What's the connection between heavy metal and early roleplaying?

[Jools]

I'm often told that early D&D was very metal and that there are connections between it and the early days of the industry. Is that true?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

A Venn Diagram of the books read & TV/movies watched by alienated "nerds" and "geeks" and alienated metalheads probably shows significant crossover in fantasy, horror, and sci-fi.

Then it's just a hop, skip & jump into gaming.

 

[Sadras]

I don't know anything about the interlinking history but there certainly was crossover - just look at the lyrics of many of the Manowar songs.

 

[Lanefan]

In the very early days I'd posit there wasn't much connection at all - Gygax, Arneson, etc. don't seem to come across as headbangers in any of the bio's etc. I've read. From the other side, Led Zeppelin had all kinds of Tolkein references in their music (as did some other bands) but that really had nothing to do with gaming.

A bit later, particularly in the late 70's and early 80's, fantasy started showing up much more often as a theme in metal (largely due to Ronnie James Dio, I think) leading to more cross-pollenation. Whether metal bands of that era had RPGers in them is an open question, but some metal songs of the day certainly sound like they were gaming-inspired whether in fact truly the case or not.

Lan-"oh here we see the wizard, the sky beings to crack, and he's pointing right at you"-efan

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

 

[Uller]

Having grown up in the early 80s and played D&D at the time...not all D&D players listened to metal...but we certainly weren't slaying orcs to the croonings of Lionel Ritchie.

The themes of 70s metal and hard rock and RPGs cross over quite a bit. Horror, fantasy, history, sci-fi...Iron Maiden has a song that is a retelling of rhyme of the ancient mariner. Metalica sings about the exodus and cthulu. Bands like Saxon, Rainbow, Elf, Black Sabbath and so forth all had material that would interest a D&D player and vice versa.

Sent from my SCH-I535 using EN World mobile app

 

[CydKnight]

I believe there was just thematic crossover that happened to have some parallel emergence because that was something the collective consciousness wanted to experience.

 

[LordEntrails]

I didn't see any significant crossover in my experiences. Sure I had a few friends that were somewhat into heavy metal, but I would hazard to say nothing statistically significant.

 

[Salamandyr]

I think it's more a juxtaposition of themes than direct links. Heavy metal delved deep into fantasy imagery at the time, with Frazetta and Vallejo gracing album covers, and songs were often written around themes derived from many of the same books that inspired Dungeons & Dragons. Michael Moorcock was a fixture of the Brit rock scene, and even wrote heavy metal songs. Even scifi got in on the action...Jefferson Airplane wrote songs based on Robert Heinlein stories (turns out they were mutual fans).

Fantasy art of the 70's also had a very counterculture vibe...with the rise of Heavy Metal magazine, introducing America to the French comic art scene, and some of the best, and trippiest book cover art, ever produced.

So if you were headbanger, odds are you also dug fantasy, and hey look, here's this game that lets you do the stuff you read about and fantasize while listening to Blue Oyster Cult riffs. It was just all a reinforcing circle of influences.

Magic.

The fact that various TV preachers were claiming both were devil worship probably helped with the crossover aesthetic too.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

In the 60s and 70s, I would agree that there was a general cultural upswing of interest in the occult and fantasy. The aforementioned Led Zeppelin, the rise of Tolkien amongst the counterculture, the reprints of Howard’s Conan yarns, a general explosion of fantasy literature, and then there’s the rise of alternative religious systems like The Process Church and many other sects and cults.

Band-wise, in addition to Zeppelin, I’d also mention Hawkwind, whose music was frequently tinged with sci fi and fantasy themes (with even Michael Moorcock collaborating), Gryphon (medieval-folk at first before moving into Prog), and a bunch of others. The Darkscorch Canticles compilation is a great document of fantasy-themed metal from that time period.

As for the why…maybe it has something to do with escapism – in the 70s the Vietnam War had a massive effect on culture. Or maybe it was the continued rise of leisure time?

Heck, even into the 80s, my brother and I were introduced to D&D by some hessian kid.

I believe there was just thematic crossover that happened to have some parallel emergence because that was something the collective consciousness wanted to experience.