Venom TShirTS,

Venom PosTerS

Venom are a heavy metal band, formed in late 1979 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England.

Coming to prominence towards the end of the 'New Wave of British Heavy Metal', Venom have found little mainstream success or critical acclaim, but are widely regarded as highly influential, particularly for their first two albums, Welcome to Hell (1981) and Black Metal (1982).

The title of Venom's second album would become influential and definitive enough to describe an entire subgenre called black metal, a category under which Venom is most commonly referred. The nature of Venom's high-pitch guitars, harsh vocals, use of pseudonyms, and unrelenting emphasis on Satanic lyrics and imagery is considered the groundwork for the genre's later successes.

Critic Ed Rivadavia writes that Welcome To Hell influenced "literally thousands" of bands. Venom's music helped shape the development of many thrash metal bands, specifically the 'big four' of thrash: Anthrax, Metallica, Slayer and Megadeth (Metallica opened for Venom on an early 1980s tour and Slayer toured with them on the Combat Tour in 1985).

Rivadavia argues that, somewhat like punk rockers The Ramones, Venom’s mediocre instrumental skills were actually their “secret weapon”, inspiring countless metal fan teenagers to imitate Venom .

Venom often used Satanic and other 'evil' themes in their lyrics, but critic Bradley Torreano declared that Venom  had "their tongues planted firmly in their cheeks", with a sense of humor and irony that was sometimes lost on Venom fans and other musicians. Torreano adds that Venom "[caught] the attention of both metalheads and punks, Venom  was emulated by the former and turned into camp icons by the latter."

from Wikipedia licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.

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