12 Metal Bands Your Parents Warned You About in the 80s

Metal bands had their heyday in the 80s and, believe it or not, controversy also helped. These were the days of the “satanic panic” and a lot of parents were concerned about metal music. A lot of people, particularly in the United States, were even attempting to ban some of these bands from playing and selling records.

However, as the saying goes, any publicity is good publicity. Some of these bands actually benefitted from this stunt. Moreover, kids always want to listen to the things their parents don’t allow. Here are ten bands, in no particular order, that scared parents in the 80s.

1. Slayer

Possibly one of the first metal bands that comes to mind when thinking about this topic. The thrash metal band was formed in 1981 and from almost the beginning until now (they just reunited after a 5-year hiatus) they have been heavily criticized for different situations. It can be argued that the entirety of the band’s history has had controversy.

At the beginning of Slayer, guitarists Kerry King and Jeff Hanneman were in charge of the lyrics. This is key because they deal with topics such as anti-religion, serial killers, genocide, torture, etc. This was coupled with Slayer’s satanic imagery as well as their aggressive sound. With that mix, it is logical to think that a parent in the 80s would not want their child to listen to this band.

Moreover, earlier albums like “Show No Mercy” and “Hell Awaits” had strong satanic lyrics. While this was all in jest (vocalist Tom Araya is Catholic), that caused them issues. And “Reign in Blood” showed the evolution to crimes, murders, etc.

2. W.A.S.P.

The original image of W.A.S.P. was very much glam-oriented and their music had the noise and chaos that characterized that subgenre. At that time, it was impossible not to attract people’s attention. Although the band was formed in 1982, it was not until 1984 that they were able to release their first album.

The first track was called Animal (F*** Like a Beast), which clearly has an impact on any parent. The song received a lot of criticism and the band had to leave it off the album and only sell it through independent labels. Also, the staging at that time was “eye-catching” since, for example, they drank blood from a human skull.

Leader Blackie Lawless would eventually take the band to a darker, more serious direction. However, a lot of people got to know W.A.S.P. because of these controversies. It worked as free publicity at the time but the band’s more serious efforts deserve a lot more recognition.

3. Iron Maiden

By the 1980s, Iron Maiden had been in the music business for a few years. However, when the band released “The Number of the Beast” in 1982, they received a lot of criticism that somewhat changed the general public’s image of Iron Maiden. Interestingly enough, the album was the first with Bruce Dickinson as vocalist.

The album’s artwork and name were quickly rejected by some religious groups who urged people to destroy it. They began to be considered Satanic. The band themselves took it upon themselves to clarify the situation, explaining the origin of their lyrics, which had no anti-Christian inclination or anything like that. However, the album became the band’s most successful up to that point and catapulted them to stardom.

Moreover, it is interesting that Iron Maiden never dealt with Satanism in their music. While this record might suggest otherwise, this has never been the band’s lyrical direction. Therefore, this moment speaks of the misconceptions the 80s had with some bands. However, it is likely that Iron Maiden didn’t mind the free publicity.

4. Motley Crue

Motley Crue was part of the first group of metal bands that began to form the glam metal movement in the early 80s in the United States. The reception of this movement was not very good on the part of the more conservative part of society. These movements found in these bands an image that was not to their liking beyond the musical aspect.

To this must be added that Motley Crue has been characterized by having members whose personalities are a bit hedonistic, which is not usually liked. This has been reflected in the large number of clashes they have had with other bands.

5. Mercyful Fate and King Diamond

Mercyful Fate was born from the hand of King Diamond in 1981 and, despite several hiatuses, is still active. The Danish band, in its beginnings, did touch on themes related to the occult and Satanism, which is why it did not have much approval from Christian movements in different parts of the world.

In addition, the general image of the band and of King Diamond in particular does not leave a feeling that could be pleasant for parents. Moreover, once the singer became a solo artist, he kept his Satanic beliefs but the lyrics became more focused on horror. That didn’t stop parents and organizations from censoring him, though.

6. Ozzy Osbourne

Well, in this particular case, this isn’t about metal bands, but just about an individual. Of course, that individual is Ozzy and explaining why he was not liked by parents in the 80s is not a very complex thing. Besides the relationship that was always sought between rock and Satanism, in 1981, Ozzy cut off the head of a dove when he was supposed to release it in a form of peace.

