Matt Flammable is stepping down as the drummer of Destructor, the band he helped start in Cleveland in 1984, and is leaving Vulgar Devils at the same time.
"With a heavy heart I've decided to step down as the drummer for Destructor and Vulgar Devils because of health problems," he said in a statement carried by BraveWords. The statement goes on from there, and the reason it gives is the only one offered.
He has been behind the kit for almost the whole of the band's existence: from 1984 to the first split in 1990, for the brief return in 1992, from 1999 to 2012, and again from 2014 until now. Only the singer and guitarist Dave Overkill has been there as long, and the two of them are the line from Maximum Destruction in 1985 to Tales of Glory, the album the band put out this year through Shadow Kingdom Records.
Forty two years is a long time to sit behind one band, and a drummer who leaves two at once over his health is not making a career move. No replacement has been named, and nothing has been said about whether the band carries on without him.