Connecticut's Margo have been pushing a death metal and deathcore hybrid out of Wallingford since 2015, with a sound that emphasizes heaviness and intensity over any tendency toward accessibility. Exactly what you'd expect from a band that has no interest in being easy.

Brian Hugh Warner transformed himself into Marilyn Manson, one of rock's most provocative and polarizing figures, merging industrial metal's abrasive sonics with glam rock theatricality and deliberate cultural provocation. Albums like 'Antichrist Superstar' and 'Mechanical Animals' sold millions while generating constant controversy, making Manson a lightning rod for debates about art, censorship, and morality in the late 1990s. His influence on the visual aesthetics of heavy music and his role as rock's preeminent provocateur defined an era of mainstream extremity.

Mark Deutrom is an American musician and producer based in the United States, best known as the bassist for the Melvins from 1993 through 1998, appearing on Stoner Witch (1994), Stag (1996), and Honky (1997), having also produced the band's early records Gluey Porch Treatments and Ozma. After departing the Melvins, he pursued an idiosyncratic solo career spanning experimental rock, heavy music, and abstract composition, releasing albums including The Silent Treatment (2000), The Value of Decay (2011), and The Blue Bird (2019) via Season of Mist. His solo output resists easy categorization, reflecting an experimental sensibility that extends well beyond his metal associations.

Marky Ramone is the performing identity of drummer Marc Bell, a New York musician whose career bridges early hard rock, first-wave punk, and the long afterlife of the Ramones songbook. Before taking the Ramone name, he played with the Brooklyn hard rock band Dust, then moved through the downtown New York scene with Wayne County and Richard Hell and the Voidoids, appearing on Blank Generation. In 1978 he joined the Ramones, replacing Tommy Ramone and bringing a powerful, straight-ahead drumming style to Road to Ruin, which included "I Wanna Be Sedated." He remained central to the band across two major periods, recording and touring through albums that kept the Ramones' minimalist, high-speed punk formula alive into the 1980s and 1990s. After the Ramones ended, he continued with projects including Marky Ramone and the Intruders and Marky Ramone's Blitzkrieg. His current live work focuses on short, fast, hook-heavy punk rock, preserving the attack, tempo, and blunt melodic force of the Ramones while connecting that legacy to later punk audiences.

Pittsburgh's Marsh Dweller began in the melodic black metal tradition before evolving into sludge and post-metal terrain, tracing an arc that mirrors the city's industrial grit. Their later material layers atmosphere and weight in equal measure.

Aurora, Colorado's Marsh of Swans operate in the atmospheric post-black metal space, trading raw aggression for expansive, emotionally saturated soundscapes built on high-altitude bleakness. Since 2017 the project has embodied the introspective strain of the black metal tradition.

San Francisco's Martikor arrived in 2023 at the intersection of atmospheric sludge and post-black metal, a combination that suits the Bay Area's tradition of genre-bending heaviness. Dense, fog-laden, and built for patience.

Denver's Martriden draw from both death and black metal to create something tempestuous and technically ambitious, the high-altitude Mile High City providing an appropriate backdrop for their cold, expansive sound. Active since 2015, they've built a reputation in the Mountain West underground.

Savage Black / Death Metal from Laredo.