B-side "Get Ready" Genre Speed Metal Label Metronome Music GmbH | Recorded 1982 Length 3:49 | |
Released November 1982 (1982-11) | ||
"Fast as a Shark" is a song and single by German heavy metal band Accept from their 1982 album Restless and Wild.
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Its blazingly fast double bass drumming is recognized today as reaching a new level in the development of the subgenre of speed and power metal. The intro to the track is a snippet from a crackly old children's recording of a traditional German tune titled "Ein Heller und ein Batzen" (A Farthing and a Penny). The band thought it would make a humorous contrast with their heavy metal sound, and the fact that a young Dieter Dierks (in whose studio the album was recorded) was singing on the recording made it even more of an inside joke. The band soon found themselves in an unintended controversy, however: even though the song dated from 1830, it was a popular marching song during the Nazi era and still held that connotation for many listeners, a fact the band was unaware of at the time. "So out of a funny little idea we created somewhat of a monster," Wolf Hoffmann recalls.
"Fast as a Shark" was ranked Number 33 in Martin Popoff's book The Top 500 Heavy Metal Songs of All Time.
The song has been covered by Witchery, Helloween, Holy Grail, Rage, Forte, Altar Steel Prophet and Debauchery.