HEAVY: The Story of Metal
Metal is rock's untamed wild child. Metal is rude, crude, irreverent and irrepressibly loud.
Metal is rock and roll just as it's supposed to be, which is why everyone from Black Sabbath
to Iron Maiden to Motley Crue to Slayer to Slipknot, have been hated by critics, feared by
parents, attacked by politicians, and blamed for most of the world's ills. So how did a
combination of the devil and decibels become such an irresistible lure to generations of
metal fans around the world?

What Ken Burns did for jazz, VH1 does for heavy metal - only a lot louder.
Heavy: The Story of Metal, traces the evolution of heavy metal music and culture,
from its dark, grim beginnings in Birmingham, England to the worldwide force that
it remains to this day.

In a series of four chronological hours, Heavy: The Story of Metal, explores four
decades of music, each hour examining this powerful and often misunderstood genre,
from metal's pioneers to its love of glam and excess; from the fight for metal's rebellious
soul to its storied flirtation with the devil.

PART ONE (41:20): Welcome To My Nightmare traces metal's roots in the late-60's
in the bombed-out industrial town of Birmingham England to the spectacular rise of
Kiss and "glam metal" in the early 70's.

PART TWO (40:51): British Steel examines metal's growing pains during the 70's when
both high-brow rock critics and punk rock threatened its very existence. By decade's end,
bands such as Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, and Def Leppard gave birth to what became known
as "The New Wave of British Heavy Metal."

PART THREE (39:53): Looks That Kill sees metal thrive in, of all places, sunny California.
Quiet Riot, Motley Crue - it's the world of metal on the sunset strip. And, keeping everyone's
Jacuzzi-soaked ego in check, a little film called Spinal Tap emerges.

PART FOUR (39:53): Seek and Destroy takes a walk on the dark side: Guns N' Roses,
Metallica, thrash, Nu metal (Korn, Limp Bizkit), and how the music and images of
Marilyn Manson became associated with the Columbine massacre.