Origin:	Newcastle, England
Genres:	Thrash Metal

Page online:	December 20, 2012
Last update/review:	November 24, 2016

M-Pire Of Evil

This trio originally featured three former members of the mighty Venom, in the form of original guitarist Mantas, bassist/vocalist Tony "Demolition Man" Dolan, and Cronos' brother Antton on drums. The band came together around 2010 and chose the name Prime Evil (naturally, a Venom album title) as their band name, but later had to change it to avoid confusion with another band by the name. And so M-Pire Of Evil they became, debuting with an EP of mostly covers before a proper full-length, Hell To The Holy, in 2012. Comparisons to Venom here are natural and unavoidable. Though not a direct clone of either new or old Venom (though, obviously, if any band has the right to clone Venom, it would be these guys), there are plenty of similarities, the style here often going for the older style, minus the Satanic overtones, with some modern thrash touches. The production is raw and rough, befitting the vibe they're going for. There's not as much variance as one might like, and as a result the songwriting is sometimes samey (Venom, one could argue, often didn't get credit for their surprising diversity and skill in songwriting). Still, this is a pretty solid effort and could do well with old Venom fans. The band released a second album in 2013 and a self-financed live effort a year later, but most recently (April 2015) came the announcement that Dolan and Mantas had teamed up with original Venom drummer Abaddon and were performing as Venom Inc., which presumably signals the end (or perhaps the continuation) of this band.