Necrophagia is an American death metal band. The group was assembled in Wellsville, Ohio, in 1983 and is credited as being one of the very first musical groups to be classified within the death metal genre. The group was founded by Frank Pucci. The band name is derived from the act of cannibalizing, or eating a corpse; the word is crafted from the two Greek words nekron (corpse) and phagein (to eat). Necrophagia is one of the earliest death metal bands, along with others such as Possessed, Master, Death and Morbid Angel. However, they are quite often overlooked. Often the band is noted for vocalist Killjoy's vast variance in vocal talents as well as the instrumental differentiation between each album, as well a fair amount of band member changes over the years; many of which also highly esteemed in the extreme metal genres. Necrophagia remains a favorite among extreme metal fans and holds high importance in the death metal sub genre foundation.