JTMH Volume 22 | The Heavy Metal Capital of the World

For much of the 1970s and 1980s, San Antonio earned a reputation as the “Heavy Metal Capital of the World.” With routinely sold-out concerts featuring now-legendary hard rocking acts, the city certainly deserved this distinction. So, what was it about San Antonio that drew hard rockers from across the world to perform in its venues?

This article seeks to answer this question and begins with the story of two radiomen, Lou Roney and Joe “The Godfather” Anthony, and their quest to differentiate their programs by playing artists no other station in the city, or even the country, had yet discovered. The freeform station, KMAC-AM, along with its FM counterpart KISS, allowed Roney and Anthony to experiment with their programs, exposing their listeners to little-known artists including Judas Priest, AC/DC, Black Sabbath, and Rush. This account also considers the symbiotic relationship between the disc jockeys and an idealistic promoter named Jack Orbin of Stone City Attractions. These three men worked together to bring the most thrilling and controversial musical acts of the day to San Antonio, oftentimes to crowds well into the thousands.

This article will also address the city of San Antonio’s reaction to its reputation as a fertile ground for the hard rock and heavy metal genres. While the music was embraced by its youth, San Antonio’s civic leaders were none too pleased with the city’s designation as the so-called “Heavy Metal Capital of the World.” After a now-infamous act from one of rock and roll’s most notorious figures, city officials moved swiftly to sequester San Antonio from the influence of heavy metal. Led by Mayor Henry Cisneros, the city made headlines across the country as it sought to protect its youth from heavy metal influence in the 1980s.

Finally, this article will address San Antonio’s relationship to Austin in terms of being musical destinations for touring bands. While San Antonio was arguably the more appealing city to visit for hard rock artists, Austin would emerge as the city to visit in central Texas. Thanks to the popularity of artists including Willie Nelson, venues like the Armadillo World Headquarters, and finally the emergence of the Austin City Limits television show, Austin slowly eclipsed the reputation of its southern neighbor to lay claim to the title “Live Music Capital of the World.” Cleveland, too, enters the conversation as the city that managed to land the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, an honor many San Antonians would have gladly welcomed.

Spread the Word!

Founded in 1930 by Walter Williams McAllister and his partner Jack Wallace, KMAC-AM developed a reputation for providing “well selected and diversified entertainment.”¹ In 1938, McAllister sold 50% of the station’s ownership to its new manager, Howard W. Davis. Under Davis’s management, KMAC grew in leaps and bounds, adding popular programs hosted by charismatic disc jockeys and cultivating legions of loyal listeners in the process. Davis served as co-owner of KMAC with McAllister until 1942, when the latter sold his rights to the station to his partner.²

Though at the time of his purchase Davis anticipated “no changes in personnel or operating policy,” the new owner would soon broaden the appeal of his new station. After successfully petitioning the Federal Communications Commission in 1946, Davis announced that he would establish a 50,000-watt FM (frequency modulated) sister station to KMAC with the call letters “K-I-S-S.” This new FM station would be the second of its kind in Texas, with Houston’s KTHT-FM being the only other operation in business.³

Since most households at the time did not possess a radio with FM capabilities, much of the local attention remained directed towards KMAC-AM, which would simulcast its broadcasts on KISS-FM. Among these broadcasts was a popular rhythm and blues show hosted by local-favorite disc jockey Flip Forrest. The program, titled Harlem Serenade, saw Forrest playing records from 10:00 p.m. to midnight for those who preferred their music both “red hot” and “low down.”⁴  The disc jockey, known for hosting “Mr. and Miss Rhythm and Blues” competitions throughout the city, was beloved by his young fans, many of whom established fan clubs in his honor.

Sometime in the mid-1950s, Forrest departed KMAC/KISS, leaving a vacancy in one of San Antonio’s most beloved radio programs. Not only would his replacement need to have a knowledge of the most popular rhythm and blues acts of the day, but they would also have to match the charisma of the popular disc jockey. Fortunately, a candidate with these exact qualifications would soon walk into his office. The young disc jockey, a local man of Italian and Mexican descent by the name of Joseph Anthony Yannuzzi, would not only capture the attention of his San Antonio listeners, but would eventually become internationally renowned for his work on KMAC/KISS.

Joe Anthony: The “Godfather” of KMAC/KISS

Born on October 9, 1936 in San Antonio, Joseph Anthony Yannuzzi (known professionally as Joe Anthony) loved music and entertainment from an early age. After graduating from the city’s Brackenridge High School (where the future disc jockey was a member of the school band), Joe Anthony formed a successful puppeteering act before heading west to California in the hopes of becoming an actor. Upon returning to San Antonio, Joe Anthony applied to replace Forrest as the Harlem Serenade host. After offering to take $25 less a week than his predecessor (much to the pleasure of the notoriously frugal Davis), Joe Anthony was in at KMAC/KISS.⁵

Joe Anthony found great success as the new host of Harlem Serenade, even going on to host weekly “Joe Anthony Hop” dances every Saturday from 9:00 p.m. to 1:00 a.m. for young fans of his show. According to an interview conducted with journalist Jim Beal for the San Antonio fanzine It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll, Joe Anthony would become known for playing music from rhythm and blues artists such as Jay McNeely, Little Sunny, the Isley Brothers, and even up and coming Texan artists like Freddy Fender during his ten-to-midnight time slot.⁶

