i've actually heard that claim before.
Rush does a really good cover of that version too.

Yeah, that's one of them tunes that's so damn good that it's pretty hard to ruin it. I never heard the claim either, but I suppose that's how you get press.

I'm surprised that no one has yet to post a youtube of the band.

Here, enjoy the hair do's. (new window)

Here's the documentary. (pops)

Complete with Dio dissing Gene Simmons goodness.

I'D LOVE TO HELP YOU SON, BUT YOU'RE TOO YOUNG TO VOTE.

BTW - it's not a "new" documentary.

meh\

Then wouldn't the Shaggs be the first female heavy metal band?

A friend of mine saw Blue Cheer play recently and said they still kick maximum ass.

And Torc, the Shaggs were the first female heavy mental band. There's supposedly a Hollywood biopic about them in the works at present.

/threadjack over

i've watched that documentary a few times...own the 2-disc edition. i don't recall this being said.

geddy lee talks about blue cheer and they flash a bit of the video for "summertime blues" during a segment about who to credit for being the first metal band, not what the first metal song was.

sam dunn's wise choice for first metal band is not blue cheer. check out the documentary. great stuff.

I loved them - have both albums on my iPod. Saw them, I think, but that was the Acid Days so who knows if it was live or in my head?

Fruit and icebergs...

Black Sabbath has always cited Blue Cheer as their primary influence.

That article was quite idiotic.

Mistakes aplenty.

Led zeppelin was formed in July of 1968. ("Led Zeppelin did not exist in 1968")--from the article.

Also from the moronic article--"Whatever their long-term contribution to the evolution of the metal genre, Blue Cheer sucked"

Blasphemy.


"Vincebus Eruptum" and "Outside Inside" are pure masterpieces.

"Summertime Blues" is actually probably the weakest track off of both those milestone recordings.



Metal,doom,stoner,grunge,punk...etc...or anything considered "HEAVY" owes an awful lot to Blue Cheer,The Stooges and MC5.

All three of those artists had heavy-ass records out before the first Black Sabbath album.

Blue Cheer's Vincebus Eruptum informs a personal first in my own life - it the first LP I ever recorded onto one of those new-fangled cassette tapes. I plugged the cassette recorder into the aux RCA jacks on the back of my mother's console stereo and and behold - I was early RIAA fodder.

Having been a musically inclined and knowledgeable teenager at the time of Blue Cheer's emergence and still owning that same, still playable copy of Vincebus Eruptum - with the embossed cover - I have to say there is some merit to this thesis. Although I considered them to be acid rock, there is a proto-metallic twinge to their sound.

Blue Cheer's "Summertime Blues", at least in music theory, is the first actual identifiable heavy metal song - according to 'The Sound of The Beast' by Ian Christe. (I'd make every music geek read it.)
Worth noting, purely for flaming, Smashing Pumpkins have released a lot of songs that would count as heavy metal.
I'd say X.Y.U. and Zero are more thrash oriented than a lot of metal bands were even doing in the 90's.

I've heard that for decades. That's nothing new.

Although not the "inventors" of Heavy Metal; Van Halen was a major influence on the 80's Metal sound.

Jedekai: Worth noting, purely for flaming, Smashing Pumpkins have released a lot of songs that would count as heavy metal.

Absolutely. Including most of the new album...Billy Corgan has said more than once that _Master Of Reality_ is one of his favorites evAR.

SilentStrider: Rush does a really good cover of that version too.

Pretty much EVERY band does a good cover of "Summertime Blues", no big stretch.

BUT... I do blame my old pals, Matt and Gunnar for the death of 80's metal.

I Want You (She's so Heavy)?

Or, we could go to the White Album -- Helter Skelter? Most of side three?

MiamiBlues.....I always though that Helter Skelter was the first heavy metal song in retrospect. Blue Cheer was the first heavy metal band, there is no doubt about it.

1962... Monster Mash FTW! :D

Doesn't Dave Davies claim to have "invented" heavy metal?

irockalot......Did he say what song. I have all the albums up to Village Green and don't recall any heavy metal.

My Classic Rock professor at USC (yes, they have a classic rock class) named Blue Cheer as the first heavy metal band as well.

for me it was the accused

/?why not for you?

I think that You Really Got Me or All Day and All of the Night by the Kinks was the first heavy metal song(s). Not as gritty as Blue Cheer, but just as heavy.

I also would consider You Really Got Me to be the first heavy metal song.

SilentStrider: Rush does a really good cover of that version too.


Blue Cheer's version is a cover as well.


agreed that it's the weakest track on the album as well.

Hendrix, Spanish Castle Magic. Pretty metallic. For '67.

Minor key + fuzz or overdrive equals HEAVY. (descending notes/chords is even heavier)


A lot of the early "metal" was too bouncy tempo and in a major key.


That is why the first Black Sabbath is so amazingly HEAVY.

Slower and more minor with very heavily overdriven guitar and bass de-tuned to a lower pitch.


(Geezer,the bassist for Sabbath said the crunchy bass sound was actually then a mistake. He blew out some of the speakers on his amp just before recording and really had to crank it during the session)

While it may be debatable about San Francisco's role in the origin of metal, it is most definitely a metal loving town.

Metallica? Faith No More? Testament?

/STFU prissy Briton

You know who else like covering summertime blues?



/"Skippy, what's the name of the band playing on stage?"


"Who."


"The name of the band playing on stage."


"Who!"

"Skippy, Do you see the band playing on stage?"


"No, I don't see The Band, that's a different group entirely."

Ah, the good old days when metal actually rocked instead of just playing as many notes as possible as fast as possible.

Mole Man: "No, I don't see The Band, that's a different group entirely."

An Animaniacs refferance in a \m/ Thread? I beer u now.
*pops-fizz pour (glugluglug)*
You are welcome.

roddikinsathome: An Animaniacs refferance in a \m/ Thread? I beer u now.
I think I recall seeing that in an old Mad Magazine.

/you can stay on my lawn, I'm not old, I just had the "Mad About the 60s" archive book.

MikoSquiz: Ah, the good old days when metal actually rocked instead of just playing as many notes as possible as fast as possible.

That's shred, not metal. Although metal does have kickass guitarists.

helter skelter. nuff said

carmody: And Torc, the Shaggs were the first female heavy mental band. There's supposedly a Hollywood biopic about them in the works at present.

this is excellent news.

I still have the 45 of Blue Cheer's Summertime Blues, it's really scratchy but I still have it!