The first chapter is devoted to 44 Minutes, a song released in 2009 by Megadeth. It was inspired by a shootout in North Hollywood in 1997, the result of a botched bank robbery.
I talked with Putnam a few weeks ago at a book-signing event at Blackbird Books and Spirits in Belton. He said the book idea came about when he and some high school buddies were standing around a bonfire, drinking cold beverages and listening to music. The song Run to the Hills by Iron Maiden came blasting through the speakers, and his friend Kyle said that Iron Maide is the best history lesson you’ll get.
“It was inspired by that moment, but it has transitioned into demonstrating heavy metal music's ability to convey history just as good as any other form of arts,” Putnam told me.
His favorite story in the book comes in Chapter Three, where he writes about King Charles XII of Sweden.
“There's an anecdote that suggests that at some point in his life, Charles found that hunting a bear with a musket in the 1700s was not adventurous enough, and so he endeavored to capture one alive,” Putnam said during his Belton visit. “And he may have done so because there's an anecdote that he got a bear so intoxicated on alcohol that it fell out of the third story window of the palace.”
Charles’ story inspired the song Carolus Rex by Swedish power metal band Sabaton, he said. It’s the title track of the band’s sixth record, a concept album based on the Swedish Empire. That album, Putnam said, opened his eyes to an entirely new concept of history, “because we’ve never had an empire.”
Putnam grew up in the Shenandoah Valley and served in the U.S. Army from 2011 to 2020. After an honorable discharge, he then earned a bachelor’s degree in history from the University of Maryland Global Campus in 2022. The reception to A Heavy Metal History Lesson has been “better than I ever expected,” he said, and there may be a couple of follow-up volumes as well.
Iron Maiden, the band that initially combined history and heavy metal for Putnam, has a place in Chapter Eight with its song The Trooper, which was inspired by the Battle of Balaklava which took place in 1854, during the Crimean War, the “last major European conflict in which religion played a primary role,” Putnam writes.
Each chapter of the book highlights an historical world event, and then relates it to a song, so if you go in looking for a deep dive into heavy metal, you’re going to be disappointed. However, the history lessons and their ties to the songs totally makes the book worthwhile. It’s a small volume, just 162 pages with detailed endnotes and an exhaustive bibliography broken down by chapter if you’re looking to do additional research into the history behind the songs.
A Heavy Metal History Lesson by Josh Putnam is a must-read for history buffs and fans of heavy metal. I give it five head bangs.
