Metal Church is an American heavy metal band. They originally formed in San Francisco, California in 1980 before relocating to Aberdeen, Washington the following year and briefly using the name Shrapnel. Their eponymous first album was released in 1984, and their latest, XI, in 2016.[1] The band is credited as a formative influence on the thrash metal subgenre,[1] melding the aesthetics of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal and American hard rock with "incredibly tight musicianship" and "piercingly screeched" vocals.