After his success playing the hottest rhythm and blues acts of the day on Harlem Serenade, Joe Anthony co-founded Harlem Records in 1959. With the primary goal of recording talent “no one else would consider,” Anthony and Henke would eventually record many artists that would come to define San Antonio’s “West Side Sound.” In “Talk to Me: The History of San Antonio’s West Side Sound,” historian Alex La Rotta states that Harlem Records was one of the first doo-wop and rhythm & blues labels in San Antonio, made even more significant by the fact that many of the label’s groups were racially integrated during the Civil Rights era.⁷

Artists on Harlem Records included doo-wop group the Lyrics, the Royal Jesters, Charley and the Jives, and early groups fronted by iconic Texas musicians Sunny Ozuna (Sunny and the Sunglows) and Doug Sahm (Doug Sahm and the Pharaohs). Though the label was short-lived (Harlem stopped producing records in 1961), its legacy has lasted much longer. With a sound that exemplified the diverse natures of San Antonio and Texas music, Joe Anthony referred to his artists’ music as “The Texas Sound.”⁸

Unafraid to take advantage of his occupation as one of San Antonio’s most popular disc jockeys to further his record label, Joe Anthony would cautiously play Harlem’s newest recordings on Harlem Serenade, making sure to keep his ownership of the label discreet. According to Wired for Sound author Andrew Brown, once a Harlem artist had finished recording, Joe Anthony would pay to have two acetate copies of the records pressed: one to play on his show, one to preserve to make additional pressings. Only when a record proved to be a hit would there be additional pressings.⁹

In 1964, after becoming frustrated with the popular R&B acts of the day, Joe Anthony stepped away from radio. “I lost interest in music,” recalled Anthony to Jim Beal. “The Motown sound came in, became very commercial and lost its meat.”¹⁰ During his time away from radio, Joe Anthony would find himself making a failed run for local office and opening two popular restaurants: Mr. Pizza and Villa Italia. His love of music proved to be too strong, however, and after briefly working as an R&B disc jockey at local station KAPE, Joe Anthony returned to operate the boards and play records for his old employer Howard Davis in 1967.

Upon returning to KMAC/KISS, Joe Anthony began playing the same “middle of the road” fare that found him great popularity in the late 1950s. The station had changed, however, while the disc jockey was away pursuing his other passions, for Howard Davis had hired a new station manager with the same interest in cutting-edge music as Joe Anthony. Little did the veteran disc jockey know that this new manager at the station would become a sort of kindred musical spirit, one who along with him, would go on to change the course of music history in San Antonio.

Lou Roney: The Soul of KMAC/KISS

Born in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, Lou Roney arrived in San Antonio in the early 1960s to work at a station known for primarily playing Dixieland Jazz. From there, Roney went to work for San Antonio’s only country and western station at the time, KBER-AM. Working at KBER provided the young disc jockey the opportunity to work directly with country legends such as Bob Wills and even a young Willie Nelson.¹¹

Wishing to return closer to home (Roney’s wife was from Indiana), Roney found work at a successful Cleveland country radio station. Though he had received a significant pay increase at the Cleveland station, the biting weather proved too much for the couple to bear. Though it meant taking a large pay cut, Roney and his wife made the decision to return to the warmth of the Alamo City. “We hated the climate,” says Roney, “so we ended up back here in San Antonio.”¹²

Upon returning to San Antonio, Roney took a job as station manager at Howard Davis’s KMAC/KISS, and quickly learned how Davis operated. “He [Davis] didn’t want to subscribe to any of the big major record companies, which at that time, you’d have to send them like $500 a year, or something like that and they would provide you [with records] all year,” says Roney. “Major pop stuff.”¹³ Without having the biggest acts of the day to rely on for programming, Roney was often forced to rely on records provided to him by smaller labels and promotional companies, as well as records purchased on his own. “We had to rely on new acts that they would send free, that would come from the promotional company, or from the group itself,” continues the former station manager. “We both started buying imports and playing the long-cuts.”¹⁴

The station manager’s choice to play progressive and more experimental music inspired Joe Anthony to change the format, and even the name of his long-running show, Harlem Serenade. “Everyone thought Joe Anthony meant rhythm and blues,” said the disc jockey to Jim Beal. “I started inserting a little hard rock into the show and it caught on.”¹⁵ Roney also comments on the evolution of their shows. “I was still doing my progressive pop thing playing stuff like Creedence Clearwater [Revival],” says the former station manager, “and that’s where Anthony sort of worked in some weird ‘way out’ stuff.”¹⁶ By the early 1970s the two disc jockeys radically changed the formats of their shows, pushing the boundaries of their content, and in the process, introduced San Antonio to a slew of brand-new bands, many of which no one else in America had heard.

“Lou and I are able to hear a sound,” said Joe Anthony. “We have a feeling for a job we have to do.”¹⁷ The primary goal for Roney and Joe Anthony was to never, under absolutely any circumstances, be lumped in with San Antonio’s other radio stations. “We never really tried to integrate ourselves with the other radio stations in town. We were pretty much mavericks doing our own little thing,” recalls Roney. “As soon as they would put something on, off it would go! We did not want to be the same as anyone else in town.”¹⁸ Due to KMAC/KISS’s status of being an independently owned/free-format station, the programming possibilities were entirely based on the tastes of its deejays, rather than whatever the best seller of the day was. “Our shows are not printed out somewhere and we do not have to wait for a song to appear on Billboard’s charts before we can play it,”¹⁹ said Anthony in his interview with Jim Beal.

