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A new review section: Buried by Time And Dust

We added a new review section, coincidentally another Mayhem reference following 'The Past is Alive', with the title 'Buried by Time and Dust'. Over the years, a lot of promos have been gathering dust simply because a fresh wave of promos arrived the following month and they were consigned to oblivion. We will review them here to make a clear distinction with our other reviews. We will also use it to complete a discography in terms of reviews. Feel free to contact us if you would like to submit your music or would like to join the staff.

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Frozen Blood – “…labels asking if the demo or EP was going to be released soon and I told them very soon, but in reality I didn’t have anything…”

If you visit our fanzine regularly, you should be aware of the fact we have a soft spot for Death Metal from South America, especially Chile. “It is all riff-heavy, riff-oriented and riff-driven. Yet, due to the use of some eerie sounding keyboards or other sound effects, it doesn’t sound like the umpteenth band doing the Old School thing”; a well-described phrase to introduce Frozen Blood towards our readers. I’m firing a couple of questions at Sick Stabber, the multi-instrumentalist who is forming Frozen Blood alongside Devoured of Christian Souls, the vocalist. As it is a just formed act, let’s start at the beginning…

The band started last winter when there were many days when it was raining non-stop, I decided to start composing with my guitar and an old Casio keyboard for the drums and crazy sounds, then I drew the cover of the zombie with the spear through his skull and the band’s logo, it was all very fast, then I asked my friend to record the vocals and we scheduled a session in the studio, it was all very fast, I wanted to do something classic and totally self-managed, so I took care of everything, music and the cover.

The main idea was to do something brutal, no more no less, write violent lyrics without fear of judgement, clearly in metal it won’t be frowned upon but if I made my mother in law listen to the band’s songs she would probably have a heart attack, murder, perversion, revenge, stabbings, dismemberment and rottenness, there was nothing too far fetched, this is simple, it’s old school Death Metal. Influences could be Mayhem’s ‘Deathcrush’, the old Cannibal Corpse, also at that time I was listening to a lot of Spectral Voice so that’s where the idea of the clean guitars came from.

Concerning Old School Death Metal, which releases you consider as fundamental?
For me, the fundamental ones are: ‘Several Survival’, also ‘Seven Churches’, ‘Tomb of the Mutilated’, ‘Deathcrush’, ‘Slowly we Rot’, there are also many others but I think mainly these would be important influences, the classics always will be.

We’d like to hear everything about your debut release ‘Revenge’…
So far these are the editions that have been made and I do not think I will accept more because there are already many and the idea is not to saturate the market hahaha:
Dry Cough (UK): Tape
Diabolical Summoning (Chile): Tape
Death in Pieces (Mexico): Tape/Cd
Frozen Screams (USA): Tape
Excarnation (Brazil): Cd
Adirondack Blackmass: Vinyl.

The truth is that some labels talked to me and I wrote to others, it was a lot of fun because first I recorded the promo single “Revenge” and uploaded it to youtube through the Death Madness channel and it was immediately well received, I think the keyboards gave it a different touch and made people like it, and the rest is fun because the only song I worked with time and without rushing was Revenge, after I uploaded it to youtube they started to contact me from fanzines and labels asking if the demo or Ep was going to be released soon and I told them very soon, but in reality I didn’t have anything, just some riffs, most bands record all the guitars of the whole songs, I recorded one song at a time complete (guitar, bass, drums, keyboards, vocals).

This was my rather experimental system: Monday we were scheduled to go to the studio, then on Sunday I would write the guitar riffs, and the drums, bass, keyboards were just in my head, on Monday on the way to the studio which was a 3 hour bus ride I would write the lyrics, and in the studio we would meet my friend and he would record vocals and I would record the instruments, basically that’s how it was with all the songs, I didn’t have much to think about, shit like “Will this be a good riff? “Is this going to be a good song or a bad song?”. All those questions and insecurities just didn’t exist, we knew this was going to be good shit and we liked to experiment with something like that, making the songs practically less than 24 hours before recording them.

Talking about the cover, I decided to use a different one for the full Ep, we had the impaled head so thinking about doing something different I thought about drawing something new, so my idea was to make an altar of some sick psychopath, some place where he worshipped his dead under his machete, I made a collage with images of real dead and drew over that, the original image is very Carcass style but I thought it would be better if it was a drawing, I did all this on the ipad and I think the result was really good, then I thought: “The head looks great for the tape editions and the altar will be perfect for the Cd or Vinyl”, finally the labels have released the tapes with both covers hahahahahahahah, I think it’s better, each edition is different from the other, there are collectors who have all the editions so far and in fact frozen screams released a special edition with toy body pieces, just for freakies.

The lyrics are mainly about killing people, I could make up a lot of things to seem more erudite in gore or psychopath movies or books, most of the songs are simply an escape of sick thoughts that we all have sometimes but we repress them because clearly it would not be right to go around killing everyone who crosses you, if I am a fan of horror, only one song has a true story, “Castración Violenta” is a story that happened in the 90’s here in South America, it was the story of a murderer who only had in his record other murderers, violators, drug dealers, his only goal was to kill these scumbags, he killed more than 15 people and it was proved that some of them he tortured to death, others he castrated while alive, all of them he dismembered and buried in the forest, then in jail he killed many others until he was finally killed, a good guy.

As said, you have released ‘Revenge’ on tape. Are you a collector yourself?
Personally, I only collect vinyl, and only if it’s something that blows my mind, I don’t buy shit that I won’t listen to, I like rock in general, jazz and many things, the cassette is a great format, unfortunately over time it loses quality, but I respect a lot the nostalgic of the format, I have friends with great collections of tapes but they don’t listen to them hahahahahah, I think it sucks to have something that you will not listen to, anyway, the vinyl of Revenge will be released at the end of the year in USA by Adirondack Blackmass.

What are your aspirations for your band’s future? Have you already penned any new songs?
So far we are focused on the ‘Revenge’ editions, we have to sell that material first before we think about something new, I think next year we will record the new material but for now we want to focus on this work.

If my information is correct, you aren’t (actively) involved with other acts and/or projects at the moment. Is this correct?
The truth is that we both have other active musical projects, we each have our own band and frozen blood is a separate project.

Are you connected to the music scene in any other way?
I consider myself a songwriter and I also work as an illustrator for some bands, it’s fun to be making logos or illustrations that are later printed in zines or demos.

Could you mention other bands from your region of Chile of which our readers should be aware of and explore?
Sure! Lately I’ve been listening to a lot of Chilean bands, the classics are already well known so I’ll recommend Chilean bands you should listen to: Sepulcrum, Suppression, Phantasmagore, Ripper, Horrifying, Rotten Tomb, Ancient Crypt, Mortify and Inanna. Totally recommended.

Also do you have favourite labels you always keep an eye on when they announce a new release? Any favourite printed / online zine
I really like what 20 Buck Spin does and also the special editions that good johnny does in Frozen Screams, one of my favorite illustrators lately is the Colombian julian mora, he does some really disgusting paintings, and to be honest we were recently interviewed by a Polish fanzine called Wydawnictwo Psycho and together with this one it has been the longest and most interesting interview we have answered, it shows when the interviewer has really researched the band and listened to the music in depth so good for you guys and good for the bands.

