Hall of Fame

After nearly a decade of European dominance of all things anti-Abrahamic metal—starting with Bathory’s Viking-themed classic Hammerheart—Agalloch issued debut album Pale Folklore.

Four fellow dragon aficionados ensconced in the upper reaches of a Chinatown rehearsal loft they sublet with Henry Rollins (and a particularly stouthearted mouse) summoned into being the 1994 hardcore magnum opus Scratch the Surface.

Formed out of teenage jitters, a can-/will-do work ethic and long-term (possibly unhealthy) exposure to Neurosis, Swans and the Melvins, Boston’s Isis were in many respects different from what the rest of New England had to offer in the late ’90s.

Nuclear death were one of those bands that you really had to be there for. Formed in the depths of the Arizona desert in 1986 and dragged kicking and screaming through metal’s collective consciousness until 2000, the original trio was still in high school when they concocted what was to become their most beloved and influential recording.

What started out as a hobby between friends—principally guitarist/vocalist John Gallagher and bassist/vocalist Jason Netherton—in ’93, eventually turned into a career- and genre-defining powerhouse six years later. Though at the time, the Maryland-based outfit would be hard-pressed to believe it.

The era surrounding the release of Total Destruction, the 1993 sophomore album by New York City noiseniks Unsane, took Chris Spencer’s life on the craziest of rollercoaster rides.

Rust in Peace, as you will learn, wasn’t written in a day. It wasn’t even written in the studio—well, Dave Ellefson’s “Dawn Patrol” was birthed there—over many months, like so many records of the day were.

Formed in the Virginia/DC area in the mid-’80s, a region then more known for its hardcore punk than metal, Deceased slowly built a loyal local fan base as that decade came to an end, kids attracted to the band’s unique take on the nascent death metal sound.

No strangers to the north east thrash metal scene—then dominated by Hall of Famers Anthrax—New Jerseyans Overkill famously peeked out from the underground on ‘88’s Under the Influence.

This is the album that solidified Diamond’s legend as not only one of the great metal vocalists of all time, but a great horror storyteller (and songwriter) with a flair for the dramatic.

Voivod might have set the standard for Québec heavy metal with their highly idiosyncratic sound, but it was death metal that was embraced the most by the French Canadian province when the 1990s rolled around.

While society feared the collapse of the wired world, Lorrain, Davis and the Burdettes feared having to play high-velocity, crusty hardcore for the same people in the same venues until Y3K, or until they kicked the collective bucket, whichever came first.

I distinctly recall the first time I heard Ministry’s The Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Taste.

The Queensrÿche of today hardly resembles the leather-clad, high energy band of young metallers that burst onto the global underground in 1983.

It was only 18 years ago when Rorschach’s second album, Protestant, was released, but man, things were so very different. There was no Internet to help with communication or songwriting; if you wanted to write tunes, a bunch of people had to get face-to-face in a room.

Formed in 1991 in Ipswich, about 82 miles northeast of London, Cradle of Filth started out as, to quote frontman Dani Filth, a “gore-flecked death metal” band.

The story of the creation of Coroner’s No More Color is one absent of any of the hardship, debauchery and/or numerous lineup changes that have plagued many of the albums previously anointed official badass status in our esteemed Hall.

Moored by American funk and disco, reggae, dub, krautrock and the individual members’ sonic predilections, Killing Joke was more than the sum of its parts. It was a scene unto itself.

In 1993, Burzum mastermind and sole member Varg “Count Grishnackh” Vikernes both embodied Norwegian black metal’s violent strain of pagan nihilism and sought to defy the genre’s increasingly stultifying conventions.

It would be completely accurate to say that Melissa is the greatest album ever named after an errant human skull, but it would also be a ridiculously short sell.

OK, so the Discovery Channel has Shark Week. Pretty cool series about fish at the top of the oceanic food chain. For the Deciblog, we’re officially calling this week (February 14th – February 20th) Viking Week. No, we don’ t have the budget to film bloody reenactments, travel to Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, or the…

In the run leading up to 1991’s Goat, “Tight N Shiny”—a corrosive instrumental from the band’s transitional LP Head—offered a regular excuse for Yow to take a much-needed smoke break and introduce the unsuspecting audience to the art of genital origami.

In 1985, any punk band with the temerity to add metal elements to their sound were rather haphazardly lumped into the “crossover” category.

This much is known: though black metal from the kingdom was initially informed by Venom, Bathory and Hellhammer, inventive teenagers and twentysomethings in Oslo, Bergen and various towns all over the country quickly transformed it into something else.

The decision to induct Venom’s debut, Welcome to Hell, rather than the band’s second album, Black Metal, came down to one simple fact: there would be no Black Metal—the album or the genre—were it not for Welcome to Hell.

U.S. death metallers Incantation have had their Onward To Golgotha Hall of Fame show moved to Club Europa on November 20th, 2010. Again, the show will not take place at Rebel as previously published. Club Europa is located at: Europa Night Club 98 Meserole Ave. (corner of Manhattan Ave.) Brooklyn, NY 11222 Incantation will perform…

Because Angel Witch’s debut turned out to be not only their best album, but the only one recorded with anything resembling a stable lineup, it seems all the more precious today.

Tales From the Thousand Lakes is a pivotal album. Not just for Amorphis—if it weren’t for loads of ambition, wide-open minds and a bit of dumb luck, this induction would never be—but for death metal post-1994.

The story of Refused’s last—and best—album starts with the first line of Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl,” which drummer David Sandström scrawled across one wall of the band’s recording space as a mantra: “I have seen the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness.”

Mea culpa: It’s hard not to mention Entombed when discussing this month’s Hall of Fame inductee, Dismember’s 1991 debut full-length Like an Ever Flowing Stream. It’s also a bit tired and unfair to both.