Artist · EveryDisc catalogue

Metal Church

An American heavy metal band formed in 1980. Initially based in San Francisco, California, they moved to Aberdeen, Washington the following year and called themselves Shrapnel for a while. Led by guitarist and songwriter Kurdt Vanderhoof, the band has released fourteen studio albums and is considered an integral part of the then-nascent Seattle heavy metal scene of the 1980s, as well as pioneers of the thrash metal, speed metal, and power metal genres. During that decade, they achieved significant popularity: two of their first three albums entered the Top 100 of the American Billboard 200 chart. The band's early lyrical themes, such as conflict and paranoia, later expanded to include philosophical, political, and social commentary.