Terrorizer (magazine)
Terrorizer was an extreme music magazine published by Dark Arts Ltd. in the United Kingdom. It was released every four weeks with thirteen issues a year and featured a "Fear Candy" covermount CD, a twice yearly "Fear Candy Unsigned" CD, and a double-sided poster.
History[edit]
1993[edit]
Terrorizer published its first issue in October 1993[3] with Sepultura on the cover and a price of £1.95. "Sure, the layout was a bit ropey, with several 'cut out'-style pictures in the live section and some horribly lo-fi video stills in the Pestilence feature, but what a line-up of bands! Sepultura, Morgoth, Entombed, Morbid Angel, At the Gates, Coroner, Dismember, Sinister, Death...it was a veritable smorgasbord of brutality."[4]
The magazine's name derives from seminal grindcore band Terrorizer (which got the name from the death metal band Master's first demo in 1985)[5] and as such the magazine was an early champion of the emerging death metal scene, a tradition that it carried on and expanded to include all sub-generes of heavy metal adopting the slogan "extreme music - no boundaries" in 2003 with issue 108, also the first part of the Thrash Special.
After a second issue with cover stars Carcass, the then editor, Rob Clymo, took a risk by putting Metallica on the cover which, although it caused controversy with elitists, symbolised a move towards broader musical coverage. Despite this, Terrorizer's pulse remained firmly on the extreme metal underground with Cradle of Filth winning best demo and Fear Factory best newcomer in the 1993 Readers' Poll.
1994–1995[edit]
Issue 11 saw Terrorizer celebrate its first birthday, covering hardcore punk in force with features on Suicidal Tendencies, Madball, Chaos UK and Pro-Pain. "There was a sense that the team were finally properly honouring the magazine's original pledge to cover all forms of extreme music."[4]
In 1994, death metal began to get wider acceptance in the mainstream metal press, but black metal continued to be vilified or ridiculed, or both, creating a gap that Terrorizer filled by giving pages to bands like Enslaved, Emperor and Dissection, whilst the demo reviews continued to beat the trend, getting first listens of Behemoth and Amon Amarth.
The first covermount CD, entitled Noize Pollution 3 (the first two having been cassettes), appeared on issue 23 in 1995 and featured At the Gates, Six Feet Under, In Flames, Moonspell and Dissection. That year, Terrorizer also launched two phone services, "Deathline" and "Metal Mates", that were swiftly discontinued. "The former was a number you could call to actually listen to the whole of the interviews you'd read snippets of in the magazine, and the latter where you could register your personal details with a metal matchmaking agency."[4]
1996–1998[edit]
With issue 28 in 1996, Nick Terry replaced Rob Clymo as editor and the issue saw a Burzum artwork poster. With issue 29, the new editor overhauled and expanded the album reviews, live reviews and introduced a black metal news column. The next two years were dominated by black metal vs hardcore punk debates, as the two forces then dominant in extreme music came head-to-head in the magazine. Issue 33 also featured a demo review of Public Disturbance, a Cardiff-based hardcore band whose members would go on to form Lostprophets. In 1997, the first incarnation of the Terrorizer website was launched; Emperor, Deicide, Vader and the return of Mayhem made the covers, and hardcore continued to get heavy coverage with Integrity, Shelter, the reformed Agnostic Front and a UK HC scene report that introduced Knuckledust.
In 1998, coverage embraced both nu metal (albeit in a critical fashion), which the magazine tried to christen 'woolly hat' music, as well as more traditional fare; the former, however, saw them receive a great deal of criticism from the underground. Terrorizer also featured the last interview with Death frontman Chuck Schuldiner in issue 59. Although the next year saw the emergence of noisecore with Neurosis, Today Is the Day and The Dillinger Escape Plan, Slipknot, who would receive a cover by issue 73, got their first interview. Joey Jordison would later reveal how he had been reading the magazine since its first issue.
Terrorizer released its first cover mounted CD on its December 1998 issue and did so every four months until 2001, which it was released every two months. From 2002, every issue came with a CD.
