Thrashed to Death

If you’ve never heard of the band Violent Night…well you’re probably not alone. Violent Night was a local band in the Cleveland area, and despite a pretty huge fan base, it only consisted of Northern Ohio, and parts of Michigan and Pennsylvania. When the band broke up in 2005, front man and rhythm guitarist Vic Stown decided to give the fans what they had dreamed about –an album. Though this is a best of and not a full-length.


Even though Vic’s new band (Vindicator) had taken off, he took time for his old fans to produce this album. It included two discs of most, if not all, of the recording the band had recorded. Disc 1 focuses more on the band’s earlier days, including the first original demo released under the old-band name of Snowyt. The tracks are pretty raw, but they were taken right from the original recording. The rest of disc 1 has the classics (and basically the set list) from 2005 including fan favorites: Gift of the Nile and Lock Horns.


Disc 2 features some of the new songs that were being recorded up until the first break up of the band. Most of these songs are rough drafts –since the band broke up, they didn’t bother to clean them up. Despite this it gives us some songs that probably would have been hits like Impaler and Stir of Echoes. It also has songs that were never heard by the fans, mostly because they weren’t played out at live shows. Such songs include At War and Ground Zero. This is probably the best aspect about this best of in that it includes most of the bands recordings, including everything up until the break up.


The album was titled “Thrashed to Death,” simply because it thrashes pretty hard. Classics like Light the Dynamite makes you want to rush into a mosh pit, while Lock Horns makes you want to do just that –throw the horns in the air! It also thrashed to death because the band was literally thrashed to death, or nonexistence. The last two songs, which are included on the Pain demo, hint at what Violent Night could have become –with new singer Wayne Holocaust – and eventually what the band had become again once reunited in 2007. If you can find this disc, get it! Violent Night remain one of the many thrash acts that have had created a buzz in the local scene, but could not be sustained and therefore bit the dust. They truly remain today one of my favorite bands of all time, not to mention they have produced some of the best metal musicians that we will with out a doubt see in future bands!