Who are you and where do you come from, may I ask?‘, questions the indomnible behemoth of scales and greed. ‘ You seem familiar with my name, but I don’t seem to remember smelling you before.
With that said, let’s look at the broad strokes of how the world Tolkien envisioned have guided the world of metal music over the years. It’s no wonder then that it would be rife with ideas and imagery to use in the world of music – which is exactly what we are going to dig into today! With the overwhelming amount of bands/songs that fall under this umbrella, comprehensiveness is not an quality that you will find here. To say his work in The Hobbit or Lord of the Rings has been influential would be more than a simple understatement, as even to this day, the ideas he brought forth and the narrative architecture he laid are at the very core of nearly all the greats that followed. Tolkien has written a fair number of prolific works (including literary criticism and children’s books), but it’s his seminal pieces in the world of Middle Earth that have easily garnered the most attention. Chief among these influences is undoubtedly the father of fantasy, John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, or simply: Tolkien. From the likes of Dio singing of slayed dragons to Blind Guardian cycling the Wheel of Time, these narratives hold an important place among the history of metal. When looking at the influence of fantasy elements, metal in particular apes a lot of ideas from this realm of stories – more so than perhaps any other genre of music – with countless bands and songs titled after a myriad of mythical worlds and monsters. The inclusion of Tolkien imagery into this classic rock track, for example, is as memorable a quality and unique an identifier as the infectious acoustic opening or the core riff that drives the chorus line. Within the musical sphere of rock, metal, and prog, we often see this kind of overt influence of external narratives inspire the lyrics and themes of songs, worming their way into the identity of each individual track. It’s a line you’ve likely heard before, even if you don’t generally listen to likes of Led Zeppelin. ‘ T’was in the darkest depths of Mordor, I met a girl so fair/But Gollum, and the evil one, crept up and slipped away with her‘, echoes within the melody of Robert Plant’s tenored voice during the final pre-chorus passage of 1969’s “Ramble On”.
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