"Are There Now Three Venom-Like Bands? Guitarist Mantas & Drummer Abaddon, Co-founders Weigh In"

Jimmy Kay from Canada’s The Metal Voice spoke with Co-founding Venom Members guitarist Mantas and drummer Abaddon about them reuniting for upcoming festival shows.

They also spoke about how Venom cannot reunite with Cronos and their exit from Venom Inc

Watch full interview here

When asked if there are three versions of Venom now since Mantas and Abaddon have reunited?

“As far as I'm concerned, even with us, you know? I'm just going to speak the truth. The absolute truth, right? I'm the founder member. If there's a co-founder, it's Abaddon. Cronos was the last one to join (the band). Everyone knows that, right? I wrote all the early material. Blah blah blah. Right? And at this very moment in time, the way I look at it is that there isn't a Venom (Band) out there There's bands out there who are playing Venom material. And that's the honest way that I'll look at it right now. When this came about (reunion with Abaddon at Keep it True Festival 2026), um, it all came about basically through a mutual friend contacting me and saying, "Can you ring Abaddon? And I must admit, I was like, I'm going to be honest, "Oh, I don't really want to get involved in all this kind of stuff again." And I mean, Abaddon will tell you, we hadn't spoken since 2017. So anyway, I did contact (Abaddon). And then I got um I got a message from the Japanese promoters who wanted me over for Venom Japan. And then I said, um, look, if I'm coming over, what about if Abaddon was to come over? We (with Abaddon) sort of reconnected. And they were like, really? I was like, yeah, yeah, why not? You know, so all that was kind of arranged. I spoke to Abaddon, said, "Would you like to come to Japan, play a few songs?" "Yep, great." So, flights are booked. We're off on the 27th of November. We play on the 30th, I think it is."

“Then I got a message from the guys at 'Keep It True Festival', and they said "Venom reunion" And I was like, "Good luck with that, pal." I say, you know, that everybody's kicking each other's shins in court at the moment (intellectual property dispute). So anyway, I made contact with Cronos through a mutual friend and just said, "Look, tell him I want to speak to him. There's an offer coming in. It'll be a good offer. Um so, let's just talk. Even if nothing comes of it, let's just talk."... Nothing. So, the court case thing (in regards to the Venom Logo), then the lawyer spoke to his lawyer and mentioned about the reunion and what we got back was basically it's not worth my time.

When asked about 45 years anniversary of Welcome to hell

“So, myself and Abaddon, we said, "Look, why don't we just do something to celebrate this [ __ ] band?" And that's all we're doing. It's the album, it's a celebration. Yep. It's a celebration of Welcome to Hell. 45 years of that album, and this stupid [ __ ] band has missed every major anniversary in its history. We've never celebrated an anniversary of this band. So, I spoke to the guys at Keep It True, Oliver in particular, the owner of the festival. I said, "Right, here's an idea. why don't we get some special guests, people who have been influenced by the band, all that kind of thing, you know, and he went, "Great. Great. Let's do it." So, that was how it all came about and now we're getting offers from other places to do the same thing. We're going to go out and if nobody else will do it, we're going to go out and celebrate this band.

When Asked what will this new band be called?

"As far as I'm concerned there's no [ __ ] name to it. There's Abaddon's Venom logo which is his (Abaddon's). It's up there.. And then underneath it, it says Mantas and Abaddon and then special guests. And that's what we're doing. It still amazes me to this day how this band has had so much influence on the metal scene from day one. Every comment I've seen so far 90% has been really really positive (about Mantas and Abaddon) and then get the one (person) no Cronos, no Venom. It's like right okay listen to me right now you can imagine the most toxic relationship and the most stressful relationship you've ever had in your [ __ ] life and now go back and invite it back in. And that's what we tried to do. If everybody knew the real reason I left (Venom), you wouldn't even [ __ ] look at that guy again right now. All these people who say about Cronos and stuff like that, yes, he was a part of the band. I appreciate that. He didn't write all the [ __ ] early material. He didn't found the band. He was the last person to join. The woman who introduced me to him via her best friend is in my house now. If you were having problems with your wife and you put it on the [ __ ] internet, I would never go, "Oh, yeah, well, I know what's going on." Because you don't you don't know the personalities of the people involved in it. All you see from the outside is a band. I mean I love Kiss. I love Judas Priest. Now there's [ __ ] problems with KK and all the rest of [ __ ] Priest. There's problems with Ace and [ __ ] Gene and Paul and Peter and you know, but we don't know what's really going on, you know? It's ridiculous to comment on people's careers. And that's the way I feel about it. And all I'm saying is that myself and Abaddon as the two original members of Venom, we're going to go out and we're going to celebrate this band and its music and that's it. Nothing more."

Abaddon weighs in

"My take on that is very straightforward. If you've got three bands using the word Venom to sell the music, originally Venom were a three-piece. And I don't think unless you've got two members of that three-piece, you can't call it Venom because it's Cronos and some other blokes, or it's Dolan and some other blokes. If you've got me and Jeff, you got two thirds of the original [ __ ] band. Yeah, that's as straightforward as you can get."