Thanks for your kind words! For me a great way to end this interview. Is there something I’ve forgotten to ask you which you would like to mention?
I would like to thank again for the interest in the band, to all the metal fans that have listened to the EP and have enjoyed it with some good beer, we can only say that the next work will be in the same line as this debut, we will just have fun as we did with ‘Revenge’, that’s what it’s all about, enjoy the music in our own way, from the underground, from the rotten graves, without looking for fame or money, just enjoy the metal.

Cheers!
Sick Stabber

Frozen Blood

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Reaping Flesh – “…the desire to play OSDM in its original fury without getting lost in technical drifts…”

When we received the promo from Redefining Darkness, the phrase “a mission to play no frills, straight forward Death Metal, the way they believed it should be” was just the right one to get our attention. After Ben Schultz reviewed the debut EP and described it as “Reaping Flesh’s ‘Abyss Of Existence’ is absolutely outstanding and it is outright successful in giving that Old School Death Metal feel we all know and love while still being able to sound like something completely fresh, interesting and new.”. Just adding up the reasons to question the sympathetic Italians  about the band, the EP an a lot of other things. But let’s just start with introducing this new act and their motivation to jump into the pool of Old School Death Metal…

The band started to exist in march 2022: first Marco (Guitar) and Federico (Drums) met and started to work on some rough materials, then Andrea (Bass and Voice) joined the band a few months later.  Signing with a solid label and playing good shows is already something memorable, considering that we’ve been active for just one year and with only 5 songs out.

What about the genre that appeals to you / intrigues you? Is it the brutality and the rawness?
Certainly what moves us is the desire to play OSDM in its original fury without getting lost in technical drifts, but trying to focus on all riffs, vocals and blast beats. As you’ve said: we wanted brutality and rawness. Certainly also the typical attitude of the late 80s and early 90s allows us to express ourselves in a direct and sincere direction.

Which bands grabbed you by the throat and influenced you with the sound and songwriting within Reaping Flesh?
Our main influences come from those old school Death Metal legendary bands such as Obituary, Massacre, Autopsy, Death, Morbid Angel, etc …

Let’s keep on talking about your influences and Old School Death Metal in general. In your opinion which historical release or releases absolutely defines the genre and style you’re playing? Is it Autopsy’s “Severed Survival”, Death’s “Scream Bloody Gore”, Massacre’s “From Beyond”, the Morbid Angel demos or maybe something else?
For every member of the band these albums are fundamental listening , we can’t choose one, we believe that all of them have given the structural basis for the birth and evolution of death metal. They complement and influence each other and have something to say nowadays, still, to us who are setting a “new” OSDM band in 2022. These bands basically created something unique.

Lets move on to your debut EP “Abyss of Existence” (CD & Cassette released by Redefining Darkness Records)…
It’s been a harsh selection of riffs, drum beats and vocals. Months rehearsing and trying all sorts of song structures, tunes etc … We wanted to be sure that our EP would have ended being direct and raw, that after 40 years people are still able to write original Death Metal songs that actually aren’t just copy/paste from other bands. Our artwork is visibly inspired by the records that came out in the late 80s and early 90s, it well represents the EP’s vibe. I’m (Andrea) the one mostly in charge of all the lyrics. We wanted to talk about the meaning of existence and the role of humankind in this world. Starting from some questions that I had about all this, I’ve decided to underline the music and the atmospheres that the EP has.

Happy with the EP, when you listen back to it after recording it months ago?
We are very happy with the final result, in all aspects that pleases and satisfies us, both the music, the sound, the artwork and the lyrics. The recordings went very well, it all came together very spontaneously and we felt extremely comfortable with each other as with who was behind the mixer, Carlo Meroni.

How did you get in contact with the releasing label Redefining Darkness Records?
Marco (guitarist) , contacted directly a few labels, and after some proposals we’ve decided to move forward with Redefining Darkness Records. We do like loads of Redefining Darkness bands, and we really appreciate the way Thomas (label manager) promotes and supports the whole scene. He’s a pure and sincere Death Metal fan as us, and it’s mainly the reason why we’ve connected that well together for our EP.

The EP is released on both CD and Cassette. Would you like to have something on vinyl as well? What do both formats mean to you, as a recording artist but also as a collector?
In our band we are all collectors. All three medias for us are very valid and effective, certainly cassettes have a special fascination both for the memories they stir and for the format they have, without underestimating the quality of the audio they retain, as for vinyls. Marco has a visceral love for CDs, Federico and Andrea more into vinyls nowadays.

What are the (near) future plans concerning Reaping Flesh?
We want to be able to play as many shows as possible and to push our music everywhere. In the meantime we are working on new material that will be part of our first full length. We want to continue on this path, to make progress in order to improve more and more the sound we’re offering and consolidate what characterizes us.

If my information is correct, you aren’t (actively) involved with other acts and/or projects at the moment. Is this correct? Any plans maybe…to start a project or band…or joining another act?
All three of us are mainly concentrating on Reaping Flesh and are devoting a lot of energy to this band, but we all have other projects as well.

Are you involved in any other way in the music scene?
Marco is a tattoo artist and illustrator, and Federico works as a booking agent and has been touring for the past 10+ years as a musician/TM/mercher/etc.

Any other bands of your region of Italy that are worth mentioning and to check out for our readers?
The Italian scene is growing a lot and is pumping out really interesting bands. If we had to name a few, especially in our area we would say Fulci, Miscreance, Maze of Sothoth, Extirpation, Total Recall, Golem of Gore, Hateful, Burial, Putridity, Cosmic Putrefaction and the very young Mass Carnage.

Also do you have favorite labels you always keep an eye on when they announce a new release? Or any favourite zines, distros…illustrators?
Well yeah, we always try to keep up to date when it comes down to new bands or records.

Among the labels we can name: Redefining Darkness, Relapse, Metal Blade, Pulverised, 20Buckspin, Maggot Stomp, among the main ones. We are also very focused on graphics and illustrations and therefore follow various artists, including Ed Repka, Riddick, Hayden Hall, The Creep, Roh Halus Mu, Andrea Leoni (Necrospectrum), LRNZ.

The fanzines, webzines and the world of zines is really rich and complex, definitely the local Unholy, then your VM is a very interesting reality, Decibel, Metalitalia, but really the list could be endless. As distributors, the ones we follow the most, surely we can mention Evil Greed, Night Shift and Torn from the Grave.

Well, thank for considering VM-Underground an interesting zine. We appreciate the gesture. Is there something I’ve forgotten to ask you which you would like to mention?
I think we’ve been analyzing all aspects of what concerns our band and we hope to be able to see each other in the real world one day! Thank you for your time and interest on our first EP, “Abyss of Existence”, which can be found via the links in the info section (below). If anyone wants to get in touch with us, visit our Instagram account (also below) or email thisisreapingflesh@gmail.com

Reaping Flesh

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Outlaw – “A representation of the Devil and his sons”

There exists those who seek to discover the esoteric knowledge that lays beyond the stygian void, to taste it’s atrament and copulate with its essence, some may shun the daylight by closing the blinds behind them and believe they have experience darkness, when all they have done is merely create their own artificial might, nothing more…but then there is Outlaw, a Black Metal entity that traverses these unknown energies and like the alchemist, transmutes it’s serpentine motions into that of sound, bestowing onto the listener a transcendental aura, for the music that is manifested creates the metaphorical altar for the mind to take part in this ceremony to interlink with the spell that is being woven. I recently had the honor to conduct an interview with the band, so to you the readers, I hope the words in which you are about to read will be the catalyst to entice you to enter their realm and be entranced within the spirit of their sermon.

