Day 76: Dharma For One

AKA That Time a Blues Band Wrote a Heavy Metal Song Before Black Sabbath Came Out

Hi again everyone!

Today, I'm gonna be talking about Dharma For One. This song was originally from Jethro Tull's first album, This Was, released in 1968. This album predates Black Sabbath's first album by around 2 years- though technically, the version of the song I'm talking about was recorded in mid-1970, so that alternate title is a bit misleading. I'll be talking specifically about the live version from the Isle of Wight Festival, which I'll link here for reference.

Now, I'm not sure when they originally wrote this version of the song- it may have been any time between 1968 and 1970. The earliest recording I've seen of it was August 1970, but it's entirely possible it was written earlier. Why do I call this a heavy metal song? Well, let's break down some parts of the song to examine.

The main guitar riff, from what I can hear, is essentially a series of eighth notes with the string muted (or whatever the proper term is- basically holding the string so it can't properly vibrate, rather than leaving it open or pressing a fret), followed by two syncopated quarter notes. Add some distortion and this riff wouldn't sound at all out of place in a generic heavy metal song.

The song is actually largely a drum song- from what I've seen, it's usually around 10 minutes long, with a bit under half of the time spent on a drum solo. The percussion is very erratic, fast, and loud, as one might expect of heavy metal.

The vocals are, to the best of my knowledge, in a minor key, with lots of things being shouted out between lines. The lyrics are also quite short- I believe they vary with the version, but even then the longest would only be 3 or 4 verses, with 2-3 lines per verse. There are other Jethro Tull songs with a similar length, but they tend to be under 2 minutes, not near 10.

I honestly believe, if somebody were to cover this song and not change anything musically, but distort the guitars and make the singing more aggressive, it could easily pass as heavy metal. This is pretty interesting to me- as I said, the song could be as old as 1968, which is well before heavy metal of this sort became popular. Of course, I don't mean to imply that this was the first heavy metal song or anything- there's a lot of debate about what that would actually be, and I think it depends too heavily on your definition of heavy metal (for instance- Helter Skelter also came out in 1968, and some would probably call that metal). It's the earliest I've heard that fits this specific genre of metal though- though again, that's fudging some definitions.

There are lots of videos on YouTube comparing black metal to surf music- the only difference is the distortion, and possibly down-tuning of guitars, but musically they're very similar. Definitely, if the topic interests you, give it a search- the videos are pretty funny. It's also neat to see how the music varies, and how your opinion of it varies- I find the surf music enjoyable, but not the black metal, which leads me to the conclusion that distortion is a big no for me.

Anyways, that's gonna be it for today- hopefully you found this interesting! Let me know if you know any other songs like this- early, low-distortion metal is a pretty cool genre.