Steel Notes Magazine
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Father of Sin
Makers of Masterful Metal
Lehigh Valley local band Father of Sin has a 15 year tenure and
the experience certainly shows. The 6 person band consists of
lead vocalist and band founder. Dex Shellhammer, his cofound-
er, guitarist Brian Blashock. Metal queen and 10 year F.O.S. veter-
an, bassist Dena Due, as well as guitarist Cory Solt, who has been
shredding with the band since 2004. Mike Owens, guitarist and
Greg Guarini, drummer are the new kids on the block-around
a year for them. Looking at those stats it's easy to see why the
band plays like a well-oiled machine. The chemistry is solid and
the metal is memorable.
They have a very identifiable sound in vocalist Dex Shellham-
mers growling expression. He alternates heavy thrashing gut-
tural vocals with deep melodies assisted by Dena Due in some of
my favorite songs. The contrast of the vocals mimics the surprise
of the heavy guitar riffs and drums to the specifically melodic
bass and secondary guitars (no rhythm by any means...all leads if
you ask me) The song composition isn't typical metal either, the
BY JOSIE JANCI
guitar riffs and heavy strings are still there and forefront percus-
sion exists but the stops in the songs are clever and the vocals are
like an instrument in and of themselves. Here's a video of a song
on their 5th CD "Melody Black" called Blight of My LIfe (see what
they did there with the title??? hahaha)
Their performance is powerful and dark; lending itself perfectly
to the Goth metal they lean towards. There are so many sub-
genres of metal it's hard to choose just one to describe F.O.S but
Goth- thrash metal seems to work! The guitars are fabulous with
Dena's single bass guitar mixing in just fine with the three six
string guitars to create a thick layered sound. The drums are oft
times off-beat adding complexity to the composition that is dark-
ly pleasing. But nothing stops the show like Dex's deep growling
vocals. Dex can do "scream-o" if he wants or harmonize with the
other vocalists in the band (which, by the way would be everyone
but the drummer, cuz we all know that drummers don't do mics)
https://www.reverbnation.com/fatherof-
sin/song/17145430-blight=my-life-from-
melody-black
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Steel Notes Magazine
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