Real Brave Live 64

Real Brave Metalhead in Residence graces us with his presence, knowledge, and a list of his Top Ten heaviest riffs off all time. Here’s a (brief) history of the genre:

Metal is a genre of rock music whose origins can be traced to the UK in the late 1960’s.  Blues rock, psychedelic rock, and acid rock, are often seen as progenitors of the genre, pioneered by bands like Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, and Black Sabbath.  The music, then and now, is typically characterized by distorted guitars, extended virtuosic soloing, and fast, loud and emphatic beats.

Despite heavy metal’s critical slating, the genre grew to amass wide audiences.  The 1970’s saw an evolution in the music toward wider listener accessibility with bands like Kiss and Alice Cooper.  Other performers, like Judas Priest and Motörhead synthesized a faster, punk rock aesthetic into metal, stripping away much of its early blues influences.  The decade saw further evolution of the genre with Iron Maiden, Saxon, and Van Halen, who brought the music to what many consider to be its peak in widespread popularity.

During the 1980’s the genre diverged into two noticeably different subgenres.  Glam metal became popular with bands like Mötley Crüe, Twisted Sister, and Bon Jovi.  Meanwhile, an underground scene was developing with bands like Metallica, Megadeath, Slayer, and Anthrax bringing so-called ‘thrash metal’ into the mainstream.  Thrash is characterized by faster tempos, more intricate drum and guitar parts, and aggressive, jarring vocals.

By the 1990’s glam metal gave way to alternative rock and grunge, while thrash metal continued its descent into darker and heavier subgenres, like death metal, power metal and doom metal.  The list of heaviest metal riffs in this episode draws from the latter, and is curated by Real Brave’s own metal-expert-in-chief Mike.  

Aside from being a connoisseur of the chaotic, (authority of brutality?) Mike also teaches music lessons here at Real Brave.  He, like all of our instructors here, can teach you all the fundamental building blocks needed to shred with the best of them.  Whether your goal is to move the soul with the delicate, neo-romantic stylings of Chopin or Debussy, or make onlookers bleed out of their eyeballs with the killer riffs of Slayer or Megadeath, music lessons at Real Brave can help you Find Your Stage and take you to the next level of playing an instrument!