Video Nasties: Metal With The Menace Of Horror Movies

What’s your favourite scary movie? A straightforward slasher like Halloween? The surrealist headfuckery of Suspiria? Or a gore-streaked but tongue-in-cheek social satire along the lines of Dawn Of The Dead? Video Nasties will take any of the above, just so long as it makes the pulse quicken and the stomach churn.

“We want our listeners to feel that anxiety you get with horror movies, that same sense of moral panic,” grins bassist Rick Owen. “It’s about the extremity, the ultra-violence, the sheer naughtiness of it all.”

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This fusing of heaviness and horror are at the core of Video Nasties’ mission. Bringing together elements of thrash, doom, hardcore and black metal, there’s also no end of atmospherics indebted to legendary horror director and composer John Carpenter.

“Metal and horror go hand-in-hand,” nods guitarist Stu Taylor. “It just tends to work. We love the idea that our music is as heavy as it is haunting.”

It seems almost apt, then, that vocalist Damian Von Talbot first met his bandmates – Rick and Stu, plus drummer Dave Archer and guitarist Tommy Lloyd – at a Halloween party dressed as Jack The Ripper. More than that, there’s a glee in leaving the real world at the door in favour of macabre escapism. “We’re political people in our own lives,” Stu states, “but we wanted to step away from that in the music. It’s important to have an escape from reality.”

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With their savage debut album Dominion about to drop (“It’s the soundtrack to your worst nightmares,” says Stu with a wicked grin), and support slots with U.S. death metallers Gatecreeper on their forthcoming UK tour looming, Video Nasties’ murderous spree is just getting started. For now, though, they’re embracing the chaos, as at last year’s London Desertfest, where a hard weekend’s drinking saw them bringing a different sort of splatter to the stage.

“Tommy managed to get through the set,” Rick laughs, “but at the end he had to stop and vomit into a pint glass.”

“He was really sick,” adds Stu, “but people actually thought it was part of our stage show.”

The horror! The horror!

Video Nasties' album Dominion is out March 13 via APF