KMAC/KISS had made dedicated fans out of not only San Antonians, but of other radio stations in major markets around the country. Program directors from cities including Cleveland, Los Angeles, and Chicago would call the small station regularly to ask what bands Roney and Joe Anthony were playing next. “We never consulted anybody,” says Roney proudly. “Everybody called us.”²⁰

Though KMAC/KISS had received national recognition from its peers, the North American radio narrative neglects the station’s influence in favor of other notable stations. An example of this can be found in Cleveland’s WMMS-FM, a radio station (not unlike KMAC/KISS) often credited with kickstarting the careers of many legendary rock and roll artists. Among these artists is Canada’s Rush, whose song “Working Man” debuted on WMMS’ airwaves in 1974, much to the excitement of its listeners.

Though WMMS is often recognized as Rush’s earliest North American supporter (Donna Halper, the disc jockey credited with first playing “Working Man,” has long been considered a close friend by the band), Lou Roney and Joe Anthony can also count themselves among the group’s earliest supporters.²¹ In 1975, after receiving abundant radio support from KMAC/KISS, Rush booked their very first show in San Antonio, thanks to Lou Roney and handful of investors. “I had never done a concert,” recalled Roney. “I went around and got about ten different partners to throw in a hundred bucks a piece, and the record company said they would bring Rush down here.”²²

“When Rush first came to town, this is how wacky it was,” remembers former KMAC/KISS disc jockey Donnie Meals. “Joe Anthony gets on the air and says, ‘Hey Rush is in town, and we need someone to give them a ride from the airport!’”²³ A few dedicated fans heard Anthony’s call and assisted the trio to Randy’s Rodeo, their venue for the evening. In his 2006 book, Roadshow: Landscape with Drums – A Concert Tour by Motorcycle, Rush drummer Neil Peart recalls his band’s reception in San Antonio. “As we arrived in town, we were amazed to hear them playing nothing but Rush songs all day and night.”²⁴ The October 1975 performance was a complete success, one that would entice the Canadian trio to return to San Antonio for twenty-one performances over the course of the next thirty-seven years. “With all that radio hype, the tiny roadhouse was packed,” writes Peart of the band’s debut concert. “That performance was the seed of an enduring popularity for the band in San Antonio.”²⁵

Along with other radio stations around the country, local concert promoters also considered themselves fans of Joe Anthony and Lou Roney. Chief among them was fellow San Antonian Jack Orbin, founder and owner of Stone City Attractions. Orbin, who in the late sixties became immersed in the psychedelic rock scene taking place in Austin while attending the University of Texas, began booking benefit concerts in San Antonio in 1972. “I was into music and I was into anti-war, so we started doing benefits for the war resisters league and the food bank, and things like that,” recalls Orbin.²⁶ Though he initially planned to just hold concerts for benefit purposes, the rising popularity of hard rock and roll (thanks to KMAC/KISS disc jockeys Joe Anthony and Lou Roney) quickly thrust Stone City into the rock business.

“It was a tremendous time of creativity musically,” recalls the promoter. “More and more bands wanted to get into the hard rock and heavy metal scene.”²⁷ Citing the bare-bones approach of heavy metal (no lip synching or backing tracks, and no popular choreography of the day, for example), Orbin believed bands were “rebelling” against the popular musical styles of the 1970s. 

“[Jack Orbin] got to realize that Joe and I were breaking some really big stuff,” recalled Roney, “and he started calling every week, Joe or myself, wanting to know who’s going to be our next star.”²⁸ The partnership between promoter and disc jockey provided the trio the opportunity to break a number of now-legendary rock groups before they found success in any other market. “It was kind of a mutual double shot to Lou, Joe, and ourselves,” continues Orbin. “The music was on the air, people could hear it, I would bring the bands."²⁹

Booking a concert with Stone City Attractions was without question a lucrative opportunity for musical groups. Not only would artists get to play to large crowds in San Antonio, thanks to Stone City, they would often get the opportunity to play in other cities in Texas as well, though there was a difference in venue size. “The bands wouldn’t come down for one show,” recalls Orbin. “I’d have to have to book them in other cities as well to make it worth their while.”³⁰ Popular San Antonio venues used by Stone City included the Municipal Auditorium (now part of the Tobin Center for Performing Arts) and the San Antonio Convention Center, commonly known as the HemisFair Arena, both of which had anywhere between a 5,000-to-10,000-person capacity. “We’d sell out the Municipal Auditorium here, a 5,000-seat theater,” reminisces the promoter, “then we’d play the Opera [Opry] House in Austin, a 1,200 to 1,400 capacity [theater]. It was the same show, just a huge difference in attendance.”

The prospect of playing more than one well-attended show brought Jack Orbin and Stone City Attractions to the attention of agents from around the country. Representatives from other markets would reach out to Orbin to inquire about how he was booking such successful shows, when often times the bands struggled in other cities. “I would do something like [Oakland, California’s] Yesterday and Today, and do 5,000 tickets and they couldn’t do 350 tickets anywhere besides California where they were from,” recalled the promoter. “Agents would call me and say ‘What’s going on? How did [the bands] do that?’”³¹

Once Orbin informed them about the special combination of radio airplay along with the youth of San Antonio’s unquenchable appetite for heavy music, agents would present other artists they were looking to break. One of those artists was the English heavy metal band Judas Priest, who first visited San Antonio in 1977 while opening for Foreigner and REO Speedwagon. “The first five dates were in Texas, where we had a following,” recalls Judas Priest vocalist Rob Halford, “mainly because a local radio DJ, Joe Anthony, loved [1976’s] Sad Wings of Destiny and played us to death.”³²

