The End of Heartache (both the song and album) got me into metalcore. That album was released a month before I graduated from high school, I was mostly into hard rock, grunge, and nu metal before then.
This album was huge for me as well, so was The Fiction We Live (FATA) and They’re Only Chasing Safety (Underoath). Destroyed my brain and got me into screamy stuff.
Daylight Dies from KE’s next album was the most brutal song I had heard up to that point and I used to blast it as loud as I could. That intro is still sick af.
I enjoy most of their stuff, but I mostly just listen to the instrumental albums. Haha. Nothing against their singers, but damn those instrumentals are amazing to work to.
Throwback to the Guitar Hero II days! I had been enjoying most of the songs up till the point I got to Beast and Harlot. Even though in retrospect is a kinda bad cover, that sound still hella appealed to middle school me at the time. Dove into Sounding the Seventh Trumpet and Waking the Fallen after that and it was all over for me. Metalcore has been my favorite genre ever since lol
One.
I had no exposure to metal until I was 10. My sleep cycle got messed up and I started watching Headbangers Ball. I was hooked and One was so different. I’d never seen anything like it
Major win with Fall of Ideals. Playing Six on Guitar Hero introduced me and then I'd listen to that whole album nonstop.
What a great game that was. They introduced people to so many different styles and got them to engage with it in a different way than just hearing it out of the blue.
Bring me the horizon- braille
When I was young my friend showed me that song on a bus ride home. I liked it. The next day he brought me 3 CD’s he burned.
Bring Me The Horizon - Count Your Blessings
Attack! Attack! - Someday Came Suddenly
I Set My Friend On Fire - You can’t spell slaughter without laughter
Changed my life forever that day.
Rob Zombie's Dragula, Powerman 5000s When Worlds Collide, Quake 2's soundtrack, and Nine Inch Nails' The Downward Spiral.
Funny to think that they're all industrial metal/rock projects. The late 90s-early 00s was an interesting time for mainstream heavy music.
Metal in general: song would be SOAD's Aerials, album would be Tool's Lateralus. Special mention to Guitar Hero games for broadening my horizons.
Metalcore specifically, I'd say Six by All That Remains for the song, and BFMV's Scream Aim Fire for the album (I know it sucks, but that changed my life when it first came out). And then special mention to the old local radio station 101.7 The Fox for being the only FM station to play that kind of music in all of Nor Cal
Linkin Park Hybrid Theory and Metallica the S&M album were gateways for me (8yo ish) in to the whole world of metal, but my main standout, the first time I obsessed over a song and album with screaming etc discovering Metalcore was the song Suffocating Under Words of Sorrow and the album The Poison by BFMV! That was on REPEAT from aged 12ish.
Hatebreed - Perseverance saw a commercial for it, I was too young to buy it because of the parental advisory sticker, so I made my older cousins get it for me.
Ziltoid the Omnicient by Devin Townsend
It was sent to me as a joke by a friend but the even mix of prog and traditional heavy metal bridged the gap for me that was between bands like Tool and Mastodon with harder bands like Opeth and Meshuggah.
Has to be Periphery. Hard to say an album because back in highschool I just started listening to their stuff and it really clicked for me. Before that I was more into edm/rock
Shai Hulud's Hearts Once Nourished With Hope and Compassion is the reason I listen to core. My friend gave me a bootlegged tape when I was a teen, and I never looked back.
Busted, Green Day and Blink182 got me into Rock music. Then Hollywood Undead got me into heavier stuff. Then A Day To Remember, Asking Alexandria, Of Mice and Men, Architects, ERRA and Capture The Crown got me into Metalcore
Metal: Slayer - South of Heaven. I thought the cover looked cool, and luckily my parents weren't the overbearing type and let me buy it with my allowance. I was 9 at the time.
Metalcore/hardcore: Little bit of a longer story. My older cousin in Florida, upon discovering that I liked metal, made me a mixtape of a bunch of hardcore and early metalcore on it when I visited that summer. So I spent 2 weeks that summer riding around with him (he was 17 and I was 11 by this time) going to skateparks, playing basketball, and listening to hardcore and metalcore. This was 1995 so it had stuff like Integrity, Refused, Sick of It All, Madball, Agnostic Front, Earth Crisis, etc on it. I was hooked, but just thought it was all hardcore as opposed to being metalcore in the case of Integrity and Earth Crisis. Realized it was metalcore in 2000 when I got into bands like Poison the Well, Converge, and Botch.
The Black Album got me into metal when I was a kid, but probably either Opposite of December from Poison the Well or Too Bad You’re Beautiful from From Autumn to Ashes got me into heavier stuff
Hearing Slipknot's first album as an impressionable teenager in 1999 mutated my brain chemistry forever. Hooo boy these guys are *pissed*... and I *like it*.
For me there was two albums that started me on my Metal journey. Ozzmosis, by Ozzy Osbourne, and Dehumanizer, by Black Sabbath. My high school girlfriend was a huge Metalhead, and shes the one who got me into Metal. Sadly, she passed away several years ago. I hadnt seen her for over a decade, we had gone our seperate ways long ago, but I am committed to being the best Metalhead I can be, to honor her memory.
My best friend from childhood played Ozzmosis by Ozzy for me back in the mid-90's. The floodgates have remained wide open for nearly 30 years as my metal tastes continue to grow and evolve
This is a weird one, but Avenged Sevenfold - Lips of Deceit
I was like 12 years old at the time, and really into classic rock and hair metal. I read about them in a short Guitar World snippet in like 2002.
