Speed Metal and Thrash

Like hardcore, the next generation of metal was confrontational with its alienation and took a political and socially-critical angle; because of the Cold War going on at the time, most of these artists believed themselves to be the victims of centralized government and its political wars detached from the daily lives of the people, and thus the ethics of the music were highly populist and individualistic. The latter tendency would save later generations from being absorbed by the former, as hardcore was almost entirely by 1985, at which point the musical quality declined rapidly (to embrace populist politics means, in a liberal democratic era, to abandon dissidence for an extremism of the dominant rhetoric of the age). As hardcore died, it passed on its genetic material to metal, and the best examples of this were Discharge and the Exploited and GBH, whose stylistic attitudes appeared through succeeding generations of metal.

Arguably the first genre to emerge was speed metal, which followed expanded heavy metal structures but used muffled strumming to turn ringing chords into short explosive bursts of bass-intensive sound. This made the music more aesthetically menacing, and for a long time, guaranteed it zero airplay. On the other end of the spectrum, thrash music made less frequent use of muffled chords but took on two forms: metal riffs in punk song structures (COC, DRI) and punk riffs in metal song structures (Cryptic Slaughter, dead horse). Speed metal tended to use metal riffs in metal song structures but show the influence of hardcore music in riff texturing, which evoked the sounds of one-chord rhythm riffing, and in general uptempo songwriting and abrupt changes in melodic line within each song. Perhaps the best examples of speed metal were Metallica, Exodus and Slayer; the first two were based around muffled-chord player, while the latter focused on playing quick fluid phrases known for their complexity, and using introductory sequences of riffs like a progressive band in simple, aggressive form.

Thrash died out early, because there is only so much one can do with short, fast songs (frequently under thirty seconds). Speed metal proved to be too close to the heavy metal song format, and since there was more money and future for the musicians in radio-friendly heavy metal than battering-ram speed metal, most speed metal bands by the turn of the decade mutated into heavy metal acts with "speed metal influences," in the case of Metallica eventually going on to incorporate country music into their sound. This "selling out" of speed metal reflected a fundamental division in metal at the time, namely the perception that one could not speak the truth in public, and thus anything popular had compromised reality for a public reality which sold records. This belief was also echoed in the indie, grunge, rap, techno and punk music of the time.

Thrash bands tended to write a mixture of "political" songs and more direct, existential critiques of modern society; for example, in DRI's "Give my taxes back." Speed metal bands incorporated a fair amount of such existential critique as well, for example Metallica's "Escape."

Feel no pain, but my life ain't easy
I know I'm my best friend
No one cares, but I'm so much stronger
I'll fight until the end
To escape from the true false world
Undamaged destiny
Can't get caught in the endless circle
Ring of stupidity
Out of my own, out to be free
One with my mind, they just can't see
No need to hear things that they say
Life is for my own to live my own way
Rape my mind and destroy my feelings
Don't tell my what to do
I don't care now, 'cause I'm on my side
And I can see through you
Feed my brain with your so-called standards
Who says that I ain't right
Break away from your common fashion
See through your blurry sight
Out of my own, out to be free
One with my mind, they just can't see
No need to hear things that they say
Life is for my own to live my own way
See they try to bring the hammer down
No damn chains can hold me to the ground
Life is for my own to live my own way
- Escape, Metallica

However, the majority of songs in speed metal rotated around fear of government, nuclear war, apocalypse, social issues and occult topics. What was common to both movements was a belief that the path of progress as a general item was missing the point, and that somehow there was something inarticulable in polite society that needed to be done. As time went on, however, even these genres fell short because of their popularity, in the view of many metal artists, and thus the next step was taken.