The details are fuzzy, but the image in my memory is clear. I’m a young kid up way past my bedtime. Watching TV. Music videos. This video comes on and the music is loud and fast. There’s this ugly dude singing upwards into a microphone. Something about an iron fist. I didn’t know what to make of it, I didn’t know who it was, but it left an impact on me.

I liked it.

It was some years before I knew that was Motörhead. Without question, one of the icons of rock. While the music may be fast, hard, and loud, at the heart it’s just a lot of blues and soul both musically and lyrically. It’s not some “technical virtuoso heavy metal”; when the band hits the stage Lemmy says “We are Motörhead, and we play rock and roll!”. And rock and roll they do, with everything louder than everyone else.