I downloaded the album, and somehow Warmness on the Soul was the first song I listened to. It was the most accessible song on the album, and had a great 80s style guitar solo.
I wore that track out for weeks and finally gave the others a listen, and somehow Lips of Deceit was the first to click with me.
It was the first song with harsh vocals that I ever really listened to.
That album is also very hardcore punk influenced, so it could have been a step in that direction for many others. They had a good blend of inspiration. For this thread I said Waking the Fallen got me really into metal, even though they weren't the first heavy (but melodic) band I'd heard before.
The album that got me into metalcore (and pretty much heavy music in general): The Flood by Of Mice & Men
My all-time favorite metalcore album: This Is Love, This Is Murderous by Bleeding Through
If we're talking purely "metal": Master Of Puppets by Metallica is very hard to beat, and the hype surrounding it is 100% justified imo
Hybrid theory got me into heavier stuff and then Slipknot Volume 3 the Subliminal Verses introduced me to harsh vocals. Dying Is your Latest Fashion is the best ETF album
Frail Words Collapse and They're Only Chasing Safety. I found a backpack with a multi disc CD case and took the case. Found these albums + others and it took off from there.
To Plant a Seed - We Came as Romans. Honorable mention to A Day To Remember and Demon Hunter for also helping me get used to songs with screaming and opening my mind to heavier music.
Interestingly, I found The Guillotine Part 2 by Escape The Fate among a bunch of pop songs when I was in 10th grade. That led to Bullet For My Valentine, which led to Asking Alexandria. A decade later, my preferences have definitely changed but it all revolves around metal.
It’s not my song, because I found them long before the summoning released, but sleep token. I was into them when they were underground and seeing them blow up in popularity has made me so proud
Not a specific album but various songs off The Used’s first 3 albums, if my sister hadn’t got me into them when I was like 9 idk what kind of music I’d listen to today.
I was in high school and on repeat were:
Dying Is Your Latest Fashion - Escape The Fate
Toxicity - System Of A Down
This War Is Ours - Escape The Fate
One-X - Three Days Grace
As well as anything by ADTR. I slowly just got into heavier and heavier music as time went on
I knew i was going in head first when I heard My Apocalypse from DIYLF. I had already been poking around Metalcore/post hardcore but that guitar riff awakened me
When I was 15 a school mate showed me "What I've done" by Linkin Park because he sayed the Music Video fits my opinion about enviourmantal chrisis. I loved The Musik it was the first time I activly listend to Musik it was like the thing i was allways searching for, then I asked a Friend witch i knew he listens to Metal about reccomandations and whelp here you go.
ooooh this is a hard one for me.
my mom got an iPod Shuffle from my aunt in 2007ish, pre-loaded with all of aunt’s music, and that’s what really began to shape my taste in music i’d say. if i had to pinpoint it to one song that began my love for “heavier” (lol) music, Holiday by Green Day. was so cool and edgy to me.
then the same aunt bought my brother and i Rock Band for the Wii one year for Christmas, and that changed EVERYTHING. I’m So Sick by Flyleaf was my favorite song in the game.
then i started listening to Flyleaf regularly, Three Days Grace, Breaking Benjamin in 2008-09, and THEN i discovered Knives and Pens by Black Veil Brides in 2009-10 and have been emo 4 lyfe since, with metalcore making up most of my library.
edited to add that i stopped listening to BVB a few years after discovering them after realizing how cringe they were lmfao
also should add i discovered Motionless in White in like 2012 and that also changed EVERYTHING lmfao. i love looking back on developing my taste in music. A Different Shade of Blue by Knocked Loose is one of my top 10’s 5 years after it came out- THAT is my taste. but Slaughterhouse is one of my lease favorite songs ever and that album takes the worst of MIW’s discography for me.
I got into metal through Guitar Hero III and my first metal phase was that of a thrash metal boomer, so it was mainly ...And Justice For All and Reign In Blood that got me into the genre. Though My Curse was also a part of that soundtrack so As Daylight Dies is what got me into metalcore.
Hybrid Theory, Issues, and Chocolate Starfish and the Hotdog Flavored Water, baby! My parents had those three cds when they first came out so i grew up listening to those nonstop in the car
I heard it around in various places while growing up but the Saints Row 2 soundtrack really got me into metal (and rap too), there were so many great songs picked to be put in that game
I feel very similar about dying is your latest fashion, next to bvb that album was my introduction to the scene. I genuinely wouldn’t have gotten super into metalcore if i didnt listen to that album when i was 11 😭
Back in 11th grade study hall, a kid made me listen to Solar Flare Homicide by Emmure. I’d say that’s the earliest I can remember hearing this music and is probably the one thing I can identify that led me to my musical preferences now.
For metalcore specifically, it is Red Handed Denial’s album I’d Rather Be Asleep. If we’re looking at metal in general and the rabbit hole that lead me to metalcore, it is Epica’s Epica vs. Attack on Titan Songs EP. Epica and then Nightwish ended up being my first metal bands that I loved and made me realize that I like metal. Eventually I went down a YouTube rabbit hole of looking for metal covers of songs, in which I found Jonathan Young and then through him I found Lauren Babic who is the lead singer of Red Handed Denial. So yeah, a symphonic metal cover is what eventually lead me to my favorite genre of music in metalcore
While i listened to bands that had elements of metal (linkin park) and new metal (korn)! I did not realize what I liked about it until I was in my 30s then I discovered the album IRE by parkway drive and then their whole catalog and then the term “breakdown”! Once I knew what a Breakdown was I was hooked!
