Diamond Head (British band)

Diamond Head

Diamond Head are a British heavy metal band formed in 1976 in Stourbridge, England. They were one of the leading members of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM) and are acknowledged by later bands like Metallica and Megadeth as an important early influence.

Band History

Early history

Formed by school friends Brian Tatler and Duncan Scott with Tatler playing on a Cheap Fuzz guitar and Scott on Biscuit Tins. Sean Harris later joined the band after they learned about his vocal abilities while on a school trip, singing Gene Vincent's 1956 hit Be-Bop-A-Lula, and auditioned him in Tatler's bedroom. Bassist Colin Kimberley joined the band some months later (and was in fact Diamond Head's fourth bassist) and the band started to play local gigs in the Black Country area. Even from their early days the band refused to play cover songs and stuck to their own material. The only exception to this was the adding of Black Sabbath's "Paranoid" in 1978 and "This Flight Tonight" plus "Rock The Nation" in 1991. In one interview Brian Tatler reported that they wrote 100 songs before their first studio release. The truth can be proven in this statement by the fact that only one song (It's Electric) from their 1978 set ended up being recorded on their debut.

The band recorded and released self-financed demo tapes in 1977 and 1979. Although only recorded within six hours on a four-track, their unique sound and quality of song writing gained enough attention to tour as support with AC/DC and Iron Maiden. Although a clutch of record companies fought to sign the band, none were willing to fully commit. The fact that the band was at the time managed by Sean Harris' mother (Linda Harris) did not help the band's commercial momentum. So, while other 'New Wave of British Heavy Metal' bands, such as Def Leppard were signed to major labels and were headlining their own tours Diamond Head were growing increasingly impatient and decided that they would release their material through their own label Happy Face Records.

The first release from this label was the 1980 single Shoot Out The Lights (B-side Helpless), having already had a previous single Sweet and Innocent (B-side Streets of Gold) released by Media Records in the same year. In the same year the band also recorded their debut album on Happy Face most commonly known as Lightning to the Nations, although it has never officially had a title, within seven days at The Old Smythy Studio in Worcester, which the band described as 'dead'. This album came in a plain sleeve with no title, having on it only a signature of one of the band members and no track listings. The reason for this was that the band's manager, Reg Fellows, owned a cardboard factory and could produce blank sleeves at a low cost. There were originally only 1000 copies pressed of the album, which were only available at their concerts or through mail-order at cost of £3.50. In fact the only mail-order advertisement appeared in Sounds and ran for four weeks. However, the band did not pay for the ad and ended up being sued. This album has become one of the most sought after record collector items from the time. Later 1000 more copies were pressed, which contained the track listings. Unfortunately, the only original one-and-a-quarter-inch master tapes were lost after the band sent them to the German record company Woolfe Records, and they were never returned. Although Woolfe Records did release the album, which is the version with a picture of the world burning on the front cover. The album was also re-released via Sanctuary Records in 2001, although Brian Tatler had mentioned in an interview in 1982 that it was never going to be re-released.

Living On...Borrowed Time

The success of their first album finally led to a record deal with MCA Records in 1981, and they released the Four Cuts EP, which contained classics such as Call Me and Dead Reckoning. Their 'major label' status afforded them a slot on the Reading festival bill in 1982. They played a stunning set which was recorded by the BBC and later released in 1992 through Raw fruit Records as the 'Friday Rock Show Sessions'. The first MCA LP, Borrowed Time featured a lavish Rodney Matthews illustrated gatefold sleeve, based on the album's Elric theme, which was the most expensive sleeve commissioned by MCA at the time. The investment paid off as it was enthusiastically received and it managed to get to #24 in the UK album charts, enabling the band to perform a full scale UK arena tour, performing large venues such as London's Hammersmith Apollo. Along with Borrowed Time came Diamond Head's third single "In the Heat of the Night", which contained live versions of Play it Loud and Sweet and Innocent (recorded at the Zig-Zag club) as well as an interview with DJ Tommy Vance (although the latter was not available on the 12").

Unfortunately success was short lived, as Diamond Head tried a more experimental follow-up to Borrowed Time, tentatively titled Making Music, and which later became Canterbury, in 1983. The success of this album was initially stalled by the fact that the first 20,000 copies suffered vinyl pressing problems, causing the LP to jump. Secondly many people did not like the progressive direction, most fans were expecting a second Borrowed Time. This was also the first album not to feature Duncan Scott and Colin Kimberly, due to pressure from MCA to have them removed from the band. Mervyn Goldsworthy, formerly of Samson and Robbie France, who later went on to become a founding member and producer of Skunk Anansie, came in on bass and drums respectively. Also introduced to the band was a keyboard player named [[Josh Phillips-Gorse (originally of Procol Harum), this was done as the band had started to move away from their hard rock roots and were experimenting with a great use of synthesisers. Footage of this line up was officially released via the Diamond Head fan club. The footage was of the band's live show at the University of Leicester on February 12th 1984.

