VENOM Vinyl & CDs

Review: Venom’s arrival in the early 80s marked a seismic shift in the UK metal scene, grabbing the gourmand attention of both metalheads and punks alike for their sludge-mired shreds and vocal catharses. Asmodeic shapeshifters and crimson fiends are heard terrorising London on this latest, greatest hits compilation from the band, reaffirming their rather tense relationship with the big smoke following their comeup in Newcastle upon Tyne. Most of Venom’s early material was penned by bassist and frontman Conrad Lant (aka Cronos) and guitarist Jeffrey Dunn (aka Mantas), with a distinctive focus on satanic imagery. Get ready for a ravelling, blackened English metal catabasis, perfect for those listeners who need it raw.

Review: The follow up to Newcastle metal icons' stellar debut, Welcome To Hell, is often regarded as one of the quintessential extreme metal contributions, even to this day. Venom would meticulously craft their sophomore effort, with vocalist/bassist Conrad Lent working overtime to mix the tracks, utilising his engineering experience in an attempt to keep costs low while also maintaining full creative control. The end result was Black Metal, a ferocious onslaught of unprecedented technicality, satanic imagery and malevolent atmosphere. It's no small secret that the project is all but directly linked, cited and blamed for the resulting Norwegian black metal genre that would slowly take decrepit shape in the late eighties before plaguing the nineties with as many controversial news articles as it did seminal albums. Even the infamous artwork has become synonymous with the genre as an entity, while the hyper-aggressive, unsettling form of speed-thrash the tracks exude, still stands tall and bold as the intrinsic signifier of the metal scene as a whole, on a deathmarch into uncharted, undiscovered realms of extremity in 1982. Four decades on, this anniversary edition serves as credence to the birth of all modern forms of extreme metal.