Heavy Metal:
In the wake of British Steel, Judas Priest and New Wave of British Heavy Metal which took place in ’80, the genre of heavy metal became extremely popular. There were many heavy metal artists that were able to benefit from the exposure that MTV had granted them, which started airing in the early eighties - the sales often soared if the videos from the band were screened on the channel. In ’83, the videos for Def Leppard’s for Pyromania made them considered as superstars in America. On the Billboard chart, Quiet Riot was the very first domestic band performing heavy metal that was able to make it to the top with Metal Health. A seminal event that was known for aiding in the growing popularity of Metal was the United States Festival that took place in California. The heavy metal day included performances by Van Halen, Ozzy Osbourne, Motley Crue, Scorpions and Judas Priest.
As the mid eighties were approaching, heavy metal was able to go from eight percent to a twenty percent share of all of the recordings that sold in the United States. At this day and time, metal music wasn’t only an exclusive domain of the male teenagers. The audience for metal music has become younger, older and even more so, females. By the time of the mid eighties, glam metal had made a dominant presence on the charts in the United States, music television as well as in the arena concert circuit. The new bands were able to remain very popular - the bands included Warrant for Los Angeles as well as acts that originated from the East Coast such as Cinderella and Poison.
Bon Jovi who was from New York was able to become an enormous success with the third album he produced, “Slippery When Wet”. During ’87, Headbanger’s Ball, which was a show that MTV launched was exclusively devoted to the heavy metal videos. But it wasn’t too long before the metal audience began to factionalize, among those in many of the underground metal scenes, in which they favor more disparaging and extreme sounds the popular style such as hair metal or lite metal. |