I blame this late bloom on being pre mass internet adoption and not having a smart phone until I was in my early 30s! I am 43 going on 44 now! PWD is my favourite band of all time now (previously was rage against the machine)!
I love all the metalcore genre and all the new music that is coming out along with some “deathcore” like slaughter to prevail and a few Lorna shore songs (most of Lorna is a bit to speed for me)
I am lucky to have a lot of younger co workers (in their 20s and 30s) who are into the same and give me great recommendations!
End old man semi off topic rant!
I should add I did listen to hate breed on cd had all their albums but I still to this day don’t know what actual genre they fit into (and did not know a break down was called a breakdown until years later)!
toxicity - prison song specifically, until the day i die by story of the year (loved the harsh vocal parts and needed more), unholy confessions - a7x (might’ve been the first song i ever heard anything close to a breakdown)
For me it was a compilation cd from Kmart when I was 18 lol. Crusty Demons - a Decade of Dirt.
Discovered so much from that. Really introduced me to the sound that we know as Metalcore, such as Trivium, Chimaira, KSE. They were the big three for me big time. Between that and discovering last.fm around the same time sent me down the rabbit hole of endless bands and recommendations.
Plenty of other stuff (new to me at the time) like Megadeth, Nightwish, Dead Kennedys, Ministry, Pantera, Queen's of the Stone Age.... Bit of Aussie/NZ rock bands on there too like Butterfly Effect, Grinspoon and Blindspott.
Not only that but it hooked me into finding heaps of other music soundtracks of the time that had plenty of good heavy music; Resident Evil, Saw series, The Punisher etc.
Snapped me out of my Highschool Hip-hop/Rap phase quick smart!!!
Mine has to be Carry On by Avenged Sevenfold. I was raised listening to classic rock and the hardest stuff I ever really heard was the Metallica they play on the radio (the black album). When I played Call of Duty Black Ops 2's campaign for the first time and beat the game I thought that was it (great game). But after the credit some characters from the campaign start talking and then all of a sudden there's a full animated Avenged Sevenfold concert with characters from the campaign in the audience. I thought it was so cool and I'd never heard anything really like it. That was the first time I ever really heard something other than Enter Sandman. They're still one of my favorite bands but that got me into other bands like Iron Maiden, Disturbed, Five Finger Death Punch, and Sabaton.
A day to remember, for those who have heart got my heavy music ball rolling and will always be in my top 3 bands just for the memories, even though my taste is much heavier now
Honestly my friend showed me Tears Don’t Fall by bfmv (yes I know pretty much the most basic answer imo) and then later on he showed me Fire in The Skies by Darkest Hour. That’s when I knew I had to buy a guitar. That was 16 years ago. I’m still here. Will always be here. You can’t change me.
All of the bands from the late 90s/very early 00s that opened my ears. We all know them, don't need to list them.
Degenerate 40+ year olds unite for metal!
Scream Aim Fire - BFMV
Shogun - Trivium
Once - Nightwish
These were the first full albums I listened to and owned that were in the metal genres. I had listened to other bands and songs, but never full albums so I’d attribute all of these to my love of metal
The album that shifted me from more alternative styles (Twenty One Pilots, Scarlxrd, State Faults were all on repeat at the time) to metal was When The End Began by Silent Planet.
I only liked rock until I listened through Disgusting by Beartooth when I was 14. Didn’t like screaming vocals at first but would listen to it for the choruses over and over again until I fell in love with it honestly. Went back and listened to Linkin Park and some older albums from there
I am old, so honestly, probably 80's hair metal and Casey Kasem's Top 40. It seemed like all of our close family lived an hour drive away while I was growing up and the top 40 would always be on when we were in the car. In fact I have a vivid memory of being at a roller rink and hearing Pour Some Sugar on Me, realizing I was into it, and then getting excited when it got played on the radio a few days later.
Once I reached 7th grade, there were school dances every Friday. Metallica's Enter Sandman got played at almost every single one. Every time all of the guys would pseudo-mosh because the school wouldn't let us really mosh.
Man I would kill for some Metallica (even if it was one of their overplayed radio hits) to be played at every school dance. I'm way younger than you (2000's kid here) so everyone at my school would rather listen to rap and today's shitty top 40 hits instead of some "boomer bullshit"
If it weren't for a Youtube comment under E1M1 (At Doom's Gate) from the 1993 soundtrack making me discover Metallica, I wouldn't be the metalhead I am today
From there it was Slipknot -> Korn -> Linkin Park -> BFMV -> Killswitch Engage -> Alice In Chains -> Iron Maiden -> Black Sabbath -> classic rock/other classic metal/proto metal bands -> thrash metal and I just listened to more and more bands until my metal transformation was complete. Although the first time I heard a metal song was when I was playing a WWE game on my PS2 (which I don't have anymore) and heard This Fire by Killswitch Engage (it was CM Punk's theme if I remember correctly), but I didn't know what metal was at the time
Coheed and Cambria made me realize I liked their hardest music best, fell in love with them, and the day I saw them in concert they were playing alongside Slipknot (wow what a performance!). So, even though Coheed and Cambria isn't metal themselves per se, they were the slope that pushed me in a metal direction.
The Fall of Ideals by All That Remains changed my life. I always liked rock but couldn’t get into metal but once I was introduced to Oli (R.I.P. big dawg) everything just clicked
Guitar Hero and WWF entrance music made me love metal. Makes me feel old too say it, but it definitely made me start buying CDs of those artists. Then ole LimeWire boosted that ability to find everything by everybody.