A year later he would do the same with a bat. In 1984, a teenager committed suicide listening to an Ozzy song. This is not to mention the lifestyle of excess that characterized him at that time. This is just a brief summary of why the Englishman was not considered an appropriate image for children according to his parents.

In many ways, Ozzy became the boogeyman of the 80s music scene. But that is something that he nailed perfectly.

7. Judas Priest

Judas Priest is an institution in the world of metal, but in the 80s they were subject to criticism that affected their image a bit. In 1980, the English band released “British Steel“, one of the most successful albums of their extensive career.

The album had songs like “Breaking the Law” that, within some extremely conservative groups, was interpreted as an incitement to vandalism. It was also viewed as a call to disrespect the norms of society. That didn’t seem to affect the band in terms of their output and how they went about things.

8. Twisted Sister

Despite being one of the pioneering metal bands of the 70s, Twisted Sister‘s greatest peak of popularity came in the 80s. It was in 1984, with the release of the album “Stay Hungry”, that the band achieved international fame. Hits like “We’re Not Gonna Take It” or “I Wanna Rock” have cultural icons in the music business.

Despite Twisted Sister‘s success and how catchy their songs were, the band’s image and how loud they could be did not help them to be liked by parents. People only have to see how Dee Snider looked in the 80s and how he behaved on stage to understand that. Snider also had a memorable audit with the PMRC in the decade

9. Venom

 

Venom‘s influence on extreme and thrash metal is undeniable. An entire subgenre of metal is named after their 1982 album, “Black Metal“, which says a lot. It is common for metal bands to be associated with Satanism and the occult by those outside of this world who do not see a little further.

However, in the case of Venom, their songs did deal with these themes. As the band always clarified, it was for entertainment reasons, something similar to what horror movies do. Despite this, in 1982, their song “Possessed“, from the album of the same name, entered a list of “banned” songs by the Parents Music Resource Center.

Furthermore, the band’s sound was raw and explosive. It is difficult to find a band in the early 80s with a more extreme music approach. In that regard, that also helped to scare parents at the time. The heavy riffs and screechy vocals made for a terrifying combo. In many ways, Venom changed the game for extreme metal bands as a whole.

10. Def Leppard

In the early 1980s, Def Leppard began to gain prominence after being together for a few years. In 1981, they released “High ‘n’ Dry“, an album that was generally well-received. However, some of its songs did not please everyone.

The eponymous song “High ‘n’ Dry (Saturday Night)” was also included on the Parents Music Resource Center’s list of “banned” or “inappropriate” songs. The committee argued that the song promoted excessive alcohol consumption. This made Def Leppard a band that wasn’t very popular with parents.

The case of this band is quite interesting because they went from heavy metal to a more pop-oriented sound. A few years later, most kids in the 80s would be listening to Def Leppard thanks to the “Hysteria” record.

11. Black Sabbath

Black Sabbath are often credited as the originators of heavy metal, and from the start they were shrouded in controversy. Formed in 1968, their early songs like “Black Sabbath” (1970) used occult imagery, church bell sounds, and ominous lyrics that alarmed many listeners. In one early incident, a nurse died by suicide with the Paranoid album on her turntable, sparking outrage and a moral panic over the band’s music. Throughout the 1980s, the mere name “Black Sabbath” was enough to worry parents caught up in the Satanic Panic – TV programs about devil worship even pointed out if a troubled teen was a Black Sabbath fan as if it were evidence of evil​.

Religious groups and PTA meetings frequently targeted the band for supposedly promoting Satanism, even though the band members insisted it was all theatrical. Black Sabbath’s dark image (upside-down crosses in artwork, gloomy lyrics about doom and war) made them an easy scapegoat for society’s fears. They were even singled out by the Parents Music Resource Center for a song about drinking (ironically, “Trashed”)​. All of this kept Black Sabbath in the crosshairs of worried parents, who saw them as the embodiment of heavy metal’s threat – a reputation the band wore like a badge of honor as pioneers of the genre.

