Metal Heads of DoomWorld, what was your introduction to metal?

I'm curious to know how other people got into metal.

For me it happened somewhere around the early 2010s, a friend and I used a program called "Songr" basically you'd input the name of a song, band or you could browse through genres, one day I decided to check out "Heavy Metal" just out of curiosity. At the time I barely knew English so most of the lyrics sounded like gibberish to me, at some point I stumbled across Twilight Tavern by Ensiferum (still one of my favorite songs and bands) suffice to say 10 years old me was blown away. With time I forgot about the song, still listening to it every once in a while, until one day in 2015 I ran into "The Vengeful One" by Disturbed (edgy I know...) with that I regained my interest for metal, during the years I started listening to more and more genres, and while I can't really choose my favorite I tend to lean towards Power or Death metal.

Black Sabbath and Metallica are the two bands that made me a casual fan of metal. Naglfar is the band that really got me into metal (I happen to be wearing their shirt right now). 

Possibly Slipknot, Metallica and Korn were the more mainstream bands that got me started when I was like 12. How? Stickdeath.com and MTV.

Then at the start of high school a friend introduced me to Fear Factory, Pantera, Disturbed and others.

Metallica, Iron Maiden and Judas Priest got me into it, then I worked my way up to extreme metal, ending up in a black metal phase and then dropping that off a bit to be quite varied overall.

Doom introduced me to "metal MIDI" when I was a tot. Obviously Doom has some riffs from popular metal and rock bands in it, but I also played wads that had Alice in Chains, NIN, Metallica and other bands in MIDI form. By 1999 I had actually heard a bunch of metal, just as background music in WADs.

Some time in the early 2000s, when I was 11-12 or so, I started listening to the radio more often. I ended up hearing "Head Like a Hole" followed by "Man in the Box" on the radio, and my jaw dropped hearing those MIDIs in their true, grittier form. From there I sought out music from NIN and Alice in Chains and such on one of those old, risky filesharing programs.. I think it was Morpheus at the time, before Kazaa/LimeWire was even a thing.

My parents also listened to a lot of Beatles, Zeppelin, Sabbath and other great music from the 60s-80s when I was a kid, so I was basically starting from square one with an open ear for "music with guitars", for lack of a better qualifier. Also, my older brother was into The Offspring and Linkin Park, which both sounded pretty heavy and cool to pre-teen me. As a teenager, a friend of mine named Tomas got really into Lamb of God, which was a foot in the door for loving death metal.

Once I moved to Australia I met some cool musicians in 11th and 12th grade, they introduced me to mutual friends who were in death metal bands, so after graduating 12th grade I joined them and played guitar and drums with them for a while. This introduced me to even more stuff like Morbid Angel, Ministry, Nile, Fear Factory and such. This was in 2010-2011.

My "main preferences" really lie somewhere between Led Zeppelin, Sabbath, Slayer, Metallica and Alice in Chains. I still do like death metal and black metal as well, though these days, I prefer "chilled metal and rock" for lack of a better term. I also love stuff that's nowhere near metal (but still is the granddaddy of metal) like blues, jazz and "60s pop rock" (which really isn't much like "modern pop" at all - stuff like the Beatles, The Kinks and that).

I didn't know much except various radio metal or Metallica's Black Album until I got interested enough to look it up on the internet and learned of such bands as Death, Deicide, Nile, and other bands my parents didn't like.

Friends with Pantera and Metallica. I ended up hating both bands but my original start was grunge (specifically punk like The Offspring and even Nirvana) and Alice In Chains/Soundgarden. Then onto Industrial (Nine Inch Nails, Stabbing Westward, Gravity Kills, KMFDM, etc.) Actually thinking back, shit like Def Leppard when I was 6 paved the way early on then was forgotten when Grunge hit. I don't do black or death metal, but Nu Metal and that era I'll even listen to still, like System of a Down, Disturbed, Static-X, etc. The GOOD Nu Metal and Metal from then. My favorite goth metal act was Type O Negative for years and my all time favorite Metal Metal was Fear Factory.

I started out listening to the music from Doom then looking into their inspirations.

First listening Iron Maiden's Dance of Death was what got me into it. From there i went to Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, other popular stuff like Pantera and Alestorm of all things. I got into a long phase with thrash metal with stuff like the american Big Four, Exodus, Sepultura, Sacred Reich. Amon Amarth was what eventually softened me up for Death Metal, Death/Entombed/Morbid Angel. Carcass' surgical steel was released shortly after i got into DM. Nowadays i listen to a bit of everything, the only things that i never got into are the more symphonic/industrial/core-y or djent side of things

Edit: I really liked the Doom 3 title screen song as a kid if that counts lol

When I was a kid my dad got me into it. He introduced me to Metallica, then from there on I was hooked.

When I was about 6 I started watching Metalocalypse (which is actually where I got my pfp from)

I can say my childhood was freaking awesome.

Now I listen to Metallica, Dethklok, Some classics like Black Sabbath, def Leppard,

Cannibal Corpse,  there's this one funny band called infant annihilator with their song decapitation fornication..