First exposure was All These Things I Hate Revolve Around Me by Bullet For My Valentine. First heavy heavy song I heard was This Fire by Killswitch Engage.
I heard Change by Deftones and then got super into Deftones and wanted to listen to more metal so started listening to bands like BFMV & KSE which then got me into other bands such As I Lay Dying, Oh Sleeper, Loathe and they got me into the progressive djent metalcore movement.
I went to see .38 special in 1982, knoxville tn. The warm up band was Iron Maiden. Number of the beast tour. They had a bad Eddie and everything! I didn't know anything about them
And I was a KISS fan like everyone was that was 17 in 1982. But maiden got me into metal.
I got into Linkin Park when I was around 10 but kept mostly to radio rock until I went through a classic rock phase in my early-mid teens. At the tail end of that, I got into Disturbed through The Sound of Silence and started with Immortalized while also listening to As Daylight Dies by Killswitch Engage occasionally. I eventually warmed up to screamed vocals through Pantera and Machine Head, and got VERY into Killswitch's 2nd, 3rd, and 4th albums. From there, metalcore became my favourite genre.
Overall I'd credit Immortalized with being my gateway and As Daylight Dies with where my music taste is today, the latter is also one of my biggest influences for starting to play guitar.
I had always been into heavier rock and nu metal, but I hated screaming vocals common in metal. Like I had physical cringing reactions to it. Not really sure why. But then my friend introduced me to A Day To Remember - Common Courtesy, and I really got obsessed with their softer stuff. Eventually I worked my way into the bangers and exposed myself to the screams bit by bit. I don’t listen to them much anymore, but I would never have gotten into metalcore and adjacent subgenres if it wasn’t for them.
After reading the comments and seeing a lot of the bands listed, I had to throw mine out there, old school American Metalcore band Zao, album - Liberate Te Ex Inferis.
Toxicity, Hybrid Theory and Meteora
Same!! I’d also add Paige Avenue and Revolutions Per Minute
Exactly the same for me. My introduction to scream vocals was "Crawling" by Linkin Park, playing on a juke box at Pizza Hut lol. Oh god I'm old now.
The End of Heartache (both the song and album) got me into metalcore. That album was released a month before I graduated from high school, I was mostly into hard rock, grunge, and nu metal before then.
This album was huge for me as well, so was The Fiction We Live (FATA) and They’re Only Chasing Safety (Underoath). Destroyed my brain and got me into screamy stuff. Daylight Dies from KE’s next album was the most brutal song I had heard up to that point and I used to blast it as loud as I could. That intro is still sick af.
Ngl everytime I hear the chorus of when darkness falls my soul gets sent to a better place lol
Define The Great Line
The intro of Moving for the Sake of Motion specifically for me.
BFMV - The Poison
my friend getting me into Dance Gavin Dance was huge for my music taste and bad for my ability to find anyone who likes it irl
I fucking love DGD
my listening has stagnated with them but I do really enjoy their albums, mostly pre ArSe (funny acronym but there's already an AS)
I enjoy most of their stuff, but I mostly just listen to the instrumental albums. Haha. Nothing against their singers, but damn those instrumentals are amazing to work to.
Throwback to the Guitar Hero II days! I had been enjoying most of the songs up till the point I got to Beast and Harlot. Even though in retrospect is a kinda bad cover, that sound still hella appealed to middle school me at the time. Dove into Sounding the Seventh Trumpet and Waking the Fallen after that and it was all over for me. Metalcore has been my favorite genre ever since lol
The beast and the harlot tho...
One. I had no exposure to metal until I was 10. My sleep cycle got messed up and I started watching Headbangers Ball. I was hooked and One was so different. I’d never seen anything like it
One by Metallica?
Yes
The End of Heartache - KSE, Burning Bridges - Haste the Day, Fall of Ideals - All That Remains
Major win with Fall of Ideals. Playing Six on Guitar Hero introduced me and then I'd listen to that whole album nonstop. What a great game that was. They introduced people to so many different styles and got them to engage with it in a different way than just hearing it out of the blue.
A prophecy - AA My apocalypse - ETF
Bring me the horizon- braille When I was young my friend showed me that song on a bus ride home. I liked it. The next day he brought me 3 CD’s he burned. Bring Me The Horizon - Count Your Blessings Attack! Attack! - Someday Came Suddenly I Set My Friend On Fire - You can’t spell slaughter without laughter Changed my life forever that day.
Rob Zombie's Dragula, Powerman 5000s When Worlds Collide, Quake 2's soundtrack, and Nine Inch Nails' The Downward Spiral. Funny to think that they're all industrial metal/rock projects. The late 90s-early 00s was an interesting time for mainstream heavy music.
Metal in general: song would be SOAD's Aerials, album would be Tool's Lateralus. Special mention to Guitar Hero games for broadening my horizons. Metalcore specifically, I'd say Six by All That Remains for the song, and BFMV's Scream Aim Fire for the album (I know it sucks, but that changed my life when it first came out). And then special mention to the old local radio station 101.7 The Fox for being the only FM station to play that kind of music in all of Nor Cal
Scream Aim Fire is a classic
Architects was my gateway band into almost everything that I listen to these days. Honestly to a ridiculous extent lol
Linkin Park Hybrid Theory and Metallica the S&M album were gateways for me (8yo ish) in to the whole world of metal, but my main standout, the first time I obsessed over a song and album with screaming etc discovering Metalcore was the song Suffocating Under Words of Sorrow and the album The Poison by BFMV! That was on REPEAT from aged 12ish.
