The one prog-rock band that pissed off every single metal fan
Progressive music has never been for everybody. The idea of someone sticking around to listen to a nine-minute epic piece with 40 different sections isn’t something bound to get on the charts all that often, but if anyone is feeling more adventurous to go outside the norm, there’s always room for bands like Yes and Genesis to help expand everyone’s musical palette. But prog-rock isn’t the only kind of outsider music, and the one thing that any band from the genre could have done was upset the metal community.
Because on one hand, metal and prog are two sides of the same coin. Neither of them fit within the realm of pop music and were designed to help show a different side of rock and roll, but it’s a much different story listening to someone like Tony Iommi compared to Steve Hackett whenever they play guitar. They’re both creating well-thought-out parts, but it’s much easier to bang your head to a metal riff than worry about what time signature any certain tune is in.
But despite Iommi being the ‘godfather of heavy metal’, there were a few brief moments where he almost didn’t join Black Sabbath. He had already been putting his group together when he got the call to join Jethro Tull, and even though he played his ass off during their gig at The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus, he knew his heart was in playing with Sabbath than playing second fiddle to Ian Anderson’s flute.
And it’s not like history didn’t work out for the best. Martin Barre was a fantastic guitar player in his own right, and as much as Iommi could write intricate songs that went on for ages, he may not have been as onboard as the rest of Tull were when putting together the pieces for Thick As A Brick. But right as metal would become a pioneering force in popular music, Tull would have the last laugh.
By the late 1980s, metal was getting far too big to ignore. The Grammys may have treated metal with the same kind of disdain that the Academy has for horror movies, but they would have been delusional to think that bands like Van Halen and Poison weren’t tearing up the charts as much as the Eric Claptons of the world. They needed to carve out a spot for metal in the conversation, but when Metallica seemed poised to take the first metal Grammy, Tull snatched it up for the album Crest of A Knave.
While And Justice For All has some flaws in production, the idea that Anderson’s progressive ditties are a better showcase for heavy metal is still considered one of the most tasteless snubs in Grammy history. It’s one thing to bring some attention to heavy metal, but whoever was deciding the winners seemed like a disgruntled dad who only picked the band whose name he recognised.
This kind of snub should have hurt a lot more for a band that has the word ‘metal’ in their name, but Metallica didn’t need to prove anything that night, either. Their performance of ‘One’ at the same ceremony proved they were the people’s champion, and once Lars Ulrich took the podium in the 1990s after they won for The Black Album, he did have a sense of humour about the whole thing, eventually thanking Jethro Tull for not releasing an album that year.
But to throw Jethro Tull a bone here, it’s not like their progressive tendencies didn’t have some impact on heavy metal. After all, a band like Soundgarden had combined all the heaviness from metal with some of the strangest progressive time signatures anyone had ever heard, so maybe Tull was influencing bands in a few pockets. It’s not enough to excuse them for being one of the most dumbfounding choices in Grammy history, but looking back, even Anderson can appreciate that his band fits into heavy metal history.
