The band was formed in 1988 in Buffalo, NY. The band is best known for their violently disturbing lyrics, Chris Barnes dog-like growls, blazing solos, rapid drumming and heavy bass. The titles of their songs are self-explanitory (ie. Hammer Smashed Face, Necropedophile), the content of these songs is extremely aggressive and violent. Their violent music was good enough to get quite a following, including Glen Benton (of DEICIDE) and Francis H. Howard (of INCUBUS) who sang (barked?) back-up vocals on two songs from the 'Eaten back To Life' album; 'Mangled' and 'Skull Full Of Maggots'.

The band's following continued to grow after each album was released. In 1993 the band gained nationwide publicity for appearing as the band in the club in Jim Carrey's 'Big Break' movie; Ace Ventura Pet Detective. The band got many new fans from their appearance in the film, so the band decided to release a Hammer Smashed Face single, since they had already laid down a track for an upcoming Black Sabbath tribute album, 'Eternal Masters', they decided to turn the single into an EP with 'Zero The Hero' (Zero The Hero was written by Black Sabbath for their 'BORN AGAIN' (1983) album) and a few other songs added to make it worthwhile. Around the same time,1994, they decided to replace long time guitarist Bob Rusay with former Malevolent Creation guitarist Rob Barrett to create the album The Bleeding (NOTE: Barrett joined the band before the Ace Ventura movie).

Their lyrics aren't very imaginative, the subject of all of the songs is death and all of the most horrifying and disgusting ways to die, be it dying in a horrible car wreck or being decapitated by an axe. Although it may seem as though they are just rambling about mindless violence with no real point, you should really take a look at the lyrics. Sure most may be gory and disgusting with subject matter which is unsuitable for.... anybody, hidden deep within the gore of some songs, Chris Barnes' actually tries to describe thesychological aspect of murder which isn't really heard about when people talk about the band. You will notice within almost every song, Barnes talking about the psychological side of death and murder, he really gets within the head of the character, telling a story about how the person feels as it performs or thinks about such acts of horror. Each song is a gore story, not unlike what you'd see in a gore flick or in comic books (well, except Tomb Of The Mutilated kinda stuff) only most people try to stay away from such subject matter (or at least not describe the gory details). They have been blasted by politicians for their explicit lyrics and their 'immoral suggestions' (some politicians think they want people to go out and do the things they sing about. Only in America.....). This extra publicity added with their appearance in Ace Ventura has only helped strengthen the band's popularity among their fans

Their latest line-up change (and most controversial) is the departure of Chris Barnes who joined Six Feet Under (he left due to 'musical differences') so to replace the king of grunts, they brought in former Monstrosity frontman George 'Corpse Grinder' Fisher. This move doesn't seem to have hampered their success in any way, 'Vile' is the first Death Metal album in the history of soundscan to debut on The Billboard Top 200, coming in at #151 the first week of it's release.