12. AC/DC

AC/DC might be a bluesy hard-rock band at heart, but in the 1980s they became entangled in the era’s Satanic Panic in a big way. The Australian rockers had long played with devilish imagery – guitarist Angus Young would don devil horns onstage, and their 1979 album Highway to Hell cheekily embraced a demonic theme.

This stagecraft was mostly tongue-in-cheek, but not everyone got the joke. In 1985, AC/DC was dragged into notoriety when the press linked them to the crimes of serial killer Richard Ramirez (the “Night Stalker”), a self-professed Satanist who was obsessed with their song “Night Prowler.” After a suspect’s AC/DC hat was found at a crime scene, sensational media reports accused the band of inspiring murder​.

Rumors even spread that AC/DC stood for “Anti-Christ/Devil’s Child” – a completely false claim that the band had to publicly deny​. As America’s Satanic Panic peaked, concerned parents and preachers zeroed in on AC/DC, conflating the band’s hellish album titles and stage antics with genuine devil-worship.

The band, of course, insisted it was just rock ‘n’ roll theater (Angus famously explained the name actually came from his sister’s sewing machine)​. Nevertheless, mid-’80s parents looked warily at AC/DC’s records, fearing that the hard-rock boogie of these Aussies hid a pathway straight to the devil – a reputation the band found both absurd and perversely fitting for an album called Highway to Hell.

13. KISS

By the 1980s, KISS had already spent a decade as one of rock’s most flamboyant and controversial acts – and a persistent bogeyman for parents and pastors. In their 1970s heyday, KISS performed in outrageous black-and-white face makeup with Gene Simmons spitting blood and breathing fire in his demonic “The Demon” persona. This over-the-top spectacle led to wild urban legends about the band. Perhaps the most famous rumor claimed that “KISS” was actually an acronym for “Knights In Satan’s Service,” fueling the idea that the band members were secret Satanists leading kids astray.

The band has repeatedly denied this, but the rumor was so widespread that even KISS’s own fan club newsletter addressed it in 1979, debunking it.) Parents during the Satanic Panic era often took these rumors seriously – if your kid had a KISS poster, some worried it was practically an altar to the devil. On top of that, Gene Simmons’ freaky onstage antics inspired other tall tales, like the apocryphal story that he had a cow’s tongue grafted onto his own. In truth, KISS was more about shock value and merchandising than the occult, and by 1983 they even shed their makeup to boost waning popularity.

But for many uneasy moms and dads in the ’80s, memories of KISS’s fire-breathing “Demon” and those Satanic acronym rumors kept the band filed under “dangerous.” The irony? KISS mostly sang about rock ‘n’ roll and party anthems – but the image had taken on a life of its own, scaring parents long after the band had moved on.

14. Alice Cooper

Long before the ’80s metal boom, Alice Cooper earned the title of the original “shock rocker” – and he was still terrifying parents during the 1980s. Alice (born Vincent Furnier) had a theatrical stage show featuring guillotines, electric chairs, snakes, and plenty of fake blood. He famously thrived on controversy. In the early 1970s he’d been blamed for everything from corrupting youth to (unfairly) killing a live chicken onstage​, and was even banned from performing in some places after outraged petitions by moral watchdogs​. By the time the Satanic Panic rolled around in the ’80s, Cooper was a veteran at rattling the establishment – and fundamentalist groups still had him in their sights.

Ultra-conservative Christian organizations in America branded Alice Cooper a Satanist, launching a modern-day witch-hunt against him​. This was quite ironic, as Alice was the son and grandson of pastors and has said, “I never did anything onstage that was anti-Christian… They just found an easy target.”​. Indeed, Alice’s onstage persona was a villainous character, but it was all for show – he wasn’t actually promoting devil worship.

That didn’t stop parents in the ’80s from warning about Alice Cooper like he was the devil incarnate. His comeback tours in the mid-’80s (complete with the guillotine act and ghoulish makeup) drew protests from the same kind of folks who later went after heavy metal. Cooper’s attitude?

The more they tried to ban him, the more curious kids became. He later quipped that in the old days “if parents hated us, we were on the right track.” Alice Cooper’s legacy is living proof that sometimes the outrage only makes the forbidden fruit more delicious to teens – and in the ’80s, he remained a potent symbol of rock rebellion that kept parents sweating.