Although I wouldn't consider myself a 'metal head'. I definitely enjoy some songs here or there; although my introduction was when a friend was listening to a slayer mixtape in their car.

I mostly listen to more 'heavier' stuff these days though. Beast In Black is one of my favorites for obvious reasons. Well, if you know the super secret lore about me.

Years after playing Doom at a very young age I started hearing songs the midis were based on, and still not knowing or understanding the relation, I gravitated toward certain bands partly because they had a "Doom" type of sound, and that type of music was also just popular at the time, and bands like Alice in Chains, NIN, Marilyn Manson, White Zombie etc were par for the course and were appealing anyway.

I had the movie soundtrack to Mortal Kombat and while I liked the whole thing (and still do), the song by Napalm Death was likely one of my first tastes of metal. In the 6th grade a classmate had Pantera's Vulgar Display of Power on cassette in their desk, and without telling them I slipped the tape into my backpack, took it home, made a copy, and returned it the next morning. A few years later someone gave me their copy of Butchered at Birth by Cannibal Corpse because they thought it sucked and thought I might appreciate it because I was into music. While I wasn't quite ready for that sound at first, it really grew on me and I'm still a huge fan of them.

What really got me into metal was that I already played guitar, and metal riffs were much more fun to play and write. I grew up thinking Metallica were kind of lame and wrote a few riffs based on their And Justice for All album to make fun of them and laugh among my friends, and then I just really got into it. While they're still not one of my favorite bands I do really enjoy that album. After Napster died out I started using Audio Galaxy, which was possibly the biggest catalyst to get into all sorts of different kinds of music, and a hell of a lot of metal like Opeth, Death, Deicide, Immortal, Cryptopsy, and I just ran with it.

I got introduced to metal by listening to DOOM (2016) and DOOM Eternal OST by Mick Gordon

Guess I'm showing my age with this one, but Guitar Hero was mostly my introduction to metal. Specifically Guitar Hero 3: Legends of Rock. No one around really listened to that type of music, so when I was younger games were my only exposure to metal and metal-adjacent music.

Oh boy where do i begin.....

Welp let's start off by saying i grew up to the old and i mean old school pre metal bands, like Vanilla fudge, the sonics, jimi hendrix and it also helped that my dad plays music as well. I also got into the 70's and 80's bands growing up like Motorhead, Metallica, black sabbath, the doors (i count them as metal because jim Morrison wrote some dark, dark shit) ect. I guess where it all started was when i bought Metallica's black album.....leave me alone i was ten when i bought it, Anyways i was so hooked on Metallica that i started listing to nothing but metallica for a while, then i got into System of a down (which i'm listing to right now as of typing this up), bought there albums.....Toxicity is still my favorite album by them fight me.

After that Slipknot, Mudvayne, testament, creed (i know cringe), Bobaflex, avenged sevenfold (or A7X), stone sour, and the list goes on and on and on. NiN (or Nine inch nails) i never got into them until 2018 i know i know a boomer, but the song closer was the reason why i couldn't get into nine inch nails and also it was way to dark for my taste at the time growing up. 

So pretty much i got introduced to metal in 2006 to now a days. As i always tell people "just because i'm a metal head from a byegone era, dosen't mean i don't kile other music....expect EDM and Dubstep, i can't stand that type of music".

Opeth was the first metal band I really sat down and listened to. Before that, I didn't care about music in general.

These dudes corrupted me for life.

As for videogame music, I think the first piece of ''metal'' music I heard was in the Unreal Tournament 2004 soundtrack. It's more of a mixture of metal with electronic but it is badass.

my brother showed me metallica the rest is history

I had an uncle who was huge into Grunge, alt rock, and metal. I feel like the first metal band I would have heard would have been Korn given how huge he was into it at the time, but it could have also been Pantera since their stuff got played a lot as well.

 My first introduction to extreme metal was the typical "Opeth" answer, but they weren't what actually sold me on it despite me loving their stuff. I was a huge music snob who was into weird Avant Garde stuff so my proper gateway drugs were Agalloch and Maudlin of the Well. Gorguts might have been in there too. 

A long time ago, Iron maiden’s Number of the beast, Scorpions’s Blackout, Deep purple’s Burn, AC⚡DC’s High voltage (with the dog) and Rory Gallagher’s Stage struck then Iron maiden’s Seventh son of a seventh son and Motörhead’s Rock ’n roll.

Later, the Stooges, Napalm death, Metallica, the Young gods, Obituary, Slayer, Sepultura, Monster magnet, Ministry…

The earliest heavy stuff I remember hearing is the Quake2 soundtrack.

The first metal CD I've had was the resident evil apocalypse soundtrack. It had all the catchy stuff from that time. Loved the lacuna coil track, still fond of the band. Also caught a little bit of the "bring me to life" virus around those times. Doom OST wasn't there for me because my computer wasn't able to play the music there, as well as sounds in many other games.

EDIT: sanity checked, found the link: https://www.discogs.com/Various-Resident-Evil-Apocalypse-Music-From-And-Inspired-By-The-Original-Motion-Picture/release/697091

I can't remember whether it was Metallica's Master of Puppets or The Best of Black Sabbath compilation album.

