Metal Massacre is the 1982 compilation album that gave Metallica its first record and started Metal Blade Records. Brian Slagel, a 21-year-old record-store clerk with a fanzine, released it on June 14, 1982. The series went on to introduce Slayer, Armored Saint, Voivod and Possessed, and the label it built signed Texas thrash bands from San Antonio to Houston.
The Short Version
- Metal Massacre came out June 14, 1982, as Metal Blade’s first release.
- Metallica’s “Hit the Lights” closes it; Slayer debuted on Metal Massacre III (1983).
- Fifteen volumes appeared between 1982 and 2021.
- Texas link: San Antonio’s Juggernaut is on Metal Massacre VII (1986).
- As of October 2026, Slayer plays Sick New World Texas in Fort Worth on October 24.
What Was Metal Massacre?
Brian Slagel grew up in Woodland Hills, California, and worked at a rock record store called Oz Records as a teenager. He imported New Wave of British Heavy Metal records, and in the early 1980s he started one of the first metal fanzines, The New Heavy Metal Revue. He also wrote columns for Kerrang! and Sounds.
The fanzine reached only so many people. Slagel later wrote that probably fewer than a thousand copies were made. British compilations like Metal for Muthas gave him the next idea: put the best unsigned bands in Los Angeles on one record.
He had no label and very little money. In his book For the Sake of Heaviness, excerpted by Vice, Slagel says his savings came from a brief job selling appliances at Sears. He asked two importers he bought from at Oz Records, Greenworld in Los Angeles and Important in New York, whether they would distribute a compilation. Both said yes.
The bands mostly paid for their own recordings, because being on any album was a big deal in 1982. Slagel later told Vice how little he expected from it:
“I didn’t do it as a career, I didn’t think I was starting a record label, I didn’t think I was doing anything but helping out the local scene.”
Who Was on the First Metal Massacre Album?
The first pressing (catalog number MBR 1001) has ten songs by nine bands. It opens with Steeler’s “Cold Day in Hell” and closes with Metallica’s “Hit the Lights.” The cover carried the line “The New Heavy Metal Revue presents,” a nod to the fanzine.
The lineup was a snapshot of the Los Angeles scene. Ratt contributed “Tell the World.” Steeler, fronted by Ron Keel, would add a 19-year-old Yngwie Malmsteen in February 1983, in time for its only album. Bitch, fronted by Betsy Weiss, and Ventura’s Cirith Ungol signed on early. Malice got two songs. Mötley Crüe was meant to be on it and dropped out after signing elsewhere.
The record kept changing after release. Ratt signed to Atlantic and Steeler to Shrapnel, so both songs came off later pressings, and Black ’n Blue’s “Chains Around Heaven” took Steeler’s opening slot. Accounts of the first run differ: Slagel’s book talks about pressing perhaps 2,500 copies, while other accounts say all 5,000 printed copies sold.
Cirith Ungol
Ventura, California, formed 1971. Start with King of the Dead (1984), then Dark Parade (Metal Blade, 2023).
How Metallica Got on Metal Massacre
Lars Ulrich had no real band yet when he called, just garage jams with James Hetfield. Near the end of the project, he asked Slagel whether he could have a slot if he put a group together. Slagel, quoted by Rolling Stone in 2022, remembered the call this way:
“Lars asked me, ‘Hey, if I put together a band and give you an original song, will you put it on the record?’ And I said, ‘Sure, of course.’ So that was basically the beginning of Metallica.”
The song arrived at the last possible moment. Assistant producer John Kornarens told Rolling Stone that he and Slagel waited on a Hollywood sidewalk before a 3 o’clock mastering session. Ulrich showed up and “pulled a cassette out of his back pocket.”
That first “Hit the Lights” had James Hetfield singing and a friend, Lloyd Grant, playing the guitar leads. The sleeve misspelled the band as “Mettallica.” Later pressings swapped in a new recording with Dave Mustaine on lead guitar. The song then opened Metallica’s debut album, Kill ’Em All, released by Megaforce on July 25, 1983.
Metallica
Formed in Los Angeles in 1981. Hear the Metal Massacre version of “Hit the Lights” first, then Kill ’Em All (1983).
Metal Massacre III and the Signing of Slayer
Slayer’s route to Metal Blade started at the Woodstock club in Anaheim, California. Slayer was opening for Bitch with an eight-song set, six of them covers, and Slagel saw the band play an Iron Maiden song. Slagel met the band backstage and offered a spot on the next compilation.
“Aggressive Perfector” opens Metal Massacre III (1983), and the buzz it created led Slagel to sign the band. The band paid for Show No Mercy with singer Tom Araya’s wages as a respiratory therapist and a loan from guitarist Kerry King’s father. Metal Blade released it in December 1983.
