On April 22, 1961, guitarist Jeffrey "Mantas" Dunn was born in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. As a co-founder and lead guitarist of VENOM, Mantas helped create the sonic template for black metal, thrash metal, and extreme metal as a whole. His raw, distortion-drenched guitar attack on seminal albums "Welcome to Hell," "Black Metal," and "At War with Satan" was deliberately primitive yet devastatingly effective, prioritizing atmosphere and aggression over technical polish. The very name "black metal" comes from VENOM's 1982 album, making Mantas one of the architects of an entire genre. His riffing style, combining MOTÖRHEAD's speed with a darker, more sinister edge, influenced countless bands from BATHORY and CELTIC FROST to MAYHEM and DARKTHRONE. Despite VENOM's lineup turbulence over the decades, Mantas remains one of extreme metal's most important founding figures.
