Sunday 27 January 2008

Sunday night rock 'n' roll

Motörhead are a British heavy metal band formed in 1975 by bassist, singer and songwriter Lemmy, who has remained the sole constant member. Usually a power trio, Motörhead had particular success in the early 1980s with several successful singles in the UK Top 40 chart. The albums Overkill, its follow on, Bomber, Ace of Spades, and particularly No Sleep 'til Hammersmith, cemented Motörhead's reputation as one of Britain's foremost heavy metal groups. More recent exposure has included providing wrestler Triple H's entrance music, and performing live at WrestleMania events; and in 2004, contributing the song, "You Better Swim", to the soundtrack of The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie. In 2005 the band received their first Grammy.

While Motörhead are typically classified as heavy metal, speed metal or thrash metal (and often regarded as a foundational influence on the latter two styles); Lemmy dislikes such labels, preferring to describe the band's music simply as "rock and roll". Motörhead's approach has remained the same over the band's career, preferring to play what they enjoy and do best, their like for the early rock and roll is reflected in some of their occasional cover songs. Motörhead's lyrics typically cover such topics as war, good versus evil, abuse of power, promiscuous sex, substance abuse, and "life on the road".

The band's distinctive fanged face logo was created by artist Joe Petagno in 1977 for the cover of the Motörhead album and has appeared in many variations on covers of ensuing albums.

I am embarrassed to admit that I bought tickets to see Motley Crue when they toured Australia a few years ago. Why, do you ask, would a man with my obvious high quality taste in music do such a thing? Because the great Motorhead was the support act. They were great - and loud - easily outdoing Motley Crue in the music department but losing the flamboyant stakes.

Killed By Death is, in my opinion, the greatest heavy metal song ever written so here it is, with some of their other great numbers.

Killed By Death



Ace Of Spades



Overkill



(Nothing Follows)

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