Five thousand copies was the label’s average at the time. Show No Mercy sold between 15,500 and 20,000 copies in the United States and more than 15,000 overseas, which made it Metal Blade’s best-selling release. The 1984 EP Haunting the Chapel sold 70,000 copies in its first eight months, Slagel told Billboard in 1985.
The label could not hold on to the band. After Hell Awaits (1985), Slayer moved to Def Jam, and Vice notes Metal Blade also lacked the money to sign Metallica, Megadeth or Mötley Crüe. Start with Show No Mercy: it is rough, fast and still sounds like a band discovering how far it could push.
Slayer
Huntington Park, California, formed 1981. Start with Show No Mercy (Metal Blade, 1983), then Hell Awaits (1985).
Which Bands Did the Metal Massacre Series Launch?
The early volumes read like a map of 1980s American metal. Metal Massacre II (1982) opened with Armored Saint and included Trauma, whose bassist Cliff Burton later joined Metallica. Slagel told Vice he helped bring Burton to Metallica: “the bass player was incredible.”
Metal Massacre IV (1983) had Trouble. Volume V (1984) brought Voivod, the East Coast Overkill and Metal Church. Volume VI (1985) had Possessed, Hirax and Dark Angel’s “Welcome to the Slaughterhouse.”
The thrash run continued with Flotsam and Jetsam on VII (1986) and Sacred Reich on VIII (1987). Volume XII arrived in 1995, then the series paused for 11 years. Metal Massacre XIII (2006) mostly featured bands already on the label, and volume XV came out in 2021.
Armored Saint
Los Angeles, formed 1982. Start with the 1983 Armored Saint EP on Metal Blade, then March of the Saint (Chrysalis, 1984).
Metal Blade Records History, From the Garage Up
For its first three years, the label lived at Slagel’s family home. “For the first three years I was running it out of my mom’s garage,” he told Vice in 2017. Armored Saint’s EP, and the band’s signing to Chrysalis afterwards, was the moment he felt it “becoming something real.”
Distribution grew in steps. Slagel’s early deal went through Greenworld, later known as Enigma, after a short-lived manufacturing deal with Metalworks. In April 1987 the two signed a long-term development and distribution deal that also ran select Metal Blade acts through CEMA, Capitol-EMI’s distribution arm. Slagel ran the company by himself until 1988.
A partnership with Warner Bros. followed in the late 1980s. In 1992, after Warner tried to censor Gwar’s America Must Be Destroyed, the two parted ways. Metal Blade handed the Goo Goo Dolls to Warner and moved to RED Distribution. The label went on to release Cannibal Corpse, Mercyful Fate, Fates Warning and Amon Amarth.
The first compilation still matters to the company. For its 40th anniversary, Metal Blade reissued Metal Massacre on vinyl on April 22, 2022, its first vinyl pressing since 1984. In 2027, its 45th year, Slagel will release one podcast episode a week about 25 of the label’s landmark albums, according to Blabbermouth.
Metal Blade and Texas Metal
Texas showed up on the series by its seventh volume. San Antonio’s Juggernaut formed in 1985, and drummer Dave McClain played long enough to record “In the Blood of Virgins” for Metal Massacre VII in 1986. The band then made Baptism Under Fire (1986) and Trouble Within (1987) for Metal Blade.
Juggernaut
San Antonio, 1985 to 1993. Start with Baptism Under Fire (Metal Blade, 1986), then Trouble Within (1987) with Steve Cooper singing.
McClain had come from San Antonio’s original Slayer, the band now known as S.A. Slayer. Two bands called Slayer with records out was an obvious problem, and stories grew that Metal Blade forced the Texans to change names. Bassist Don Van Stavern told Classic Rock in a 2024 feature that no cease-and-desist letter arrived, and Slagel confirmed by email that none was sent. The “S.A.” went on when Under den Linden issued Go for the Throat in 1988. The full story is in our S.A. Slayer article.
S.A. Slayer
San Antonio, formed 1981. Start with Go for the Throat (1988); the live Prepare to Die-Alive (2026) streams songs from both early records.
Other Texas bands came through the label later. Houston’s D.R.I. released Crossover on Metal Blade in 1987, the record covered in our D.R.I. article. Helstar made Nosferatu for the label in 1989 at Rampart Studios in Houston. Rigor Mortis put out its Freaks EP on Metal Blade the same year. Both bands have their own pieces here: Helstar and Rigor Mortis.
Helstar
Houston, formed 1982. Start with Nosferatu (Metal Blade, 1989), then A Distant Thunder (Metal Blade, 1988).
