Power ballad

Power ballad is the name given to a certain genre of songs that were frequently included on heavy metal albums in the 1970s and 1980s. These songs often explored various sentimental themes such as yearning and need, love and loss. In their generally confessional nature they were positioned as oppositional to metal's more usual lyrical themes of hedonism, violence, or the occult. Ironically, a power ballad is really not a ballad at all in the defined sense, but is instead a love song. In the years when record companies first considered the marketability of power ballads, they probably figured that the phrase power ballad was more accessible and appealing than the phrase metal love song.

Typically, a power ballad begins with a soft keyboard or acoustic guitar introduction. Heavy drums and distorted electric guitars don't enter into the arrangement until, perhaps, the chorus. The electric guitar parts usually take the form of simple root/fifth chords which sustain until the next chord change, but screaming, melodic guitar solos are also important markers of this genre. The interplay throughout the arrangement between "clean" timbres and distorted ones is crucial to the creation of emotional tension in the power ballad aesthetic.

Power ballads were often crafted in hope of scoring a Top Forty hit, sometimes at the insistence of a record company and written only grudgingly by band members. However in recent years, power ballads have been re-imagined (as has much of 1980s culture) as something "authentic" rather than something "manufactured" (i.e. pushed onto bands by record labels). For instance, VH1's advertising copy for its top-25 countdown show on power ballads states: "These bands had a fantastic sense for what their fans wanted. In most cases their record labels and managers didn't want them to do these songs." In any event, power ballads were often a band's most (or only) commercially successful songs. Because of the perceived superficiality of their sentiment, though, power ballads were consistently despised by music critics, who rejected the way metal musicians actively borrowed the musical codes normally reserved for more "authentic" styles of rock.

Power ballads originated in the 1970s with arena rock bands like Styx, Boston, REO Speedwagon and Journey; indeed, the first power ballad may have been Styx's "Lady" from its 1973 album Styx II. Later development of the style from the mid-1980s to the early 1990s is exemplified by Scorpions' "Still Loving You," Dokken's "Alone Again," Night Ranger's "Sister Christian," Mötley Crüe's "Home Sweet Home," Cinderella's "Nobody's fool", Guns n Roses' "Dont Cry",Whitesnake's "Is This Love," Van Halen's "Love Walks In," Poison's "Every Rose Has Its Thorn," Aerosmith's "Angel," Cinderella's "Don't Know What You Got (Till It's Gone)" and Warrant's "I Saw Red." For some 1970s arena rock artists, the power ballad was also responsible for helping to revive their careers in the 1980s; examples include Heart's "These Dreams" and Cheap Trick's "The Flame". And is still used to this day from artists like Avril Lavigne's "I'm With You," Lifehouse's "Hanging By A Moment," Velvet Revolver's "Fall To Pieces," Kelly Clarkson's "Because Of You," Nickelback's "Someday," Slipknot "Vermillion Pt. 2," Stone Sour "Bother," Black Label Society "In This River," and Staind's "It's Been A While." Even Thrash bands like Metallica had a few with "Nothing Else Matters," "The Unfogiven," "Fade To Black," and "Welcome Home (Sanitarium)," Testament's "The Ballad," Metal Church's "Watch the Children Pray," and Pantera with "Cemetary Gates," "This Love," and "Planet Caravan."

Occasionally, the term power ballad is applied more generally to earlier rock songs which start slowly and quietly and then gradually crescendo to a powerful, climactic end. This usage is far less common, however, and seems to be a retroactive application of the genre's name to pre-1980s album-oriented rock songs such as Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven," Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Free Bird," and Aerosmith's "Dream On", which vaguely fit the power ballad aesthetic.

Generally, a power (or rock) ballad is considered suitable for slow dancing because of its slow beat.

VH1's top 25 power ballads

1. Open Arms - Journey
2. I Don't Want to Miss a Thing - Aerosmith
3. Beth - KISS
4. With Arms Wide Open - Creed
5. I'll Be There for You - Bon Jovi
6. November Rain - Guns N' Roses
7. Every Rose Has Its Thorn - Poison
8. Love Bites - Def Leppard
9. Sister Christian - Night Ranger
10. Is This Love - Whitesnake
11. Nothing Else Matters - Metallica
12. Home Sweet Home - Mötley Crüe
13. Again - Lenny Kravitz
14. Keep on Loving You - REO Speedwagon
15. I Remember You - Skid Row
16. How You Remind Me - Nickelback
17. These Dreams - Heart
18. Don't Know What You Got (Till It's Gone) - Cinderella
19. Only God Knows Why - Kid Rock
20. Love Song - Tesla
21. Silent Lucidity - Queensrÿche
22. Still Loving You - Scorpions
23. It's Been Awhile - Staind
24. When It's Love - Van Halen
25. Close My Eyes Forever - Lita Ford with Ozzy Osbourne

See also

• List of power ballads