Xentrix For Whose Advantage

Although they surely qualify as one of England's most successful thrash metal bands, Lancashire's hapless Xentrix ultimately came to epitomize all of Great Britain's relatively insignificant contributions to speed metal – as compared to the genre's utterly dominating American bands. Formed in 1986 (as Sweet Vengeance, in the town of Preston) by vocalist/guitarist Chris Astley, guitarist Kristian Havard, bassist Paul MacKenzie, and drummer Dennis Gasser, Xentrix started life, not surprisingly, as a Metallica cover band, gradually drawing attention to themselves on the U.K. pub circuit and with their 1988 demo, Hunger For…. Fledgling Roadrunner Records soon took notice and signed the band, releasing their debut album, Shattered Existence, in 1989, and, later that year, the now infamous Ghost Buster EP…