Darkness Descends

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title: "Darkness Descends" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["dark-angel-(band)-albums", "1986-albums", "combat-records-albums", "albums-produced-by-randy-burns-(music-producer)"] topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darkness_Descends" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::data[format=table title="Infobox album|"]

Field	Value
name	Darkness Descends
type	studio
artist	Dark Angel
cover	Darknessdescends.jpg
released	November 17, 1986
recorded	April 1986
genre	Thrash metal
length
label	Combat
producer	Randy Burns, Dark Angel
prev_title	We Have Arrived
prev_year	1985
next_title	Leave Scars
next_year	1989
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Music Grinder Studios, Hollywood
Mad Dog Studios, Venice | genre = Thrash metal | length = | label = Combat | producer = Randy Burns, Dark Angel | prev_title = We Have Arrived | prev_year = 1985 | next_title = Leave Scars | next_year = 1989

Though bassist Rob Yahn appears on the album, Mike Gonzalez received credit in the liner notes. Darkness Descends was Dark Angel's final album to feature original vocalist Don Doty, and also the first to feature drummer Gene Hoglan, who joined the band a few months prior the release of their debut album We Have Arrived.

Background and recording

According to drummer Gene Hoglan, recording for Darkness Descends began on April 14, 1986. It was produced by Randy Burns, who had just recently completed work on Megadeth's second album Peace Sells... but Who's Buying?, and production of the album lasted two weeks. Hoglan claims to recall an incident during the album's recording process where he was kicked out of the studio by Burns because he was screaming at Doty for "not being fucking heavy enough." Hoglan also stated that he recorded all of his drum takes within one day, with the exception of "Black Prophecies", which the band had written one day prior to entering the studio. Hoglan said the track was "nailed" in one take.

Music and lyrics

The song "Darkness Descends" is about the comic book characters known as the Dark Judges from the Judge Dredd comic book series, and even contains their famous statement, "this city is guilty, the crime is life, the sentence is death." "Death Is Certain (Life Is Not)" deals with euthanasia. "Black Prophecies" addresses Nostradamus's prophetic gift and the foretelling of Hitler. "Perish in Flames" describes a pilot's thoughts as he destroys a ground target with terrible weapons. "The Burning of Sodom" tells the story of Lot's flight from the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. "Merciless Death" is a re-recording of a song from Dark Angel's previous album We Have Arrived.

Dark Angel drummer Gene Hoglan described the writing process, "Well, to be honest, the 'mixed bag' of other writers on Darkness Descends was more like a riff here and there. Eric Meyer wrote a riff on 'The Burning of Sodom', so we gave him credit. Eric also got credit for writing something in 'Death Is Certain (Life Is Not)'. But I can guarantee you that that was me, Jim and [bassist] Rob Yahn who wrote that song and Eric just had an idea for how to start off the song. But back then I didn't really know much about songwriting credits and all that."

While Darkness Descends continued the traditional thrash metal sound of We Have Arrived, a portion of the album (particularly "Black Prophecies") contains elements that would be expanded upon on Dark Angel's next two albums, Leave Scars and Time Does Not Heal, which saw the band produce a mixture of thrash metal with progressive and technical structures. Hoglan would later claim, "In Dark Angel's evolution, we've never had two albums sound the same. Darkness Descends did not sound like We Have Arrived, and Leave Scars did not sound like Darkness Descends, and so on."

Reception and legacy

| rev1 = AllMusic | rev1Score = | rev2 = Collector's Guide to Heavy Metal | rev2Score = 6/10 | noprose = yes In August 2014, Revolver placed Darkness Descends on its "14 Thrash Albums You Need to Own" list. Decibel Magazine placed it 9th on its "50 Greatest Thrash Metal Albums of All Time." Loudwire placed Darkness Descends at number 6 on its "Top Ten Thrash Albums NOT Released by the Big 4" list. It is considered to be a classic in the thrash metal genre.

Gene Hoglan's drumming on the album has been criticized for perceived "slopp[iness]," particularly in comparison to the drummer's output later in his career. Invisible Oranges stated that Hoglan was "getting by more on intensity than on technique" at this stage in his career. Hoglan himself retrospectively said of his performance on the album: "I was an 18-year-old kid with a whole lot of energy who thought he knew what he was doing, but totally didn't. On that record, I was woefully un-tight. And we certainly did not have a great guitar sound [...] We actually slowed down drastically when we recorded [the album]. We were much faster before that — because I believed that you needed to really feel it to be at your best, and unless you were playing as fast as you [could], you probably weren't really feeling it. I just didn't have the proper philosophies back then. So Darkness Descends is just a challenging album to listen to, from my standpoint. I appreciate that people enjoy it and I'm grateful that it has kept up its reputation over the years, but it's not an easy album for me to listen to."

Track listing

Icarus Records 2010 remastered bonus tracks

Personnel

;Dark Angel

Don Doty – vocals
Jim Durkin – guitars
Eric Meyer – guitars
Rob Yahn – bass
Gene Hoglan – drums
Ron Rinehart – vocals on the live recordings
Mike Gonzalez – bass on the live recordings

;Production

Randy Burns – production, engineering
Casey McMackin – engineering
Eric Meyer – engineering
Rob Yahn – bass recording engineering

References

"Dark Angel to Perform Entire 'Darkness Descends' Album at L.A. Show This April".
"Creeping Death's Lincoln Mullins: How Dark Angel Made Me a Better Drummer".
"Discs Of Doom: Philip H. Anselmo".
"Voices From The Darkside".
"GENE HOGLAN Reflects On 30th Anniversary Of DARK ANGEL's Darkness Descends Album - "Howling Christ, Has It Been That Long?"".
"Drummer Gene Hoglan Was Just 18 When He Recorded an '80s Thrash Classic".
Popoff, Martin. (2003). "The Top 500 Heavy Metal Albums of All Time". ECW Press.
Kitts, Jeff. "Dark Angel: Gene Hoglan Looks Back on Tumultuous Rise and Fall of Thrash Pioneers".
(July 14, 2025). "GENE HOGLAN Is 'Really Confident' Fans Will Think New DARK ANGEL Album 'Extinction Level Event' Is 'Killer'". [[Blabbermouth.net]].
Rivadavia, Eduardo. "Dark Angel - Darkness Descends review". [[All Media Network]].
Popoff, Martin. (November 1, 2005). "The Collector's Guide to Heavy Metal: Volume 2: The Eighties". [[Collector's Guide Publishing]].
(August 29, 2014). "14 Thrash Albums You Need to Own". [[Revolver (magazine).
"Decibel: The Top 50 Thrash Metal Albums Of All Time". RateYourMusic.
[https://loudwire.com/top-10-thrash-albums-not-released-by-the-big-4/ Top Ten Thrash Albums NOT Released by the Big 4]
Staff, Invisible Oranges. "Top 10 Great Metal Albums with Terrible Drumming".
"Dark Angel: Gene Hoglan Looks Back on Tumultuous Rise and Fall of Thrash Pioneers".

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