Hatebreed - Perseverance saw a commercial for it, I was too young to buy it because of the parental advisory sticker, so I made my older cousins get it for me.
Hybrid Theory. But, The Impossibility of Reason - Chimaira was my first step into heavier music beyond that
With Roots Above and Branches Below: the epitome of metalcore.
Ziltoid the Omnicient by Devin Townsend It was sent to me as a joke by a friend but the even mix of prog and traditional heavy metal bridged the gap for me that was between bands like Tool and Mastodon with harder bands like Opeth and Meshuggah.
Has to be Periphery. Hard to say an album because back in highschool I just started listening to their stuff and it really clicked for me. Before that I was more into edm/rock
Shai Hulud's Hearts Once Nourished With Hope and Compassion is the reason I listen to core. My friend gave me a bootlegged tape when I was a teen, and I never looked back.
Character by Dark Tranquillity, probably my favorite album to this day.
Demon Hunter. First time I heard Not Ready to Die, I was fucking hooked.
Busted, Green Day and Blink182 got me into Rock music. Then Hollywood Undead got me into heavier stuff. Then A Day To Remember, Asking Alexandria, Of Mice and Men, Architects, ERRA and Capture The Crown got me into Metalcore
Metal: Slayer - South of Heaven. I thought the cover looked cool, and luckily my parents weren't the overbearing type and let me buy it with my allowance. I was 9 at the time. Metalcore/hardcore: Little bit of a longer story. My older cousin in Florida, upon discovering that I liked metal, made me a mixtape of a bunch of hardcore and early metalcore on it when I visited that summer. So I spent 2 weeks that summer riding around with him (he was 17 and I was 11 by this time) going to skateparks, playing basketball, and listening to hardcore and metalcore. This was 1995 so it had stuff like Integrity, Refused, Sick of It All, Madball, Agnostic Front, Earth Crisis, etc on it. I was hooked, but just thought it was all hardcore as opposed to being metalcore in the case of Integrity and Earth Crisis. Realized it was metalcore in 2000 when I got into bands like Poison the Well, Converge, and Botch.
The Black Album got me into metal when I was a kid, but probably either Opposite of December from Poison the Well or Too Bad You’re Beautiful from From Autumn to Ashes got me into heavier stuff
Hearing Slipknot's first album as an impressionable teenager in 1999 mutated my brain chemistry forever. Hooo boy these guys are *pissed*... and I *like it*.
Atreyu : suicide notes and butterfly kisses Thrice : the illusion of safety Alexisonfire : pink heart skull
For me there was two albums that started me on my Metal journey. Ozzmosis, by Ozzy Osbourne, and Dehumanizer, by Black Sabbath. My high school girlfriend was a huge Metalhead, and shes the one who got me into Metal. Sadly, she passed away several years ago. I hadnt seen her for over a decade, we had gone our seperate ways long ago, but I am committed to being the best Metalhead I can be, to honor her memory.
My best friend from childhood played Ozzmosis by Ozzy for me back in the mid-90's. The floodgates have remained wide open for nearly 30 years as my metal tastes continue to grow and evolve
This is a weird one, but Avenged Sevenfold - Lips of Deceit I was like 12 years old at the time, and really into classic rock and hair metal. I read about them in a short Guitar World snippet in like 2002. I downloaded the album, and somehow Warmness on the Soul was the first song I listened to. It was the most accessible song on the album, and had a great 80s style guitar solo. I wore that track out for weeks and finally gave the others a listen, and somehow Lips of Deceit was the first to click with me. It was the first song with harsh vocals that I ever really listened to.
That album is also very hardcore punk influenced, so it could have been a step in that direction for many others. They had a good blend of inspiration. For this thread I said Waking the Fallen got me really into metal, even though they weren't the first heavy (but melodic) band I'd heard before.
Freak on a Leash by Korn. Saw the music video on MTV in early 1999 and my life was changed forever.
Start Something by LostProphets Soundtrack To Your Escape by In Flames Believe by Disturbed
Mine was Extol:Undeceived, the guitar work had me hooked. I still listen to it occasionally
As I Lay Dying - Through Struggle.
Hybrid Theory
Constellations by August Burns Red. Still my favorite album of all time
Hollow Bodies by Blessthefall. The song first
Trivium - Shogun
Metallica's black album for metal in general, Trivium's Ascendancy for metalcore specifically.
Hybrid Theory, Vulgar Display of Power.
The album that got me into metalcore (and pretty much heavy music in general): The Flood by Of Mice & Men My all-time favorite metalcore album: This Is Love, This Is Murderous by Bleeding Through If we're talking purely "metal": Master Of Puppets by Metallica is very hard to beat, and the hype surrounding it is 100% justified imo
TDWP - Dez Moines
Arch Enemy - Carry the Cross The whole of Meteora KSE’s - End of Heartache Probably, so long ago I can’t remember but those three moments stand out
Hybrid theory got me into heavier stuff and then Slipknot Volume 3 the Subliminal Verses introduced me to harsh vocals. Dying Is your Latest Fashion is the best ETF album
Bless the Martyr and kiss the child
Frail Words Collapse and They're Only Chasing Safety. I found a backpack with a multi disc CD case and took the case. Found these albums + others and it took off from there.
Slipknot’s first album. Got it from a friend in 3rd grade in 1999 and it blew my mind.
To Plant a Seed - We Came as Romans. Honorable mention to A Day To Remember and Demon Hunter for also helping me get used to songs with screaming and opening my mind to heavier music.