Hails to you Outlaw! Firstly, it is my pleasure to have this interview with you, i am most excited, so thank you! Let’s get started, shall we? I am most curious to know how this entity was conceived, would you mind taking us back to the roots of Outlaw’s creation? In addition to this, what was the main force which compelled you to create such a vessel?
Hey, it is a big pleasure for me to give you this interview.

Outlaw was created in 2015 when I was 18 years old. I started to create some songs just to put out some ideas that I had, but at some moment I wanted to record it as a band. I invited a friend of mine to play drums, and all the rest happened naturally.

I think that the main reason for me to create Outlaw was to manifest my desire to make Melodic Black Metal, and at the same time spread my spiritual believing, or whatever I want to share with people who want to listen to it.

If you had to define the entity of Outlaw, how would you express such, to give a meaning and purpose for what the band stands for as both an outfit and its identity? Also, adding to this, you are already three full length albums into the life span of Outlaw, in the grand spectrum of the genre, what would you hope to achieve with the band, in terms of the legacy?
I think that Outlaw is a representation of the Devil and his sons. I think we have to be wild and classy at the same time. We can nowadays use blood and leather jackets and in the future be totally different, because it is always about how I feel the music, so there is no standard, and our visual on stage is just a way to make people understand our message.

In terms of legacy. I don’t know where the future leads us, but the idea is to make our music spread through the people that have the understanding of our art and if it means to be important only to us, it is what it is. This is all about being ourselves no matter where it leads.

Every artist that creates, there usually exists a certain force or energy which fuels them, how would you describe such in the creation process where Outlaw is concerned? Also, from the early days in crafting material for Outlaw versus present day, would you say that the process has changed or transformed in terms of how you get into that mindset of creating?
The music can come from different channels, and on Outlaw it comes from many different places and in different ways. It is very hard to describe it because it is always unpredictable and sometimes a bit crazy. Our songs are just the leads to something else. In the early days of the band I was creating music with a lack of experience, so the songs were more basic and couldn’t convey the feeling I wanted to. Nowadays I already know the way I should go with my music, so it makes the process easier and at the same time harder, as it is easy to get predictable. So I am always fighting to make my art transcend.

Your most recent album, ‘Reaching Beyond Assiah’ possesses a rather ceremonial and cosmic feeling to its composition, the very architecture of it gives the listener the sensation of a ritualistic feeling. Could you delve into the creation of this offering, and the energies imbued onto it, how did the manifest these potent feelings onto the album?
The album was created in two different moments, part of the songs were created in early 2021 when I was living in Italy and in quarantine, and the rest after the 2021’s tour during another quarantine. I had a lot of time to go deep into my mind and find the keys I didn’t have in the early years.

This album is a consequence of the esoteric part, but also my esoteric vision always changes during the creation of an album, as it always makes me question myself and go through different ways of thinking and materializing my worship. I don’t have control and even know all the energies in there sometimes, as it is something beyond my conscience, and I am just the vessel who puts it out to the physical world.

I’d like to take a deeper dive into ‘Reaching Beyond Assiah” regarding its spirit and themes, for lyrical wise, it deals with occult-like topics as well the Kabbalah (in referencing the title), can you expound and these themes and how they relate to you as an artist on a internal level? In addition to this, the way the album is structured, it is obviously fashioned by someone who has knowledge in these areas, so if i may ask, how did you find this path? Regarding the occult?
You can find different ways to transcend and reach beyond, but I think it will always lead in the same place if it leads somewhere. All the religious parts in my music are aspects that I recognize in different cults and find usable on my own path. Everything on Outlaw is very personal about me and the people who write the lyrics, and that’s the nicest part of making music, you can let people understand it in their own way, and maybe use it to find their way to beyond.

I personally found occultism when I was a teenager, especially because of Black Metal and some friends, but with time I started diving deeply into those themes and it started to be more present and important in my life. Nowadays I learn with a lot of different people about many different themes, and it is making my own path. Reading books and knowing every aspect of the sinister path is not going to make you transcend or be spiritualized, just a nerd, so that’s the reason why I think that knowledge from books is less important than learning with the right people and practicing.

The artwork for ‘Reaching Beyond Assiah’, feel free to keep me honest here, but it seems to resemble the Hindu Goddess, Kali, how exactly did you decide on the art and it being the bridge to the actual music? Can you explain the meaning behind it?
The decision was very easy as the album is about transcendence, and Kali would be a good symbol of that.

‘Reaching Beyond Assiah’ can be viewed as a chalice which holds an esoteric energy to its nectar, so as the creator, how would you want another to ingest this album? Besides its melodies, what value would you hope they derive from it?
Sincerely I don’t expect that people will understand everything in the album as there are so many personal things. But I hope that people understand that you have to chase your truth and look for the light that illuminates you, not just believe in people that want to sell you an idea. The whole message of the album is transcendence and I think that you can’t transcend if you are tied to a pre-created idea.

I want to go back to the ‘Total Devil Worship’, live demo and the first full length, ‘Path to Darkness’, firstly, seeing as these represent the first recordings of the band, what was the feeling in crafting these two pieces, would you say your mindset has evolved in how you approach creating and recording since the first demo? Also, you can correct me here, but the sound on the early release resembles that of Dissection (you even did a Somberlain tribute) and parts of Watain, can you divulge into this as well as what were your early influences in this genre?
I created the songs of the first demo when I was a teenager so nowadays I hate it, haha. I also don’t like the first album, but I understand the meaning and why it was important to record it at that specific moment. I was really influenced by Dissection and Watain, and nowadays these bands are still my biggest influences. But at this time I was really in love with Chaos Invocation and Ofermod, and these bands were part of the reason to create Outlaw.

You recently signed to AOP records which in turn released your newest album, a label that has a rich number of bands teeming with quality, so how has the relationship been thus far with the label? Also, how did you get under the radar of AOP? In addition to this, would the previous two albums be repressed by the label?
Signing to AOP was probably my best decision since I created the band. The label works well and they really care about quality and delivering a good material to our crowd and at the same time, they do their best to help the bands. It is kinda hard to get into a good label as you need to find someone who really likes your music and pays attention to you, and thinks that you are worth the work. In our case, I sent him some emails trying to make him listen to the music, and when he listened we got signed.

We are not planning a repress of the first albums, but maybe in the future. Now we are already working on a new album, so we are more focused on bringing something new and superior instead of pressing our old music.

If you had to translate the album of ‘Reaching Beyond Assiah’ into a live performance, in order to truly encapsulate its atmosphere and themes, to bring to life the sounds in a physical form, how would you describe such experience, and from your imagination, what form and live setting would it assume?
That’s a hard question as there are many different ways to do it. I would like to have 2 guitar players so I would be able to sing and have more action on stage, but as an underground band the costs would be too high to afford, so for now I am still playing guitar.

I think that our show is supposed to be dangerous but not frightening.

I know with every artist, the answer tends to vary, but in your perspective, how would you view Black Metal, do you think it transcends more than just merely a genre, but it can be looked upon as philosophy and a tool? How would you express such words?
Black Metal for me is just music, but music can be more than just music. I think that any kind of music can have a spiritual approach and any act done with devotion

In ending with this interview, I want to extend my thanks to you in having me host this, for it was truly my pleasure, i shall leave the final words to you! What words would you like to leave to the readers?
I don’t have anything specific to say, just listen to our new album and find your own meaning to it.

