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Easter egg from Lars
Metallica has a new single out, and at one point Kirk Hammett directly quotes several bars of Blackmore’s solo from Speed King:
The track is called Screaming Suicide and is credited to James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich & Robert Trujillo. It is from Metallica’s upcoming new album 72 Seasons due out on April 14 (coincidence?), 2023.
Credit for the trainspotting goes to Tobias Janaschke.
Unauthorized copying, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing
Kirk said he got the idea for Enter Sandman from the Smoke riff.
January 20th, 2023 at 22:09genius !!!!
LLRnR
January 21st, 2023 at 09:43LL Ritchie Blackmore
Brillant quote and it adds a level of fun that doesn’t exist in most Metallica stuff.
January 21st, 2023 at 14:40I’m neither a Metallica fan nor a hater, I respect them though it’s not really my cup of tea. I buy their albums out of intellectual curiosity and applaud when they bravely do off the wall stuff like Lulu. I’ve heard them do far more grating stuff than this new track here and Kirk’s fanboy quote is cute. He’s always had more of an influence from 70ies guitar heroes than from 80ies shredders.
One thing that is really pleasant about Metallica is that they hardly ever sound like Led Zep. For a Yank heavy metal band that is a redeeming factor. Great thanks to the Little Dane for probably making DP adoration mandatory in his band instead!
January 21st, 2023 at 21:09DP mark 2 is the origin of lots of heavy metal but still Ian Gillan hate to be labelled as heavy metal.
January 23rd, 2023 at 11:17Their 4 albums really covered everything and that’s why they are the greatest band ever created.
Peace ✌️
Heavy Metal is an offspring of 70ies Heavy and Hard Rock and that is an offspring of 50ies Rock’n’Roll, Blues Rock and gritty Brit Invasion Rhythm’n’Blues, no two ways about it. Don’t disown your children.
I first came across the term Heavy Metal in 1974 when Warner Bros put out a such-monikered 24-track double LP sampler:
https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0566/5105/5295/products/785687_1279x1288.jpg?v=1649074758
which by today’s standards contained exactly one Heavy Metal song, namely Iron Man by that band which on its first two records essentially just slowed Cream’s music down and turned the volume up and less than ten would have even qualified as Heavy/Hard Rock at the time:
MC5 – Kick Out The Jams 2:49
Black Sabbath – Iron Man 5:47
Alice Cooper – I’m Eighteen 2:53
Jimi Hendrix – Freedom 3:21
The James Gang – Must Be Love 3:50
Deep Purple – Smoke On The Water 7:23
T. Rex – Bang A Gong (Get It On) 4:22
The J. Geils Band – Give It To Me 6:27
Dr. John – Right Place Wrong Time 2:52
Led Zeppelin – D’yer Mak’er 4:22
Buffalo Springfield – Bluebird 8:54
Faces – Cindy Incidentally 2:34
The Doors – Touch Me 3:10
The Allman Brothers Band – Ramblin’ Man 4:55
Delaney & Bonnie – Only You And I Know 4:19
Van Morrison – Domino 3:06
Eagles Outlaw 3:25
Yes – Starship Trooper (9:57)
Golden Earring – Radar Love 5:02
Grateful Dead – Johnny B. Goode 3:44
Foghat – What A Shame 3:48
Uriah Heep – Stealin’ 4:48
War – Lonely Feelin’ 3:41
Blues Image – Ride Captain Ride 3:43
That album pretty much shaped my fledgling musical tastes back then, I loved nearly every song on it. I thought the term Heavy Metal a cool one and didn’t and don’t obsess over the accuracy of the description. If someone says Deep Purple is “Heavy Metal”, I know what they mean with it. If you take as Heavy Metal’s definition “can play at Wacken and not get booed off the stage”, then both DP and Status Quo evidently qualify. But then the Stones could probably play Wacken as well and receive a warm reception as could have The Ramones, but could you imagine Coldplay or U2 being there? See, we’ve reached agreement, those two aren’t Heavy Metal at all!
; – )
January 23rd, 2023 at 15:28Yo,
Metallica are a strange band to me in many ways, & there’s no doubting their world-wide success with a string of No.1 albums across the globe, & their popularity is growing still to this day…
I warmed to them around 20-years ago, when they were played non-stop ( Master of Puppets ) on a Motor-cycle racing trip from Melbourne to Sydney return, & then in 2009 or so, I bought “Death Magnetic” when I saw it. It had a cool cover design I thought, but the music(?) inside, to-this-day, has never been played-out fully. What a waste of money, & I couldn’t even give the disc away.
