Joel Graham is the bassist of English

thrash metal Thrash metal (or simply thrash) is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal music characterized by its overall aggression and often fast tempo.Kahn-Harris, Keith, ''Extreme Metal: Music and Culture on the Edge'', pp. 2–3, 9. Oxford: Berg, 2007, . ...

band

Evile Evile are an English thrash metal band from Huddersfield, formed in 2004. They have experienced numerous line-up changes over the years, with drummer Ben Carter being the only member of the original line-up to have stayed consistently. The curr ...

and former bassist of metal band Rise to Addiction.

Biography

Graham was born on 10 February 1977 in Dewsbury, England. He was strongly influenced and supported by his parents from a young age to enjoy music and was taken to rock shows from the age of 7 to see such bands as

Queen Queen or QUEEN may refer to: Monarchy * Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom ** List of queens regnant * Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king * Queen dowager, the widow of a king * Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mother ...

Iron Maiden Iron Maiden are an English heavy metal band formed in Leyton, East London, in 1975 by bassist and primary songwriter Steve Harris. While fluid in the early years of the band, the lineup for most of the band's history has consisted of Harri ...

and Bruce Springsteen. Graham started playing Bass as his main instrument in 1988 playing in local bands around the West Yorkshire area. He moved to Nottingham in 1999 and helped form the stoner rock band Ninedenine who released the highly praised Scars E.P in 2001. During this time he also worked at

Earache Records Earache Records is a British independent record label, music publisher and management company founded by Digby Pearson in 1985, based in Nottingham, England, with offices in London and New York. The label helped to pioneer extreme metal by rel ...

processing orders for the label's then-first webstore. In May 2004, Graham moved to Kenora in Northwest Ontario, Canada where he spent time volunteering in the

First Nations First Nations or first peoples may refer to: * Indigenous peoples, for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area. Indigenous groups *First Nations is commonly used to describe some Indigenous groups including: **First Natio ...

community.

Rise to Addiction

In 2006, Graham returned to his birth town of Dewsbury and replaced Rob Naylor as the bassist of Rise to Addiction. Graham co-wrote and played on the albums ''A New Shade of Black for the Soul'' 2007 and ''Some Other Truth'' 2009.

Evile

On 16 December 2009, Graham was announced as the replacement for Mike Alexander, the founding Evile bassist who died whilst on tour in Sweden on 5 October 2009. Graham played his first show with Evile on 14 January 2010 at Cardiff Barfly, also the same day his daughter was born. After a long intensive tour through the United States in 2010, he began recording the third Evile album ''

Five Serpent's Teeth ''Five Serpent's Teeth'' is the third album by the English thrash metal band Evile. It was released on 26 September 2011 in Europe and on 18 October 2011 in North America. The album was produced by Russ Russell ( Napalm Death, Dimmu Borgir) at ...

''. This is the first Evile album to feature him as the bass player, although the re-dux edition of '' Infected Nations'' released in 2010 contained a bonus disc of live material which featured him playing bass.

Writing

In early 2014, Graham joined Bass Guitar Magazine as a reviewer and contributing writer.

Playing style

Joel Graham uses both a finger-picking style and a plectrum when performing, although his preferred style is finger-picking. Graham mainly uses the alternate two-finger (index and middle finger) picking style, but he performs a speedy three-finger roll style (made famous by bassist

Billy Sheehan William Sheehan (born March 19, 1953) is an American musician. He is best known for playing the bass guitar with acts such as Talas, Steve Vai, David Lee Roth, Mr. Big, Niacin, and The Winery Dogs. He is also known for his "lead bass" playing ...

) during faster songs such as "Descent into Madness" and "Long Live New Flesh". He uses a plectrum for all songs originally performed by Mike Alexander, commenting in several interviews that he wanted to play those songs just as Alexander did.

Influences

Graham has cited bassists including Steve Harris, John Entwistle,

Cliff Burton Clifford Lee Burton (February 10, 1962 – September 27, 1986) was an American musician who was the bassist for heavy metal band Metallica from 1982 until his death in 1986. He performed on ''Kill 'Em All'' (1983), ''Ride the Lightning'' (1984) ...

Les Claypool Leslie Edward Claypool (born September 29, 1963) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, filmmaker, and author. He is best known as the founder, lead singer, bassist, primary songwriter, and only continuous member of the ro ...

, Scott Reeder,

Pat Badger Patrick John Badger, (born July 22, 1967, in Boston, Massachusetts) is a musician, singer, and songwriter, best known as the bass guitarist in the band Extreme. He has also performed in groups like Daemon, In The Pink, Super Trans Atlantic, Tri ...

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and

John Deacon John Richard Deacon (born 19 August 1951) is an English retired musician, best known for being the bass guitarist for the rock band Queen. He wrote several songs for the group, including Top 10 hits " You're My Best Friend", "Another One Bite ...

as influences.

Rise to Addiction

* ''A New Shade of Black for the Soul'' (Mausoleum) 2007 * ''Some Other Truth'' (Mausoleum) 2009

Evile

*'' Infected Nations'' redux edition, disc 2 (

) 2010 *''

'' (Earache Records) 2011 *''

Skull The skull is a bone protective cavity for the brain. The skull is composed of four types of bone i.e., cranial bones, facial bones, ear ossicles and hyoid bone. However two parts are more prominent: the cranium and the mandible. In humans, th ...

'' (Earache Records) 2013 *''

Hell Unleashed ''Hell Unleashed'' is the fifth studio album by British thrash metal band Evile, released on 30 April 2021 by Napalm Records. It is the band's first studio album since ''Skull'' (2013), making it their longest gap between studio albums to date. ...

'' (

Napalm Records Napalm Records is an Austrian independent record label focused on heavy metal and hard rock. Originally, Napalm focused on black metal bands, such as Abigor and Summoning, and folk metal bands, such as Falkenbach and Vintersorg. The label l ...

) 2021

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Graham, Joel English songwriters English heavy metal bass guitarists Male bass guitarists Musicians from Dewsbury Living people 1977 births 21st-century English bass guitarists 21st-century British male musicians British male songwriters