Metal After Midnight

San Francisco Power Metal band Vicious Rumors has had more of their fair share of tragedy and a revolving door of band members, but somehow founder and guitarist Geoff Thorpe was able to construct some of the most Powerful and Melodic Metal ever produced over the years...

Crimson Glory starting off in the late 70's as more of a Progressive Rock band and eventually evolved into a Prog-Power Metal band by the late 80's.  They never achieved mainstream success like Queensryche, but their influence on Metal stretched across the globe...

There's a few different stories about how this band was formed in the mid-80's. But whatever the case, their debut in 1988 went platinum behind songs like "Get It On" and "Living Out Of Touch".  I can't tell you home many people over the years thought Led Zeppelin had reformed when they first heard them...

Triumph are arguably one of Canada's greatest rock bands, there's not many who would argue with that.

Technically Sweet (or The Sweet) aren't traditional "Metal", but their over-the-top bombastic style with high-pitched guitars and vocals was certainly an influence on the Metal Community. Generally they were considered more of a "Glam" band, but considering the time period songs like "Ballroom Blitz" were and  still are very heavy songs...

Megadeth was formed after frontman Dave Mustaine was asked to leave Metallica back in the early 80's.  There was bad blood for many years (and still might be) but both bands went on to be very successful.

UFO started in Great Britain with Phil Mogg, Andy Parker, Pete and Mick Bolton, who was replaced a couple albums in by former Scorpions guitarist Michael Schenker.

Back in the 80's we saw the evolution of Metal as more "Thrash" bands started to break into the scene like Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax, Overkill, Metal Church and others.  Most of them were heavily influenced by the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal AND in many cases had Punk as a secondary influence...

The 80's LA scene pumped out an overload of Hair Metal, most of them embracing the 70's Glam and following in the footsteps of Aerosmith, Sweet and T. Rex.  However, there was also a fairly strong underground Metal scene brewing too, and shock-rocker Lizzy Borden was at the helm...

Yngwie Malmsteen came onto the scene in the early 80's as this blistering young Swede from the band "Alcatrazz" that featured Rainbow lead singer Graham Bonnet.  But soon he  became almost to big for the band and started his solo career under the moniker "Yngwie Malmsteen's Rising Force"...

Once in awhile I have to feature a more modern band on "Metal After Midnight" just because there's some great stuff still coming out.  "Spiritual Beggars" aren't what I consider true "Metal" by definition anymore, but it was 1971 they'd be one of the heaviest bands out there...

Manowar is synonymous with Heavy Metal around the world.  The New York-based band came onto the scene in the early 80's wearing loin cloths and oiled-up bodies on the cover of their debut.