Either way, there was a renaissance of hard rock, heavy and thrash metal around the time I was attending junior high school.
As I grew older, my musical preferences become more varied though.
But I still enjoy Lamb of God, Slipknot, the Big 4, Disturbed, Iron Maiden, Testament and a few others.

It was Nightwish, properly, specifically the song "10th Man Down". And the first few albums I got were theirs. I was taken a lot by the mix of symphonic elements and metal, and I think that's led to me always taking the most interest in metal music that involves and mixes different styles and elements. Also back then and for a good while I was most into upbeat sounding music so power metal was a fairly obvious route to go down. So I guess the early list was Nightwish, Within Temptation, Lacuna Coil, Epica, Kamelot, Xandria and Therion. Eventually I got led down the specific power metal route and so Stratovarius, Iced Earth, Blind Guardian, Rhapsody of Fire and Symphony X. I suppose that then led to more progressive styles. I listened to Iron Maiden and Megadeth for relatively short period, because there was some decent stuff there but traditional heavy metal and thrash never had a tonne of allure for me. I can like specific songs but just not the bands in general. 

A couple of years ago I had a big shift to extreme metal, although that was happening gradually, so the sudden shift was more losing interest in quite a lot of what I had listened to before. Actually listening to Therion's early death metal albums and Epica did help prepare me for the extreme vocal style, but I guess maybe some of it had just got stale for me? It took a while anyway, over 10 years in some cases. Draconian was the only band I stuck with, as getting into them was a sign of things to come for me. That said I still enjoy symphonic death metal, Scepticflesh, Ne Obliviscaris and Gorgon are awesome, and Eluveitie introduced me to folk metal. After hearing In Mourning's "Monolith" and Insomnium's various albums I was completely sold by melodic death metal. I got into Opeth's mid era albums and I've since come to really love Paradise Lost and Decembre Noire, so gothic doom is a style I like as well. Overall the music I listen to became a hell of a lot gloomier, but it feels like it has been a journey, and I'm not the kind of person who's static in what he likes. 

Blame Thank Quake 2

6 hours ago, Chezza said:

Possibly Slipknot, Metallica and Korn were the more mainstream bands that got me started when I was like 12. How? Stickdeath.com and MTV.

 

Then at the start of high school a friend introduced me to Fear Factory, Pantera, Disturbed and others.

Are you me? Because this is very close to how I was introduced to heavy metal music, right down to later being introduced to Fear Factory and Pantera. That was the point where I started to really acquire a taste for metal, since before FF I was finding most metal vocals hard to get into. But the voice of Burton C. Bell turned out to be my gateway drug.

I've seen a fair amount of people slag off nu-metal, but I think the people doing that fail to appreciate that it's popularity injected a bunch of young blood at the time.

The Doom soundtrack. Because I heard that Bobby Prince would take a famous metal/rock song and then change it a little bit, so naturally I wanted to hear the actual original song it was based off of.

However I was also gradually adjusting to the sound. The very first two rock songs I heard and loved as a teenager were In A Gadda Da Vida (all 17 min) thanks to the Simpsons and Europe's The Final Countdown. Then in college I discovered Jimi Hendrix, The Doors, Deep Purple, and gradually got more accustomed to darker sounds. When I heard Black Sabbath/War Pigs for the first time, it was like Pandora's Box was opened and what came forth would never be put away again. 

In a funny way, the music is so powerful I can clearly remember the image in my head of precisely where I was and what I was doing when I first heard a particular Metallica song--Four Horsemen, Fade to Black, Call of Ktulu, Master of Puppets, etc. Same for Alice in Chains' Dirt (which I listened to before Facelift) and probably many others too.

Since i was young I was exposed to classic Rock and Metal. Dad always used to play Rainbow, Deep Purple etc.
Then at high School i was introduced to more agressive forms of metal with, oddly enough, Through the Fire and the Flames - By DragonForce and that's when i really started exploring the genre.

Next was the Big 4 of Thrash and then Classic Heavy Metal.

Nowadays i kinda went back to my Power Metal roots, and started listening to DragonForce Again, as well as Sabaton.

From as far back as I can remember, listening to my mom's original Iron Maiden CDs. She's still got a British import copy of Number of the Beast.

My first proper introduction to metal was when a friend of my brother's played some Nightwish to me in early 2000s. Century Child had a lot of electronic elements to it, which made the transition much easier since I had mostly listened to electronic/dance music before that (Darude, Bomfunk MCs, basically whatever was on the radio).  Around the same time I often had MTV on while I was doing other stuff, and bands like Metallica and Slipknot were on which got me listening to their music. It just kinda ballooned from there, and I spent a lot of time reading about similar bands online. Later on a Norwegian friend introduced me to In Flames, Dimmu Borgir, Emperor (how appropriate) and that sort of more extreme stuff, while another friend to Stratovarius, Dream Theater and Liquid Tension Experiment.

I think the fact that I got recommendations all across the spectrum made it easier to approach different types of metal without getting stuck on any single sub-genre. Nowadays I listen to a lot of varied stuff, not just metal, but I still go to metal concerts whenever I have the chance.