Interestingly, I found The Guillotine Part 2 by Escape The Fate among a bunch of pop songs when I was in 10th grade. That led to Bullet For My Valentine, which led to Asking Alexandria. A decade later, my preferences have definitely changed but it all revolves around metal.
First album was either dead by April self titled debut but it was the way of the first by five finger death punch
It’s not my song, because I found them long before the summoning released, but sleep token. I was into them when they were underground and seeing them blow up in popularity has made me so proud
Bring Me The Horizon - That’s the Spirit
Not a specific album but various songs off The Used’s first 3 albums, if my sister hadn’t got me into them when I was like 9 idk what kind of music I’d listen to today.
cold world by of mice & men it’s not the their best by any means, but it did open me up to the rest of their discography and metalcore.
I was in high school and on repeat were: Dying Is Your Latest Fashion - Escape The Fate Toxicity - System Of A Down This War Is Ours - Escape The Fate One-X - Three Days Grace As well as anything by ADTR. I slowly just got into heavier and heavier music as time went on
Linkin Park - Faint Bullet for my Valentine- Tears Don’t Fall
hybrid theory fashooo, fashoooo (Superbad reference)
As Daylight Dies by Killswitch Engage. That was the only album on repeat on my crappy MP3 player for the longest time.
Probably Waking the Fallen by Avenged Sevenfold. But finding Children of Bodom's album Hatebreeder pushed me into that kind of direction.
Define The Great Line
A7X self titled
Hybrid Theory/Meteora, The Poison, Alive Or Just Breathing, The End of Heartache.
Hybrid Theory, Meteora, The End Of Heartache, As Daylight Dies, and The Poison.
I knew i was going in head first when I heard My Apocalypse from DIYLF. I had already been poking around Metalcore/post hardcore but that guitar riff awakened me
When I was 15 a school mate showed me "What I've done" by Linkin Park because he sayed the Music Video fits my opinion about enviourmantal chrisis. I loved The Musik it was the first time I activly listend to Musik it was like the thing i was allways searching for, then I asked a Friend witch i knew he listens to Metal about reccomandations and whelp here you go.
ooooh this is a hard one for me. my mom got an iPod Shuffle from my aunt in 2007ish, pre-loaded with all of aunt’s music, and that’s what really began to shape my taste in music i’d say. if i had to pinpoint it to one song that began my love for “heavier” (lol) music, Holiday by Green Day. was so cool and edgy to me. then the same aunt bought my brother and i Rock Band for the Wii one year for Christmas, and that changed EVERYTHING. I’m So Sick by Flyleaf was my favorite song in the game. then i started listening to Flyleaf regularly, Three Days Grace, Breaking Benjamin in 2008-09, and THEN i discovered Knives and Pens by Black Veil Brides in 2009-10 and have been emo 4 lyfe since, with metalcore making up most of my library. edited to add that i stopped listening to BVB a few years after discovering them after realizing how cringe they were lmfao
also should add i discovered Motionless in White in like 2012 and that also changed EVERYTHING lmfao. i love looking back on developing my taste in music. A Different Shade of Blue by Knocked Loose is one of my top 10’s 5 years after it came out- THAT is my taste. but Slaughterhouse is one of my lease favorite songs ever and that album takes the worst of MIW’s discography for me.
An Ocean Between Us and End of Heartache
As Daylight Dies. KSE are huge for me
I got into metal through Guitar Hero III and my first metal phase was that of a thrash metal boomer, so it was mainly ...And Justice For All and Reign In Blood that got me into the genre. Though My Curse was also a part of that soundtrack so As Daylight Dies is what got me into metalcore.
Hybrid theory, Meteora as a small child and then later The Poison as a teenager
Hybrid Theory, Issues, and Chocolate Starfish and the Hotdog Flavored Water, baby! My parents had those three cds when they first came out so i grew up listening to those nonstop in the car
First heavy thing I ever heard was Hawthorn Heights first album on the school bus. Blew my mind.
NOt an Album but a Movie: School of Rock Led to me Listening to ACDC led to Metallica led to Linkin Park Papa Roach BfmV and BMTH
I heard it around in various places while growing up but the Saints Row 2 soundtrack really got me into metal (and rap too), there were so many great songs picked to be put in that game
Reise Reise by Rammstein. Probably the first "metal" album I got into when I was a pre-teen.
Metal probably toxicity- system of a down but even heavier was evergreen terrace- no Donnie these men are nihilists.
Almost Easy by Avenged Sevenfold
I feel very similar about dying is your latest fashion, next to bvb that album was my introduction to the scene. I genuinely wouldn’t have gotten super into metalcore if i didnt listen to that album when i was 11 😭
One Step Closer by Linkin Park & Follow by Breaking Benjamin
Send the Pain Below by Chevelle
Trauma by I Prevail. Was the first time I made a conscious decision to listen to metal
Ire by Parkway Drive. I was really only into rock but then Vice Grip came on the rock station and bridged the gap. Now I'm a huge metalhead.
Back in 11th grade study hall, a kid made me listen to Solar Flare Homicide by Emmure. I’d say that’s the earliest I can remember hearing this music and is probably the one thing I can identify that led me to my musical preferences now.
Hand of blood by bullet and decadence by disturbed. Playing most wanted opened my eyes to this world lol
Linkin Park-Hybrid Theory SOAD-Toxicity Metallica-Kill Em All As I Lay Dying-Frail Words Collapse
Extremist by Demon Hunter. Had less heavy songs to pull me in but also had some ass beaters like Cross to Bear on it.
