Metal Blade Records | |
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Founded | 1982 |
Founder | Brian Slagel |
Status | Corporate |
Distributor(s) |
RED Distribution (US) Warner Music Group (Outside the US) Riot Entertainment (Australia) Sony Music (CAN) BMG Rights Management (Europe) Diamante Music Group |
Genre | Heavy metal, extreme metal |
Country of origin | United States |
Location | Agoura Hills, California |
Official website | www |
Metal Blade Records is a heavy metal record label founded by Brian Slagel in 1982. The U.S. corporate office for Metal Blade is located in Agoura Hills, California. It also has offices in Germany, Japan, Canada, and the UK. The label is distributed in the U.S. by RED Distribution, and in Canada by Sony Music Entertainment. It was distributed by Warner Bros. Records in the United States from 1988 to 1993.
Metal Blade Records was founded by Brian Slagel, who at the time was a record store employee in suburban Los Angeles, as a way to increase the recognition of local metal bands. The label's first release was a compilation album called The New Heavy Metal Revue presents Metal Massacre, and included Metallica, Ratt, and Black 'N Blue.
Metal Blade artists that have appeared on the Billboard 200 chart include The Goo Goo Dolls, Amon Amarth, Trouble, As I Lay Dying, Behemoth, The Black Dahlia Murder, Slayer, Cannibal Corpse, Fates Warning (the first Metal Blade band to have achieved this), Lizzy Borden, Anvil, GWAR, King Diamond, Job for a Cowboy, Whitechapel, Armored Saint, The Red Chord, Unearth, Between the Buried and Me, D.R.I., Corrosion of Conformity and Cattle Decapitation.