A lot of people should just shut the fuck up!

both flavours of uspm, the various forms of eupm all share a single fundamental thing. The guitar riffs and to some extend the guitar/drum interplay is what i considered like distilled heavy metal. Less punk, blues, hard rock and a focus on the most purely metallic elements of NWOBHM.

No power metal song will have the rocking nature of Strong arm of the law for example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGnhF0_rA90

or the punky blues as in this venom song
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5wUr4Lut4A


now ofcourse since the days of classic pm we have especially seen in europe the building on this riff template into something once again quite detached from say blind guardian or omen yet still in the guitar play we can still see the distilled nature of playing.

It's a very useful term. Not all euro-power is flowery.

It comes down to the rhythm section, pretty much. Power metal emphasizes simple (you could even say minimalistic) rhythms and strong lead/vocal melodies. Blues elements are usually kept out.

There is no identifiable "thing" that makes power metal power metal; "power metal" is a mostly unconscious and subjective impression of the entire package of how a metal band sounds, and its very existence is predicated on the existence of other subgenres (thrash metal, speed metal, doom metal, heavy metal, etc., etc.) and thus it cannot be understood except in relation to those other subgenres. There are power metal bands that have few or none of the most readily identifiable signifiers of power metal but give off an unmistakable power metal vibe, there are bands that do other styles but have recorded power metal songs, and there are oddballs, outliers, and edge cases. We can draw general traits that most power metal bands exhibit under most circumstances: leading melodies, whether presented as simple leads or harmonized into riffs, minimal blues influences, a vocalist who can sing clean-ish and at least attempt to make it sound dramatic and awe-inspiring, rarely under 110 BPM or so, but there is no definable essence of power metal.

What makes a band Power metal? Fondness for cock of course

Yes, you're. People talk too much. Usually to say stupid things.


What makes a band power metal? When they play, you know, power metal.

Power metal essentially = Iron Maiden with trem riffs and double bass (what I'm gathering from this thread)?

Have there been any power metal bands that actually pursued gay themes, unashamedly and without some chickenshit veil of irony (fuck you Nanowar)?

Don't you know that comprehensible vocals are the epitome of homosexuality, dude? Gawd!

All of this goes for every genre of art no matter the medium, so it's a bit of a tautology. And I would argue against there being no definable essence of power metal, obviously there is or we wouldn't be calling bands power metal.

I think Rainbow pioneered the sound with certain songs like "Gates of Babylon".

How does that follow? There's no definable essence of anything expressible by language! Words are just symbols, and the symbols derive their meaning from their relationships to other symbols, and these symbols come about because they're convenient to the culture using them or inherited from an earlier culture. The category of "chairs" consists of objects we have decided to label with "chair", not objects that possess a sort of chair-ness. Plato was wrong.

So you can't describe a chair with words? Or were you being funny?

I don't want to speak for him, but he seems to be denying universals. Just like a red flower and red car are both red, they do not instantiate a universal 'redness' that exists independent of their representation. We just label the wavelength that is emitting from both of them as red.

Well I'm glad to see this thread reached its logical conclusion of determining that words really mean nothing.

This is all we're really concerned about here.

When I hear the term ‘power metal’, I tend to immediately imagine European Power Metal. Personally I always found the US Power Metal scene of the 80s to be far too disparate to consider it a cohesive sound (much like First Wave Black Metal). Unlike the majority of sub-genres of this time, it wasn’t really localised, at least not as tightly as the Euros of the late-80s/early-90s being concentrated around Germany and Italy. USPM just wasn’t clearly defined. Even Metallica were calling themselves ‘power metal’ circa 1982. Plus a lot of USPM had progressive tendencies that would probably have them labelled ‘power prog’ in a modern context.

When someone mentions a band is power metal, I tend to envision instrumentation such as 16-note double bass or gallop beats at high tempos from the drums. There is less emphasis on guitar riffs as the focal point of the song, at least compared to other sub-genres, though I’m not suggesting there are not riffs, but the way a song is constructed is less focused on stringing riffs together. This is mainly due to the focus on vocal melodies, or melodies in genre. Even the guitars (or occasionally keys) contribute far more traditional melodic content than the more chromatic riffing of other sub-genres.

The focal point tends to be the vocals for mine. A greater reliance on major key melodies and harmonies tend to lend PM it’s unique sound among metal genres. A lot of people attribute the European musical tradition for this melodic focus (I imagine for contrast, the flattened thirds of the blues give North American and British metal, and the overall influence of the blues at least early in its development give those styles their flavour). Some people would describe these as more ‘epic’ or ‘operatic’ inflections.

