Bio

Late one Saturday night in a Christchurch pub sometime around October 1998 Nathan Ballard drunkenly staggered up to Chris Rigby and asked, "Do you want to get a band going?".

Both were veterans from the early 90’s Christchurch underground grind/death scene and had also been hanging out to play that sort of music once again. Phone numbers were exchanged and a few days later Chris called Nathan to remind him of this conversation (which by this stage, he had totally forgotten about). Never the less the two still got together to discuss and jam out ideas as well as sort out the next problem, a drummer! Enter Daniel Wilkinson. Chris had known Dan from a couple of years earlier through his association with the ‘Drop n’ Rot Grindcore and death metal Radio show’. He also knew that although Dan had never been in any other bands, he had been teaching himself Drums and was hanging out to play in a band of previously mentioned genre.

Within only 3 weeks of being together Meatyard had already played a disjointed gig/jam at a party and by February 1999 they had performed their first official gig to a surprisingly receptive (and aggressive) local audience! Throughout 1999 and 2000 Meatyard played a number of successful live appearances. These included the ever popular Satanfest 99, 2000 & 2001 (and soon 2002 ... the 10th Anniversary of Satanic Blasphemy) as well as support to touring acts such as Atomizer (Aus), Impaled Nazarene, Sticky Filth (NZ) and Malevolence (NZ) among others.

Sometime around November of that year the band went into Nightshift studios to record a number of tracks. Five of which (along with a live track) have been released as the 'Dismembered Debbie' demo cassette and the remaining tracks to be released as a split cassette with fellow anti-Christchurch satanic grinders Sinistrous Diabolus and also an extremely limited edition EP release with Rich Hoak’s (ex-brutal truth) Total Fucking Destruction.

Band Members:
Nathan Ballard (guitar, vocals)
Chris Rigby (bass, vocals)
Daniel Wilkinson (drums, vocals)