Conrad ‘Cronos’ Lant, Singer and Bassist of Black Metal Pioneers Venom, Dead at 63

Conrad “Cronos” Lant, bassist and lead singer of the black metal pioneers Venom, has died at the age of 63.

Lant’s death was announced Thursday by his Venom bandmates on social media; no cause of death was provided. “It is with profound sadness and broken hearts that we share the news that Conrad ‘Cronos’ Lant has passed away. For more than four decades, Conrad’s voice, bass and vision were at the heart of Venom,” the band wrote.

“From the first dark rumblings of [albums] Welcome to Hell, through Black Metal, At War With Satan, Possessed and beyond, he created something that changed heavy music forever. VENOM never followed the rules. They forged their own path. And Conrad was there at the centre of it all — uncompromising, fearless and unmistakable.”

Venom emerged during the tail end of the first wave of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal, a movement that brought bands like Def Leppard, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, and Motörhead to the forefront. Inspired by imagery, intensity, and speed of the latter two groups, Venom formed in 1979, with Lant initially serving as rhythm guitarist before switching to bass and ultimately taking over as vocalist following Clive Archer’s exit in 1980.

The following year, Venom released their debut album Welcome to Hell, featuring the influential title track. “Blasphemy has been an effective attention grabber for centuries, but until 1981, heavy metal had never seen a band go as all-in on Satan as the three lads from Newcastle calling themselves Venom did,” Rolling Stone wrote of “Welcome to Hell” in our 100 Greatest Heavy Metal Songs List. “Contrasting with the forward-thinking innovation of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (a.k.a. NWOBHM), the trio stripped heavy metal down to its most primitive, bluntest form… Critics were appalled, metal fans ate it up.”

Welcome to Hell was soon followed by what became the group’s landmark LP, 1982’s Black Metal, an album so influential that it coined its own subgenre, as well as inspired offshoots like thrash, speed, and death metal.

Over the decades that followed, Venom’s music has been covered endlessly by the metal bands the group inspired, like Obituary, Cradle of Filth, Dimmu Borgir, and Mayhem, who infamously led the Norwegian black metal scene. Similarly, bands like Metallica, Slayer, and Megadeth have all championed Venom’s influence.

It wasn’t just metal bands that loved Venom. “Venom fucking rocked,” Beastie Boys’ Mike D said in 1995. “They had the speeches, the routines, the metal! Venom were an early crossover band. I used to listen to this hardcore radio show in New York, and they used to mix stuff like Venom in amongst the Black Flag and Minor Threat. We thought Venom were excellent. But then they came to New York to do some gigs, and we found out that they weren’t joking at all!”

The Beastie Boys gave Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore a tape of Lant’s onstage banter from a 1986 gig in Trenton, New Jersey, which Moore in turn pressed onto a 7-inch single dubbed “Venom – Live.” Lant’s speech was also sampled at the end of Beastie Boys’ Check Your Head track “Mark on the Bus.”

In addition to Venom — which initially broke up in 1988, though Lant reformed them with various lineups and continued to perform as Venom up until his death — Lant also fronted his own band Cronus, as well as collaborate with Warfare, Cradle of Filth, and Dave Grohl’s metal side project Probot.

“I want to thank all of the Legions for all of the support you have given my dad over the years,” Conrad’s son Nathan Lant added in a statement. “I know he really appreciated you all. He has laid down his soul, and his music will live on. The legend of Cronos will never die. His music will never die. His voice will never fade.”