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Is O:M Metal? Yes.
Prog? Definitely not.
Brilliant? Of course it is.

Heathen wrote:branding O:M as hard rock is plain wrong, but tagging it commercial can only be described as an aberration and a true mindcrime. It's a masterpiece both lyrically and songwriting-wise (and especially vocally) and yet obviously all you can hear on the record are the catchy choruses. Your horizons are so far away from one another that you have no clue what happens in between.

No one is arguing "classic" status here. That's completely opinion based. However, so far all of the examples you have given to try and convince me that this is apparently a Metal record have not been aspects of what defines a genre.

LethylSteel wrote:"Operation Mindcrime" isn't Hard Rock ... different kind of Metal but it's Metal thru and thru. If you say AC/DC is typical Hard Rock and O/M too than yiou can clearly hear the difference why it something called Hard Rock because it's basically (heavier) Rock, which OM isn't.

As for Black Metal term, everything that had blackish lyrics in the 80's fitted the term Black Metal and was labeled as Black Metal. Don't confuse Black Metal of the 80's with Black Metal of the 90's that was mainly connected with the classic BM sound that is known today. Most of the bands of that music genre don't even deserve to rink Euronymous' piss because they just lended the BM sound but lyrically are Pagan or Wood Metal which has NOTHING in common with BLACK Metal in general. I kinda find it always funny if a certain people call a band Black Metal just because they have stolen the BM sound while their lyrics are dealing with norse mythology and all that celtic shit. What does it matter how a god is called if Wotan or Jehova or whatever, religion is religion ...

"Operation: Mindcrime" is Hard Rock the same way Anthrax, Testament, Forbidden, Anacrusis, Kreator, Sodom, Demolition Hammer and Morbid Saint are all Thrash Metal. These bands obviously do not sound exactly the same (in fact, quite different) but they still share the key characteristics of the sub-genre and therefore all belong. Compare OM to the first Queensryche EP. There is a huge difference in style between the two where the band substituted a Metal edge for a commercial Hard Rock approach.

The problem you guys are facing is that you are thinking with your heart rather then objectively with your mind. It's fine if you love the album and rank it amongst your favourites but do not get caught up trying to argue the genre of music it belongs to as if you will lose some sort of cred because it's not actually a Metal record. I listen to many indie Hard Rock bands from the 80's and rank some of them quite high but I'm not foolish enough to call them Metal just because of it.

Regarding the "Black Metal" term. I do not believe this to be true for these early bands either and this is exactly why I cited this example to prove that referencing the terminologies of the past is a moot point as it's not relevant today.

Marken wrote:Is O:M Metal? Yes.
Prog? Definitely not.
Brilliant? Of course it is.

Is O:M Metal? Metal is a pretty general term these days. It fits in the Art Metal section IMO
Prog? Some aspects point to it definitely, think 2112, Cygnus X1, Bytor and the Snowdog etc... from Rush as possible music influences
Brilliant? Not a fan but I give it due respect, Much like Savatage's later Rock Opera it was an interesting listen from a guitar player's standpoint

I felt Queensryche was over after their first ep. I saw them on The Warning Tour w/ Kiss at Glens Falls Civic Center in upstate NY and Kiss smoked 'em. The Warning was an ok album but immediately started to sound a bit FM radio friendly? Their EP is what I would call brilliant in a period when Metal was still radio taboo for the most part. The first time I heard Queen of the Ryche I was blown away

if queensryche is not a metal band i don't know what i have been listening to all my life, even their last album is metal, not traditional metal nor nwobhm but is still a metal album and a metal band, i would even say that they are responsable for the big wave of us power metal bands that born on the 80's.

There is a lot of stop-start hard rocking stuff on it (Revolution Calling, title track) but I don't see how songs like Speak, Spreading the Disease, and The Needle Lies are anything but metal. Some of the more melodic songs like Eyes of a Stranger might seem borderline, but to keep fair standards, Transcendence has its equivalents in Burning Bridges and Lonely, as did every band coming from that side of progressive metal in the 80's and early 90's. Maybe if you judge the album purely on counting the number of unambiguously metal vs non-metal songs it would come up short, but I think the metal opera style they were going for allows more flexibility than might be afforded to others.

thundersteel wrote: i would even say that they are responsable for the big wave of us power metal bands that born on the 80's.

sure they are, but I think those bands were influenced more by "The Warning" and people here are talking of "O:M"

Great record by a great band (at the time). Went downhill after that in my opinion.