The original post: /r/music by /u/LongIsland1995 on 2024-10-02 14:41:57.

There are two camps of people opposed to the idea that Sabbath, more or less, invented metal.

Those who claim that it already existed,

As for the first camp ; I strongly disagree with the idea that Sabbath was in the same realm of what hard rock artists like Cream or Hendrix were doing.

Sabbath’s debut had all the ingredients of what we now know as metal (dark/occult/horror lyrics, metal riffing, overall heaviness) and was frankly pretty far removed from something like Helter Skelter (which many people claim was the first heavy metal song).

I think the most important ingredient of Sabbath being metal vs hard rock (like Cream) or an occult rock band (like Coven) was Tony Iommi’s guitar tone + technique. Even on their first album, the heavy riffs are present throughout. While some attribute this to downtuning due to his factory accident, this is not exactly true as they didn’t start downtuning until Master of Reality.

I am aware that “heavy metal” was also used to refer to Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple, but this predates the modern understanding of metal culture.

As for the camp that claims Sabbath wasn’t metal because they didn’t “ditch the blues like Judas Priest”, I find that to be a silly claim. Blues influence and metal are not mutually exclusive, and even on Stained Class (arguably Priest’s best album) there is a non zero amount of blues influence on the shredding.

Even The Wizard with its harmonica, is a very metal song! Between the lyrics and Iommi’s crushing riffs, it still meets the modern definition of metal.

TL;DR: Sabbath did actually invent metal, and this is one of the most clear cut examples of an artist/band creating a new genre!