Destroyer 666

Deströyer 666, an unsubtle Melbourne-based Australian act, first took shape as a solo black metal venture led by the imaginatively named K.K. Warslut, also known as Keith Destroyer and formerly tied to the pioneering Bestial Warlust. After the self-recorded Violence Is the Prince of This World appeared in 1995, the project gained Shrapnel on guitar, Bullet Eater on bass—otherwise identified as Phil Gresik of Hobbs' Angel of Death and Bestial Warlust renown—plus Ballistic Howitzer behind the drums, resulting in the 1997 follow-up Unchain the Wolves and the simultaneous embrace of the tagline “Australian and Antichrist.” Three years later Phoenix Rising arrived as the third album, introducing sharper thrash and death metal textures that expanded the group’s reach through its initial international outing on Season of Mist. The same label arrangement applied to Cold Steel...for an Iron Age in 2002, though activity cooled after the Terror Abraxas EP the following year. An unexplained break ended in 2009 when Deströyer 666 reappeared with the widely praised fourth album Defiance. To the Devil His Due surfaced in 2011 as a collection of all previously 7"-only tracks, and in 2016 the band delivered its long-awaited fifth studio album, Wildfire.