They have their fans, but I choose not to listen to them anymore, or won’t even take the chance. They have a great name however, & the drumming on “Master of Puppets” was superb.- ( He has a very nice touch, reminiscent of Bill Ward ).
Peace !
January 23rd, 2023 at 22:26Uwe
If my memory serves me right there s an interview, it might have been a Dutch one related to his succes with LOVE IS ALL, not sure….in which he uses the term heavymetal bassplayer.
He said something alike ” not bad for a DANG DANG DANG heavy metal bassplayer.” 🙂
I think the term got percieved differently over time.
January 24th, 2023 at 00:55RV, for the – somewhat murky – origins of the term “heavy metal” look no further than this comprehensive treatise by Professor Deena Weinstein, it’s the best and most thorough I’ve read on the topic and well worth your time:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/19401159.2013.846655
William S. Burroughs (the author of Naked Lunch), Mars Bonfire (writer of Steppenwolf’s Born to be Wild and the phrase contained therein: “heavy metal thunder”), Lester Bangs (legendary rock journalist of Rolling Stone and Creem), Mike Saunders (another rock journo from Creem) and Sandy Pearlman (producer/co-songwriter/manager-Svengali of Blue Öyster Cult) all can take some credit.
I first heard the term in the mid-70ies and in the second part of the 70ies it gradually took the place as a description of music otherwise referred to as “hard rock” or “heavy rock”, which was a synonym for guitar-oriented music played in a muscular fashion with the aim of overwhelming the audience, Led Zeppelin, Grand Funk Railroad, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, Rory Gallagher, Uriah Heep and Humble Pie, to name a few, were all deemed “hard rock” or “heavy rock”.
The first band I remember actually referring to themselves as “heavy metal” were Blue Öyster Cult in a 1975 CBS media release, I guess Sandy Pearlman simply liked the sound of the term, in reality BÖC were nowhere as heavy as, say, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple or even Status Quo in their 70ies prime. By the end of the 70ies and the advent of NWOBHM (New Wave of British Heavy Metal) it was well-established as a caption for music that only a few years earlier would have simply been referred to as “heavy rock”.
Come the 80ies, the term became a coat of arms, an insignia many bands and their fans wore proudly – just think of Manowar’s inane “Death to false metal!” slogan – whereas in the 70ies it had often had a derogatory connotation as a description of the music from people who did actually not like it.
I’m relaxed about even liberal use of the term. If someone calls DP a “heavy metal band” or me a “heavy metal fan” I don’t lose any sleep over it though to me the term is more apt in usage with bands (I also like) such as Black Sabbath, Judas Priest and Queensryche. Bands as varied as Deep Purple, AC/DC, Kiss, Van Halen and even Motörhead all profess(ed) to be “not heavy metal”, yet if they held an open air concert together it is a safe bet to assume that 80-90% of the present audience would describe themselves as “heavy metal fans”.
And most certainly, true “dyed in the wool” heavy metal fans are not going to jeer if you out yourself as a DP or Rainbow fan, but will rather nod approvingly (to the extent their worn out cervical vertebrae still allows such movement, of course!) in recognition, DP is one of the egg yolks to their particular omelette after all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_EzMO27MS0
January 24th, 2023 at 15:55“Death to all but Metal” – Steel Panther
January 24th, 2023 at 20:04@ 9, Wiiliam S. Burrows, & his book “The naked lunch” lol ! Steely Dan acquired their name from a steam-powered-phallic described in that same book, but I’ll let that history reveal itself to those who seek-it-out…
It has inspired many people it seems !
Peace !
January 26th, 2023 at 22:48Talking of ‘Eavy Metal as Neil from The Young Ones used to say. The metal clans have a very similar dress sense to the Village People ‘shake your butt’ clans in many ways, that scene anyway. Leather & studs, Denim & a few chains etc, strutting about, yes indeed there is something there it seems. Remember when Rob Halford ‘came out’ & the outrage was palpable. I know of one Priest ‘fan’ who was a classic Australian yobbo & he burnt all his JP records when that was announced. We did laugh. Anyway it is all good, well some of it. Cheers.
January 27th, 2023 at 04:35My musical tastes have Metallica, Megadeth, & Pantera almost on the level of Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, & Led Zeppelin. They are the natural progression of what talented musician can do growing from the roots of the heaviest side of the pioneers of classic hard rock.
January 27th, 2023 at 06:49“I know of one Priest ‘fan’ who was a classic Australian yobbo & he burnt all his JP records when that was announced. We did laugh.”
