Decline
By the early 1990s, the scene had mostly died down, with many groups disbanding, going on hiatus or venturing to musical styles deemed more commercial or accessible at the time.
Oakland thrash metal band Vio-Lence would dissolve, leading guitarist Robb Flynn to form and front Machine Head, who would help popularize the groove metal genre. Flynn (who had also co-founded Forbidden) would be joined by drummer Chris Kontos (formerly of Attitude Adjustment) and later guitarist Phil Demmel, who played alongside Flynn in Vio-Lence.
Vocalist Steev Esquivel would take a similar direction to Flynn after the 1994 break-up of his thrash metal band, Defiance, when he formed groove metal/nu-metal group, Skinlab, the following year.
Possessed would disband in 1989 after vocalist/bassist Becerra was shot by 2 street thieves and left paralyzed from the waist down. In addition, personal and creative conflicts within the band had been described by former members. Mike Torrao would reform Possessed the following year with a different line-up; however, the group would fold once again in 1993.
The 2008 documentary film Get Thrashed attributed thrash's disintegration to grunge's rise after the Clash of the Titans tour. While every band touring the 1990 European segment were veterans of 1980s thrash, a then-unknown Alice in Chains was the opening band on the North American segment in 1991. Death Angel were originally intended by promoters as the supporting act (for their album, Act III); however, in the previous year, a vehicle accident in Arizona left drummer Andy Galeon critically injured, and Geffen Records had dropped the group from their roster after a disagreement on who to replace him; subsequently, the band would dissolve. The same year, Geffen created a subsidiary label, DGC Records, which was responsible for signing Nirvana, who – along with Alice In Chains, Pearl Jam and Soundgarden – epitomized the face of the Seattle grunge phenomena of the early 1990s. Nearly coinciding with Nevermind's No. 1 spot on the Billboards, Exodus would be dropped from Capitol Records and the group would go on hiatus the same year.
Despite line-up shifts and label changes, Testament managed to intercept thrash's slow period by touring Europe and building a new fan base abroad. Sadus bassist Steve DiGiorgio and Floridian guitarist James Murphy (both alums of Schuldiner's band Death) would join ranks with the band, in addition to former or session members of Forbidden, Exodus, and Slayer. However, Murphy would leave Testament after a brain tumor diagnosis in 1999. He had initially replaced founding guitarist Alex Skolnick, who had left Testament in 1993 to explore other musical styles.
Almost in tandem with grunge's receding vogue, and the increasing popularity of alternative rock, nu-metal, rap rock, rap music and boy bands, MTV's Headbangers Ball (which had showcased music videos of many Bay Area thrash groups in the late 1980s and early 1990s) would be taken off the air in 1995, limiting U.S. output of thrash (in addition to associated metal subgenres like death and black metal) to outlets such as radio shows, carrier current, mailorder, word of mouth or the internet.
Out of all bands from the Bay Area metal scene, Metallica managed not only to stay active (despite alcoholism, internal conflicts and a turnover of bassists) but also branch out to the mainstream, even while thrash metal and other 1980s metal styles began to shrink from the public eye. Metallica was the only "big 4 thrash group" not on the Clash of the Titans tour; instead, after the Titans event ended, the band teamed up with Guns N Roses and Faith No More on 2 consecutive tours in support of their self titled 5th album, known colloquially as the Black Album. The record was considered a musical departure from their thrash metal days, showing a direction reared toward modern hard rock, and was attributed (along with Load and ReLoad) as alienating long-time fans. The April 2000 Napster file sharing lawsuits would bring the band further controversy from both the press and fans, considering the process of music trading was a factor in their early success. Since the beginning of the Soundscan era, the Black Album has held distinction as the best selling album of all time; the accumulated Metallica discography currently makes the group the 3rd most financially successful heavy metal band of all time (after Led Zeppelin and AC/DC) and the best selling thrash metal band of all time. The band has sold a total of over 100 million records.
Read more about this topic: Bay Area Thrash Metal
Famous quotes containing the word decline:
“The chief misery of the decline of the faculties, and a main cause of the irritability that often goes with it, is evidently the isolation, the lack of customary appreciation and influence, which only the rarest tact and thoughtfulness on the part of others can alleviate.”
—Charles Horton Cooley (1864–1929)
“We have our little theory on all human and divine things. Poetry, the workings of genius itself, which, in all times, with one or another meaning, has been called Inspiration, and held to be mysterious and inscrutable, is no longer without its scientific exposition. The building of the lofty rhyme is like any other masonry or bricklaying: we have theories of its rise, height, decline and fall—which latter, it would seem, is now near, among all people.”
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881)
“Where mass opinion dominates the government, there is a morbid derangement of the true functions of power. The derangement brings about the enfeeblement, verging on paralysis, of the capacity to govern. This breakdown in the constitutional order is the cause of the precipitate and catastrophic decline of Western society. It may, if it cannot be arrested and reversed, bring about the fall of the West.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)