Metal can easily be considered as the most inaccessible form of music for mass consumption, but its fans are devoted and they are many. Richmond is musically known for quite a few bands; mostly hardcore stuff but also a ton of metal. Gwar is arguably the most famous metal band out of Richmond, but other notable ones are Battlemaster, the incredible Municipal Waste, and of course Cannabis Corpse.
I've lived in Richmond for about 5 years now and heard the name Cannabis Corpse floating around town. I knew they were a band and I knew they played metal but it sounded like a joke to me. That is until a co-worker of mine finally played some for me and I remember thinking "holy shit these guys are for real and goddamit they are good!" The band is comprised of Andy "Weedgrinder" Horn of Battlemaster, Nick "Nikropolis" Poulos of Parasytic, and twin brothers Phil "Landphil" Hall of Municipal Waste and Josh "Hallhammer" Hall. They are essentially a super-group of RVA's best metal and they are fucking amazing! Nikropolis is a fantastically talented demon on the guitar and Landphil plays some of the most creative bass lines I've heard in metal.
I work with people who are friends with these guys so here's their story: In the summer of 2006 the guys gathered around a fat blunt and decided they should start a side project that expressed their love of death metal (specifically Cannibal Corpse) and smoking weed. Their myspace page says, "We did it in the hopes of creating a band that got you stoned with a sick oldschool death metal sound alone! We can promise you that every growl, every guitar riff, and every drum beat was done when we were completely obliterated on sweet sweet chiba.We wanted people to spark up a doober and follow along with the lyrics so they could be transported into a horrific world where you are not safe from getting your weed stolen by bloodthirsty zombies or getting captured by an ancient cult that cultivates demonic weed with the blood and body parts of sacred ritual sacrifice!" The stamp of approval to call the band "Cannabis Corpse" was given by members of Cannibal Corpse themselves! They recorded their first album, "Blunted at Birth", in Weedgrinder's kitchen and played their first show on 4-20-07. They soon after got picked up by Forcefield records and recorded their second album "Tube of the Resinated" which is amazing. A new EP called "The Weeding" was released this October and I have yet to pick it up. They just finished up a tour but will be picking back up in February. I had the pleasure of seeing them in Richmond a few weeks ago and it blew me away!
Cannabis Corpse - Mummified in Bongwater

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gordhandasvb:
I can't believe I forgot to mention Lamb of God! They are also from Richmond and possibly even more well known than Gwar.