Black metal band crash couple's romantic photo shoot

A picture of black metal band Coldvoid and the happy couple
Coldvoid and the happy couple (Image credit: Janet Wheeland)

A couple celebrating their engagement with a photo shoot in the woods captured some unforgettable memories when they stumbled across a black metal band ‘in the wild.’

John Awesome and Nydia Hernandez wanted to mark getting engaged by taking some pictures in the woods in Holy Jim Canyon, California. They hired photographer Janet Wheeland to take some romantic shots, but John noticed some eye-catching characters lurking among the trees.

Metal band Coldvoid were also in the woods shooting promo shots, using the full moon as a backdrop.

John Awesome, 34, tells ABC: “During the last part of the session, we noticed a few guys with some corpse paint makeup on sitting at a nearby bench blaring out some black metal music.

“We just randomly thought it would be a funny idea if we could get them to be a part of our engagement shoot. So we approached them and asked and they were more than happy to accept. Super nice people. I seriously can’t make this stuff up.”

Photographer Wheeland approached the band to ask if they’d pose with the couple. She says: “They gave us a copy of their new demo and it was the perfect eerie soundtrack for the drive out of the woods.

“It was a perfect, spontaneous finale to our photo shoot. We couldn’t have planned it better.”

The couple are set to tie the knot in 2017.

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Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.