Brooks Wackerman has been Avenged Sevenfold's drummer since 2015, taking on one of the most delicate positions in American metal: replacing The Rev, the band's co-founder, who died in 2009 and whose style was an inseparable part of the group's identity. Born in California in 1977, he arrived with a résumé that barely intersects with the repertoire he would come to play. He was Bad Religion's drummer for fourteen years, and before that was part of Suicidal Tendencies and Infectious Grooves — a path running through melodic punk, hardcore and the crossover with funk, not through technical metal. He comes from a family of musicians: his brother Chad Wackerman played for years with Frank Zappa. That varied grounding is precisely what qualifies him. Post-2015 Avenged Sevenfold abandoned the formula that had made its name and began changing direction with every record — The Stage (2016) is a concept album about artificial intelligence and cosmology; Life Is But a Dream... (2023) is openly experimental. Performing that demands a drummer with no attachment to a single language. He debuted on The Stage and remains in the current line-up.
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