Spread the Disease was an extremely black metal influenced metalcore band, a genre that later became known as noisecore. They were fierce and unholy without being corny like most black metal acts of the 90s. This band formed out of Karenza after a vocalist switch up and a three month “no name band” change. They also briefly used “Her Severed Head” as a moniker. By the time Spread the Disease was titled in February 1998, the line up featured Ben Pobjoy on vocals, Dave Buschemeyer and Trevor Dykstra on guitars, Stu Brown on bass and Shawn Butchart on drums. The last Karenza songs were redone in STD style and were released as their first ep “This Blood Ridden Tragedy” out on Undecided Records. Not very long after that they once again teemed up with Witching Hour Records (they had worked with them as Karenza) to release a split 7″ with Song of Zarathustra. That summer they went on tour with Racebannon and were partly accompanied with Last Days of August. This tour took STD to the midwest, then to the southern states, and back up the east coast.
On their return they went to Signal 2 Noise to record their first full length “We Bleed from Many Wounds”. This would be released on Eulogy Recordings, which was already familiar with New Day Rising. In the winter of 1998 they went back on tour, this time with Confine. During 1999 they continued to play shows, but in June Stu left temporarily, and Andrew Hercules replaced him. No shows were however played with Andrew. Stu came back and they got a spot on Hellfest on June 26, 1999. This proved to be the break STD was waiting for. They dressed up like 80’s metal kids and when they went up on stage their vocalist yelled out “You think you’re fucking metal? Well you’re not! We’re Spread the Disease!”. And followed by blasting through their set. The rest of the day was spent avoiding the majority of attenders, and that was it. They were legends of metal. After that, everyone wanted to see them play.
“The Sheer Force of Inertia”, their second full length was once again released on Eulogy, with a 12″ vinyl version out on Good Life Recordings in Belgium. The album featured guest vocals by Ian Clarke and electronic tracks composed by Bryan Belanger, and gave the album a much more distant feeling. A few last shows were played that summer, but Trev would move to Ottawa to go to school and a lot of the pre-planned shows and tour with Confine and Poison the Well in the United States were cancelled. Spread the Disease played their last show on July 24, 1999 at the Oakville YMCA.
Spread the Disease – Discography