Diamond Head opened the 1983 Monsters of Rock festival and started work on what was meant to be their fourth studio album, entitled Flight East. However, MCA did not like the new direction the band were taking and were dropped. Although bootleg copies of this ablum have been floating around that contain five tracks of the album. The bootleg shows that they band had totally changed dirction with the dropping of all the signature features that where the reason for Diamond Head's success, such as guitar solos and heavy dynamic riffs. The band had also taken a religious route in their songwriting, with one of the songs entitled A New Messiah. The bootleg also contains two early demos of Shoot Out The Lights and Streets of Gold and well as three tracks from the Dirty Box Band, who seem to be an attempt of the band reinventing themselves under a new name. After little interest from any other major record label picking up the project, both Tatler and Harris decided to call it a day after thinking that they no longer fitted into the metal scene that was blooming, with the likes of Metallica and Slayer. So the band split up for the first time in 1985.

The reason for the change in the band's musical direction was due to the band being bored of just playing heavy metal and felt that it was time to change, much like Led Zeppelin did. Another change the band made at the time was Brian switching from his Flying V to a Gibson Les Paul, saying that "I think the Les Paul's better, the V's more of a metal guitar. At one stage it was just me and Schenker with them, now the guy in Saxons got one and all the European metal bands like Accept have them".

Reunion and the National Bowl Incident

Metallica's increasing status and their often mentioned influence due to the Diamond Head sound kept the band name relatively prominent and helped back catalogue sales. Inevitably in 1991 Tatler and Harris reformed Diamond Head, and with Karl Wilcox on drums and Eddie Moohan on bass performed a few low key gigs under the name Dead Reckoning. The band also released a new EP called Rising Up which contained Wild on the Streets and Can't Help Myself, but was only available at the concerts and specialised music stores. The same year Sean Harris worked on a song with Dave Mustaine for Megadeth called "Crown Of Worms" - it was released as a B-side to Megadeth's 1994 single Train of Consequences and would also feature on the re-mastered version of Countdown to Extinction.

In 1993, featuring contributions by Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath and Dave Mustaine of Megadeth the band released Death and Progress. However, the band's reunion was short lived, as they were on the verge of splitting up as soon as the record was released. One notable event on the Death and Progress tour, was when Diamond Head opened for Metallica and Megadeth at the National Bowl in Milton Keynes on June 5th 1993. During this show Sean Harris came out dressed as the Grim Reaper, which Brian Tatler reported in the British rock mag Classic Rock, this was Harris' way of saying that NWOBHM was over. Their performance was very underpar, which was due to the pressure of playing live on MTV, the fact Tatler was suffering from shingles at the time and Diamond Head had had very little rehearsal time prior to the gig. This was not the first time that the two bands had appeared on the same bill as each other, as the previous autumn Diamond Head appeared on stage with Metallica at Birmingham's NEC to jointly perform the Diamond Head classics Helpless and Am I Evil?. Footage of this show was released via the Metallica fan club on a video entitled Metallican, which can now be seen on Youtube. In 1994 the band split again and did not reform until 2000.

2000s

In 2000 Harris and Tatler got back together with guitarist Floyd Brennan and performed a series of short acoustic gigs, including a support slot with Budgie, which ended in the release of the First Cuts Acoustic EP. It seemed that Diamond Head were now back in business and the band started touring again doing electric shows with Eddie Moohan and Karl Wilcox back in the band. This tour also saw Diamond Head play their first show in the US, which never happened during their heyday due to management problems. The band even went back into the studio to record a new album, but Harris wished it to be put out under and new name and had lost the desire to perform live. After years of Tatler, and the rest of the band, breaking their backs to accommodate Harris' desires Diamond Head and Sean Harris went their separate ways. Although Harris issued a press release on Blabbermouth.net that said that as far as he was concerned he had as much right over the Diamond Head name as anyone else, and that as far he was concerned he was still in the band.