When asked why Abaddon was no longer in Venom Inc

“My wife got pregnant and we moved to a different place from where her parents were and uh she was quite young. She was married when she was 21. She got pregnant and I asked for some time off. I asked Tony and I said I need to take some time off and as soon as I was gone there was a new drummer in. I was never sacked. I was never let go. I didn't do anything. I just wanted to take a month, maybe two months off with my wife while she was having the baby. That's all it was. And I never heard from Dolan again, apart from toxic things online." Abaddon

When asked in Mantas wanted back in Venom Inc

"Nope. No. Nope. It was like, I can remember the last show that I did. And before we go any further, you have to remember that both myself and Abaddon, we've just been in the Royal High Court of Justice, right? Where we stood in the witness box and took an oath to tell the truth. And that's what we did. I told the absolute truth and so did he under oath. I would go back into that same courtroom and say exactly what I've already said about the Venom Inc situation, right? Because I'm telling the truth. And when I had the second heart attack, it was in April and I had the last conversation I'd had with Tony Dolan was March 26th. Previous to that, we had done two festivals. I think it was one in Crete and one in Poland. Anyway, there were two festivals to do and I said, "Okay, look, I'll do the festivals." And the reason I was pulling out at that point was because Anita, my partner, had been diagnosed with cancer. Now, that was a misdiagnosis, but we went through 18 months of hell, not knowing what the [ __ ] was going on, right? So, anyway, I had said there, you know, there was a second leg of an American tour to do. And even I suggested Mike Hickey. I said, "Look," you know, and we were sitting outside the airport waiting to come home after the second festival. And I said, "Look, just do the [ __ ] tour, right?" You know, get Mike, do the tour, blah, blah, blah blah. So anyway, that's what happened. And from then on, contact was very, very sporadic. No matter what anybody in that camp says, it was very sporadic. And then I'm not going to go into all of this [ __ ] but four times I was on the brink of leaving Venom inc because of behavior, right? Four times. One of those times was when Abaddon was still with us and I can remember coming home off that particular tour and Anita said to me, "Oh, how'd it go?" I says, "That's I'm [ __ ] done with this." I was like, "What? What? What?" She couldn't understand. I was like, "Fuck enough of this." The last time it happened, it was the sound guy in the back of a cab in New York on the way to JFK who persuaded me to stay with the band. I just had I [ __ ] had enough. But anyway, I continued. I kept going, kept going. Um,

"So like I say, the contact got less and less and less and less and then they were off doing other things and whatnot. And yes, they said, "Oh, we're going to do this festival. Do you want to do it?" And I was like, "No, I'm staying at home with Anita. I'm staying at home." And obviously the second heart attack, I was scared of flying. I'll admit that. You know, I've never been a I've never been afraid of traveling, but I thought 37,000 ft up in the air, if this [ __ ] happens again, [ __ ] this, you know. Um, so and then the straw that broke the camel's back was when I saw a gig advertised on Facebook for Newcastle, our hometown, where I founded the band and I thought, "Okay, right, okay." So, I just got on with what I was doing. And I had um about 18 months previous to that, I had written a song and it was called 'Losing My Faith'. And uh I did the vocals on it and everything. And um I did myself a video for it and um I put a 30 second clip of it up on uh on Facebook one night saying, "Oh, look, new song blah blah blah blah blah." Tony Dolan within seconds had unfriended me, blocked me, and deleted me off everything as soon as I put that up. Right. Okay, that's it. Done. And there's been no communication since. Venom Inc. they I've I said this ages ago. They can continue. Go go go just go do your thing. It's like, you know, go and play every club on the planet, every stadium on the planet. I don't care. I really really don't care. I'm not following what you do. I'm not bothered. Right? And it's the same with Cronos. It's like, right, if you don't want to be with us and you want to be with your two hired guns, then great. Just get on with it. But particularly with Cronos, I think, yeah, why not? You can go back to doing your thing with those guys, whatever you want to do. Just as Abaddon will go back and do his Abaddon UK gigs and, you know, I'll probably go back over to Japan and do my thing with the Japanese musicians. I've got four recording projects on the go at the minute. So, I'll go back and do that as well. "

Jeff "Mantas" Dunn and Anthony "Abaddon" Bray, iconic co-founders of the pioneering black metal band VENOM, will celebrate the 45th anniversary of VENOM's classic debut album, 1981's "Welcome To Hell", at the 2026 edition of the Keep It True festival on April 24, 2026 at Tauberfrankenhalle in Lauda-Königshofen, Germany.

For this unholy occasion, Mantas and Abaddon will summon the spirit of the very first black metal album with a once-in-a-lifetime performance. To make this night even more legendary, they will be joined by an infernal all-star lineup of guest musicians:

* Tom Angelripper and Andy Brings (SODOM)

* Tom G. Warrior (CELTIC FROST, HELLHAMMER, TRIPTYKON)

* Schmier (DESTRUCTION)

* Attila Csihar (MAYHEM)

* Danny Lilker (NUCLEAR ASSAULT, S.O.D.)

* Diva Satánica (BLOODHUNTER, NERVOSA)

* and introducing Blake "Bulldözer" Arendell from the rising force INTERCEPTOR

This exclusive gathering of metal legends will take place as the Friday headliner of Keep It True 2026 — a night of chaos, darkness and unrelenting power.

Mantas: „I still vividly recall walking into Neat Records in 1981 to record another set of demos when David Wood, the owner, asked us if we had enough material for an album, we of course said yes and we were given three days to record our first album Welcome To Hell. That my friends was 45 years ago and now we are here at the Keep It True festival to celebrate 45 years of Welcome to hell, a groundbreaking album in Heavy Metal that I am so proud of. This is gonna be an amazing night my friends with so many very special guests. Come celebrate with us. April 24 2026, see you all there. MAXIMUM RESPECT.“

Abaddon: „Jeff ' Mantas' Dunn, and Antony 'Abaddon ' Bray, will be performing at next year's Keep It True festival. It will be a celebration of their seminal album...Welcome to Hell. Mantas and Abaddon, founders of Venom will be joining by an amazing line up of guests from some of the world's greatest Thrash, Speed and Black Metal bands.“

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www.keep-it-true.de/tickets

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