Judas Priest guitarist K.K. Downing also recalled the early support the band received thanks to Joe Anthony in his 2018 autobiography, Heavy Duty: Days and Nights in Judas Priest. “Outside of specific towns like San Antonio, only select parts of the East Coast and the Midwest were receptive to our kind of music at that time [the late seventies].”³³ According to the guitarist, the band considered San Antonio one of their “strongholds” and would visit the city often for performances.³⁴ “It was a massive stronghold, mostly on the back of the KMAC radio station DJ Joe Anthony,” recalls the guitarist. “The result in the [1980’s] British Steel era was that in San Antonio we’d sell out an arena, whereas in other places where metal was not played on the radio, we’d still be playing clubs or smaller venues.”³⁵ In a July 1980 issue of It’s Only Rock ‘N’ Roll, when asked by journalist Clyde Kimsey why San Antonio was the city Judas Priest was “most popular,” vocalist Rob Halford commented, “KMAC-KISS has a lot to do with it.” The front man continued, “Without them we couldn’t play to audiences of this size.”³⁶

Another group that benefitted early on from the relationship between Stone City and KMAC/KISS was Australia’s AC/DC. An early fan of the quintet, Lou Roney regularly played the band on his show, even though his partner, Joe Anthony, could not count himself as a fan. “Joe hated the album covers for the first AC/DC albums,” recalled Roney with a laugh, “and he wouldn’t play them until they started getting more and more popular.”³⁷

In 1977, after hearing the band on KMAC/KISS, Orbin booked AC/DC for their very first North American performances opening for hard rocking Toronto band Moxy, another international hard rock group who found great popularity in San Antonio after sharing bills with acts including Black Sabbath. “Lou and Joe played them, and I wanted to promote them immediately,” states Orbin in author Jesse Fink’s 2013 book, The Youngs: The Brothers who Built AC/DC. “They were destined to become popular from the outset.”³⁸ According to the article “Let There Be Rock: AC/DC at the ‘Dillo,” Orbin booked the band for dates in Austin, San Antonio, Corpus Christi, and Dallas, paying them one thousand dollars per date.³⁹

The band made their American debut on July 27, 1977 at Austin venue the Armadillo World Headquarters. Attendees of the concert included Lou Roney and Joe Anthony, who actually went to the show to see Moxy, a band Anthony regularly played on his radio shows. “He thought Moxy would blow away everybody, and AC/DC blew away everybody,” says Roney. “He was convinced by that time that they [AC/DC] were something.”⁴⁰

The band made their San Antonio debut the following night at the city’s Municipal Auditorium, playing for nearly 6,000 fans, many of whom, like Joe Anthony in Austin, had come to the concert to see night’s headliner. According to Roney, the only reason San Antonio was unable to host AC/DC’s first North America performance was because he and Orbin wanted to feature the band on a Saturday, as opposed to a Friday. Though they were the night’s opener, the band, led by guitarist Angus Young and charismatic lead singer Bon Scott, stole the show, leading Orbin to unprecedently book the band the following year as a headliner. AC/DC, who were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003, would go on to perform in San Antonio a total of eight times between 1978 and 1988.

You Can’t Kill Rock and Roll: Ozzy Osbourne vs. the City of San Antonio

Heavy metal was at the height of its popularity when Stone City Attractions booked iconic metal vocalist Ozzy Osbourne for his Diary of a Madman tour on February 19, 1982. The singer was no stranger to San Antonio, as he had regularly performed there as early as 1971 with his previous band, Black Sabbath.⁴¹ After arriving in San Antonio, in an effort to curb the singer from getting into trouble before his performance that evening, his manager (and future wife) Sharon Levy rounded up all of Osbourne’s clothes from his hotel room, a ritual she had done several times before.

Osbourne, undeterred by his manager’s attempts, found a “dark green frilly” evening gown left behind by Levy, and, after some slight maneuvering, placed it on and took to the streets of downtown San Antonio. At some time between two to three in the afternoon, the vocalist made the unfortunate decision to relieve himself on the Alamo Cenotaph, a monument erected to honor soldiers who had fallen at the Texas landmark. “I knew it was a big deal place where lots of Americans had been killed while fighting the Mexicans,” Osbourne recalls in his 2010 autobiography I Am Ozzy. “But I hadn’t made the connection between the old wall I’d been pissing on and the ruins of a sacred national monument.”⁴²

The vocalist was arrested by officer Bill Holbert at around three ‘o clock for “causing a disturbance,” charged with public intoxication, and placed in a holding cell in the Bexar County Adult Detention Center.⁴³ Levy then turned to the tour’s liaison with the city, Jack Orbin, for assistance in retrieving the metal star from jail. “I got him out of jail,” recalled Orbin to journalist Nelson Allen. “He didn’t know what he had done, didn’t understand the significance of it.”⁴⁴ According to Orbin, who considered Osbourne a “marketing genius,” he had to explain to the singer just how beloved the Alamo was to Texans. Likening urinating on the Alamo to “urinating in the queen’s cup,” Orbin says that Osbourne later claimed that he had in fact defiled the cenotaph on purpose, and that the “White House was next.”⁴⁵

The mayhem from the day’s activities only added to the excitement surrounding the front man’s performance that evening. The concert, which took place at the HemisFair Arena and featured English rock bands UFO and Starfighters, was completely sold out, much to the dismay of those unfortunate enough to not have a ticket. This did not stop a few hundred fans, desperate to be part of the night’s performance, from taking matters into their own hands. According to the article “Arena Crowd Shatters Doors,” written for the San Antonio Express News, nearly an hour after the show began, at approximately 8:30, fans shattered the glass doors and windows of the arena in an effort to gain entry.⁴⁶