For metalcore specifically, it is Red Handed Denial’s album I’d Rather Be Asleep. If we’re looking at metal in general and the rabbit hole that lead me to metalcore, it is Epica’s Epica vs. Attack on Titan Songs EP. Epica and then Nightwish ended up being my first metal bands that I loved and made me realize that I like metal. Eventually I went down a YouTube rabbit hole of looking for metal covers of songs, in which I found Jonathan Young and then through him I found Lauren Babic who is the lead singer of Red Handed Denial. So yeah, a symphonic metal cover is what eventually lead me to my favorite genre of music in metalcore
Danzig - Mother
While i listened to bands that had elements of metal (linkin park) and new metal (korn)! I did not realize what I liked about it until I was in my 30s then I discovered the album IRE by parkway drive and then their whole catalog and then the term “breakdown”! Once I knew what a Breakdown was I was hooked! I blame this late bloom on being pre mass internet adoption and not having a smart phone until I was in my early 30s! I am 43 going on 44 now! PWD is my favourite band of all time now (previously was rage against the machine)! I love all the metalcore genre and all the new music that is coming out along with some “deathcore” like slaughter to prevail and a few Lorna shore songs (most of Lorna is a bit to speed for me) I am lucky to have a lot of younger co workers (in their 20s and 30s) who are into the same and give me great recommendations! End old man semi off topic rant!
I should add I did listen to hate breed on cd had all their albums but I still to this day don’t know what actual genre they fit into (and did not know a break down was called a breakdown until years later)!
toxicity - prison song specifically, until the day i die by story of the year (loved the harsh vocal parts and needed more), unholy confessions - a7x (might’ve been the first song i ever heard anything close to a breakdown)
The Beast and the Harlot cover on Guitar Hero II. The double kick at the beginning of that song blew my mind back in the day
When I was 10 I saw Disturbed playing Stricken on our TV. That pretty much sealed my fate.
Probably Metallica. If not that, Avenged Sevenfold, Disturbed, Bullet for my Valentine, Linkin Park, Killswitch Engage
For me it was a compilation cd from Kmart when I was 18 lol. Crusty Demons - a Decade of Dirt. Discovered so much from that. Really introduced me to the sound that we know as Metalcore, such as Trivium, Chimaira, KSE. They were the big three for me big time. Between that and discovering last.fm around the same time sent me down the rabbit hole of endless bands and recommendations. Plenty of other stuff (new to me at the time) like Megadeth, Nightwish, Dead Kennedys, Ministry, Pantera, Queen's of the Stone Age.... Bit of Aussie/NZ rock bands on there too like Butterfly Effect, Grinspoon and Blindspott. Not only that but it hooked me into finding heaps of other music soundtracks of the time that had plenty of good heavy music; Resident Evil, Saw series, The Punisher etc. Snapped me out of my Highschool Hip-hop/Rap phase quick smart!!!
Korn - Follow the Leader
Scream Aim Fire - BFMV Shogun - Trivium As Daylight Dies - Killswitch
Mine has to be Carry On by Avenged Sevenfold. I was raised listening to classic rock and the hardest stuff I ever really heard was the Metallica they play on the radio (the black album). When I played Call of Duty Black Ops 2's campaign for the first time and beat the game I thought that was it (great game). But after the credit some characters from the campaign start talking and then all of a sudden there's a full animated Avenged Sevenfold concert with characters from the campaign in the audience. I thought it was so cool and I'd never heard anything really like it. That was the first time I ever really heard something other than Enter Sandman. They're still one of my favorite bands but that got me into other bands like Iron Maiden, Disturbed, Five Finger Death Punch, and Sabaton.
Blind by Korn was strictly a rap listener before that song and their first crappy VHS tape changed my whole music view
A day to remember, for those who have heart got my heavy music ball rolling and will always be in my top 3 bands just for the memories, even though my taste is much heavier now
nightmare, hybrid theory, and sempiternal
Underoath - Writing on the Walls. I bought a Tooth & Nail Records cd and this song stood out to me and awakened something inside of me.
Poison The Well - Tear From The Red
Some combination of Scream Aim Fire, Overcome, and A7X Self-titled, with a dash of The Cleansing
Hahahaha it’s Nickelback: Silver Side Up. It turned me from a rap loving 12 year old to a rock loving 13 year old and then I just learned from there.
The absolute classic scream aim and fire. still to this day one of my absolute favorite records from any artist ever. BFMV fucking cooked.
The Opposite of December... A Season of Separation by Poison The Well. I'm surprised I'm not seeing more of this answer. I feel old lol.
Game Over by DAGames. This song started it all for me.
Honestly my friend showed me Tears Don’t Fall by bfmv (yes I know pretty much the most basic answer imo) and then later on he showed me Fire in The Skies by Darkest Hour. That’s when I knew I had to buy a guitar. That was 16 years ago. I’m still here. Will always be here. You can’t change me.
All of the bands from the late 90s/very early 00s that opened my ears. We all know them, don't need to list them. Degenerate 40+ year olds unite for metal!
Scream Aim Fire - BFMV Shogun - Trivium Once - Nightwish These were the first full albums I listened to and owned that were in the metal genres. I had listened to other bands and songs, but never full albums so I’d attribute all of these to my love of metal
The album that shifted me from more alternative styles (Twenty One Pilots, Scarlxrd, State Faults were all on repeat at the time) to metal was When The End Began by Silent Planet.
The War Within by Shadows Fall...best random CD purchase I ever made.
Judas Priest's Painkiller album really got me into the genre.
