Never Say Die (Heavy Metal 1970-1991)

The story of the longest surviving and certainly the loudest genre of rock, heavy metal. With no sign of disappearing, metal has been the most controversial and misunderstood of all rock genres. Emerging at the tail end of the hippy dream from the rust belt of industrial England, heavy metal would go on to secure the most loyal fan base of all. With Black Sabbath as the undisputed Godfathers, we follow their highs and lows, and, along the journey, meet Deep Purple, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and Metallica.

“I can already hear the cries of where are AC/DC? Van Halen? Slipknot? Slayer? Alice Cooper? And so many more bands and artists who aren’t in this film. All I can say is sorry. Metal as rock music’s longest survivor has potentially four decades worth of tales to tell.

Our story begins with the origins of the heavy rock sound in 1970’s Britain with Black Sabbath and Deep Purple. It continues with the New Wave of British Heavy Metal and the success and excess of Hair Metal in the 80’s. The story ends with Metallica, who brought metal back to its roots and with the Black Album took the music forward into its third decade.

With the script in place, Lighting Cameraman Robin Cox, Researcher Tony Higgins and I headed out to America on a three city tour to interview the giants of Metal. We started with Black Sabbath in LA and ended with Vince Neil in New York. In between we visited Metallica in San Francisco, where we discovered that the rock lifestyle was still alive and kicking.

At Metallica HQ we set up the equipment in the studio and waited for founding band member Lars Ulrich to show up. He didn’t. It was the first no show of the shoot. Zach, who runs the studio couldn’t have looked more embarrassed as the minutes ticked by, and still no Lars. Eventually James Hetfield showed up – in a huge monster truck – and whispers started to circulate that maybe Lars was a little worse for wear that morning.

We went ahead with James’s interview in the hope that Lars would show up. James definitely had the allure of a rock dude and I found myself quite mesmerised chatting to him for over 2 hours. Finally I had to admit that I didn’t have any more questions and the crew dragged me away. In the meantime the interview with Lars had been re-scheduled for later that day at his home.

Our next appointment was with Deep Purple’s vocalist Ian Gillan in a disused warehouse in the Presidio district of San Fran. Gillan was on a solo tour of the States and was playing a gig that night which he kindly invited us to – result!

Ian sounded a little hoarse and as it happened he’d been out on the lash with Lars the night before. Gillan had been dragged back to Lars’s house and been force-fed film archive of Purple performing Smoke on the Water on repeat until the wee hours. Lars was rumbled.

I felt a twinge of embarrassment when I asked Gillan to tell the story of how “Smoke on the Wate”r came about. He must have answered that question a million times. Still, I had to have the story of one rock’s most enduring anthems and Gillan obliged, resignedly.