Many were injured and several were arrested as a result of the melee. In an attempt to protect concertgoers, police officers refused to allow any additional people into the performance, whether they had a ticket or not. When Osbourne took the stage that evening, he regaled the audience with his exploits at the Alamo, stories that were greeted with cheers from fans.⁴⁷

The saga of that fateful Friday in February 1982 is necessary when attempting to understand heavy metal’s history in San Antonio. Though equal parts shocking and humorous, it nonetheless changed the course of not only how heavy metal was viewed and accepted in the city, but also the way rock music was accepted in general. One week after the incident at the Cenotaph and Arena, councilman Bernardo Eureste, who according to the 1982 article “Rock Star’s Banning from S.A. proposed,” called for a fifteen-year ban preventing Osbourne from performing in any city facilities.⁴⁸

Eureste’s February proposal did not pass; however, when rumors that an additional Osbourne performance would take place that June reached members of the city council, an ordinance to ban the vocalist was quickly passed. “We don’t need a bum like him in the city,” commented councilman Van Henry Archer about the idea of another concert from the vocalist. The proposal, which was passed unanimously, was made by councilwoman Helen Dutmer and banned Osbourne from performing in any city-owned facility, including the HemisFair Arena.

“If I were mayor of San Antonio,” wrote a concerned citizen in a 1982 “Letters to the Editor” column of the San Antonio Express News, “I would ban any rock groups from performing in this city.”⁴⁹ Parents who were not fans of rock music were another group who showed little to no support for heavy music in San Antonio. Some, citing religious beliefs, felt that city leaders were failing in their responsibilities of preserving the virtue of the city’s youngsters. Paraphrasing a passage from the Bible, another concerned reader wrote that those misleading the young (a reference to Osbourne) should have a millstone tied their necks and be thrown into the sea.⁵⁰

Three years later, on the heels of Osbourne’s ban from performing in city-owned arenas, the San Antonio City Council tightened its reigns on the city’s live music industry by banning smoking of all kinds in its arenas. Orbin, in an attempt to fight the council’s order, threatened to move his highly lucrative concerts to either the private Joe and Harry Freeman Coliseum located on the city’s east side, or north to Austin.⁵¹ Along with the elimination of smoking in arenas like the HemisFair and the Municipal Auditorium, city leaders also stated they intended to hire a child psychologist in an effort to determine if heavy metal rock shows were having a negative effect on youths.

Groups of San Antonio parents like the “Community Families in Action” had long pressured city council members for allowing heavy metal artists to perform in city-owned venues. Finally, in November 1985, the Council acquiesced to their demands. First, there was an attempt to prevent artists from performing their most controversial songs while in San Antonio. This proved to be unconstitutional and did not pass. Still, the city council, led by Mayor Henry Cisneros, did not stop attempting to control the city’s concert industry.

San Antonio’s wars against Ozzy Osbourne and heavy metal, both of which had thrust the city into the national spotlight, were reinforced by the 1985 efforts of the Parents Music Resource Center. The group, founded by Tipper Gore and Susan Baker, began advocating for a type of rating system for music, not unlike the MPAA ratings for motion pictures. Releasing a list of fifteen questionable songs, the infamously titled “Filthy 15,” the PMRC set out to argue that a rating system was necessary to protect the country’s youths from being exposed to suggestive or violent lyrics.

“The idea that teen-agers turn bad because of rock ‘n’ roll is ridiculous,” stated Joe Anthony in a 1986 interview with the San Antonio Express News.⁵²  Anthony, who did not support vulgarity in heavy metal (the disc jockey referred to this as “scrap metal”) had found notoriety for playing artists included in the PMRC’s Filthy 15 including Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, and AC/DC. “I think censorship is very stupid. It’s uncalled for,” he continued.⁵³

In an attempt to prevent impressionable youngsters from attending salacious rock concerts, Cisneros and the city council proposed an age limit on concerts in San Antonio. The proposal, which according to the article “San Antonio May Ban Children from Some Rock,” was the first of its kind, drew eyes from across America upon San Antonio. As part of the new rule, anyone younger than thirteen years of age would be barred from attending any concerts that depicted “sadistic or masochistic sex, rape, incest, bestiality, and exhibitionism on stage.”⁵⁴ Orbin, a lifelong believer in free speech, once again protested the proposed ordinances. The promoter claimed that imposing an age limit on concerts would have negative financial effects on the city and likened the repressive proposal to living in South Africa.⁵⁵

Despite efforts from Orbin and like-minded organizations like PASS (Parents Against Subliminal Seduction), San Antonio became the first city in America to make it a criminal offense for promoters to allow anyone under the age of thirteen into concerts featuring vulgar performances.⁵⁶ The ordinance, which passed with a seven to three vote in November 1985, would now require any young heavy metal concert attendee to be accompanied by a parent. According to the article “Ordinance Restricts Language about Violence and Illicit Sex,” both promoters and directors were required to inform the public that certain performers might be “unsuitable” for children.⁵⁷

Prepare to Die: The Influence of Heavy Metal on Local Youths

The artists played by Roney and Anthony on KMAC/KISS, and later brought to town by Stone City, had a profound effect on the youth of San Antonio. It was not long before young locals began forming their own groups to perform the songs regularly played by Lou Roney and Joe Anthony. “I would hear new bands I’d never heard before,” recalls San Antonio guitarist Art Villareal about KMAC/KISS. “These lower-tier bands that weren’t really on the radar.”⁵⁸

Though these groups found inspiration in early heavy metal bands including Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, it was the late seventies/early eighties musical movement known as the “New Wave of British Heavy Metal,” or the NWOBHM, that had the most profound influence on local groups. The movement, pulling inspiration from the do-it-yourself ethic of British punk rock, found its bands self-releasing their own music, much of which found its way to San Antonio via record stores including Rick Ireland’s Rock Around the Clock and Dave Risher’s Hogwild Records.⁵⁹