 

Outlaw

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Isataii – “Death to Colonized America and forever at war against Religious Scum!”

Leonardo Da Vinci once remarked that the painter has the universe in his mind and hands, this is a statement i believe to be a fact, for so whoever bestows onto reality an idea that was once bred in the womb of one’s imagination and wills it into this physical realm, it is indeed a universe that is worth exploring. Isataii, a one-man Black Metal band summons forth an earthly resonance to his art, wherein the sounds exude an organic candor to its movements weaving together a world that radiates an ancient and live-in aura. Drawing upon the inspiration from the indigenous culture and themes fused together with the flesh of Raw Black Metal, Isataii indeed fashions from the clay a world that draws you in and intersects with your very senses, producing a transcendental yet entrancing listening journey. To you the readers, i hope the following interview entices you enough to immerse yourself in this artist’s offerings, to dissect its elements and draw from it the atmosphere you so desire.

 

Greetings, i would first like to extend my many thanks to you for facilitating this interview, for it is my honor and pleasure to be hosting this, truth be told…i have been looking forward to this one for some while, so let us begin! Firstly, the entity that is Isataii, can you give the readers an insight to how this project came about from its conception to reality? In addition to this, i would like to delve a little deeper, would you mind explaining the core ideology of Isataii, both as a band and as an entity, what exactly is the crux of this being?
Aho! Definitely, So Isataii started back in 2021 during the Pandemic known as The Covid Era. I started it because my Live band “Kvlt of Odium” wasn’t able to play shows and because they were all cancelled due to the sickness. I realized I needed and Outlet for not only representing love for Black Metal but also my passion for my culture. So I saw this as a great opportunity to blend both. So Isataii is a Native American Black Metal band dedicated to bringing not only my people (Penetuka Comanche) but also creating a space for all Indigenous cultures here in the Black Metal Genre.

Since 2021 you have released a plethora of music be it in the form of demos, Eps, Splits and Full lengths, this is quite impressive for such a short span, so my next question deals with the creative process, since you are the sole creator, can you describe the mindset and the process you must undergo to achieve this artistic ability? In other words, the act of creating, is there a certain ritual or state that you must put yourself into? Would you be able to divulge into this?
Haha. So honestly without sounding too egotistical I just have so much creativity that it’s just waiting to be released. And as far as where it comes from and what inspires me is truly my love for the music and my cultures spirit. I love creating and I love getting lost in the writing process because there’s no limits to what you can do especially because it is a one man band. I have allot of hatred for colonized society and religion. So channeling that into my riffs and songwriting really is a lot of the driving force here with Isataii.

Bleeding forth from the previous question, i would like to know more about your creative forces, for i would believe to produce that vast amount of releases your ideas are very much bountiful in its flow? So where do you draw your inspiration from, be it from whatever medium it may be?
Awesome question. Really like a said in my last response it comes from somewhere deep within me almost an Ancestral Power that flows through me. I can’t explain it but I could literally write full songs in my head and finally get home to plug in and record. I feel as if tho the spirit of my people take over and unleash these songs and I’m the vessel for this process. I don’t like a lot of what’s coming out in today’s age as far as music or anything artistic. I feel it has no soul no real human aspect. So what I stand for is pure originality.

If i am not mistaken, you also play guitar in Kvlt of Odium, seeing as that band is a full outfit versus where Isataii is only yourself, how would you say it differs, both the spirit of the music and the approach?
Kvlt of Odium is my love project in which was started to carry on the original ideals an aesthetic as far as true Black Metal. I feel this project is in appreciation toward my need to perform live and give the world the true meaning of Black Metal and take it back to it’s roots. As for Isataii I have full control and it lets me get possessed and taken to another world where my people once ruled the land. And times were pure.

 

This year saw the release of your fourth full length, “In Vein Of The Ancestors” which in my opinion is a fantastic, enthralling work of art! Would you care to take us through the process of the inception of how this album came to be, also, how does this piece differ from the last 2 full length albums from 2022?
“In Vein of the Ancestors” definitely is my most proudest release yet. As I gave so much of myself and spirit in the writing process and the appreciation of my people. I decided to focus this album a lot more on Native American awareness and it’s beliefs and ideology. I had a lot of fun with this album in it I paid tribute to the morals and mentality of the culture. I feel this album has also displayed my best songwriting and how it’s level of maturity is reached. I’m very proud of this album and thank you for your honouring words.

So i would like to talk about your influences in terms of the indigenous themes you incorporate into your music, firstly, what exactly was the driving force that compelled you to merge these themes with Black Metal? Following up on this, to you as an individual what do these themes of culture mean to you?
Definitely my driving force was just the overall atmosphere of the true indigenous times. The Accomplishments and the hardships. The victories and the losses. I grew up with knowledge about my people all around me. And have always carried a sense of pride of knowing I came from The Comanche people also known as The Lords of the Southern Plains. Black Metal for me as always been a warlike genre. It was rooted to the defiance against Christianity and the rebellion against it. My people fought against this plague religion and waged wat against it. It only makes sense to merge these two because it goes hand and hand with each other.

Recently there seems to be much interest within the realm of Black Metal where indigenous themes are concerned, even though there are other bands who have been doing this for some whiles, why do you think there exist an influx in this blending of styles? Also, for the readers who may be wanting to discover new bands who incorporate these themes, are there any you would recommend?
I think that we are in a time where people are hungry for something new. Something to feel more connected to spiritually and culturally. Indigenous Black Metal has always been around but I believe Certain attention has been getting mainstream fans to open their eyes to this movement. Although I’m against the mainstream and forever wish to remain underground I feel that Indigenous Black Metal is something to take notice because although Black Metal started as a European genre it’s concepts and ways of mentality can truly relate to all ethnicities and cultures.
Oh most definitely. Indigenous Black Metal bands to look out for would definitely be Mutilated Tyrant, Pan American Native Front, Burnt Lodge, Coyokiztli, Iisnaahi, and Tzompantli.

As an Artist i am certain when you create you have certain goals in mind, in terms of what the listener gains from your art, what would you wish they take away from their listening journey? What would be the goal of Isataii to impart onto its listeners?
I would say for them to understand the importance of the original inhabitants of this land. And to understand what they went through and what they stood for. Their ways of life and customs. And to know the truth behind organized religion and it’s poison that took the lives of millions of innocent woman and children all because they wanted to force this filth to replace their identities.

Going back to “In Vein Of The Ancestors”, the way the release is represented, it is done in a lo-fi, raw manner, what exactly compelled you to bring this atmosphere to the release as opposed to clear and clean production? Do you think Isataii thrives more as a Raw Black Metal outfit?
Oh of course. My goal for Isataii was never to have top notch production and a massive produced sound. I grew up on bands like Venom, Celtic Frost, Satanic Warmaster, and Sargeist. So because of this love and appreciation I realized their goal was never to have a really clean sound but more to create memorable songs and sick ass riffs with a strong message. So I say that will forever hold true with everything that is released from me. Never forget your roots and always honour where you come from.

