Description
By now, DECEASED need no introduction. One of the longest-running American death metal bands, since 1985, DECEASED have been there for it all: death metal’s genesis, its creative peak, its commercial peak and subsequent sink into trendiness, the eventual fallout and “un-trendiness,” its rebirth at the hands of a new generation, and on and on. There they have stood, simply and 100% always DECEASED, not caring what year it is or what is hip – simply, always, DEATH METAL FROM THE GRAVE!
Through it all, DECEASED have always been upfront and forthright about their influences, most of which stem from heavy metal’s glory years in the 1980s. To date, the band have done three all-covers albums – 2002’s Zombie Hymns, 2004’s Rotten to the Core, and 2020’s Rotten to the Core Part 2 (The Nightmare Continues), as well as 2015’s massive double-disc Cadaver Traditions, which compiled the first two covers albums with more than a dozen additional covers – and now DECEASED return with a thematically unified all-thrash covers album, appropriately titled Thrash Times at Ridgemont High.
“Thrash Times at Ridgemont High is a project I’ve wanted to do since while writing Fearless Undead Machines in 1996,” explains founding frontman/drummer King Fowley. “Thrash metal is some of my favorite music and a very integral part to the DECEASED sound. I’d thought of a tribute record to bands of the genre that really ripped it up during those teenage years.” Of them, the tracklist to Thrash Times at Ridgemont High reads both as an essentials list of ’80s thrash’s meanest bands as well as some of its most cult. From the requisite Voivod (one of King Fowley’s all-time favorite bands), Razor, Whiplash, Sacrifice, and Bulldozer on to Artillery, Blessed Death, Texas’ Rigor Mortis, and Germany’s Darkness to England’s Deathwish, Finland’s Stone, and Belgium’s Cyclone, DECEASED rip it up in reverential style, both keeping the intent of the originals intact whilst displaying their characteristic Death Metal From the Grave.
Featuring lovingly extensive liner notes by King Fowley and all previously unreleased tracks recorded over the course of 2020-2021, Thrash Times at Ridgemont High is essential listening for all DECEASED diehards and self-respecting thrashers alike!