Rotting Corpse crossed paths with this world on its own terms. In May 1986 the band played Sneakers in San Antonio, and the earliest surviving footage shows it covering “Die By The Sword” from Show No Mercy (see venues and media). In 1987 it played a short Texas run of dates with Dark Angel, a Metal Massacre VI band, recounted on the history page.
The band worked the same do-it-yourself network that Slagel’s fanzine came out of. Its 1986 demo, cut at Pantego Sound, was mailed to fanzines on four continents, according to the Demo One page.
Where to Hear It Live
As of October 2026, two of the first Metal Massacre graduates have confirmed Texas dates. Texas shows come first:
- Slayer, Saturday, October 24, 2026: Sick New World Texas at Texas Motor Speedway, Fort Worth. Festival tickets and lineup.
- Metallica, Tuesday, May 18, 2027: Sun Bowl Stadium, El Paso, with Limp Bizkit and Avatar.
- Metallica, Saturday, May 22, 2027: Alamodome, San Antonio, with Limp Bizkit and Avatar. Both Metallica dates are listed in Blabbermouth’s tour announcement.
- Outside Texas: Slayer plays a Reign in Blood 40th-anniversary show at the Kia Forum in Inglewood, California, on November 13, 2026, per Consequence.
For the rest of the roster, Metal Blade keeps a running tour dates page. Rotting Corpse posts its own dates on the shows page.
Start with “Evil Slaughter” (1986)
It is track two on the 1986 demo the band mailed to fanzines on four continents, the same tape-and-zine circuit that produced Metal Massacre.
Sources
- Vice, Alex Deller: Metal Blade’s Brian Slagel Looks Back at 35 Years of Metal Domination (August 22, 2017)
- Rolling Stone, Kory Grow: Metallica’s Rare First Recording With Dave Mustaine to Be Reissued on Vinyl (February 23, 2022)
- Ultimate Classic Rock, Eduardo Rivadavia: 35 Years Ago, Metallica Release Their First Song on Metal Massacre (June 14, 2017)
- Metal Blade Records: Metal Blade Records Celebrates 40 Years (April 25, 2022)
- Wikipedia: Metal Massacre
- Wikipedia: Brian Slagel
- Wikipedia: Metal Blade Records
- Wikipedia: Show No Mercy
- Wikipedia: Slayer
- Metal Hammer (Louder), Dave Everley: An Epic Oral History of Slayer’s Early Years (May 10, 2024)
- Wikipedia: Helstar
- Wikipedia: Armored Saint
- Wikipedia: Cirith Ungol
- Wikipedia: Kill ’Em All
- Louder (Classic Rock), Dave Everley: Slayer vs Slayer (February 14, 2024)
- Wikipedia: S.A. Slayer
- Wikipedia: Juggernaut (band)
- Wikipedia: Nosferatu (Helstar album)
- Wikipedia: Rigor Mortis (band)
- Wikipedia: Crossover (D.R.I. album)
- Blabbermouth: Brian Slagel to Launch New Podcast Celebrating Metal Blade’s 45th Anniversary
- Blabbermouth: Metallica Announces Spring 2027 North American Tour
- Consequence: Slayer Announce Two 2026 US Shows Celebrating Reign in Blood’s 40th Anniversary
Frequently Asked Questions
What was the first Metal Massacre album?
Metal Massacre was a compilation of unsigned Los Angeles metal bands put together by Brian Slagel and released on June 14, 1982. It was Metal Blade Records’ first release, and its sleeve read “The New Heavy Metal Revue presents,” after Slagel’s fanzine.
Which Metal Massacre has Metallica on it?
The first one. Metallica’s “Hit the Lights” closes Metal Massacre (1982), misspelled “Mettallica” on the first pressing. Later pressings used a re-recorded version with Dave Mustaine on lead guitar.
Which Metal Massacre has Slayer on it?
Metal Massacre III (1983) opens with Slayer’s “Aggressive Perfector.” Brian Slagel then signed the band, and Metal Blade released Show No Mercy in December 1983.
Who founded Metal Blade Records?
Brian Slagel, born February 14, 1961, founded Metal Blade in 1982. He worked at Oz Records in Woodland Hills, California, wrote the fanzine The New Heavy Metal Revue, and ran the label from his mother’s garage for its first three years.
How many Metal Massacre albums are there?
Fifteen. Volumes I through XII came out between 1982 and 1995, Metal Massacre XIII followed in 2006, XIV in 2016 and XV in 2021.
Were any Texas bands on Metal Massacre?
Yes. San Antonio’s Juggernaut recorded “In the Blood of Virgins” for Metal Massacre VII in 1986, then made two albums for Metal Blade.
