Feature: Choose Your Own Vengeance – Muscles, Mayhem & Christian Metal Nostalgia

I was 15 when I first heard Vengeance Rising’s Human Sacrifice, and I swear it felt like the heavens cracked open just to scream at me. That album didn’t ask permission, it just kicked the church doors off their hinges, flipped the communion table, and baptized me in distortion.

From 15 to 18, I was all in. Human Sacrifice and Once Dead were my holy grails. Violent, theologically dense, raw to the core. And they were real. The kind of real that made me want to shred air guitar solos and read the Bible in the same sitting. The lineup of original members all in sync, was untouchable.

Then came Destruction Comes.

I still remember when my friend bought the cassette (yep, I’m that old). He picked it up at the local Christian bookstore and drove over to grab my brother and me for one of our classic aimless drives. That’s what we did before TikTok and 24/7 gaming marathons. Just hit the road with some heavy music and a vague sense of purpose.

Our friend liked to crank the volume but had this weird habit of turning the bass and mids all the way down. So what we got blasting through the car speakers was this weird high-end buzz that made everything sound… off.

At first, I didn’t know what to make of it. The sound was rawer, stranger. It didn’t click right away. It wasn’t the same band, but it didn’t seem like it was trying to be. It was chaos incarnate. And somehow, over time, that chaos found a home in my bloodstream.

What always stood out, though, was that cover.

A grinning bodybuilder, one half normal dude, the other half pure anatomical horror, stripped to bone and muscle, smiling as the world collapsed behind him. Biblical destruction, Temple ruins, end times, all just a backdrop for this jacked anatomical model looking like he just stepped out of Gold’s Gym (God’s Gym?) and into Revelation. I remember hearing the model was Roger’s personal trainer or bodybuilding coach or something.

And most of the Christian bookstores couldn’t handle it. Many places slapped a full flesh sticker over the bodybuilder. Modesty, of course. Because nothing says “protect the flock” like censoring art that’s literally depicting the physical decay of man and the wrath of God. Makes total sense.

Enter: The Choose Your Own Adventure

Flash forward to 2025. I decided to bring that wild cover back in a way no one asked for, but maybe everyone secretly needed.

I mocked it up as a fake Choose Your Own Adventure book cover:
“Destruction Comes: An Apocalyptic Tale of Ruin and Chaos.”
Yeah. It felt right. The kind of thing you’d find wedged between a Carman VHS and a crumpled Left Behind poster at a dusty garage sale. I would have read this in a heartbeat.

And I didn’t stop there.

I made the bodybuilder into a retro-style action figure (as seen in the main image). Vengeance Rising font, fire extinguisher accessory, Bible in hand, because obviously. Nostalgia’s weird like that. It creeps up, taps you on the shoulder, and says, “Hey, remember this chaos you used to love?” And you find yourself smiling at something that once terrified your church youth leader.

Why This Stuff Still Matters

Sometimes I like to throw myself back 35 years just to remember what it felt like when this stuff meant something to me. When the riffs felt like lightning in my veins and lyrics about martyrdom didn’t just sound cool, they felt like prophecy.

Nostalgia’s a funny thing. It can trap you if you let it. But it can also tether you to the parts of yourself that were awake. This project wasn’t just a meme; it was a time machine. A reminder that even in the ruins of yesterday’s scene, there’s still value in what moved us.

We grow up. We shift. We lose our bands, form new beliefs, and sometimes even transform ourselves. But we don’t have to forget what lit the fire in the first place.

This little AI art project wasn’t just for laughs. It was for the kid inside me who needed a reason to scream with purpose—still screaming.

The article was originally posted on my Seth Metoyer Substack Blog.

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