This is a question in which i am always interested in hearing the perspective from different artists, so, where Black Metal is concerned, how would you as a creator express your thoughts on it and its meaning as either a philosophy or genre, what does the spirit of it mean to you?
Black Metal to me is War, is Culture, is a wayy of life. It isn’t something to take lightly and deserves full respect. Isataii is my contribution in the appreciation of this genre. It’s a world where you give all of yourself and soul. Never ending possibilities in creativity and where you can take it.

Ending with this interview, i would like to express my thanks once again, for i took pleasure in preparing these questions, as well as being a fan of your project! I would leave the last words to you, anything you would like to impart onto the readers ?
Thank you for honouring me with this interview. I am completely grateful have had the pleasure of being interviewed by you.
Thank you to all my warriors of the Isataii tribe old and new for your support and dedication. Without all of you I would be nothing. A tribe is nothing without it’s members. With that being said.

 

Long Live True Native American and Indigenous Black Metal!
Death to Colonized America and forever at war against Religious Scum!
I would like to leave off with this statement.

Isataii

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Dungeon Keeper – “We reject all forms of intolerance and elitist behaviour”

Not all too long ago I stumbled upon a great demo tape that blended all of those tasty elements of Hellhammer and Isengard. It was a no-brainer to imediately order this first Dungeon Keeper demo and while reviewing it I realized there was very little information available on the band. An excellent demo from an obscure band? Reason enough, when I did order that demo tape to take advantage of that opportunity and ask the band some questions right away…

 

Something that has to be taken off my chest first, tell me, is the name Dungeon Keeper indeed taken from the computer game from the late 90’s? If so, what did make you choose this title?
Hey Felix, first of all, thank you for your interest in Dungeon Keeper as well as having us for this interview.
The combo had existed for some time and we had already written a bit of music when we were pondering over a name. At some point we came up with “Dungeon Keeper”, obviously borrowed from the computer game. The idea was not really meant that seriously in the first place, but seemed fitting after all. Being surprised that the name was not yet occupied by another band, we grabbed it. Other than that we see no connection to the game or its contents. We think the name stands for itself and supports the general style.

Musically you seem to be delving even deeper into history, ‘Fortress Of Evil’ bears a distinctive and unmistakable resemblance with Hellhammer and early Celtic Frost – I love those trademark high pitched screams! I am quite sure that it was a deliberate choice to make Hellhammer an integral part of your musical identity. Can you tell me something about your musical drivers?
We cannot deny Hellhammer and Celtic Frost as prominent influences. It seems that not many bands tend to make music of this kind at the moment. We saw a chance for self-expression without overflooding the scene with music that has already been created a hundred times better.

Another unmistakable influence seems to be those legendary Isengard albums, two recordings I personally absolutely cherish. Especially the “semi clean” vocal parts do remind me much of Fenriz’ most primitive works. Can you take us into your personal world of appreciation for Isengard?
As you have mentioned, Isengard is an important influence for Dungeon Keeper, especially for the clean sung parts.

Fenriz tended to often support his vocals with riffs that follow the vocal lines (think “Neslepaks” from the legendary Høstmørke album for example). This makes the overall feel of a song a little more playful and folklore-like, if you will. As for us, when it comes to instrumental work, we try to not overcomplicate riffing and drumming.

Neither are we into folklore as a way to deliver ancestral stories, nor are our lyrics aimed at referencing such things but clean vocals in Black Metal sound fucking sick, so why not?

While ‘Fortress Of Evil’ sounds really familiar, you do blend in some elements of your own, so it doesn’t sound like Apocalyptic Raids or Warhammer. So, besides Isengard I believe you have mentioned Carpathian Forest as a musical reference, what else can you add to this list? Are there any other bands or genres that you do like to listen to?
Well, Occvlta of course. What we find differs the style of Dungeon Keeper from the bands you have mentioned in terms of vocal work is that we have two people singing in different voicings. Bestial Bonecrusher usually does voluminous shouting parts with those high pitched screams while Archaic Tormentor does more of a mid-range voicing. We try to combine these voicings for choruses or in the clean parts for more depth.

While we’re at these topics… Personally I always love to peek in everyone’s record collection. So, let me browse through yours… What were the last records (or CD’s/cassettes if you prefer those) that you have played and purchased?
Bestial Bonecrusher: Kriegshög – Self titled
Battle Druid: Молчат Дома – Этажи
Archaic Tormentor: The self-titled EP by Dolchstoß. Also live an absolute recommendation.

Due to the quality of the recording, not only in its nice and crunchy sound but also in the strong song writing, it is highly unlikely that you guys have not been active in different bands before – or maybe still are. The internet doesn’t tell me much about the band’s background, can you tell us something about your (musical) backgrounds?
Referring to the sound of the EP, we have to give credit to Poison Drinker from Minenfeld. For some time, he has been like a fourth member to the band, recording the EP as well as mixing and mastering it, taking photos and doing what not to support us.

Other than that, all of us have been involved in several projects over the years. In terms of genre, these range from thrash over death to black metal and grind. Panzer Squad, Misery Vortex, Gorge, Karst, just to name a few.

Two of us are also currently together in the war metal combo Prehistoric War Cult, as well as Bestial Bonecrusher playing in the sludge project Baerus.

By taking a quick look at your song titles it seems that you have mostly been inspired by the dark side of things, no Post Black Metal topics here. Human abominations, satanic evil and even cannibalism. Can you enlighten us with your views on such topics? What is the main force of inspiration when writing lyrics? If they are important to you at all…
Well, there is actually not too much to say. We feel that our lyrics are to support the overall feel of the music and what comes with it. This means that we do not dwell on complex factual contexts of current day politics, nor do we dissect historical occurrences in elaborate treatises.

A strong base for our general musical expression – not only with Dungeon Keeper – is a worldview that is founded in anti-fascist and anti-oppressionist thinking. We reject all forms of intolerance and elitist behaviour and stand for an open and unpretentious scene. Other than that, we are happy to just fuck around with whatever comes to our mind.

Your first effort, the ‘Fortress Of Evil’ demo tape was released last month through Kellerassel Records. I haven’t seen any other reviews of the demo so far, but I guess the reaction must have been positive since all 100 copies seem to have been sold out. Can you tell us something about the reception of this first demo tape?
As far as we can tell, the reaction was quite positive. We do not use Facebook, Instagram and other social media, except Bandcamp to distribute our music and to list our shows. Of course, this also means that you don’t get many immediate reactions from the public. But we have received some concert requests, will play gigs in Germany, Czech Republic, Croatia and Austria in the coming weeks and months and are of course looking forward to getting feedback from the music scene in this way. On a side note, we have just received the second pressing of the tape and can offer another 100 on our next gigs. What won’t be sold there, will find its way to our Bandcamp page.

And, as a whole, how do you look back to the whole process of writing, recording and releasing ‘Fortress Of Evil’?
We wrote Fortress of Evil as a duo over the course of 2022 but when recording came closer, we found that Dungeon Keeper was supposed to be a three-piece band. Battle Druid, who we have been friends with for quite some years now, joined to play bass for the recording sessions and stayed as a full member. Other than that, we can only give credit to Poison Drinker for designing the artwork and to Mogel for releasing.

How did you guys end up with your label, Kellerassel? And, if I am right the label is closely working together with Fucking Kill Records too and they are releasing some great vinyl releases, can we wait to see the demo to be released on vinyl as well?
Kellerassel Records is run by our good friends Mogel and Jana. They usually focus on more obscure music, like small noise core releases or grind, and we are very happy that they have decided to release Fortress of Evil on their label. At the same time Steffen from Wolfsburg-based label Lycanthropic Chants provided us with buttons to accompany the release (thanks a lot!).

