Metal Heart

Metal Heart is the sixth studio album by German heavy metal band Accept, released in 1985. Although the group had recorded before at Dierks-Studios, this was the first album produced by Dieter Dierks himself. It marked the return of guitarist Jörg Fischer after a two year absence, with Herman Frank having been his replacement. This album was a cautious attempt to crack the lucrative American market with more accessible songcraft and emphasis on hooks and melodies. Although critically panned at the time, today Metal Heart is often considered by fans as one of the band's best records.[3] It contains several of their classic songs such as "Metal Heart" and "Living for Tonite". The band also makes a detour into jazz metal territory with the unusual song "Teach Us to Survive".

This article is about the album by Accept. For other uses, see Metal Heart (disambiguation).

Metal Heart
Studio album by
Accept
Released4 March 1985 (1985-03-04)
RecordedOctober–December 1984
StudioDierks Studios, Stommeln, Cologne, Germany
GenreHeavy metal
Length40:53
LabelRCA (Europe)
Portrait (US)
ProducerDieter Dierks
Accept chronology
Balls to the Wall
(1983)		 Metal Heart
(1985)		 Kaizoku-Ban
(1985)
Singles from Metal Heart
  1. "Midnight Mover" / "Wrong Is Right"
    Released: March 1985
  2. "Screaming for a Love-Bite" / "Wrong Is Right"
    Released: 1985
  3. "Midnight Mover" / "Screaming for a Love-Bite"
    Released: 1985 (promo)
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[1]
Collector's Guide to Heavy Metal9/10[2]

Album information

Wolf Hoffmann explained the concept behind the album: "We had read an article that someone was working on an artificial heart and that one day everybody is going to have a computerized heart. It talked, in general terms, about how more and more of humanity gets sucked out of the daily life and more and more replaced by machine. It's not a new thing now, but then it was new. Humans versus machine, was the general vibe of the record." The original cover concept was for a hologram of a metal heart, until budget considerations resulted in a traditional cover. But fittingly for the futuristic theme of the album, Metal Heart was the first Accept album to be digitally mastered.[4]

Hoffmann recalls Dieter Dierks as a very demanding producer: "We would do some pieces several dozen times trying to capture what he had in his mind for a specific section," adding: "Each song we tried different combinations of guitars, mic'ing and even strings!"[4]

The song "Metal Heart" is well known for containing the cover of two famous classical themes: Tchaikovsky's "Slavonic March" (in the intro) and Beethoven's "Für Elise" in the main riff and solo. This song was covered in 1998 by Norwegian black metal band Dimmu Borgir for their album Godless Savage Garden. "I had no idea it would become as popular as it did," Hoffmann remembers of his contribution to the song.[4]

"Midnight Mover", about a drug dealer, is one of the more commercial songs on the album and was selected for a memorable music video that anticipates the bullet time filming technique by a full decade. "Just ahead of our time again!" jests Hoffmann.[4]

Despite the more commercially appealing sound of the album, it fell short of the sales figures of its predecessor Balls to the Wall in America. Udo remembers the Breaker through Metal Heart era as the time when the band got along best together.[5] Thus this would turn out to be the last album of Accept's golden era, as cracks were soon to appear in the band's solidarity.

The 2002 digitally remastered CD edition includes two live bonus tracks, "Love Child" and "Living for Tonite", both taken from the live EP Kaizoku-Ban. The 2013 release from UK based record label Hear No Evil Recordings contains the live EP itself.

Track listing

All lyrics and music written by Accept and Deaffy.

Side one
No.TitleLength
1."Metal Heart"5:25
2."Midnight Mover"3:07
3."Up to the Limit"4:45
4."Wrong Is Right"3:08
5."Screaming for a Love-Bite"4:05
Side two
No.TitleLength
6."Too High to Get It Right"3:47
7."Dogs on Leads"4:24
8."Teach Us to Survive"3:33
9."Living for Tonite"3:34
10."Bound to Fail"5:05
Total length:40:53
2002 bonus tracks
No.TitleLength
1."Love Child" (Live, Taken from Kaizoku-Ban)4:49
2."Living for Tonite" (Live, Taken from Kaizoku-Ban)3:50
Total length:49:32

Credits
Band members
Production
  • Dieter Dierks – producer, arrangements
  • Gerd Rautenbach – engineer
  • Mike Kashnitz, Peter Brandt – assistant engineers
  • Bob Ludwig – mastering at Masterdisk, New York
  • Gaby "Deaffy" Hauke – management, cover concept
  • Dirksen & Sohn Modellwerkstâtten, Stahl, Werbefotografie – cover art

Charts
Chart Peak
position
Canadian Albums (RPM100)[6] 86
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100)[7] 13
Norwegian Albums (VG-lista)[8] 9
Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan)[9] 4
Swiss Albums (Schweizer Hitparade)[10] 14
UK Albums (OCC)[11] 50
US Billboard 200[12] 94
gollark: The screens are excellently sized for it though.
gollark: Like showing ads to bricks.
gollark: Yes.
gollark: Humans typically have greater depth than bricks. But I don't have a brick on hand or a ruler to verify.
gollark: You're paying for things *with shifts in your attitudes and perceptions*.

References
  1. Rivadavia, Eduardo. "Accept Metal Heart review". AllMusic. Rovi Corporation. Retrieved 31 January 2013.
  2. Popoff, Martin (1 November 2005). The Collector's Guide to Heavy Metal: Volume 2: The Eighties. Burlington, Ontario, Canada: Collector's Guide Publishing. pp. 8–9. ISBN 978-1894959315.
  3. Popoff, Martin. "Accept - Balls to the Wall". Martin Popoff.com. Archived from the original on 6 May 2006. Retrieved 30 January 2013.
  4. Hoffmann, Wolf. "Metal Heart". Wolf Hoffmann official website. Archived from the original on 11 June 2000. Retrieved 31 January 2013.
  5. Stefanis, John (May 2007). "Interview: UDO Dirkschneider". Get Ready to Rock.com. Retrieved 31 January 2013.
  6. "Top Albums/CDs - Volume 42, No. 8, May 04 1985". Library and Archives Canada. 4 May 1985. Archived from the original on 10 July 2015. Retrieved 10 June 2014.
  7. "Officialcharts.de – Accept – Metal Heart". GfK Entertainment Charts. Retrieved 10 June 2014.
  8. "Norwegiancharts.com – Accept – Metal Heart". Hung Medien. Retrieved 10 June 2014.
  9. "Swedishcharts.com – Accept – Metal Heart". Hung Medien. Retrieved 10 June 2014.
  10. "Swisscharts.com – Accept – Metal Heart". Hung Medien. Retrieved 10 June 2014.
  11. "Accept | Artist | Official Charts". UK Albums Chart. Retrieved 10 June 2014.
  12. "Accept Chart History (Billboard 200)". Billboard. Retrieved 10 June 2014.
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