Raw blackened speed metal channeling Motorhead and Judas Priest through an extreme metal lens. 'Midnight Assassin' is a nine-track ode to serial killers.

Lawrence, Kansas's Sarkatha arrived in 2023 with a speed/thrash/black metal hybrid that pulls the Great Plains' wide-open emptiness into genuinely ferocious music. They operate in a college town with a surprisingly deep underground tradition, channeling that energy into a sound that refuses to pick just one lane between black metal's cold fury and thrash's kinetic aggression.

Savage Grace is an American power and speed metal band formed in Los Angeles, California in 1981 originally under the name Marquis de Sade, drawing early attention when their song 'Scepters of Deceit' appeared on Metal Blade's Metal Massacre II compilation in 1982. The band released the EP The Dominatress (1984) and their debut full-length Master of Disguise (1985), followed by After the Fall from Grace (1986), both considered significant entries in the early American speed metal canon. After a lengthy hiatus following their 1993 split, the band returned in 2023 with Sign of the Cross, the first new studio album in 37 years.

Out of Jonesboro, Arkansas, Scootergypsy has been hauling classic speed and heavy metal influence through the South since 2013 with a no-frills directness that feels ripped straight from the genre's early-80s heyday. Their music runs on twin-guitar attack and wiry, hard-rock swagger — the kind that sounds better on a back-road highway than in a concert hall. They sit comfortably in the tradition of NWOBHM-influenced American speed metal, with enough hard rock looseness to keep it from feeling purely academic.

Austin's Sex Chamber have been blending stoner metal's fuzz-soaked swagger with speed metal's throttle since 2012, producing a grimy, high-octane sound that thrives in the Texas capital's anything-goes heavy music environment. They move fast and heavy at the same time, rarely letting either impulse win.

Los Angeles's Shrapnel, formed in 2021, deliver heavy and thrash metal shaped by the city's sprawling extreme metal community, prioritizing riff density and forward momentum in a style that echoes the early-80s heavy thrash underground.

Los Angeles speed/power metal band formed in 2017, channeling the fist-pumping energy and high-velocity attack of classic speed metal through the city's hard rock tradition.

Akron, Ohio's Silent Knight have spent two decades threading death, thrash, and speed metal into a cohesive whole since forming in 2005, blending the velocity of old-school speed with the darker tonality that comes from a genuine death metal foundation.

Old Bridge, New Jersey's Silo have been refining technical thrash and speed metal since 2016, hailing from one of the Garden State's most storied underground scenes and putting a premium on precision and velocity in roughly equal measure.