In Osnabrück and the surrounding area there is a quite small but dedicated community that supports each other and from which different combos have emerged. Mogel and Poison Drinker, who recorded the EP, for example, play together in the death metal band Minenfeld. Everyone puts their heart and soul into it and helps each other out with releases, gigs, etc. In addition, we are all united in the organization of shows with our concert initiative Kellerassel Booking. Only in this way can the underground exist.

Following on from the previous question, now that the demo is out, it is safe to say that I am pretty curious what will be next. So, what can we expect from Dungeon Keeper in the remainder of the year? Or even beyond.
We are currently writing new songs and plan to release a full length, maybe at the beginning of next year. Other than that, we have several shows planned and look forward to playing with other bands, meeting people and supporting the underground. Feel free to check out our Bandcamp page for tour dates and upcoming releases.

I’d like to thank you for your time in answering these questions. If you feel I have not covered everything, feel free to take these last words.
Thank you for conducting this interview. And thanks a lot to VM-Underground for the great support! We are always looking for new shows and opportunities, so if you are interested in having us, just reach out!

Dungeon Keeper

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Lord Belial – “Brutal and fast riffs, but with melodic leads on top”

One of Sweden’s longest running Black Metal bands suddenly reappered (again) in 2020 and and last year we could finally and definitely welcome Lord Belial back with a new album. On ‘Rapture’, the band’s ninth album and the first for the new label, Hammerheart Records, Lord Belial feels like an old friend but one with a fresh new haircut and wardrobe. Perhaps the time and break has done the band good? Time to catch up with guitarist Niclas Pepa Green…

 


Hi Pepa, thanks for taking the time answering my questions and, of course, welcome to VM-Underground. Your latest album, ‘Rapture’, has been out for some months now. Perhaps a good time to take a cautious look back already, how would you reflect on the process of creating the album?
Hail Felix! We bring ideas into the rehearsal room and put them together there, I really enjoy that process. We have more or less always worked like that.

There’s no point in introducing the band to our readers, nor to tire you with questions about an introduction, but I am curious about what made you decide to bring the band back from the dead for a third time. Can you take us through your considerations and motivations?
I went to Micke late one night down over a coffee and talked about doing another Vassago-album, I had made a demo and got signed on NWN with Yosuke for a full-length album, and Micke got very delighted by the idea, he told me that he had also grown into the hamster-wheel and was in need of escape. The drummer we signed for the recording never showed up, so Micke had to play the drums, which kind of made him want to play the drums more again!

We were quite pleased with the sound on the album and wanted more. Thomas brought his gear to Micke’s basement and we started jamming. Three weeks later, we bought a ton of new stuff and got a very shabby rehearsal room that inspired us a lot, but then we changed rehearsal room again after some six months and got our own one which is just perfect, we have installed a small studio there and we have mixers and in-ear monitoring, so we can adjust the levels how we want, it is absolutely perfect, the best rehearsal room we have ever had.

I personally felt that Lord Belial had a bit of a dip in terms of musical creativity during the late 00’s, at least ‘Revelation (The 7th Seal)’ and ‘The Black Curse’ are my least favourite Lord Belial albums, and I guess that is pretty much the generally accepted opinion. How do you look back at those years, prior to your break-up, specifically?
I personally had some time off during The 7th Seal, I cannot say that I was very much involved in creating that one, it is more or less all Thomas’ ideas and riffs. But on The Black Curse, I was very much involved again. We used a different studio then, it was rather small and low-budget.

And, drawing that a little more broadly, if you looked back on your entire musical career and you were to be asked the question, which so you are being asked now, to sum that up in a few sentences. How would you characterise that adventure?
I have jumped ship a few times because I had to travel a lot, which made it difficult to keep up with rehearsing three to four times a week, I guess I needed to see more in life than just rehearsal studios, recording studios and stages. But we have always found our way back together, through thick and thin, even though I’ve been diagnosed as bipolar which may or may not count as one of the reasons for my own fleeting presence. I have just had too much to do in the past, but now things have calmed down quite a lot, I medicate and everything is smooth sailing.

When listening to ‘Rapture’ it sounds quite refreshing, even when it sounds quite firmly rooted in 90’s Melodic Black Metal. Although you all definitely look much older than on the Ablaze Magazine poster that I had in my bedroom some twenty 20 ago, the spirit seems to be burning. Or maybe it was recently lit again. What do you consider the main difference between ‘Rapture’ and the preceding recordings? And explanation for the ‘freshness’ of this old styled music?
We had a VERY clear picture of what we wanted the final product to be like, and we did every sound from scratch. We tried out different snare drums, different bass drums, etc, and Thomas and I have Kemper profilers + Mesa Boogie amps so the raw mix felt very clear and nice. Then in the final mix, we went to lengths trying to make everything stick out. There are some bits and pieces that could have been better, ie some choirs that is difficult to hear that they are even there, but in general I think we got what we wanted from the start.

One thing that I thought was remarkable is that the music on ‘Rapture’ sounds a little more melodic than the albums that preceded it. Was this a deliberate choice, or was this just a natural thing to happen?
We talked about going back a bit to riffing as we did on Enter the Moonlight Gate, so that is what shines through – brutal and fast riffs, but with melodic leads on top of that.

It usually is a bit of standard label talk, stating that any band’s new album is their strongest to date. Something along those lines was also stickered on your online promo by your current label, Hammerheart Records. If you look back at your almost life-spanning career, what album do you cherish most? And is there an album that you consider your least favourite? And, of course, why?
I do think Rapture is one of the best albums we have done, apart from that I would say Enter the Moonlight Gate is my favorite, but the sound on Unholy Crusade and Angelgrinder is just total crap, you can’t hear the guitars at all, it is just a mess. There are so many guitars, but you can’t hear them, it is very frustrating!

Speaking of labels, when I had just recovered from the news that you would be returning again, I was also surprised that you did not return to the womb of Swedish labels. I had expected that a new album would be released on Regain Records though, especially now that they seem to be a bit more active again than a few years ago. What made you finally choose Hammerheart Records and how do you like it?
We have been ripped off too many times…! Hammerheart is a solid label and so far they have been very true to us and they seem to want what is best for the band, not the other way around.

You have been active in bands since the early 90’s, so definitely you can be considered a scene veteran. How would you describe the change in the extreme metal scene over those past three decades. And, while now being amongst the nestors of the Swedish extreme metal scene, do you still feel part of that scene at all?
There are some bands that I have never stopped listening to (Cannibal Corpse, Abbath, old German thrash metal, etc) but I can’t say that I have kept up with the scene, not really, just as a bystander that sees what happens.

While we’re at it, things have changed dramatically over the years, tape trading seems to be something of a memory to some and even something that “they” only heard or read about and internet made things so much easier. How do you think the internet and other technical and social developments have changed the way of life in a metal society?
It has changed dramatically. I loved tape trading, but there is just no way to be able to keep up with listening to hundreds of new mp3-files every day – and the chopping block has become very distinct, if people write bad reviews everyone else seems to follow in that direction, not even bothering, or daring, to state their own opinion. One of the downsides of having everything accessible within seconds is that it is easy to compare and fast to judge while the upside is that you can find music that you like very fast as well (of course).

