10 Greatest British Hard Rock Bands

When metal first started, much of the menace came from how loud it was. While many bands were taking a darker approach in the lyrical department, most of the scary elements of metal music were coming from the sheer volume at which these bands were playing their instruments. There's nothing wrong with volume on principle, but Iron Maiden took metal music in a different direction through raw aggression.

Under the creative mastermind Steve Harris, Maiden broke down the barriers that metal had become known for and injected it with both speed and finesse. Whereas other bands had been called metal with slow and sludgy riffs, the gallop Maiden put into their music made everything feel much more exciting. Even with all the impressive instrumentation, it doesn't get any better than the all-out wail of Bruce Dickinson, who took these songs from grand ideas to some of the most theatrical performances in metal.

The firm grip that Maiden had on the genre helped birth the New Wave of British Heavy Metal while also paving the way for more aggressive subgenres like thrash later down the line. Metal in the early '70s may have been a good start, but it wasn't until Iron Maiden that the genre grew up and got fangs.