “We were this live, crazy band, and they made us sound like a refined group. That’s never what we were about.” Consequently the group turned its critically acclaimed 1985 follow-up, Delirious Nomad, into “a complete rebellion against refinement, and against Chrysalis.” The record salvaged the band’s credibility but left its career on the rocks. Too late the band learned that its strength was in its quirks.
Likewise, signing to Atlantic Records in 1984 brought the beginning of bad times for Raven. “We wanted to write songs with stronger hooks,” says John Gallagher. “That became Stay Hard, which was maybe a little more commercial, but Atlantic played up our crazy image.” Toning down its over-the-top music made Raven sound surprisingly conventional. With a plethora of power metal now available, metal fans deserted Raven for fresh pastures. “Back then we were kind of alienated from our fans—you only met them at the show,” Gallagher says. “That could never happen now. We only heard people telling us we were great. We never heard any of the negative.”
While his former bandmates caught widespread accolades, shunned Metallica guitarist Dave Mustaine resurfaced in 1985 with his stunningly mature new band—originally named Fallen Angel in sardonic reference to his fall from grace. Dubbed Megadeth—a name that summoned images of deadly nuclear warheads instead of dark devilry—the band’s early lineup featured a whirlwind of rhythm guitarists. Slayer’s highly recognizable Kerry King, wearing a gauntlet of six-inch nails, made sporadic appearances in the band’s inconsistent roster. “[King’s tenure] was a day or two here or there randomly for a long period of time,” says Mustaine. “When we first met Kerry he was very innocent. He was not a drug user or a drinker or anything like that. He was very much into black metal. I showed him my particular rhythm style, which I know he was very intrigued by. He was really fun to be around.”
Dave Mustaine in Megadeth (Todd Nakamine)
Megadeth was Mustaine’s return in a blaze of glory. After being ousted from Metallica, he had returned straight to his hometown of Los Angeles without even stopping by the El Cerrito house to retrieve his personal possessions. He became devoted to plotting his vindication. “I was still very angry about my getting asked to leave Metallica,” says Mustaine, “and I wanted to outmetal them.” Despite touches of high-speed jazz fusion, Megadeth was powerfully toned, with a wild edge that at its best offered greater possibility than the strict, bludgeoning fury of Metallica. The Megadeth debut, Killing Is My Business … And Business Is Good, “was a very aggressively heavy album,” says Mustaine. “I wouldn’t redo it now. I think that I wasted a lot of great riffs in those songs. You could probab
ly make a dozen songs out of two or three of those songs, because each one has five or more riffs in it.”
Along with bassist Dave Ellefson, Killing Is My Business featured drummer Gar Samuelson and lead guitarist Chris Poland, who worked repairing instruments for Slayer on the side. Mustaine and Ellefson were die-hard thrashers, but Samuelson and Poland had few preconceptions of how to play metal. They delivered something quirky, layered with unusual chord combinations, and brilliant. “Gar was very jazz-influenced, and so was Chris,” says Mustaine, “and that probably had a lot to do with it.” Songs were almost arbitrarily contrary, designed to defy expectation. They included the antioccult warning “Looking Down the Cross,” a hectic cover of Nancy Sinatra’s “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’,” and “The Mechanix,” the early Mustaine-penned Metallica song that appeared on Kill ‘Em All as “The Four Horsemen"—here presented at twice the speed.
Yet even as Mustaine attempted to forcibly “outmetal” Metallica, the troubled guitarist was not alone. Kirk Hammett’s former band, Exodus, relied on a heavy violence metaphor to express its claws-extended ascent. On Bonded by Blood, the band’s much-anticipated 1985 debut, songs like “A Lesson in Violence” expressed the metal struggle as a literal street fight. “Bonded by Blood” saw the union of headbangers as a blood pact, with singer Paul Baloff shrieking, “Bang your head against the stage and metal takes its price/Bonded by blood.” The gleeful thuggery of the lyrics cheered the metallic war of “Deliver Us to Evil,” another charming ode to destruction. Relating the attack to world affairs, the exotic “And Then There Were None” cast Exodus as a ragged coastal tribe, ready for one push of a red button to send them into a primitive, radioactive wasteland.