LOL, he mustn’t have listened very closely to the lyrics of by then 13 official Priest albums! Which other band had that body of work without mentioning the words “she”, “her”, “woman”, “girl” or “baby” once? (You have to go as far back as Victim of Changes from the second album to hear “she”, “her” and “woman”, but tellingly that lyric wasn’t penned by Halford, but by his predecessor.)
Halford sang about the joys of gay bars as early as on “Raw Deal” in 1977 (produced by Roger Glover, no less), years before he donned his gay biker look à la Village People. He had known he was gay since he was a child.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TddtYPOBdOg
As an early Priest fan (that band caught my ear for its similarities to Purple, it had a pleasantly familiar neatness and structure in its sound), I knew by 1980 or so (without making any fuss about it, German music magazines had reported as early as 1979 that Rob as the single unmarried Judas Priest member took only a fleeting interest in women and was adamant to describe himself as “free, completely …”) he was gay as a goose. That was part of his unmistakable charm as a front man and had to do much – just like Freddie Mercury (a Halford role model) and Queen – with Priest’s overall appeal.
January 27th, 2023 at 15:25@11. It’s easy to see that transition over to those bands you mentioned, but some of us gravitated to the likes of “Stone Temple Pilots”, or even “Pearl Jam” & say “Nirvana”…
STP are awesome imo, regardless of who’s up-front singing. I really got-into the short EP featuring Chester Bennington (RIP) called “High Rise”, & wished they’d delivered more than the awesome 5-tunes. For myself, this band followed-on from DP, BS & LZ, whilst staying contemporary, unique & keeping me happy in modern-times. Time will tell if their music goes-the-distance.
“Pearl Jam” & “Nirvana” were well over-rated imo, but there’s no doubt the band “Foo Fighters”, that evolved from “Nirvana” delivered the goods again & again, being quite heavy, & yet managing catchy songs that got lots of radio-play, at least here in Oz. Hit, after hit, after hit down this way at least. ( RIP Taylor Hawkins ).
I guess for myself, with RB creating so much negativity & controversy in the early 1990’s within DP, allowed STP into my inner circle of faves. I don’t take to politics & soap-operas too well, but was sure impressed with “Purpendicular” & happy that the band found Steve. They were different, far more musical, & deserved even more success than they received imo. Especially when weighed-up against the bands aforementioned.
Peace !
January 28th, 2023 at 00:13@ 11- yes indeed Donald Fagan & Walter Becker say no more. Cryptic, philosophical, sarcastic, double entendre’s, cynical, humorous & not to be messed with. Wonderful songwriters & didn’t give many interviews either. I would say they didn’t take any prisoners at all. That is what makes them so special in many ways. Bravo. Cheers.
January 28th, 2023 at 01:41Yes regarding the burning of the JP albums, the penny hadn’t dropped at all in the preceding years. I am not sure how that could be as it wasn’t half obvious to myself & others & that is without ever hearing any JP, just images in rock magazines were a giveaway. Or maybe we did see a video on Top of the Pops or something, but not albums at all, no one I knew back then was into JP. Some people used to run down Freddie Mercury, Elton John etc while they owned JP records. Boy was that guy pissed off when the truth ‘came out’. Good comedy though. Cheers.
January 28th, 2023 at 02:20@16 G’day mate ! Yes, it’s hard to find much on Steely Dan, that’s for sure…If you’d like some interview material, there is a really good “Classic Albums Steely Dan Aja” DVD available. ( These guys did a “Deep Purple Machine Head” DVD that’s excellent too ). Both possibly available on YouTube.
And Steely Dan’s last studio album from 2003 called “Everything must go” comes with a hilarious bonus DVD of them taking a taxi-ride through Las Vegas, whilst pulling over & picking-up some mostly gorgeous young ladies to chat & discuss the new album…
Peace !
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waIBA6_0GQc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgaX6159wmM
January 28th, 2023 at 10:13@ 18 – yes I have the Aja classic albums dvd plus the live concert from around the turn of the century, Two Against Nature. I went to a gig back in 2009 in Brisbane, superb it was & talk about a clinical performance. To be expected though as those two & anyone that works with them are incredibly gifted musicians. Thanks for the info, it is always good to communicate as there is a chance of picking up something that can slip under the radar at times. The DP Machine Head Classic albums dvd is one of my favourites of that series. Brilliant although I still wonder as to why Lazy isn’t mentioned at all. Some copyright issue or something, I don’t know. Frustrating in a sense as it is one of the must have tracks. Every other song is there. Cheers.
