Perry Strickland Left Vio-Lence Last Month

Influential Bay Area thrash band Vio-Lence has been without a drummer for at least a month as they’ve reportedly been in the studio, as co-founding member Perry Strickland left the band.

Fans were unaware of the change until Strickland made an Instagram post showing a video of him playing with the band, stating that he would “miss playing these songs.” Naturally, fans questioned him in the comments about his status with the band, at which point he finally let the cat out of the bag and that he’d left the group in January.

As of this post, Vio-Lence hasn’t even hinted at the fact that Strickland left, with most of their recent Facebook posts promoting upcoming shows. Since they’re still promoting those gigs, it should lead one to believe that they’ve at least landed a temporary replacement behind the kit. Especially if they intend to still perform on their upcoming tour of Asia, Australia, and New Zealand.

Perry had been with the band since its inception in 1985 with lead guitarist Phil Demmel. Over the years, there’d been multiple lineup changes, with Strickland leaving for the first time in 1993. He then came back for short stints from 2001 to 2003, then again in 2018, and then finally he rejoined in 2019 until his most recent departure.