Dave Lombardo's Dead Cross features the co-founding drummer of Slayer paired with Gabe Serbian (the Locust, Retox, Cattle Decapitation) on vocals, Justin Pearson (the Locust, Retox, Head Wound City) on bass, and Mike Crain (Retox, Festival of Dead Deer) on guitar.
The group came together during session booked by Lombardo with Pearson and Crain, shortly after Lombardo's band Philm had split. Their live debut was December 1, 2015, at the Casbah.
Lombardo later recruited Faith No More/Mr. Bungle frontman Mike Patton to be their lead singer, alongside Pearson and Crain. A self-titled debut was released via Ipecac and Three One G in August 2017.
A new video debuted in summer 2017 for "Seizure and Desist," from the debut Dead Cross album, directed by Eric Livingston. Another video premiered later that year, "Church of the Motherfuckers," that they described as "a visual rebuke of organized religion."
At the end of 2017, the band announced a summer 2018 European tour, including a June 17 performance at the Download Paris festival.
May 2018 saw the unannounced release of a self-titled, four-track digital EP, later offered as a limited edition 10-inch black/green swirl vinyl record. A music video for the track "My Perfect Prisoner" was produced by Eric Livingston, who also created the cover art for the band's full-length album debut and the new EP.
The EP release was followed by a six week European tour, kicking off June 2 at Barcelona’s Primavera Sound festival and including stops at several festivals including Download, Novarock, Graspop, Roskilde and Dour.
An early 2019 EP from Bronx-based rapper Kool Keith includes a mashup of his song "Uncrushable" with the Dead Cross track "Church of the Motherf#ckers," produced by Luke Henshaw. A video for “Uncrushable” was created by David Hall (writer and director of Where in the Hell is the Lavender House: The Longmont Potion Castle Story).
During the early 2020 pandemic shutdown, they released a cover of Black Flag's "Rise Above" that the band says was "created in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement and staunchly opposing police brutality and systemic racism. As such, the track opens with a recording of a Los Angeles resident voicing his displeasure with the LAPD during a public comment period from a regularly scheduled LA police commission meeting." The video was filmed by Lombardo with the Lonely Rager and Becky DiGiglio.
Their 2022 album II dropped October 28 via Ipecac Records, preceded by a video for "Reign of Error" inspired by Supreme Court events. "Words can’t even begin to describe how much this album means to me," says Crain, who had recently been treated for cancer. "It’s birthed of pain and uncertainty. The slow, excruciatingly painful, and nauseating recovery from cancer treatments were the catalyst for every riff and note on this album." A video for II's sophomore single "Heart Reformer" dropped in August 2022, followed in September by a single for "Christian Missile Crisis."
In 2023, Dave Lombardo teamed up with his wife, Canadian born singer/songwriter and pianist Paula Lombardo, to launch a new band called Venamoris. “Several months after meeting Paula in 2010, she hesitantly shared with me her past decade-long career as the lead back up singer for Wayne Newton,” says Lombardo. “She later played me some of the demos she recorded throughout the years and I was floored by her sonically soothing, rich tone and natural, instinctive ability to harmonize. I was determined to persuade her to return to her creative self.”