Home of Metal

On Thursday afternoon James and I made the trip up to Birmingham for the opening of a major exhibition at Birmingham Museum. Home of Metal is based on the city's undeniable links with the birth and propagation of Heavy Metal. The exhibition is curated by the wonderful women at Capsule, longtime local music promoters and organisers of the excellent Supersonic music festival. It covers the rise of Black Sabbath through to the birth of Grindcore, and all inbetween. The attention to detail is excellent and the execution is super slick. We thoroughly recommend making the effort to check this out if you get the opportunity.



The meagre Amos contribution to the Home of Metal exhibition.




JJ with his more considerable contribution to the event. This was taken from a cover he drew for the Face Magazine, back from who know's when.




Part of the excellent Grindcore/Anarcho Crust exhibit, dealing with the birth of the genre in the early 1980s. This is largely created from a small selection of Napalm Death founder member, Nic Bullen's personal collection. This includes actual photos, letters, original scribbled lyrics and Punk/Anarchist 'zines he both collected and worked on at the time, together with Miles Ratledge (another Napalm Death founder member).




Nik Napalm himself, probably slightly confused by my gushing enthusiasm for his contribution to the exhibition.




Kriz and Zip, Birmingham skateboard legends, owners of long running West Midlands institution Ideal Skates, and all-round top blokes. They are pictured here in front of a 1980s scene from the Mermaid, a venue they regularly frequented in its heyday. They may well have been at this particular show.