HEAVY MUSIC HISTORY: Avenged Sevenfold – Avenged Sevenfold

When AVENGED SEVENFOLD opened their fourth, self-titled album with an organ solo, few could’ve guessed they would go onto greatness, but by the time the six-minute prog-country odyssey and album closer Dear God serenades you to sleep, there’s no doubt the seeds of their festival-headlining dominance a decade later were well and truly sewn.

Sure, 2005’s City Of Evil’s shift to a clean-singing, alt-metal approach saw them steal Best New Artist from under RIHANNA and JAMES BLUNT’s noses at the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards. They even found themselves knocking at the door of charts at home and over the pond, but they were missing the something special all great bands of our time need.

Sitting controversially as the middle child of their messy discography, AVENGED SEVENFOLD’s self-titled stripped away the metalcore that made them an underground sensation on Sounding The Seventh Trumpet and Waking The Fallen. Twisting City Of Evil’s trad-metal stylings, primary songwriter James ‘The Rev’ Sullivan sent the band spiralling into new worlds; outlaw country (Gunslinger), symphonic prog (A Little Piece Of Heaven), and barnstorming radio rock (Afterlife, Brompton Cocktail) which not only saw them invade the Billboard 200’s Top 5, but paved the way for the band they’d later become on 2014’s Hail To The King and 2016’s The Stage.

Despite splitting critical opinion more than pledging allegiance to pop-era BRING ME THE HORIZON does friendships, self-titled stands out 15 years later as the album AVENGED SEVENFOLD graduated from being a bunch of heavy metal kids rebelling against their parents to stadium-sized songwriters who could shred riffs and write symphonies simultaneously. Despite reviews comparing them to a ‘poor man’s HARDCORE SUPERSTAR’ and suggesting the album was “unoriginal, overlong…and riddled with banality”, self-titled’s willingness to experiment is what ultimately set AVENGED SEVENFOLD on the path they’ve trodden since.

The Rev’s role as conductor of their gothic orchestra is a seismic earthquake felt throughout, yet the tremors felt years later is palpable. Little pieces of their puzzle can be heard on every album they’ve released since, and in the sound of countless bands popping up, too. Opener Critical Acclaim is the first-time vocalist M. Shadows and guitarist Zacky Vengeance co-wrote together, leading to a partnership that practically shaped their stadium-sized ascent; Almost Easy saw them all sing simultaneously to create the chorus’ iconic choir-like roar; and A Little Piece Of Heaven saw them lean into Broadway showtunes, replacing their signature guitars with orchestral strings and horns for a symphonic showstopper. If you ever needed proof the Butterfly Effect is real, simply skip over to 2016’s The Stage to hear the signals just under a decade before.

No other song is as integral to the legacy of self-titled as A Little Piece Of Heaven is. Arguably the most ambitious song AVENGED SEVENFOLD had penned to date, it’s also The Rev’s crown jewel composition. Originally known as ‘Big Bear’ after the cabin they were writing the record in, the demo initially had The Rev doing all the vocals and playing every instrument. It’s easy to suggest that AVENGED SEVENFOLD simply wouldn’t be who they are today had The Rev not been allowed to flesh out his gothic fantasy into the eight-minute opus it became.

The Rev was just 26 when he wrote the songs that became self-titled. Few artists muster up the ambition he had, let alone possess the ability to bring it to life like Frankenstein’s monster. If there’s any what if questions revisiting self-titled leaves you with, it’s just where The Rev would’ve taken AVENGED SEVENFOLD had he not died two years later during the sessions for 2010’s Nightmare. Fiction, given to the band by The Rev just three days before he died, undeniably hints at what could’ve been – its haunting piano-lines and lack of guitar (the only track by the band to not feature guitar at all at the time) suggest they’d only have sunken further into the proggy wilderness of gothic showtunes.

The Rev’s vision for AVENGED SEVENFOLD, which he blueprinted on their self-titled record and began to prototype with Fiction, can be heard throughout their releases since his death. Whilst it was there in Nightmare, you could argue the harmonies and hooks, the double-bass thunder and stadium riffage that gave birth to the greats – GUNS N’ ROSES’ Appetite For Destruction (1987), METALLICA’s The Black Album (1991) – truly came alive on 2013’s Hail To The King.

Of course, without Nightmare, they may not have got there. AVENGED SEVENFOLD honoured their fallen brother by recruiting his favourite drummer – DREAM THEATER’s Mike Portnoy – to help create the world he envisioned. Speaking in a video on his YouTube channel, Portnoy explained “it was a very, very emotional album with the guys, and I was honoured to come in and bring The Rev’s drum parts to life…there’s a lot of moments of me in there mixed in with what The Rev had intended to do if he had lived.”

It’s clear from the crackling fire and tolling bells, the atmospheric drumbeats made for festival openers, that ushers in Hail To The King’s opening number, Shepherd Of Fire, that the vision both The Rev and his fellow bandmates had can be directly traced back to Self-Titled. Whether it’s Critical Acclaim’s explosive introduction into your eardrums, or Brompton Cocktail’s heavy metal pomp, the bare bones are there.

Of course, whatever your feelings are on 2016’s The Stage, one thing is for certain: it’s lineage can also be traced directly back to the self-titled record. A prog-metal concept album about artificial intelligence and the self-destruction of society as we know it, The Stage took the storytelling narration that A Little Piece Of Heaven and Dear God dabbled in, threw it into a blender with Critical Acclaim’s politically-minded social commentary, and soaked every song in its resulting sauce.

Having headlined Download Festival, among so many others across the world since, and despite having not released a new record since 2016, AVENGED SEVENFOLD arguably sowed the seeds on their self-titled album for the band they’ve become today. It might be the troubling middle child, but it’s also one of their proudest and most beloved moments.

Avenged Sevenfold was originally released on October 30th, 2007 via Warner Records.

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