The True Story Of Kansas City's Cult Black Metal Band

Stygian in 1999 (L to R) Draxon Blashperion, Lord Dahak, Anshar Daemonchrist, Knightstorm IX.

STYGIAN is the morbid afterbirth of the events of the Columbine massacre on April 19, 1999 and the May 3, 1999 tornado outbreak in Oklahoma City. Brothers Draxon Blaspherion (Jon) and KnightStorm IX (Pete) decided to form a straight forward black metal band. Taking the name STYGIAN, we aimed to create our own style of black metal, which was heavily influenced by Norweigan Black Metal. There was little to no support in the area we lived in so we decided to spearhead the project completely by ourselves. The recording of our first demo under the of VOMIT AMERICA, consisted of a cover of "Deathcrush" (Mayhem) with Draxon on guitar and Knightstorm on drums. But Draxon's guitar amp broke that morning so we used an acoustic guitar distorted through a computer - and since Knightstorm did not have a drum set, the drums of a casio keyboard was used (as well as handling vocal duties). The end result is horrible to the point of almost legendary status, but we were so proud of it. Our first real recording! Hokum, the guy who recorded it for us, had his own industrial project going called OVERWHELMED and together we sort of combined forces (we'd be the back up band to him if he'd record our material). We then recorded 5 guitar tracks - RegirgiNation, Alliegance To The North, Nameless Angel (electric and acoustic) and Chainsaw Trendkill...and then never did anything with them. On Halloween of 1998, we played our first live show with Draxon on Guitar and Vocals, Knightstorm on drums (a borrowed set from a friend) and a guy named Anthony on Bass. We did two songs "Deathcrush" and "Quintessence" (Darkthrone) and finally we put all of these tracks together to create our first demo, Vomit America. After this show, we lost contact with Hokum and Anthony and decided to make some changes. Knightstorm switched to bass and we would recruit another guitarist and a drummer. We found that guitarist in Tyler (EX-INTENT, THE LEO PROJECT) and his cousin Justin Bennett (a/k/a Dahak) on drums. We rehearsed over and over, deciding to just play cover songs at that time. We recorded one live show titled XERO which consisted of covers of "Four Horsemen/Seek & Destroy/Creeping Death/For Whom The Bell Tolls" (Metallica), "Lesbian Show" (Nightfall), "Quintessence" (Darkthrone), "Sweet Dreams" (Euythmics), "Deathcrush" (Mayhem), "Fade To Black" (Metallica), "So What" (Anti-Nowhere League), & "MMMBop" (Hanson - yes, as a joke). Shortly after this show, we parted ways with Tyler because we (Draxon, Dahak, myself) wanted to play just black metal - the original intent of this band in the first place. So we needed a new singer. Thats when Anshar Daemonchrist (D.C.) joined the band and we officially took the name of Stygian. He took over full vocal duties (with Knightstorm backing him up) and began rehearsing two original songs and three cover songs. Eventually, we recorded a demo titled 666/1999 containing the songs "Cry Of The Night", "Xianthropy", "Welcome To Hell" (VENOM cover) and "Deathcrush" (MAYHEM cover). In between the songs contained samples of the satanic mass from the rare album Witchcraft: Destroys Minds & Reaps Souls by COVEN as well as the infamous 911 call at Columbine High School. This got the attention of a mutual friend of ours, Troy "Mastero TVH". He told us he would produce an EP for us when we had the cash. To get that cash, we decided to set out and play a live show and by strange luck, got our chance in June of 1999 from an old friend of Draxon's. We played to a crowd of 50 people and at the end, only 5 people remained...but those were our first 5 fans - woohoo!! Depsite the horrid show turnout, we did make some decent money and this led to us being able to fund the EP. On July 26th, 1999, we recorded the EP in our basement on a digital 4 track (previously done on July 12th, but accidentally deleted.) Four tracks were recorded including "Cry Of The Night", "Xianthropy", "Quintessence" (DARKTHRONE cover) and "Deathcrush" (MAYHEM cover) and we titled the EP AMBIENCE OF EVIL. We even stuck an intro on there, from one of my favorite games of all time, Super Castlevania 4. KRIEG!! After mastering, we originally were told we were going to get thirty copies of the CD. We got our first ten and sold them quickly, but after Troy and the CD Manufacturer got into a major fight, this led to the EP being inadvertently limited to 10 copies (somewhere out there are still 20 more copies of AMBIENCE OF EVIL but we don't know how to get them or where they are - probably in a dumpster where they belong.) Anyways, we were somewhat dissapointed by this, but the sound of the CD was great and thats all we cared about. We sent a few copies of the CD to some record labels to only modest repsonse but we did get some attention from a few people, including Septimus of MASKIM, who really enjoyed the atmosphere of the album with its complete throwback to early 90's Nordic Black Metal. On July 30th 1999, we played our second live show in our garage and recorded this event on VHS only and titled it DEATHFEST LIVE. (Eventually the 666/1999 demo was re-released with these live tracks added on). Unfortunately after this show, Dahak lost interest in the band and left. We hired a replacement, Meteo, but he did not work out well, even though we recorded two songs, "In Dreams of Darkness" and "Cry of the Night (New Version)". We kept these recordings and hired another drummer, RDM. RDM was a strange guy (this would lead to him being fired eventually) but he drummed well and it was all we had at the time. After some more rehearsing, on December 31, 1999, the new Stygian debuted and recorded our last demo/rehearsal DAWN OF THE BLACK MILLENIUM which featured the tracks "Grond (Hammer of the Underworld)" (A combination cover of "Quintessence" by DARKTHRONE and "Noregsgard" by STORM with no real original title at the time), "In Dreams of Darkness", "The Stygian", "Winter Storm Eternity", "Death Comes Ripping" (THE MISFITS cover) and "Q2000" (Synth/Drums only cover version of "Noregsgard"). We added on the two tracks with the previous replacement drummer for this demo. Unfortunately this did not work out and at the same time, we discovered the name Stygian had been used by another band so we abandoned the name and becamse something else. Something that became a whole other trip. But that's another story.

In 2002, Septimus and myself decided to release the album UNIFIED EVIL, containing unreleased and remastered MASKIM tracks and AMBIENCE OF EVIL EP with a bonus track on my own label, CHAOSTORM RECORDS. Finally, AMBIENCE OF EVIL got the release we always wanted for it. In early 2004, CYBERTZARA got a hold of some of the CDs and for a few days, the Maskim/Stygian split was their #1 album. Additionally, the unexpected addition of them as "heroes" to the local underground metal community, with major support from bands like GRAVESPAWN, LYTHOS, SPLINTERS OF DEATH (which at one time featured Knightstorm IX as a session vocalist), CHURCH OF MELKARTH and DISINTERMENT. We even got some recognition from Nocturno Culto (DARKTHRONE) and Vrangsinn (CARPATHIAN FOREST, A WASTE OF TALENT, HATEPULSE). STYGIAN are grateful for the support were given from the beginning to today as it was all about the atmosphere and metal - no bullshit! NOTE: The planned final Stygian album GOETTERDAEMMERUNG has been all but abandoned. Jon and Pete will return in Othila...