It’s almost a logical assumption, but assuming that you are indeed now less enthusiastically putting all your time and money into swapping out demo tapes, are you still following the scene at all? Were there any records in recent times that really grabbed you? And if so, which ones were they and why?
Not really, I listen to a lot of different kinds of music. Steve Vai, Credence Clearwater Revival, Rammstein, Chuck Berry, Sweet, Accept, ZZ Top, Rainbow, Dio, White Noise notched at 2600 Hertz(!), Immortal (+Abbath etc), Cannibal Corpse, Jan Cyrka + heavy/thrash from the 80s like Destruction, Kreator, Judas Priest, and many more.

Something that not only seems old news, but actually is old news, but I am still a little puzzled about. There was a lot of controversy around the release of your ‘Purify Sweden’ EP from 2003, but I never really understood the reasons only that the label thought it was too patriotic. So, let’s jump in the DeLorean… What the hell happened there?
Thomas was 100% pissed off and wrote the lyrics in that state of mind and they became quite nationalistic with a view that stretches back to before all religions entered Scandinavia. So much for freedom of speech, eh?

You are also in Vassago (together with Lord Belial drummer Micke Backelin). A band with roots that go even further back, all the way to the late 80’s, but isn’t all that prolific, at least compared to some other bands and taking in consideration that the band has been around for quite some years. Is there any news to share on Vassago?
We recorded Storm of Satan a few years back and we were supposed to get this very talented drummer for that session, but due to personal reasons, he couldn’t make it, which meant that Micke did the drumming. It was quite alright, but we had to rearrange a lot of the riffs. The final product is quite alright but the record company posted the songs in a completely different order on youtube and they said that Andy La Roque did the leads, it was, in fact, Anders Almqvist from New Jersey, the same guy as on Knights From Hell. Also, the songs are called “War”, “Fire” etc, but the record company added “…of Satan” after all the titles. Quite annoying!

If I am recalling it correctly I have seen you on stage for the first time in, I think it was 2003. You shared the stage with Ancient Rites and some local bands hardly worth mentioning. What do you consider your best gig or tour? Care to share any special or fond memories?
Once in Paris was absolutely crazy, the crowd started to fight in front of us and it was total mayhem, quite different from playing in Amsterdam where everyone is super calm and barely moves (but they like it anyway, so they say, but it is hard to tell you know). Bischofswerda is great, and Leipzig has always been good. We played in Belgrad once, which was also very memorable. Anders (Bloodlord) and I cut ourselves too deep at one occasion and it would not stop bleeding so there was a lot of blood everywhere, onstage and backstage, unfortunately, I don’t remember where it was.

With the latest record being out now, what can we expect from Lord Belial in the near future? I hope we can rest assured that there will be a next records and not another break-up?
Yes! We just started talking about releasing a single with maybe three or five songs! We got the riffs, the ideas, the theme, the cover ready, and everything.

Alright Pepa, thanks a lot for sharing all your thoughts and answering the questions. Feel free to take the opportunity to take the last words…
Thank you so much Felix for this interview.

Take care and keep in touch!

//Pepa

Lord Belial

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Dead Head – “I really like it that you consider Dead Head a stoic band”

Despite the fact that there are a lot of fans of Dead Head, one of the vedettes of the Dutch metal scene, at VM-Underground, it took a lot of digging in the deep archives to find that the last Q&A dates back to 2006. Of course, that’s way too long ago! I dusted off the contacts and talked to guitarist Ronnie Vanderwey about the latest album ‘Slave Driver’, the (distant) past and the future.

 

Hi Ronnie, welcome to VM-Underground and thank you for taking the time to answer these questions. As you may know, we at VM-Underground do have a weak spot for Dead Head, the band has been featured quite a few times, including two interviews dating back to the years 2000 and 2006. That requires some catching up! Your latest album, ‘Slave Driver’, has now been released almost a year to the day. An eminently appropriate time to take a look back. How would you describe the whole process surrounding the creation of that album?
I would describe the process as an unguided missile that finally hit the target. Recordingwise things have changed over the past years… Nowadays it is more a fragmented process whilst in the old day we were used to be locked up in a recording studio an finish the recording within a couple of weeks. The advantage of the latter method is that you can work very efficiently and focused. The disadvantage is that you don’t have the opportunity to step back for a while and reconsider some decisions.

If you wanted to describe Dead Head, you could think of anything, but not that it is a band that has tinkered a lot with its musical direction. So how and where do you always find the drive to come up with a new album?
Indeed, but I’d rather qualify that fact as the appropriation of our own style. In the past we made some songs that obviously did not directly fit to our musical style. In some cases we succeeded to do something different, and sometimes it didn’t work out as intended. Our writing process however is a continuous development… Sometimes it comes in a flow, and sometimes the ideas seem to be less inspirated. We never force ourselves to write a song because we have to. It is always driven by spontaneous ideas

When we do take a closer look and listen to ‘Slave Driver’, one of the major difference is to be found on the vocal department. Long-time vocalist/bassist Tom van Dijk has left your ranks again and has, again, be replaced by Ralph de Boer. What’s up with this in-and-out relationship with those two musicians?
Yes, that indeed is quite remarkable… It might be a pragmatic move to deploy Ralph. But I think it is a small chance to find a singer that sounds like Tom anyway… and someone who doesn’t live in some country far away… and can play the bassguitar.

Other than the slight difference in vocal approach, what do you consider the main difference between ‘Slave Driver’ and your previous recordings and ‘Swine Plague’ in particular?
I consider the main difference is that ‘Slave Driver’ sounds somewhat more consistent. But I also find it quite difficult to analyze because I might be involved too closely on this subject. Fresh ears should make a purer judgment on this. Another difference also is that Robbie Woning (guitar right) wrote more material on ‘Slave Driver’. And Ralph and the rest of the band have been more involved in the writing of the lyrics.

Your current label, Hammerheart Records, seems to be a driving force for the band in the last couple of years. Not only have they released your two latest albums, they have also re-issued some of your back catalogue, of which I especially appreciated the vinyl version of ‘Kill Division’, how do you look back at that reissuing campaign?
Well, we simply have the luck that the people of Hammerheart obviously like the band. I think we have gained some appreciation in the last couple of decades when we regularly played live in the country. And we are grateful that our older albums are (again) easily available now. I personally find it very inconvenient that some bands made terrific albums that are very hard to obtain now. Or cost 50 euros or more for a first pressing…

And now almost everything seemed to be made available again, what about ‘Depression Tank’? That album, originally released by Displeased Records, seem to be the only gap in your discography when it comes to albums on vinyl.
To fulfill your request I can announce that ‘Depression Tank’ will be released in a re-recorded version in a couple of months. We are working on a short live section to be added to the new package. And as a completion to that release we will play several songs from the DT album live.

