Tank was often compared to contemporaries and fellow Brits Motorhead. Both bands played a fast, brash style of heavy metal inspired by the early punk movement (bassist and singer Algy Ward had once been a member of punk pioneers The Damned). Original Motorhead guitarist “Fast” Eddie Clarke even produced Tank’s debut album, Filth Hounds of Hades.

Listen to the title track “Filth Hounds of Hades” here below.

The album is considered by many to be one of the high points of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM) era. Tank would flounder commercially after their debut and endure numerous lineup changes. Two different versions of the band remain active to this day, but neither has ever recaptured the glory of the debut album. Here with the title track of that iconic release is the original lineup of Tank.

When it comes to metal, there are fewer albums more massive than Judas Priest‘s iconic 1982 album Screaming for Vengeance. The album kicks off with the binary-paired assault of “The Hellion” and “Electric Eye.” The two songs are so powerful that they served as the opening for almost every Priest concert for nearly 30 years.

Watch Judas Priest perform “The Hellion” and “Electric Eye” here below.

Well, now that I have moved my other weekly columns, Thrashback Thursday and Black Metal Friday, over here to GoD, there’s only one left to introduce to you guys and it is called Massive Metal Monday!

When I was growing up in rural Indiana in the early 80’s, there was very limited access to heavy music. These were the days before MTV blew up with the whole hair metal, Headbangers Ball phenomenon. But on Sunday nights, there was a two-hour radio show that came from WOXY, the radio station of Miami University of Ohio, just across the state line in Oxford, Ohio. It was called Massive Metal for the Masses and I would wait all week for it to air. It was through this show that I was introduced to bands like Venom, Bathory, WASP, Michael Schenker Group, Slayer, and countless others. This Monday weekly column is my tip of the hat to that show. I call it Massive Metal Monday. Every week, I will pay tribute to defining moments by the artists that laid the groundwork for heavy metal to become the worldwide cultural bond for all of us metalheads.