Artist

Venom

Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom • Formed 1979

Venom is a music group from Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom, active since 1979. Their discography on Gatefold includes 24 records.

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Albums tracked

In collections

1979

Since

Biography

Venom is an English heavy metal band formed in 1978 in Newcastle upon Tyne. Coming to prominence towards the end of the new wave of British heavy metal, Venom's first two albums—Welcome to Hell (1981) and Black Metal (1982)—are considered a major influence on thrash metal and extreme metal in general. Venom's second album proved influential enough that its title was used as the name of the extreme metal subgenre of black metal. However, Venom's later discography remained speed/thrash metal

The Arc of Venom

The pivots — what forced Venom to reinvent.

The Impulse Studios Dirt
From 1980 to 1984, the classic trio of Cronos, Mantas, and Abaddon ruled Neat Records by making the most abrasive racket possible. They took the NWOBHM template and stripped away the melody, replacing it with Cronos's distorted bass chug and Abaddon's chaotic, slightly-out-of-time drumming. You hear this peak savagery on the title track of Black Metal, where the intro features a real chainsaw cutting through a metal door in the studio hallway. It was a three-year run of pure, unadulterated noise that horrified the metal establishment and spawned thousands of tape-trading kids trying to copy that exact guitar tone.
The Demolition Man Pivot
By 1989, Cronos was gone, leaving Mantas and Abaddon to draft Tony 'Demolition Man' Dolan on bass and vocals for Prime Evil. This era shifted Venom away from the cartoonish Satanism into a much more professional, technical thrash metal direction. Dolan could actually sing and play complex basslines, which forced the band to drop the loose, falling-apart charm of their early work. The records from this period, like Temples of Ice, sound like a completely different band trying to compete with the American thrash scene they had originally inspired.
The Neat Records Reunion
In 1996, the original trio put aside their massive personal hatred for a paycheck and signed to SPV to cut Cast in Stone. The reunion was sparked by a massive headlining gig at the Dynamo Open Air festival where they realized the entire black and death metal scenes of the nineties were worshiping their old catalog. They tried to modernize the sound with industrial elements and a cleaner mix, but the tension in the studio was toxic. Abaddon left shortly after, proving you cannot recapture the lightning once the original hatred turned corporate.

Influences

Motörhead — Lemmy's distorted bass tone is the direct blueprint for Cronos's 'bulldozer' bass sound. Venom famously covered 'Iron Fist' and stole the double-bass speed run from Philthy Animal Taylor. You hear it in the relentless, galloping tempo of 'Sons of Satan'.
Black Sabbath — Mantas repeatedly cited Tony Iommi as his sole guitar inspiration for the dark, tritone-heavy riffing style. The slow, doom-laden bridge in 'At War With Satan' is a direct lift of the heavy atmosphere Sabbath built on Master of Reality. They took the occult imagery and turned the volume up to ten.
Deep Purple — The band frequently played Deep Purple riffs during their early rehearsals in Newcastle church halls to test their speed. The frantic, screeching guitar solo styling on 'In League with Satan' is Mantas trying to replicate Ritchie Blackmore's chaotic whammy bar abuse from Fireball. They just played it with zero classical training.
The Sex Pistols — Cronos has admitted in multiple interviews that the band's entire attitude was punk, specifically modeled after the snotty, nihilistic delivery of Johnny Rotten. You hear this in the spit-flecked, half-spoken vocal delivery on 'Poison' rather than the operatic metal singing of the era. They wanted the chaos of punk with the volume of metal.
Judas Priest — Venom wore the leather, studs, and spiked wristbands that Rob Halford brought into the metal scene, pushing the look to its absolute cartoon extreme. Musically, the dual-guitar attack on 'Schizo' is a cheap, distorted imitation of the Tipton and Downing harmonies found on Sad Wings of Destiny. They wanted the theater of Priest but with none of the polish.