1999–2018[edit]
Terrorizer ended 1999 with a Christmas show that saw Hecate Enthroned and Akercocke support Morbid Angel at The Astoria 2 in London. In late 2000, Jonathan Selzer replaced Nick Terry as editor and 2001 saw a doom metal revival with coverage of Cathedral and Spirit Caravan so intensive that British doom metallers Warning split up following an argument inspired by quotes in their Terrorizer interview that year.[4]
Issue 91 saw cover placement for London-based Satanic metallers Akercocke and later coverage of emerging British black metallers Anaal Nathrakh which would culminate in the previously studio-only band headlining Terrorizer's 2005 Christmas event, "A Cold Night in Hell", as their first ever live appearance. With news of Chuck Schuldiner's death, issue 97 saw him appear on the cover in tribute along with six pages inside.
For issue 116, the covermount CD changed its name from "Terrorized" (then on its 26th volume) to "Fear Candy", with some volumes given over to the yearly "Fear Candy Unsigned" (previously called "The Abominable Showcase") CD in which unsigned bands competed for an interview in the magazine. For 2006, the "Fear Candy Unsigned" was mounted on the CD along with a regular "Fear Candy". Previous entrants for the "Fear Candy Unsigned" who have since had a level of success include Season's End, a symphonic metal band now on 1 Records, zombie-themed thrash band Send More Paramedics on In at the Deep End Records, post-hardcore band Million Dead (now split-up) and avant-garde grindcore band Tangaroa on Anticulture Records.
In September 2007, Jonathan Selzer left Terrorizer for Metal Hammer, and was replaced as editor by Joseph Stannard, the magazine's news editor until that time. Subsequently the role of editor was occupied by former Rock Sound and Kerrang! staffer Darren Sadler, after previous editor Louise Brown left Terrorizer to create specialist heavy metal magazine Iron Fist. Other roles were filled by Tom Dare (web editor), Darrell Mayhew (designer), Steve Newman (designer) and notable contributors included Morat, Paul Stenning, Ronnie Kerswell-O'Hara, Olivier "Zoltar" Badin, Kez Whelan, Jose Carlos Santos, Kim Kelly, John Mincemoyer, J. Bennett, Lee Macbride, Mike Kemp, Ian Glasper and Kevin Stewart-Panko.
The magazine's last issue (287) was released in June 2018[6] and its publisher Dark Arts Ltd. was dissolved in January 2019.[7] Lack of communication about the closure of Terrorizer caused controversy with subscribers who had not been informed of the impending demise.[8][9] There was additional controversy as, despite the lack of publication, subscribers were still being charged.[10]
Terrorizer Online[edit]
Launched in the autumn of 2007, Terrorizer Online is a weekly ezine characterised by a more personal and irreverent tone, frequently introduced by various members of the editorial team directly. In addition to this, the newsletter features exclusive content, ranging from reviews to alternative versions of lead features such as Down, Apocalyptica, Today Is the Day, Dam, Testament, Cannibal Corpse, Pestilence and completely original interviews with Massacre, Finntroll, The Locust, Sepultura, Bad Brains, Wintersun and Iced Earth.
John Peel[edit]
British radio DJ John Peel, famously a champion of death metal and grindcore, mentioned the magazine in an episode of Home Truths on BBC Radio 4. "...I took several copies of a music magazine called 'Terrorizer' out of my luggage before leaving for New Zealand via Los Angeles in 2002 and given the hostility of the officials we encountered in California I'd say we did the right thing..."[12]
Writers[edit]
Terrorizer's pool of writers included former Stampin' Ground bassist Ian Glasper, who has also written three books on UK punk, Burning Britain: The History of UK Punk, 1980–1984, The Day the Country Died: A History of Anarcho Punk 1980–1984 and Trapped in a Scene: UK Hardcore 1985–1989, author and ghostwriter Paul Stenning, former Cradle of Filth keyboard player Damien (aka Greg Moffitt), comedy writer and Moss drummer Chris Chantler and guest columns from Fenriz, Today Is the Day's Steve Austin, Amon Amarth's Johan Hegg, Brutal Truth's Kevin Sharp and The Haunted's Peter Dolving.