San Francisco in the ‘80s; the birthplace of Thrash Metal. Any and every Metal fan knows bands such as Metallica, Megadeth, Exodus, Death Angel, and Slayer, to name a few changed the face of Heavy Metal music as we know it. Today, these bands are considered to be legendary, but back in the early ‘80s, they were just a bunch of dorky longhaired kids who loved three things: Music, beer, and each other.
Murder in the Front Row is an excellent visual companion to the 2012 book of the same name written by Brian Lew and Harold Oimoen. Murder in the Front Row (the book) was more or less a yearbook of the early days of the Bay Area Thrash/Metal scene and featured some of the earliest and iconic photographs of Slayer, Megadeth, Metallica, Y&T, and Exodus just to name a few. The photos in this book documented the level of camaraderie and love that these guys all had (and still have) for each other, but the documentary brought them to life.
One of the things I loved the most about this DVD was getting to see some of the artists expressing their love for the memories that they have of the “old days,” and they also show a lot of pride in the community. There was no competitive ugliness among these bands. Instead, it was a huge family helping each other on their way up the success ladder and encouraging and inspiring each other.
My thoughts on some of the musicians that were interviewed for this feature:
Death Angel vocalist Mark Osegueda has to be the nicest guy in the industry. I totally want to have a beer with him.
Exodus/Slayer guitarist Gary Holt has such a dry sense of humor, and I really came away liking him more than ever.
Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett is so fucking dorky but in a really cool way. He’s so excited about music and about, well everything. He’s the kind of guy I could see having a beer or three with and just talking about anything and everything.
Of all of the musicians interviewed, I was surprisingly moved the most by Metallica’s James Hetfield. I have my own opinions of Metallica and the band that they became. I’ll be honest. I look at Metallica as a band that was at a crossroads at some point, and they chose to take the road to success and money. While I feel that they appeared to have lost sight of who they once were, Hetfield proved me wrong about himself. I could see it in his eyes and his expressions as he recounted the old days. He’s very proud of those days and being a part of such a legendary community. He came across as humble, appreciative, and even emotional when talking about the loss of Metallica bassist Cliff Burton.
Oh yeah, and Kerry King of Slayer is the most pretentious douchebag on the planet.
While I loved this documentary, I did feel like it was a bit heavy on Exodus/Paul Baloff, Metallica, and Slayer. At this point, I would like to think that most Metalheads know most of what they talked about regarding these bands. There weren’t any real surprises here, but I’m sure that these bands were the selling point. I would have loved to have seen more about Testament, Death Angel, Vio-lence, and Forbidden. While not as popular as the bands covered in this documentary, I would have found it much more interesting to learn more about these bands and hear from them regarding their place and their thoughts on the ‘80s Bay Area Thrash scene.
All in all, Murder in the Front Row is a fantastic documentary of a magical time and place where a whole new genre of music was born. There aren’t any real mind-blowing stories or reveals that we haven’t heard a million times, but to hear them from the mouths of the artists that were there definitely put a much cooler spin on it. Maybe the success of this documentary will lead to Part 2, where some of the smaller, less mentioned bands will get their due. While they may not have achieved the level of success the others did, they still played an essential role in helping to set the foundation for a genre of heavy music that would go on to inspire many future bands and thrive for well over 40 years and counting.
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