Metal Church

1 festival played →

American metal institution going since 1980, bridging traditional heavy metal and the speed of early thrash — riff-driven, high-register, and remarkably durable.

Metal Church formed in 1980, first based in San Francisco under guitarist Kurdt Vanderhoof, before relocating the following year to Aberdeen, Washington, where they briefly performed as Shrapnel. Vanderhoof has remained the band's sole constant across more than four decades, writing for all fourteen of its studio albums even after he stepped back from live performance in 1986.

Their self-titled debut and The Dark, both released in the mid-1980s, pair fast, technical riffing with high, clean vocals, a combination that placed the band alongside the emerging Seattle heavy metal scene and marked them as pioneers of thrash, speed and power metal alike. Two of their first three albums reached the Top 100 of the Billboard 200.

The band has cycled through numerous vocalists, guitarists, bassists and drummers, from founding singer David Wayne through Mike Howe, who joined at the end of the 1980s and sang on Blessing in Disguise (1989), home to the well-known track Badlands. Howe recorded two further albums with the band before its first breakup in 1996.

Metal Church reformed in 1998 and went through several more breakups and reunions afterward, in 2001, 2009 and beyond, with Wayne, Ronny Munroe and Howe each returning to the microphone at different points. Howe rejoined in 2015 and recorded two more records before his death in July 2021.

He was replaced by Marc Lopes, who sang on 2023's Congregation of Annihilation, and in 2025 by Brian Allen, joined in that lineup change by original Megadeth bassist David Ellefson and drummer Ken Mary of Fifth Angel and Flotsam and Jetsam.

Read more