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Corrosion of Conformity is an American heavy metal band.
History
COC started as a hardcore punk band in 1982 in Raleigh, North Carolina, with original members Reed Mullin on drums, Woody Weatherman on guitar, Mike Dean on bass and Benji Shelton on vocals. COC were pioneers of the crossover thrash genre in the 1980s.
They were featured on the "No Core" compilation tape and made their vinyl debut in 1983 on the "Why Are We Here" 7" compilation with other North Carolina area bands like Blood Mobile, Stillborn Christians, and No Labels.
Benji soon departed and was replaced by Eric Eycke in time for the "Eye For An Eye" LP in 1984. While still very much a hardcore punk record, this was the band's first dabbling in the heavy metal and they began to play more gigs with straight up metal bands like Slayer.
Soon after, Eric left the band and COC soddered on as a three piece with both Mike and Reed sharing the vocal duties on the 1985 follow up LP "Animosity", considered to be one of the classic records in the "cross-over" genre. Animosity got rave reviews in both punk and heavy metal fanzines across the globe.
In 1987, COC recruited Simon Bob Sinister away from their fellow Carolina band and Death Records labelmates, Ugly Americans. The band's 1987 release, Technocracy featured the hectic thrash musicianship of COC with a cleaner vocal style then they had in the past.
Just when things seemed to be going well for COC, Mike Dean departed in 1987 and Simon Bob soon followed, leaving COC in a state of flux for a couple of years. The remaining members re-tuned the line up and searched high and low for a new vocalist, including posting a classified in Flipside Fanzine for a vocalist similar in sound to "James Hetfield or Ozzy Osborne" to go with their new metal sound. Caroline Records released some old tracks with Mike singing during this time with the aptly named "Six Songs With Mike Singing" EP.
After much searching, Karl Agell was recruited on vocals, Phil Swisher on bass and Pepper Keenan on rhythm guitar. COC gravitated towards a more straightforward heavy metal sound. By 1991's Blind they had become a heavy metal band.
In 1993, Agell and Swisher left the band, Dean returned and Keenan took over lead vocals. The following year COC signed to Columbia Records, and the release of Deliverance saw the band move toward Southern metal, a sound that they also carried onto the Wiseblood and America's Volume Dealer albums.
COC was nominated for a 1998 Grammy Award in the "Best Metal Performance" category for the song "Drowning in a Daydream" off Wiseblood. Soon after that, Columbia dropped COC, who then moved to Sanctuary Records. Mullin left the band in 2001. Since then the band has worked with a series of drummers: Jimmy Bower of Down, Stanton Moore of Galactic and Jason Patterson, who previously played drums in the Raleigh-based rock band Cry of Love.
In recent years COC has mixed elements of stoner rock with their metal sound. They have also collaborated with a number of other artists: James Hetfield of Metallica contributed vocals to the song "Man or Ash" on Wiseblood; Warren Haynes of the Allman Brothers' Band and Gov't Mule played slide guitar on "Stare Too Long" on America's Volume Dealer; and Stanton Moore of Galactic played drums on In The Arms of God.
Members of COC have also participated in collaborations: Keenan plays guitar with the metal supergroup Down, and Dean contributed vocals to a track titled "Access Babylon" on former Nirvana drummer and Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl's Probot project.
Members
- Pepper Keenan – guitar, vocals (1990 onwards)
- Woody Weatherman – guitar (1982 onwards)
- Mike Dean – bass, vocals (1982-1987, 1993 onwards)
Former members
- Reed Mullin – drums (1982–2001)
- Karl Agell – vocals (Blind)
- Phil Swisher – bass (Blind)
- Simon Bob Sinister – vocals (Technocracy)
- Eric Eycke – vocals (Eye For An Eye)
- Benji Shelton – vocals (original vocalist)
Collaborators
- Jason Patterson – drums (2005 onwards)
- Stanton Moore – drums (In The Arms of God)
- Jimmy Bower – drums (2001–2002)
- Warren Haynes – slide guitar ("Stare Too Long," America's Volume Dealer)
- James Hetfield – vocals ("Man or Ash," Wiseblood)
Discography
Albums
- Eye For An Eye (1983, No Core Records, re-released by Toxic Shock Records)
- Animosity (1985, Death Records)
- Blind (1991)
- Deliverance (1994)
- Wiseblood (1996)
- America's Volume Dealer (2000, re-released in 2004 as a DualDisc)
- Live Volume (2001, also released on DVD and DVDA)
- In the Arms of God (2005)
EPs
- Technocracy (1987, Death Records)
- 1985 (1989, Caroline Records)
Compilations
- No Core tape (1982, No Core)
- Why Are We Here? 7" (1983, No Core Records, "Poison Planet", "Indifferent", "Too Cool")
- Cleanse the Bacteria LP (1985, Pusmort Records, "Kiss of Death")
- Thrasher Skate Rock Vol. 3 LP (1986, Thrasher/High Speed Records, "What", "Not For Me", "Citizen")
- Empty Skulls Vol. 2 LP (1986, Fartblossom Records, "Center of the World", "Eye for an Eye", "Negative Outlook")
- Complete Death LP (1986, Death Records, "Loss for Words")
- Life is a Joke Vol. 2 LP (1986, Weird System Records, "Eye for an Eye")
- Flipside Vinyl Fanzine Vol. 3 LP (1987, Gasatanka Records, "Intervention")
- Rat Music for Rat People 3 LP (1987, CD Presents Records, "Bound")
- "Clerks" Soundtrack LP (1994, Columbia Records, "Big Problem")
- A Tribute To Black Sabbath LP (1994, Columbia Records, "Lord of This World")
- Music To Score By LP (1999, RED Interactive, "Land Of The Free Disease")
Music videos
- "Vote with a Bullet" (1992)
- "Dance of the Dead" (1992)
- "Albatross" (1994)
- "Clean My Wounds" (1994)
- "Wiseblood" (1996)
- "Drowning in a Daydream" (1996)
- "Stonebreaker" (2005)
External links
Heavy metal musical groups | American musical groups | Hardcore punk groups
Corrosion of Conformity | קורוז'ן אוף קונפורמיטי | Corrosion of Conformity
"Corrosion of Conformity"