Inspired by NWOBHM artists, teens from across San Antonio, especially the city’s south side, began forming groups of their own. Emulating the faster, heavier sounds of their new musical heroes, local bands including Wyzard, Syrus, Wicked Angel, Juggernaut, and Heather Leather formed, oftentimes from the ashes of one another’s former groups. Performing to ever-increasing crowds throughout the city, local shows became must-attend events, according to scene historian Reuben Luna. “We had the crowds and people wanted to play here,” recalls Luna.⁶⁰

According to Luna, in the early 1980s San Antonio, Austin, and Houston formed what he refers to as the “South Texas Triangle,” with San Antonio acting as the epicenter. With their established local fanbases, these bands helped form a network between the three cities that provided each band with excited crowds and well-attended concerts whenever concerts were booked. Following in Stone City Attractions’ footsteps, Omni Productions (founded by local teen Marc Solis) began booking underground metal bands onto shows between the three cities, with San Antonio being the central thanks to both KMAC/KISS and Risher’s Hogwild Records, a popular pre-concert hangout for musicians.

A Tale of Two Slayers

Formed in 1981 out of a community of metal-loving teens hanging around the popular mini-golf course and venue Fun ‘n Games/The Blue Room, Slayer, San Antonio’s most popular heavy metal group, was a force to be reckoned with from its inception. Its first lineup consisted of dual guitarists Art Villarreal and Robert “Bob Dog” Catlin, bassist Don Van Stavern, drummer Dave McClain, and vocalist Chris Cronk. After performing at a now-legendary battle of bands showcase at the city’s Eisenhauer Road Flea Market, Slayer was offered a contract to record an EP for local label Rain Forrest Records in 1982.

After the band finished recording their debut EP, Prepare to Die, in 1982, the Rain Forrest label, for an unspecified reason, waited six months to release the album. It was during this six-month period in 1983 that another band named Slayer, hailing from Los Angeles, released its debut, Show No Mercy, on the influential Metal Blade Records label. Once Mercy was released, Metal Blade issued a cease-and-desist to Bob O’Neil, the owner of BOSS studios, where San Antonio’s Slayer had recorded Prepare to Die. The lawsuit, along with other opportunities from different groups in the area, proved to be too much for the young band, forcing them to part ways in 1984.

On their first national tour in support of Show No Mercy, Los Angeles’s Slayer were booked to perform at popular San Antonio multi-use venue Villa Fontana. In an effort to gain anticipation for the show, Marc Solis and Omni Productions reunited San Antonio’s Slayer (now known as “SA Slayer”) and billed the concert as a “battle for the name” event. There was no name to be won, however, since Los Angeles’s Slayer had owned the rights for nearly a year at that point.

 The concert took place on the night of November 30, 1984, and by all accounts was a massive success. “It was a monster of a show,” remembers Reuben Luna of the now legendary concert. “It was a big deal. Even for Houston and Austin they [SA Slayer] were popular.”⁶¹ The performance, which featured Austin favorites Militia, along with San Antonio’s Syrus, attracted excited metal fans from across Texas to Villa Fontana. “The Fontana was always packed, but that show there was like barely breathing room left,” remembers Villareal of the night. “I’m sure the fire marshal would’ve had a field day. It was crazy, man.”⁶²

The “Slayer vs. Slayer” concert has gone down in history as one of heavy metal’s most infamous concerts, a battle for the name. Though there was no battle to fought, SA Slayer’s fans came out en masse to support their hometown Slayer. “SA Slayer were the kings,” recalls Luna.⁶³ In a 2010 interview with the Austin Chronicle, Slayer front man Tom Araya was questioned whether he felt San Antonio had earned the reputation as being “one of the heavy metal capitals of the world.” The front man and bassist agreed that the reputation was earned, and even remembered the November 1984 show where his band “battled” for its name. “There was another band from that time that was from San Antonio,” he says. “We did a show with them and after we carried the name. That was done in San Antonio—the metal capital.”⁶⁴

San Antonio’s early eighties metal scene is also notable for its incorporation of punk and hardcore bands into its shows. Villareal credits the “Slayer vs. Slayer” show as one of the first occasions where San Antonio punks began regularly attending local metal shows. Luna recalls a concert that served as both popular Houston metal band Helstar and Austin hardcore punks the Offenders’ first performances in San Antonio. “There was a Slayer, Helstar, Offenders show which was legendary,” Luna remembers. “That was the first time the punks came to metal shows. It was a weird vibe, but it went off well.”⁶⁵ The punk and metal genres would eventually combine in the mid-to-late eighties to create the “crossover thrash” genre. This style of music, which incorporates the speed of punk rock and the riffs of heavy metal, was popularized by groups including Houston’s D.R.I. (Dirty Rotten Imbeciles) and Suicidal Tendencies.

