During a recent appearance on Appetite for Distortion, Overkill‘s lead singer Bobby Blitz shared his thoughts on Metallica while also comparing them to his own band. According to Blitz, Overkill are not like Metallica since they don’t try to appeal to the masses like them.
Considering their history, Overkill was actually formed earlier than the vast majority of thrash metal bands. Their contributions to the genre are significant, and their place in the history of thrash metal is well-established. In his interview, Blitz accepted this fact, but he also said they were initially a cover band trying to blend punk with metal.
However, when Metallica stepped into the music scene, they were playing pure metal. So, the Overkill vocalist thinks that Metallica’s place in thrash metal is undebatable, as they changed the course of music. After expressing his respect for Metallica, the singer went on to compare Overkill to them in the later part of the conversation.
Blitz mentioned the project that his niece had been working on. While writing about the careers of people in the family, she came to him and said that she knew he was a singer and went touring. She then asked Blitz if they were like Metallica. The vocalist replied by saying that their musical styles were similar, but they were not like Metallica. This was because Overkill didn’t try to please the masses, while Metallica enjoyed being popular.
Bobby Blitz’s comments on the difference between Overkill and Metallica:
“My niece is a school teacher right now in high school. She was doing a project, and she was taking a kind of survey, and she was writing about the people in her family and their careers. She went through my brother, who was an attorney. Her mom, who was a nurse, etc. She got to me now. She said, ‘I know you’re a singer, I know you go touring, and I know you write songs. I mean, are you like Metallica?‘
I said, ‘No. We play a similar type of music, but we are not like Metallica.’ ‘What’s the difference?’ I said, ‘Well, here, see if you get this. Metallica endears themselves to the masses. We alienate the masses and endear ourselves to the minority, and that minority would kill for us.’ She got it.”
So, according to Blitz, they don’t appeal to the masses like Metallica, but they have a very devoted fanbase who always stand by them. In a way, he thinks that Metallica has been making popular music to please the crowds, while Overkill doesn’t care about that.
