crossover thrash band that formed in Houston, Texas in 1982. The band is currently composed of two of its founding members, vocalist Kurt Brecht and guitarist Spike Cassidy, as well as drummer Rob Rampy and bass player Greg Orr. D.R.I. never gained a mainstream audience, but the integration of their
roots with thrash metal influences was a stylistic catalyst for their contemporaries ? most notably Suicidal Tendencies,
Assault and Cryptic Slaughter ? alongside whom they are considered to be one of the major pioneers of
what would later be called "crossover thrash", along with Adrenalin O.D., with both
bands having a heavy influence on modern thrash metal. To date, D.R.I. has released seven full-length studio albums. Other than three new songs on the 2016 EP But Wait... There's More!, they have not released a full-length studio album since Full Speed Ahead in 1995. Despite this, the band has continued to tour almost every year, and gone on hiatus intermittently, notably between 2004 and 2009, when Cassidy was diagnosed with colon cancer. Since at least 1998, D.R.I. has been working on their eighth full-length studio album, which remains unreleased.
D.R.I.'s
music has combined elements of
punk rock, thrash metal, speed metal and heavy metal, while their early material has been described as
hardcore punk. They are often cited as one of the key
bands that helped create the crossover thrash genre, along with S.O.D., Suicidal Tendencies and
Corrosion of Conformity. Allmusic.com has claimed that, "Starting off as a speedy, straight-ahead
punk band, they gradually mixed more elements of heavy metal into their sound; as they did so, their songs got longer and featured more sections and more variety in tempo. D.R.I. managed the then-rare feat of crossing over to metal audiences while retaining their skate-
punk and
hardcore fan bases -- they had something for all those audiences to
love (or hate)." Many
bands and artists have cited D.R.I. as an influence or inspiration, including
Anthrax, Cryptic Slaughter, Dark Angel, Death Angel, Kreator, Municipal Waste,
Nuclear Assault, Slayer and Vio-Lence.
When Felix joined D.R.I. in
1984, he brought a new audience to the shows. The next three years the band toured and started developing a new genre, (along with other pioneers) crossover. Their third album, Crossover, released in 1987, was suitingly named, as the songs on this album had a strong metal sound to them. As the band began to "crossover" to thrash, their songs became longer, slower, and more complex. The press has called D.R.I. the major band of the "crossover" movement, a style that combined
hardcore punk and thrash metal. This
music invited a mixed audience of punks,
skinheads, and metal fans to their shows.
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