The Nick Tart Era

However, the rest of the band was determined to continue and after news of work on a new album, fans were surprised to hear of the departure of Sean Harris in 2004 and his replacement by Nick Tart. Brian Tatler is now the only ever-present member in the Diamond Head line-up. The band's next album, All Will Be Revealed (the title is apparently referring to Sean Harris), was released in 2005, but was very different from their early material. To promote this album they were fortunate enough to have Dave Mustaine to invite them on tour with Megadeth, who'd also re-formed after Mustaine had recovered enough to be able to play guitar again. Diamond Head also headlined a celebration of 25 years of NWOBHM at the London Astoria, supported by Witchfynde, Bronze, Praying Mantis and Jaguar. This concert was later released as a live CD entilted It's Electric and also the band's first DVD, To the Devil His Due in 2006. During this tour the band's guitarist Adrain Mills left the band and was replaced with Andy 'Abbz' Abberley, who was previously in traditional heavy metal band Rekuiem with drummer Karl Wilcox.

The band are still going strong and have just released their sixth album, What's In Your Head, through Cargo records with Dave 'Shirt' Nicholls, who has produced albums with bands such as Slipknot and The Wildhearts. The Japanese version of this album came with an extra track entitled This is War.

On October 15th 2007 Metal Mind Productions released Borrowed Time and Canterbury on CD format, with bonus tracks. This is the first time that these albums have been released on CD outside of Japan. However, the release has been limited to 2000 copies.

The band are about to play thier first gig in Japan on February 17th at Shibuya O-East in Tokyo.

Influence on Metallica

Diamond Head are probably most famous among heavy metal fans for their influence on Metallica. Metallica acknowledge them as a very important early influence and have often covered Diamond Head songs at gigs. Harris was even asked to join Metallica in the 1980s but turned the band down. The song "Helpless" was rumored to be a song Lars Ulrich forced the band to struggle through as an unrehearsed encore in the early days of their formation. "Sucking My Love", "Am I Evil" and "The Prince" were also common live covers at that time. The earliest known actual recording of these songs exists as a rehearsal demo recorded at then-bassist Ron McGovney's house in March of 1982. The Metal Up Your Ass live demo, recorded in November of that year, featured a live rendition of "Am I Evil." "The Prince" was also played, but the tape ran out too soon to catch it. The song would see another demo release as part of the Horsemen Of The Apocalypse demo in 1983. "Sucking My Love" exists on various bootlegs that have been circulating since 1982 along with a recording on the early demo No Life Til Leather.

The first official release of "Am I Evil" came in 1983 as part of the Creeping Death EP, paired with another NWOBHM classic "Blitzkrieg," by the band of the same name. The two songs were also included in the first pressing of the Kill 'Em All LP when it was re-released by Elektra Records.

"Helpless" would see a proper release with Garage Days Re-Revisited in 1987, and "The Prince" was included as a B-side to the Harvester Of Sorrow single.

The official recordings of "Helpless," "Am I Evil," and "The Prince" would also be featured on Metallica's 2-CD Garage Inc. compilation, a collection of numerous other cover songs that the band had played over the years. The first CD in the set was newly recorded covers, one of which was Diamond Head's "It's Electric."

Line-up

Current

• Nick Tart - vocals (formerly of The Outcasts, Alabama Bombshell, Notorious, Life)
• Brian Tatler - lead guitar (Radio Moscow, Quill)
• Andy "Abbz" Abberley - rhythm guitar
• Eddie Moohan - bass guitar
• Karl Wilcox - drums

Past members

• Sean Harris
• Colin Kimberley
• Duncan Scott
• Floyd Brennan
• Mervyn Goldsworthy
• Robbie France
• Adrian Mills
• Josh Phillips-Gorse
• Dave Williamson
• Pete Vuckovic

Discography

Albums

• Lightning to the Nations also known as The White Album (1980)
• Borrowed Time (1982)
• Canterbury (1983)
• Death and Progress (1993)
• All Will Be Revealed (2005)
• What's In Your Head (2007)

Live Albums

• The Friday Rock Show Sessions / Live at Reading (1992)
• Evil Live (1994)
• Live - In the Heat of the Night (2000)
• It's Electric (2006)

Singles and EPs

• Shoot Out the Lights(1980)
• Sweet and Innocent (1980)
• Waited Too Long (1981)
• Diamond Lights EP (1981)
• "In the Heat of the Night" (1982)
• Four Cuts EP (1982)
• Makin' Music (1983)
• Sucking My Love (Live) (1983)
• Wild on the Streets) (1991)
• Acoustic Four Cuts EP (2002)

Compilations or alternative versions

• Am I Evil (1987)
• Behold the Beginning (1991)
• Singles (1992)
• To Heaven from Hell (1997)
• Lightning to the Nations (1997)
• The Best of Diamond Head (1999)
• The Diamond Head Anthology: Am I Evil? (2004)

DVDs

• To the Devil His Due (November 21, 2006)

External links

• Official website