And of course the lyrical content would also be a major talking point when considering power metal. Between lyrics and the major (some would describe them as ‘happier’) melodies, that tends to be a make or break point for many. Of course, I’m generalising quite a bit and not really doing justice on the whole, but I guess I’m just trying to articulate what the term power metal evokes to me.

What bands called themselves at the time has basically no bearing on what we call them now; no one classifies Metallica or Pantera as USPM, and this isn't arbitrary. We don't call them USPM because, well, they're not USPM.

"Power metal" is a conventional label or grouping that picks out certain real aspects, but based on family resemblance (meaning there is no single necessary and sufficient condition for a band to be power metal, or even a group of several necessary and sufficient conditions). Having some family resemblance concepts by no means entails some kind of radical nominalism, denying universals, or anything else of the sort. "Power metal" has a lot of associations, sometimes a band ticks more or less of the boxes, but if they tick enough, we can agree to call it "power metal". There need not be "no essence expressible in language" or something, surely we can indicate characteristics. Maybe I am misunderstanding what is being meant by "essence" though - one single set of sufficient and necessary conditions? One sufficient and necessary condition? Something else entirely? Is anyone arguing that power metal is a natural kind?

Also, Plato never ever used the word essence. And if he had, sensibles would not have essences for Plato. Take it up with Avicenna. (Btw the word "essentia" is a Latin translation of Aristotle's phrases for "what it is" and "the what it is to be (the thing that it is)", more or less)

And anyway, forms are absolutely not "expressible" in language for Plato either. An "account" or something (i.e. maybe a definition) may be a sign or result of knowledge (of a form), but it doesn't capture or express it or anything like that since it is propositional and knowledge is not (for the ancients); sensibles cannot ever be known (e.g. someone could never know whether this or that song is power metal). Starts sounding oddly like the "subjective impression" of the meaning of power metal, if one is unsympathetic to Platonic forms. Can this impression not be clarified through language?

Though this may be viewed as far afield, metal just cares so much about genre and subgenre (contra a lot of other styles) that these conversations are bound to arise. Metal seems to have an in-built tendency to think in essences, forms, or whatever, and even of simulacra (fake copies, when a band is untrue). Very cool!

The term was used broadly to describe everything from the wall of sound of Exciter to the doomy black cries of Mercyful Fate, ultimately defining a sound with twice the crunch of classic heavy metal. Two times the speed, two times the spikes, power metal had double everything. Accept, Jag Panzer and Warlock took dual guitar leads, histrionic vocals, and pounding drums to a powerful place without radically rearranging the rules of Judas Priest and Iron Maiden.

This is taken from the book The Sound of The Beast by Ian Christe.

Wanna share my own vision of this, perhaps somebody would find it interesting or useful.

Attempts to reduce power metal to a 'happy choruses syndrome' are so one-dimensional it hurts. It's not only kind of derogatory for the genre, but also cuts off many bands from the genre who cannot be classified elsewhere, either way.

I think power metal, (very) broadly speaking, is defined by lesser emplasis on guitar leads and greater emphasis on vocal melodies (in comparison with classic heavy metal). 'Extended' rich melodies over fast double bass drumming, vocals take priority over the power of the guitar riff. This covers not only 'flowery' power metal, but also ballsier bands like Stormwarrior, Wizard, White Skull and so. People often consider these bands power metal too, anyway, so I think my point at least partially reflects a loose consensus in this regard (if such exists).

I think most listeners would consider this power metal, although not 'flowery' one at all:




As a side note, to me, power metal started in 1977 or so. Riot's Warrior probably was the first song of the genre.



Then in 1983 Silver Mountain and Europe released debut albums which pretty much defined the rules of the genre even before Helloween. It was really that close, isn't it?





And I think the earliest Helloween's stuff should be recognized as power metal (earliest Blind Guardian as well, by the way). It's just that strikingly different from other heavy metal of the era. Wall Of Jericho really has everything that defines power metal in my books. 'Keepers' are good albums, but they really follow the same basic formula and ideas, just in a softer and more polished way.

Walls of Jericho practically had no analogues in 1985, except for two bands probably: 1) Attack from Germany, who also were pioneers of that European power metal sound with Return of the Evil (1985)... their later albums are also one of the finest examples of Euro-power genre, to note, and 2) perhaps Stranger who released The Bell (1985), some of these songs were really close to Helloween in spirit.