January 28th, 2023 at 21:06@19…”Lazy” may have been omitted due to time constraints, & / or though an awesome tune, is possibly classed as a run-of-the-mill blues tune. All the other tunes were essentially “new”, & had something different about them, though I completely agree with you on “Lazy” being a something special.
I did learn about Steely Dan performing in Brisbane, & wanted to go, but I was in the middle of acquiring my ADME at AMC / U-Tas, & it was just not possible to get there.
I have a few of those “Classic Album” DVD’s, & they’re all quite good. Dark Side of the Moon is especially good.
Peace !
January 29th, 2023 at 22:19According to Roger, Lazy defines what a DP guitarist needs to be able to do. He’s on record for observing post-Blackmore, yet pre-Morse when asked how the new guitarist should be: “Can he play Lazy?”. And he’s right, Lazy does encapsulate quite a few key elements of DP: swing, a blues foundation, guitar and organ lines played with some finesse, music that is accessible, but not simple-minded.
January 30th, 2023 at 13:25Lazy indeed. That Clapton riff initially according to Blackmore. Sounds like Blackmore was being a little Lazy in trying to make up his own riff. Sorry, poor attempt at humour. Regarding the DVD Classic rock series, yes maybe time restraints as that series may have been produced for television ‘prime time’ audiences I presume, but I could be mistaken on that. It is disappointing not to have the complete album represented as Lazy is a rather large part of Machine Head to my ears. However you could be right Gregster as it isn’t a potential hit in any way, if that was the reason for it being neglected. What about Dark Side of The Moon though, how many non ‘hits’ are on that album. The first thing I thought of at the time & I still do is a copyright issue of some sort. Regarding Lazy being an essential DP song & a ‘induction to pass the pub test’, I agree with that big time. It does have it all in so many ways. I cannot imagine Machine Head without it. Cheers.
January 30th, 2023 at 20:16@ 21. Lazy also has a few key-changes too, & moves up a full tone for the vocal parts, & modulates again for the solo-section. It can be thought of as a minor-blues including key-changes, with DP’s unique changes in the turn-around, that move to the home Major-key for a few bars, & then back into it.
It was played here in Oz on TV for a couple of years through the 1980’s, essentially channel 9’s Wide World of Sports week-end show, & some-times leading into a commercial-break when the cricket was on ! Someone at channel 9 liked DP !
Peace !
January 30th, 2023 at 20:37Has there been a Purple gig with Roger Glover where that song has not been played since its first release on MH? Even Mk IV returned to it. And Mk V (with Roger handling the harmonica for Joe, stopping to play bass while doing it).
If an alien life form asked me what DP was, there would be a good chance of me playing it as a sample.
The instrumental snippet Rainbow would play of it used to be god-awful, much too fast. As where some of the Mk II.2 and Mk III.3 versions in the reunion phase, Blackmore would rush it to death. But the magic of that song is in the swing, not the speed.
January 31st, 2023 at 17:13If an Alien life form asked me what Deep Purple was, I would be erring on the side of caution & saying it is a combination of varying colours. The last thing they may want to be told it is a collection of long haired scruffy looking humans who make loud noises of all sorts of frequencies disturbing the peace & causing other people to behave in strange manner. Well they the Aliens may leave you alone then, but then again they may be genuine Deep Purple fans, so yes hit them with a decent version of the song Lazy & take your chances Uwe. Cheers.
February 1st, 2023 at 06:16I converse with aliens on a no less than regular basis.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DcRDqySsx8
And Antipodeans of course. Same thing really! : – )
February 1st, 2023 at 14:15The Invaders, I haven’t any recollection of that tv show. It looks well done for back then. Did you notice the array of Purple colours in that intro, possibly colourised later as the guy who uploaded says he added special effects. Maybe the colour Purple does resonate into Deep space after all. As for us alien Antipodeans, indeed we do feel alien at times all the way out here on our lonesome! Especially when certain rock bands ignore us & never tour out here, we have often wondered if we were on another planet. No doubt people flying out here think the same, ‘where are we flying to, how long is this flight going to last’? And then there is the living under a rock also, this alien existence just never seems to end. Cheers.
February 1st, 2023 at 21:10I remember that show so well (when killed the bad scheming Aliens in human guise who all had a telltale-deformed pinkie would erupt in a fuzzy red glow), my parents let me watch it in my pajamas (so I could go to bed immediately after, I was only nine years old, it ran weekly around 9 pm or so), they were totally laissez faire as TV programs go, I devoured anything – did it do me any harm? Sure, it did! Silly question. I would recount the horror, Sci Fi and war movies I had watched the night before during breaks on the schoolyard on the next day to my school buddies who would listen in awe (not being allowed by their parents to watch this stuff).
