There was never a doubt in my mind that when I wanted to have a column on ’80s rock and metal, Woody High was the one for the job. In his first edition of “Spine of Overkill,” the guitarist/vocalist of stonerly Brooklyn punkers Mighty High remembers his first encounters with Venom‘s pivotal first album, 1981’s Welcome to Hell.

There’s something about frigid weather that always makes me want to listen to Venom. The other night it was really fucking cold and as I waited for the subway on an elevated platform “One Thousand Days in Sodom” was the obvious iPod choice. Venom‘s debut album was released in December 1981 but I didn’t get it until about a year later. It was a frigid night in New York City when I first bought it and had taken the Metro North train in from New Rochelle to go record shopping. Back then I had a part time job making trophies for my high school science teacher. I would spend hours standing in his cramped, unheated garage screwing together these stupid awards given out to everyone on the JV football team or swim team. It was boring as shit but easy money to help fuel my budding metal fixation. I had been staring at the cover of Welcome to Hell for a few months in the bins at Bleecker Bob’s not sure if I was ready for Venom or not. After discovering Motörhead I kept looking for the heaviest, fastest shit I could get my resin-stained fingers on. A lot of people told me to stay away from them because of their alleged Satanism. One metal dude even told me that Venom sucked and couldn’t play as good as a punk rock band. Finally, I decided to take the plunge and risk $7.98 plus tax (my LP still has the price sticker on it). Back then that was a lot of money for an import LP and I had to work about two hours and 20 minutes to make that much. Fuck it, I had already gambled on Motörhead and won big time. Here was another three-piece band from England with bullet belts. How bad could it be?

Nothing could prepare me for the opening vomit blast of “Sons of Satan.” I thought I was hot shit because I had a couple Motörhead records, a Plasmatics record and even Damaged by Black Flag (got that one in a killer trade: gave some hippie kid the double live Genesis album and he gave me Damaged and Sabotage by Black Sabbath!). This was the fastest, noisiest shit I’d ever heard. It sounded like all my Motörhead, The Plasmatics and Black Flag records playing at the same time. I really didn’t know what to make of it. The next two songs “Welcome to Hell” and “Schizo” sounded a bit more like regular metal to me and soon my head was banging and my mother was yelling at me to turn it down. Every song on this album is a killer. I really couldn’t believe they had a song that was about how good angel dust was. I had yet to try it but this convinced me it was definitely something I should inquire about the next time I rode my bicycle into the Bronx to buy some weed. “Witching Hour,” “In League with Satan,” “Live Like an Angel (Die Like a Devil)” — so many hits! Then I also discovered that Venom, like Motörhead, put out lots of cool 7″ singles with killer songs not on the album like “In Nomine Satanas.” 

Back then Venom had a small but diverse crew of weirdos for fans. It seemed like more punks and goths liked them more than metalheads. Welcome to Hell sounds like crap, but if you were only into Priest, Maiden, Scorpions kind of metal it was totally unlistenable. They even got a big writeup in the punk ‘zine Forced Exposure way back when. All this changed when Black Metal came out and the production values were slightly improved. The sound of Welcome to Hell is so raw and some of the songs like “…Sodom” and “…Satanas” have an almost rockabilly slapback echo on the vocals. It wouldn’t surprise me if Cronos is a big Elvis fan. Maybe he told the engineer he wanted his voice to sound like the Big E’s “Mystery Train.” 

Obviously, this album inspired just about every thrash, black and death metal band that followed in its metal path but it’s still the best as far as I’m concerned. For my money, only HellHammer and Bathory really took this crudeness to the next lowest level of filth. Back on Black Records in the UK recently reissued Welcome to Hell, Black Metal and At War with Satan as double LPs with all the bonus tracks on heavy-duty vinyl. I’m sure they sound great, but the best way to experience the joys of Venom is outdoors in frigid weather on tape with a quart of beer. It also sounds great if you get to go to a party and no one notices that the Talking Heads tape is over and then you slip this one in. Get ready for some of the funnest 90 seconds you’ll ever have.

Tags: Spine of Overkill, Woody High

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 28th, 2012 at 4:25 pm and is filed under Columns. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.