Still, WoJ was 'the most' power metal thing among these, and some songs, such as 'Guardians', directly anticipated the 'Keepers' sound.

Interesting way to revive this thread. Gotta say, I disagree with pretty much all of that. If you're a power metal band and don't have big bombastic choruses, you're in the minority. Of course not every power metal band does this, but there is no single rule that you can apply to every band in any genre. That White Skull song is full of epic guitar leads and happy choruses (complete with gang vocals, no less), so you're really disproving your own point there.


I hear zero power metal in this and it's hardly any different than was Judas Priest or even Rainbow were doing at the time. What specifically makes this power metal or even unique for 1977?

Anyway, I recently saw this explanation of what defines USPM and found that to be pretty spot-on as I've always had a hard time describing that subgenre.

Perhaps it's a bad wording on my side, actually I agree that bombastic stuff is a typical feature indeed (not sure if mandatory, but yes, an obvious detector), this is what in fact I have implied talking about 'bigger' melodies. But perhaps I go a little further and set the threshold lower for being counted as power metal, than usually assumed. To me early BG counts as a power metal, because Custard usually counts too, and there isn't many differences between them in this regard. I mean, just compare:




To me it's weird that people are ready to describe the first one as power metal, and early BG? Not so much. So, why do so many resist to add early BG, Helloween, etc into power metal camp? I don't understand, especially since 'speed metal' is much worse alternative — ill-defined genre invented to separate 'cool' Walls of Jerichos and Follow The Blinds from 'uncool' mainstream power metal of today.

Regarding 'happy choruses', I probably mean it in a narrower sense than you, literally, i. e. all these joyful 'major-scale' cheesy choruses. Sadly this is how many people distinguish power metal in the first place, at least in my experience. If it turns into something slightly more agressive, or darker, some could (and do) lump it with 'speed metal' or even 'heavy metal'. Hence the point of this example, it's not on the cheesier side of the genre (at least in my books), but still it's easily recognizable power metal.



Now, this reply puzzled me a little. I'd say it's exactly (relatively) bombastic chorus which suddenly deviates from the main melodic motive of this song.

On a second thought, I'd rather agree that this song can't be considered power metal as such, because, say, 'Fast As A Shark' would be an 'early power metal example' by the same criterion as well, then.

My opinion here could be slightly biased, because I got used to perceive less melodic heavy metal as a true benchmark of a genre, so I don't wish to insist much. But I'm still curious, what exactly does this song lack to qualify as a power metal one, from your perspetive? And what's your opinion about Silver Mountain and Europe in this regard?

Anyway, I think Riot's approach here clearly anticipates power metal formula, it's definitely unique for 1977 in this sense. I don't think that Judas Priest or Rainbow have gone that far in this direction. For the same reasons Accept's classic was highly influential for German power metal scene as well.

They have to follow old running wild and agent steel otherwise it will suck. Us speed metal.

Not that familiar with it, but it seems like it's separated from heavy metal by its emphasis on hard rock chords rather than metal riffs, and the actual riffs are played as background over the chords. So maybe the overall metalness of the genre gets called into question...? Lots of melody too. And it's possibly a little bit faster than normal heavy metal.

Dude, those riffs at the verse and solo are pure USPM. Also the drum style is borderline speed metal. That album was way ahead of its time.

I think Accept did it a bit earlier with Fast as a shark released the previous year. That track is pretty much the first euro power song ever.

Good Question , when I listen some keyboard or the voice I realize that band is power metal. But I dont know how in proper explanation say the technique diference , maybe that is your are looking for. I know the classical opera singers differ by the using of the voice : baritone, soprano and so on et cetera. Iron maiden seems have voices more rough than helloween for example .

Maybe when I listen some neoclassical guitar Yngwie Malmsteen style or Ritchie blackmore style the idea come back to my head . I take a look now and I see the first disc of Yngwie soloist is in the year 1984 and Helloween 1985.
Another thing I pay attention in Helloween is walls of jericho disc . It sounds almost thrash metal and without keyboard but the Kay Hansen voice sound agressive yet and maybe Michael Kiske´s melody voice in chorus guide the sound of the power metal in some way.


You made me look in my music Heavy Metal : iron Maiden , Racer X , Riot , Angel Witch, Judas priest , Halford, King Diamond , Manowar, Accept, Mercyful fate and I remember the song of Pretty Maids ´´back to back´´of 1984 , Dio , Deep purple , Rainbow.

Power metal We have to think also in Running wild , grave digger they have rough voice too .

Fast speculations mine in this hour of the morning