Now, now, now – no crocodile tears, Herr MacGregor! Australia has the eternal benefit of having seen DP Mk IV (and those gigs weren’t bad at all). Germany never had a single Mk IV gig, the ones initially scheduled never materialized after the Bolin line-up ground to a halt on that ill-fated Brit tour. I really would have loved to have seen Mk IV and I actually could have because 1976 was the first year we were back from Africa (so I never saw Mk II in their heyday on their many German tours).
You were a bit short on Mk III though, just one gig at the Sunbury Festival IIRC!
And Mk II just one tour 1971, right?
February 2nd, 2023 at 13:54The Sydney DP concerts & Melbourne also & that Perth gig we looked at images a little while ago, at the Aqua centre, 1971. They may have done Adelaide also, possibly Brisbane but some of the smaller cities missed out on some big bands back in the 70’s. Floyd only did Sydney & Melbourne that year also or maybe 1972.. Did Purple play anywhere else than Sunbury for 1975, I am not sure. Post Blackmore DP have toured here quite a few times. Led Zep toured here only once for Sydney & Melbourne only I think, also 1971 from my memory. I was too young of course in those days. It is the bands like Rush, Crimson, Kansas & ELP that never ventured out here & a few others. Promotors could be responsible for that as well as that long flight etc. However saying that all those bands did tour Japan once or twice & that is where the frustration increases here, so close & yet so far. Tull always toured here a lot. Now about those Aliens, I used to watch the comedy My Favourite Martian as a youngster. Otherwise only ever some Star Trek, the Thunderbirds of course. Oh & The Jetsons cartoon, futuristic & all. That is the closest that I am aware of, of having an ‘Alien’ experience of some sort. Not as serious as that drama The Invaders looks. I might have a look at some of those. Remember Kolchak ‘The Night Stalker’ mid 70’s that was a little pre Mulder & Scully sort of thing. him & his trusty camera, against all the odds. You may have left the US by then though. Cheers.
February 3rd, 2023 at 01:51Forgot to mention DP MK IV & I am sure they did drop in here back then from my memory. That would have been before or after the incident in Indonesia I suspect. Cheers.
February 3rd, 2023 at 01:54Don’t know about Mk I, but Mk IV did no less than 10 gigs in Australia and NZ in late 1975.
Auckland, Western Springs Stadium – NEW ZEALAND
Christchurch, Queen Elizabeth II Park – NEW ZEALAND
Sydney, Hordern Pavilion – AUSTRALIA
Sydney, Hordern Pavilion – AUSTRALIA … by public demand 2nd concert
Sydney, Hordern Pavilion – AUSTRALIA … by public demand 3rd concert
Brisbane, Milton Tennis Courts – AUSTRALIA
Melbourne, Festival Hall – AUSTRALIA
Melbourne, Festival Hall – AUSTRALIA … by public demand 2nd concert
Adelaide, Memorial Drive – AUSTRALIA
Perth, Perth Entertainment Centre – AUSTRALIA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NJFL5rb3s4
Mk III indeed only Sunbury, in early 1975, but then they never made it to Japan either.
With Mk I’s short life span and concentrating on the US and UK, I doubt they ever made it across the (various) pond(s) to you. They never even played Germany once, just Switzerland twice. Interesting, given that Germany then became the fertile ground for Mk II’s rise to the top.
February 3rd, 2023 at 13:10Thanks for those tour dates, I did look them up after posting my comment & also re read the story on that tour including the Indonesia issues. There is no doubt that MKIV would have benefited from people not knowing of Tommy Bolin replacing Blackmore. With MK3 being at Sunbury earlier that same year. Media & news back in those days wasn’t great, especially out here in OZ under our rocks were we all live. The same would have occurred with MK3 in the US following MK2 & the success of that era. At least MK3 was roaring to go & had a cracking album behind them & the US at that time was really pumping. Regarding MK4, I bet there wouldn’t have been ‘public demand’ concerts selling once word was out. Not to worry, it is all part of the Purple history. At least the album stands up in many ways, it has some good songs & isn’t affected in any way by the drugs & ego’s. MK1 wasn’t ever here, not that I was old enough to know at that time, however Hush was pretty big here on the radio. Cheers.
February 3rd, 2023 at 20:04… “and at one point Kirk Hammett directly quotes several bars of Blackmore’s solo from Speed King.”
February 4th, 2023 at 14:09Obviously, no one have noticed the other point where Kirk also quotes a moment from Pictures of Home soon after the “Speed King point”… 🙂