DEMISE started out officially in 1988. Rich, Mike and Ian were all best friends in high school. It wasn't until Rich meet Steve in college that the lineup was complete. We recorded our first demo called "The Petting Zoo". For what it was at the time, it came out pretty good...5 songs "Mind's Eye", "Winds of Death", "The Beauty of Violence", "You're Last Breath" and the infamous "Pizza Guy". A year later we changed our name to EXPERIMENTS IN FEAR. It seemed like a good idea at the time but looking back we should have just kept DEMISE! Live and learn! Anyway, we recorded another demo that had another 5 songs, this time a bit more technical and challenging, "Lurker at the Threshold", "Disguised by Laughter", "Infection Incentive", "Lost Within Myself" and "Nosebleed". We had other songs we played live that never made it to tape like "Night Terror", "The Final Hour" and the fan favorite "Powerhouse".
We made a lot of friends along the way and the fans who supported us were spectacular...rabid thrash maniacs!! We also befriended a lot of bands at the time and were part of a pretty special scene back then...CARDINAL SIN, DESLOK, FORMICIDE, WARGASM, TEMPORARY INSANITY, HEARING IMPAIRED, ATOMICAUST, CANDY STRIPER DEATH ORGY, MELIAH RAGE and many others made thrash in Boston exciting and fun (remember the parties guys? Oh hell yeah!!)! We also had a great set of friends who helped us out a lot...Gelf, Jaime, Kurt, Rich C and the Chexican!! You guys were the best!!
We had the opportunity and privilege to open for some pretty killer headliners like SCATTERBRAIN, WHIPLASH, BIOHAZARD, EXCEL and our crowning moment, DARK ANGEL (which we found out years later was their last show!). R.I.P. to the clubs that actually allowed Boston to have a scene...The Channel, The Rathskeller, Bunratty's, Club Surrender, Escape Club/Sneaker's, Green Street Station etc.
These days, we're all married, some of us with kids, all working, all domesticated. Hopefully you like what we created...it was the best time of our lives! If you have pictures of us to share or if you'd like to drop us a line, email us here or at [email protected]