Blackened Thrash Metal

Blackened thrash metal is the fusion of thrash metal's speed and riff attack with black metal's tremolo-picked guitars, rasped vocals and occult atmosphere. Precursors in *Venom*, *Sodom* and *Sarcófago* set the template in the 1980s, but the style crystallised in the mid-1990s Norwegian and German scenes around *Aura Noir*, *Deströyer 666* and *Desaster*, who deliberately stripped black metal back to thrash's directness. Raw production, punk-inflected drumming and Satanic or apocalyptic imagery distinguish it from both the progressive drift of later black metal and the cleaner revival thrash of the 2000s.