How Power Trip’s Riley Gale Opened Up Thrash Metal, in 5 Songs

Thrash metal is supposed to be burly, fast, and exciting music. For over a decade, nobody did it better than Power Trip. The Dallas band’s frontman Riley Gale would take the stage with a cap folded over his eyes and whip up intense pits, screaming about the firing squad while kids did running flips off the stage. Power Trip were students of hardcore, who worked methodically to distill their “folders full of riffs” into tightly written and masterfully aggro albums. They thrived in the underground but eventually found massive audiences on the road when they opened for giants like Anthrax and Lamb of God.

Success also meant having fans within the conservative walls of Fox News and the WWE, which greatly chafed against Gale’s own politics. Power Trip’s 2017 album, Nightmare Logic, had songs about revolting against corporations and the one percent. “If Not Us Then Who” was named for a quote by civil rights giant John Lewis. Just a few months ago, Gale appeared wielding a shotgun in the video for “Point the Finger,” the police brutality protest song he made with Ice-T’s band Body Count. The singer’s death this week marks the gutting loss of not only the rare politically progressive presence to cross over into mainstream metal, but also one of heavy music’s most vital performers.

Here are five of his songs and performances that speak truth to power while ripping extremely hard.

“Hammer of Doubt” (2010)

When “Hammer of Doubt” appeared on the 2010 America’s Hardcore compilation, Power Trip immediately stood out among their peers. For one thing, their contribution was twice as long as nearly every other song. At four-and-a-half minutes, the unrelenting showstopper seemed designed to highlight every trick in the young band’s arsenal: dizzy, warring guitar lines that built to an explosive solo, a gnarly breakdown to fire up the pit, and Gale’s hopeless lyrics tearing down organized religion, delivered in a series of throat-shredding accusations. The song would eventually appear in revamped form as the grand finale to their 2013 debut Manifest Decimation. But here, situated among the most promising hardcore of the early 2010s, it served as an introduction to a band that already seemed to have it all figured out. They were ready to take on the world, and no one stood a chance. —Sam Sodomsky

“Divine Apprehension” (2011)

There’s a reason why this track from Power Trip’s self-titled 2011 single remained a cornerstone of their live show. Its central riff is a masterful expression of the band’s wheelhouse. Beyond the tight churn of Blake Ibanez and Nick Stewart’s dual guitars, Gale screams about what lies behind the so-called good intentions of the people in power. He calls out fear-mongers and corrupt liars, and in practically the same breath he barks “let’s go,” as if summoning a legion of kids to bum-rush the stage.—Evan Minsker

“Conditioned to Death” (2013)

A student of French existentialism, Gale wrote this Foucault-inspired meditation on the hellish torture carried out in the name of the criminal justice system. The Manifest Decimation highlight has a cascading, menacing riff that ultimately leads to a muscular vortex of pit music. When Gale barks the words “disallow life to the point of death,” the final word echoes like it’s bouncing around a bottomless pit. It’s all too appropriate for a song about how prisoners are thrown into pits, isolated and forgotten as they fall into a spiral of psychological misery. —EM

“Executioner’s Tax (Swing of the Axe)” (2017)

If you only know one Power Trip song, it’s probably this one—and for good reason. “Executioner’s Tax (Swing of the Axe),” from Nightmare Logic, is built around a massive, instantly iconic guitar part that deserves a place in the pantheon of catchy thrash riffs alongside “Master of Puppets” and “Raining Blood.” But Gale's voice alone—ferocious and unyielding—is enough to convince you that Power Trip would have only continued to reshape heavy music in their image in the years to come, even if the frontman always embraced collectivism above his own successes. Listen to the snarl he lets out in the song's final third; a less confident artist wouldn't dare attempt it out of fear of being seen as corny, but Gale and his comrades understood the power of a great anthem. They knew that if you can channel your aggression into improving this shitty world, then you can write music that helps others do the same. —Noah Yoo

“If Not Us Then Who” (2017)

Gale’s lyrics throughout Nightmare Logic offer a rebuke of the death-cult ideologies that devalue human life. Nowhere is this more apparent than on “If Not Us Then Who,” the song inspired by John Lewis’ striking “If not us, then who? If not now, then when?” quote. Gale turns those words into a militant call to fight injustice—not with rhetoric, not with words, but with direct action. Speaking to the Dallas Observer shortly after the police killing of George Floyd, Gale was adamant about the need for persistence. “I think that racism is still very alive in this country and it needs to be dealt with,” he said. “It’s going to take a lot of work—but for us, I stand on the side of peace and love.” —NY

Originally Appeared on Pitchfork