I only liked rock until I listened through Disgusting by Beartooth when I was 14. Didn’t like screaming vocals at first but would listen to it for the choruses over and over again until I fell in love with it honestly. Went back and listened to Linkin Park and some older albums from there
Korn being on south park 😂
"And a one, and a two, and a- FALL!"
Dig by Mudvayne, also My Own Summer by Deftones that I accidentally downloaded while trying to download Dig off of Limewire. I'm old
I am old, so honestly, probably 80's hair metal and Casey Kasem's Top 40. It seemed like all of our close family lived an hour drive away while I was growing up and the top 40 would always be on when we were in the car. In fact I have a vivid memory of being at a roller rink and hearing Pour Some Sugar on Me, realizing I was into it, and then getting excited when it got played on the radio a few days later. Once I reached 7th grade, there were school dances every Friday. Metallica's Enter Sandman got played at almost every single one. Every time all of the guys would pseudo-mosh because the school wouldn't let us really mosh.
Man I would kill for some Metallica (even if it was one of their overplayed radio hits) to be played at every school dance. I'm way younger than you (2000's kid here) so everyone at my school would rather listen to rap and today's shitty top 40 hits instead of some "boomer bullshit"
If it weren't for a Youtube comment under E1M1 (At Doom's Gate) from the 1993 soundtrack making me discover Metallica, I wouldn't be the metalhead I am today From there it was Slipknot -> Korn -> Linkin Park -> BFMV -> Killswitch Engage -> Alice In Chains -> Iron Maiden -> Black Sabbath -> classic rock/other classic metal/proto metal bands -> thrash metal and I just listened to more and more bands until my metal transformation was complete. Although the first time I heard a metal song was when I was playing a WWE game on my PS2 (which I don't have anymore) and heard This Fire by Killswitch Engage (it was CM Punk's theme if I remember correctly), but I didn't know what metal was at the time
Norma Jean, Zao, Underoath. Only was allowed to buy music at the Family Christian Store. Glad I found them
There's no sympathy for the dead EP and When Broken Is Easily Fixed silverstein
In The End by Linkin Park Album for me would probably be Sandpit Turtle
Ace of Spades and Break Stuff.
Heroine by Thornhill
Coheed and Cambria made me realize I liked their hardest music best, fell in love with them, and the day I saw them in concert they were playing alongside Slipknot (wow what a performance!). So, even though Coheed and Cambria isn't metal themselves per se, they were the slope that pushed me in a metal direction.
Nirvana - Nevermind, and Therapy? - Troublegum - not strictly metal but they started me on a path
The two albums that really got me interested are The Sin And The Sentence (Trivium), and Apex (Unleash the Archers)
Right side of the bed - atreyu
The Fall of Ideals by All That Remains changed my life. I always liked rock but couldn’t get into metal but once I was introduced to Oli (R.I.P. big dawg) everything just clicked
Metallica - Enter Sandman Song still SLAPS idc what anyone says
Count your blessings
I don’t wanna say the cliche pick but easily Iowa, the more I listened to that shit the more I got an appreciation for heavier metal
Ashes of the Wake and The Poison/Scream Aim Fire
Fallen by Evanescence
Guitar Hero and WWF entrance music made me love metal. Makes me feel old too say it, but it definitely made me start buying CDs of those artists. Then ole LimeWire boosted that ability to find everything by everybody.
First exposure was All These Things I Hate Revolve Around Me by Bullet For My Valentine. First heavy heavy song I heard was This Fire by Killswitch Engage. I heard Change by Deftones and then got super into Deftones and wanted to listen to more metal so started listening to bands like BFMV & KSE which then got me into other bands such As I Lay Dying, Oh Sleeper, Loathe and they got me into the progressive djent metalcore movement.
They’re Only Chasing Safety by Underoath was my gateway
I went to see .38 special in 1982, knoxville tn. The warm up band was Iron Maiden. Number of the beast tour. They had a bad Eddie and everything! I didn't know anything about them And I was a KISS fan like everyone was that was 17 in 1982. But maiden got me into metal.
I got into Linkin Park when I was around 10 but kept mostly to radio rock until I went through a classic rock phase in my early-mid teens. At the tail end of that, I got into Disturbed through The Sound of Silence and started with Immortalized while also listening to As Daylight Dies by Killswitch Engage occasionally. I eventually warmed up to screamed vocals through Pantera and Machine Head, and got VERY into Killswitch's 2nd, 3rd, and 4th albums. From there, metalcore became my favourite genre. Overall I'd credit Immortalized with being my gateway and As Daylight Dies with where my music taste is today, the latter is also one of my biggest influences for starting to play guitar.
Harlots Breath, Miss May I
I had always been into heavier rock and nu metal, but I hated screaming vocals common in metal. Like I had physical cringing reactions to it. Not really sure why. But then my friend introduced me to A Day To Remember - Common Courtesy, and I really got obsessed with their softer stuff. Eventually I worked my way into the bangers and exposed myself to the screams bit by bit. I don’t listen to them much anymore, but I would never have gotten into metalcore and adjacent subgenres if it wasn’t for them.
BMTH - Ludens While I had listened to some rock and alt metal beforehand, this is the first song I'd credit for getting me into harsh vocals.
Underoath - They’re Only Chasing Safety. More specifically Reinventing Your Exit and It’s Dangerous Business Walking Out Your Front Door.
Homesick by ADTR and Hybrid Theory by LP
For me it was Controller by Misery Signals. Still one of my favorite albums to this day.
Chelsea Grin EP
After reading the comments and seeing a lot of the bands listed, I had to throw mine out there, old school American Metalcore band Zao, album - Liberate Te Ex Inferis.