Much like the West Side Sound in the 1950s, where local bands often crossed racial boundaries when forming, San Antonio’s local heavy metal groups also were not limited by race, or even gender, with many being made up of Mexican American and Anglo members, men and women.⁶⁶ “You would go to concerts back then and you’d have white guys from the north side, and they’d be sitting with the hardcore rowdy guys from the south side and west side, guys that you never in a million years would associate with each other” says Reuben Luna. “It was a brotherhood.”⁶⁷

Rock Forever

On September 12, 1992, nearly a month before his 56th birthday, Joseph Anthony Yannuzzi passed away at the age of 55 after a brief battle with lung cancer. After a career spanning three decades that first saw the disc jockey introduce the world to San Antonio’s West Side Sound, only to reinvent himself in the 1970s to break numerous heavy metal and hard rock groups on KMAC/KISS, the man known affectionately as “The Godfather of Rock ‘n Roll” was gone. Anthony’s work on KMAC/KISS had directly impacted San Antonio culture, transforming the city into a haven for heavy metal. “Many people have felt the impact of that man because of what he’s done for the entertainment industry,” said vice president of Imagine Entertainment Scott Daly at the time of Anthony’s passing. “Joe Anthony is someone who stuck his neck out for the entertainment industry many years ago like no one else,” he continued.

At a time when heavy metal received little support from radio, Joe Anthony, along with Lou Roney, pushed the boundaries of hard rock radio. With the freedom to program their shows as they wished, Anthony and Roney fulfilled San Antonio’s appetite for hard rocking music, and in the process, took the music world by storm. “San Antonio is one of the leading markets in heavy metal music,” said Atlantic Records representative David Fleischman in a 1986 article. “There’s a national respect about San Antonio. Joe Anthony is responsible.”⁶⁸

KMAC/KISS was sold to North Carolina’s Capitol Broadcasting after Howard Davis’s passing in 1979. KMAC, the AM station that started it all fifty years earlier, was sold to a Christian radio organization in the 1980s, and had its name changed to KSLR. KISS-FM became the last remaining entity from Howard Davis’s days as owner. Capitol Broadcasting brought in new personnel, replacing Lou Roney and Joey Anthony. Now subjected to preselected playlists based on the popular rock music of the day, the station became a shadow of its former self. Once loyal listeners took ire with the station and its new general manager Tim Spencer. “Come on now KISS, the votes are in, you are boring us,” writes a fan to It’s Only Rock ‘n Roll, “Let’s go pioneer again, it’s more fun.”⁶⁹

It was the lack of experimentation and risk in programming that ultimately led many away from KISS-FM. As stated by Lou Roney, the main goal of the station was to be completely unlike any other station in town, to the point where if any station was played a song KMAC/KISS had, it would immediately be pulled from rotation. This philosophy was not shared by the new station director Spencer. “There are a couple thousand songs that can be played, and only fourteen have to be played at a certain time,” stated Spencer. “That way, there’s a flow.”⁷⁰ Joe Anthony certainly did not share in Spencer’s programming methods. Believing KISS-FM was beginning to sound too much like every other radio station, Anthony stated, “San Antonio used to be a hitmaker. Now it’s play the hits, don’t make them,” the disc jockey said in 1981.⁷¹

I’m Going through Changes

In June 1995, it was announced that the HemisFair Arena, the city-owned venue that played host to hundreds of Stone City Attractions concerts, would be demolished to make way for a new addition to the city’s Convention Center. This news came after supporters, led by Jack Orbin, failed to obtain the 48,000 signatures required to place the venue’s fate on a ballot for voters to decide.⁷² Supporters believed that the demolition of the arena would mean losing a profitable venue, one that served a variety of functions including graduations, sporting events, and, of course, concerts.⁷³

The loss of the HemisFair Arena was a major blow to San Antonio’s live music industry. The venue, which hosted its share of influential artists over its 27-year existence, was the go-to large size venue for promoters like Jack Orbin, who regularly filled the arena to capacity. With the arena gone, promoters were forced to hold shows in smaller, older venues such as the Municipal Auditorium, the Sunken Garden Theater (built in 1930 with a capacity of 4,800), the Joe Freeman Coliseum (built in 1949 with a capacity around 11,000), and, of course, the city’s Alamodome.

Though it possessed storied venues such as the Vulcan Gas Company and the Armadillo World Headquarters, the city of the Austin remained fairly quiet compared to Texas’s larger cities during the 1970s. With a 1970 population of 252,000 (for comparison, San Antonio had nearly 655,000 citizens the same year), citizens of Austin enjoyed a relatively quiet existence.⁷⁴ This changed forever with the 1976 debut of the Austin City Limits television program. First showcasing popular Texas artists (the show’s inaugural broadcast featured new Austinite Willie Nelson), Austin City Limits would eventually expand to include a variety of influential artists from all genres. For the first time ever, people from around the country were exposed to the city’s vibrant music scene. This, of course, was only the beginning.

During the early 1980s, the city of Austin began to receive international attention for producing renowned musical artists, the most popular of which was arguably guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan and his band, Double Trouble. Vaughan, who honed his skills at Austin venues the Soap Creek Saloon and Antone’s, broke onto the international music scene after playing the 1982 Montreux Jazz Festival, catching the eyes of songwriter Jackson Browne and British rocker David Bowie. Browne, taken by the band, offered the trio free recording time at his Los Angeles studio, where the group recorded their debut, Texas Flood. Bowie, after meeting Vaughan at the Montreux Festival, invited the guitarist to record on his 1983 album, Let’s Dance, ingraining Austin music into popular culture in the process.⁷⁵

Throughout Austin during this time period (much to the excitement of music fans still hurting from the 1980 loss of the city’s iconic Armadillo World Headquarters), smaller venues catering to underground and up-and-coming artists began to frequently appear. Venues such as Liberty Lunch (founded in 1975), Raul’s (founded in 1977) and Club Foot (founded in 1980) began drawing punk, new wave, and heavy metal artists from across the world, further constructing Austin’s identity as a live music city. This identity was introduced to the world in 1985 when MTV’s The Cutting Edge featured a variety of Austin’s musicians, most notably singer-songwriter Daniel Johnston. Two years after the MTV episode, the city of Austin held the inaugural South by Southwest Festival. Originally intended as a platform for Austin-based artists, the festival would expand to include artists from across the world, eventually hosting such renowned artists as Beck and Johnny Cash in the festival’s breakthrough year of 1994. Building on the popularity of South by Southwest, the Austin City Limits Festival debuted in 2002, followed by the Fun Fun Fun Fest in 2006 and others.

