Blackened
Storytellers & Artists: Chris Legg, Jay Reason, Dave Russo, Chris Beattie
Year: (c) 2009
Notes from Jay Reason (singer): "I can’t stress enough how much this band was manifested by Chris Legg. It all happened so quickly. Legg wrote almost all the music himself, and we worked on the lyrics together. I asked Dave Russo and Chris Beattie to play with us. Boom, recorded the demos in two weeks with Mike Z and then did the proper recording with Zeuss. The album came out a month or so later on vinyl and CD! This has always been one of my favorite albums, especially because Legg “sang” so much on it. Instead of backup vocals I wanted it to just be Legg’s voice."
Notes from RevHQ (expand to read)
Blackened seemed to have come out of nowhere, but the truth is that every member of the band has been involved in the independent music community for the last decade and a half. The all-star lineup boasts current and former members of the juggernaut that is Hatebreed (bassist Chris Beattie and original drummer and founding member Dave Russo) as well as current Connecticut contenders and alum alike, including vocalist Jay Reason (The Distance) and guitarist Chris Legg (Fastbreak). Founded on the terms of combining the roots of traditional hardcore with the sheer brutality of metal, Blackened is quite simply a wrecking ball that stops at nothing in its path.