Eve of Darkness

Authors: Derek Emerson, Chris Turner, Fran Grasso, Shawn Chirrey and Simon Harvey

Publisher: UXB Press

The ’80s were the global golden age of heavy metal, a decade in which loud guitars and screaming vocals took the world by storm. Toronto was no exception. Wild and uncompromising, metal defined the tastes and style of an entire generation of Canadian kids. Eve of Darkness revisits that era, taking in everything from chart-topping rock stars to defiantly underground maniacs, garish glam to furious thrash, spandex and eyeliner to denim and leather. Exposing a hidden world of clubs and concert halls, musicians and fans, labels and fanzines, record stores and radio shows, this is the story of heavy metal in ’80s Toronto.

Beyond the music, however, Eve of Darkness is also very much a book about Toronto, and a rare examination of an authentic grassroots culture that animated and enriched the lives of countless Torontonians, even as it was consistently overlooked by critics and ignored by academics. The book utilizes an oral and visual history approach and is the product of hundreds of interviews and a trove of collections of unseen pictures, flyers and other ephemera of the era.

Derek Emerson is the co-founder of UXB Press and co-author of 2019’s Heritage Toronto Book Award winner, Tomorrow Is Too Late: Toronto Hardcore Punk in the 1980s. Derek published his first thrash fanzines in 1984 and 1985, and later played guitar in Toronto hardcore band M.S.I. (More Stupid Initials). In 2003, Derek and his wife Heather co-directed the feature length documentary film Let Me Be Your Band. Derek is currently the publisher of Wayward Arts, a nationally distributed graphic arts magazine.

Shawn Chirrey is the co-founder of UXB Press and co-author of 2019’s Heritage Toronto Book Award winner, Tomorrow Is Too Late: Toronto Hardcore Punk in the 1980s. Shawn presented radio shows on CKLN, CHRY and CFRU, edited a hardcore fanzine (Still Thinking) and ran a record label of the same name. Shawn has worked in health policy for the last two decades. He can still be spotted at punk and metal shows, and owns way too many vegan cookbooks.

A product of ’80s hardcore and a history education, Simon Harvey writes about music and subculture, collects punk records (’75–’83 on 7″, please), and keeps his hair short and his clothing neat. Nevertheless, Pagan Altar, Pentagram, Celtic Frost and Motörhead remain all-time favourites.

Fran Grasso grew up on mid-’80s hardcore crossover, cutting her teeth seeing outfits like Voivod and Sacrifice at local dives. Now an IT professional, Fran also runs the Urbain Grandier label, releasing quality vintage metal on vinyl. She’s still found up front at most metal gigs, and her impressive collection of heavy metal, thrash and doom records only keeps growing.

Chris Turner is a lifelong metal enthusiast and compulsive collector of the genre, with a special interest in Canadian metal obscurities. Since buying his first metal LP at the dawn of the ’80s, he has amassed a collection that can be considered one of the largest ’80s metal libraries in Canada. In the late ’80s and early ’90s, Chris was vocalist for Newfoundland-based metal outfits Sacrament A.D. and Festered Corpse. He is currently the owner/operator of Out of the Woods Furniture.