Vengeance Rising

BIOGRAPHY

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Vengeance Rising (1988-1992, 2017): a Thrash Metal band from Los Angeles, California, USA.

he band Vengeance Rising was originally founded under the name Sacrifice back in 1985 by guitarist Doug Thieme, bass player Roger Dale Martin and drummer Steve Bertram (replaced after a couple of rehearsals by Michael Betts). They went by that name until one week before their first concert, where they changed name to Vengeance.

They would then change their name to Vengeance Rising because another act was discovered who had the legal rights to the name Vengeance to release the debut of Human Sacrifice in 1988 under the membership of Roger Martinez (R.I.P. 2025 of cancer; vocals), Larry Farkas (guitars), Doug Thieme (guitars), Roger Dale Martin (bass) and Glen Mancaruso (drums). This first album, however, was released under the name Vengeance but only for the first pressing, making it a coveted collector's item.

The support tour for the follow-up, Once Dead (1990), proved to be financially disappointing due to lack of ticket sales and leaving the band in financial straights. This ultimately lead to everyone leaving and forming Die Happy, except for Roger Martinez, who released the next albums, Destruction Comes (1991) and Released upon the Earth (1992) with him playing all roles along with guest and studio musicians which kept the act sputtering along at least for a while longer.

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Eventually, Martinez renounced his Christian beliefs (partly due to his anger with people involved with Vengeance Rising) and reportedly turned to Atheism and/or Satanism.

Between 1998 and 2001 Martinez tried to reform Vengeance Rising many times with a new lyrical direction reflecting his new beliefs and even announced a new album called "Realms of Blasphemy", but he never managed to reach a stable line up and the reunion, as well as the record, never happened.

In 2004 the line-up from the two first albums, minus Martinez, did a reunion show under the name Once Dead at the Summer Madness event that August with the vocalist being Scott Waters of Ultimatum. A live DVD "Return with a Vengeance" in 2005 resulted.

After the September 11, 2001 attacks occurred, Martinez apparently offered free albums from his website for military personnel to encourage a "holy war against Christians".

The band performed a one-off reunion show on August 9, 2017, at the SoCal Metalfest vol. 2, with all of the original lineup minus Martinez, who was replaced by Jim Settle of Hand of Fire. This incarnation endured after the gig, morphing into a Once Dead reunion in 2018.

In 2025 Roger Martinez would die of cancer.

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