With the debut of Austin City Limits, the titular capital city was thrust into the international spotlight and developed a reputation as a haven for live music. Though San Antonio may have played host to many of the era’s most popular artists, the lack of exposure (like that afforded to Austin) kept its influence shuttered to much of the music world. With the surge in popularity of Willie Nelson and Stevie Ray Vaughan, Austin’s local scene quickly surpassed San Antonio in terms of recognition and influence, attracting even more talent to perform in the capital city. The early exposure of Austin City Limits, the city’s vibrant local scene, and its many influential venues allowed the city of Austin to construct the identity of being the “Live Music Capital of the World.”

While Austin’s status as a popular live music destination began to slowly surpass San Antonio’s, an additional slight came as a fellow working-class metropolis won the national competition to house the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986. In May of that year, Cleveland, Ohio, was named the winner of a three-year nationwide competition to host the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Though numerous other cities famous for their rock and roll histories competed for the hall (most notably among them New York City, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Memphis, and San Francisco), it was Cleveland, home to disc jockey Alan Freed, that would house the hall of fame. “The city’s support of rock is well known in the industry,” said the narrator for a 1985 promotional video sent to the Rock Hall Foundation titled “Cleveland—The Heart of Rock ‘n’ Roll.” “Record sales and radio capture for rock are higher in Cleveland than in most major markets.”⁷⁶

Though Cleveland’s contributions to rock and roll history cannot be disputed, some felt the hall should have gone to an alternate location. “San Antonio should’ve been the rock and roll capital of the world,” says Lou Roney wistfully.⁷⁷ It is not far-fetched to mention San Antonio in the same breath as rock and roll cities like Cleveland. The combination of radio exposure and concert promotion made the city a force to be reckoned with in the world of rock and roll. “Nobody believed what was happening down there [in San Antonio],” said Warner/Elektra/Asylum promotion and marketing manager Rob Sides in 1992. “They could throw a record on the air and sell thousands of them.”⁷⁸

Unlike Cleveland’s city leaders, San Antonio failed to embrace its rock and roll potential in the 1980s. With the city council’s restrictions on the concert industry, along with the national recognition San Antonio had received as a result of these restrictions, rock and roll/heavy metal’s potential was limited at a time when other cities welcomed it to great benefit.⁷⁹ The city’s rejection of rock and roll, paired with the lack of venues, diminished San Antonio’s status as a live music city. Though it may have remained a popular destination for many bands from the Joe Anthony/Lou Roney era of freeform radio (as previously mentioned, groups like Judas Priest and AC/DC regularly returned to the city over the years), the days of bands breaking in San Antonio were long gone. It is worth mentioning, however, that even though San Antonio missed out on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the city was still represented in the museum’s exhibit “Don’t Knock the Rock.” The exhibit, which showcased the efforts of society to “condemn, censor, and destroy rock and roll,” prominently features a 1985 quote from an unnamed San Antonio Councilman which states, “The First Amendment should not apply to rock and roll.”⁸⁰

In September 1992, over ten years after his swift banning from performances in any city-owned venues, Ozzy Osbourne announced that he would hold two San Antonio dates on the first and second of October 1992 for his No More Tours Tour. In an effort to build good will with the city, Osbourne made a donation of $10,000 to the Daughters of the Republic of Texas, the organization in charge of maintaining the Alamo at the time. “We all have done things in our lives that we regret,” said the front man in a statement. “I am deeply honored that the people of San Antonio have found it in their hearts to have me back,” he continued.⁸¹

Not all San Antonians were excited for Osbourne’s return. Though it had been ten years since the incident at the Cenotaph, city officials were none too pleased to welcome the so-called “prince of darkness” as he performed not one, but two sold-out shows at the Joe Freeman Coliseum. “I think it stinks,” said San Antonio judge Nelson Wolff in regard to the upcoming performance.⁸²  In yet another effort to build more good will with city officials, Osbourne extended an invitation to Wolff for his October 2 concert, which he accepted.
 
Some years later, in the fall of 2015, Black Sabbath announced the final North American dates for their farewell tour, titled The End. The popular tour, which saw the heavy metal legends performing to fans young and old across America, had its final date in San Antonio, a decision Jack Orbin felt was the proper way Sabbath could end their touring days in America. “I don’t think it should be any other way,” stated the promoter to the San Antonio Express News. “Black Sabbath is really one of the bands that broke out of San Antonio.”  In an interview with journalist Hector Saldaña, vocalist Ozzy Osbourne acknowledged the shared adulation between his band and San Antonio. “It’s always been a great rock for both Black Sabbath and myself.” He continues, “San Antonio really likes our music, which makes playing there a pleasure.”⁸⁴

On the night of the performance, November 12, 2016, Black Sabbath were welcomed by nearly 13,000 fans. The fan-favorite setlist, comprised primarily of material from the band’s first three albums, kept attendees on their feet for the nearly two-hour performance. After finishing “Dirty Women,” off of 1976’s Technical Ecstasy, Osbourne addressed the crowd as he had done throughout the night before launching into “Children of the Grave,” from 1971’s Master of Reality. “I will never forget San Antonio.” He continued, “How could I?”