I remember reading a newspaper article some years ago in which Dead Head drummer Hans Spijker was interviewed because of your support slot for Slayer. It was a bit of a childhood dream come true for him. Do you also consider this one of the highlights in your career as a band? Can you share some other memories that you cherish?
Of course we have considered it an honour that we could open up for Slayer. And it was a great experience too. Back in the nineties and zeros we did some gigs with Kreator, Exodus, Sepultura and Edge of Sanity. Such opportunities are always fun to do. For me personally it was a highlight that I could encounter with Adrian Vandenberg backstage in Enschede while supporting Slayer (Adrian lives in Enschede you must know). We had a short meeting where I could show my sunburst Les Paul to Adrian…

Dead Head has been a part of the Dutch extreme metal scene since your foundation back in 1989. That is quite a life-spanning career with at good share of our readers not even been born back then, it is all the more surprising that Dead Head has suffered little from inner struggles, or so it seems, as the line-up has remained pretty stable. How do you explain this closeness between you guys?
That is a combination of the love of music and the fact that we have come to a point where we respect each other and leave room for differences. I can assure you that it is not always love & peace… We can be really harsh on one another during the writing and recording process. But the main thing is that we all have learned to understand that the result, or better the effort to reach the maximal achievement, is the most important thing in the end. The person who made the most apologies to me in my life must be our drummer Hans Spijker.

Now we’ve jumped on the retrospective train. In those almost 35 years (!) the extreme metal scene as a whole has changed a lot over the years and maybe even more in the second half of your career. How would you describe the difference between “the scene back” then the way it is now?
That is a completely different world. With its own advantages AND disadvantages. A big difference I think is the fact that real heavy music has become far more mainstream. For a part we can attribute this to the acceptance of Metallica to a worldwide audience. The other part is the influence of the internet and the possiblity of (relatively cheap) digital recording. The whole system of making a demo and trying to get a proper record deal has more or less disappeared. Bands are far more self supporting and able to do things themselves.

And what about the influences to the band? Is it still the very same records that is getting you on your collective bikes and crank out some new riffs and write good music? And what about the lyrical content?
Yes, remarkably enough we still come back to bands we collectively like a lot… I can become very enthusiastic hearing the latest Obituary or the latest Overkill or Morbid Angel or Immolation. Additionally there are lots of ‘new’ bands that have become a serious source of inspiration. Lyrically I tend to write more about realistic things and developments in society. That is because this world has become a theater of craziness and polarization. You cannot escape that. So there are numerous topics that invite to write a firm statement against them. But for Dead Head I find it more appropriate to have lyrics that express the atmosphere of the song.

And for you, on a personal level, life has changed. It only makes sense that you participate in the “metal life” with less abandon and that there are other things in your life that have become more important. How do you balance those things with still running the band?
For me that is no problem. I work virtually part-time and I have enough time to spend on music, both actively as well as passively. But I’m also very lazy so doing nothing means a lot to me. But I tend to get pretty inspired as I reach the point of boredom. And that is a great blessing of being a musician: you never get jaded when you have a nice guitar to express your ideas. The crucial point is that our collective schedules do not match very often. So we have often problems to manage sessions in which we all can participate.

In the sense of buying records and visiting shows, are you still following the metal scene as a whole?
For sure. The biggest advantage of the modern digital era is that there is an enormous amount of interesting material on the internet to be discovered. So it is quite simple for anyone to keep informed about the developments in the metal world. But since the offer of musical releases has become so numerous it is impossible to miss out a lot of things.

Speaking of records, what were the last records that you bought or listened to that really grabbed you? Is there anything in particular that you like to recommend?
In the past month I bought the latest Morbid Angel (I know it was released in 2017!) and I caught up with the phenomenon of Jeff Beck. And I heard the latest record of our labelmates Sammath, who made a very great album… My biggest ‘discovery’ however was the band Portal from Australia… But mostly, when I buy a CD, it is a classic from the past that I only have had on vinyl or cassette. I am keen on first pressings. I most cases I get attracted to something I have heard/seen on Youtube… If the attraction sustains I finally buy the cd. I even consider buying the new Metallica… :- P

Something I personally hugely appreciate is Dead Head’s stoicism. The Thrash Metal genre has gone through quite a few changes over the last 30-35 years. Hypes came and went. Melody and influences from Hardcore, groove or Nu-Metal were added and (almost) forgotten again. But Dead Head just continued to basically sound like how the band once started. All this time, was it a natural reflex to just stick to yourselves or did you sometimes also have to restrain yourselves from also playing a bit more “adventurous” music?
I really like it that you consider Dead Head as a stoic band… Because I see myself as a stoic person. The question you might come up with is whether that is a choice or conviction or just a matter of ignorance and lack of musical ability… (?) I have always appreciated bands that could change their styles and do significantly different things without losing their own identity or footprint. Pestilence has done that with the ‘Spheres’ album. Pantera after the ‘Power Metal’ album. But in several other cases drastic changes turned out in failure or very questionable music. Either it is a ‘miss’ or a ‘hit’. But to lift a slight tip of the curtain: our new EP features some ‘different’ stuff. Among some very ‘typical’ Dead Head tunes…

Like the dedication you guys seem to have for the musical identity of Dead Head, you also seem to be just as dedicated to the band as an entity. Apart from a few exceptions the three of you (not counting Ralph de Boer, who is also in Bodyfarm) hardly played in other bands. Never really felt the urge to do something different with another band?
For me personally I don’t want to be involved in another band at this very moment. I like to concentrate and put all the effort in Dead Head. But I would speak against the whole statement of not being associated with other bands or projects. In the past all of our band members have done things in other bands… Beyond Belief, Equimanthorn, God Dethroned, Asphyx, Apple, Jurassic Park, Elise, Phantom Druid, Temple, Staal… To name a few in which we have participated.

There was a five-year gap between ‘Swine Plague’ and ‘Slave Driver’, is that about the time span that we need to keep in our minds when we are expecting a new album?
Yes and no. For now we have planned to release an EP in the summer of this year. And I expect that our eighth full size album will see the light in 2025. Maybe earlier.

Okay, Ronnie, thanks a lot for your time and effort in answering the questions. We had to wait 5 years for ‘Slave Driver’ but you had to wait a whopping 17 years for this interview, we do make sure we do come back to you much sooner than 2040. That’s a promise! The last words are yours…
We will see what the future will bring us. In 2040 I will be 72 years (288 seasons) old, Deo Volente. If I don’t know by then, I never will… Thanks for the attention and the sensible questions. STAY HEAVY and stay true to your own beliefs.

Photos by: Cindy van Stralendorff

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Embrace Of Thorns – “Each of us is striving against his or her personal Entropy”

One of the longest running Greek Black/Death Metal bands is definitely Embrace Of Thorns, not only have they been there for a quarter of a century now, they are also one of the best bands from Greece – and, quite underrated too. Their latest album, ‘Entropy Dynamics’ is again finger licking good, offering a wide range of dynamic, creative and above all, well-crafted dark art. All the more reason to have a chat with Embrace Of Thorns vocalist of the first hour Kostas “Archfiend DevilPig” Koudousnes and discuss the ups and downs of the band and that excellent new album.

 

Hi Kostas, thanks for taking the time to answer these questions and welcome back to VM-Underground. What is new on the front of Embrace Of Thorns?
Thanks for having me again Felix! There is a couple of shows abroad confirmed for the upcoming months plus more in the works. This line-up sounds great on stage and we plan to play out as much as we can. Other than that, a big chunk of the back catalogue was re-issued, which makes for a nice opportunity for those who don’t have the previous albums to go and buy them in physical format (https://embracethorns.bandcamp.com/).

Entropy Dynamics’ has been out for a couple of months now, to be honest I have not read any other reviews about the album, but I can’t imagine the album having disappointed anyone who has been following the band for some time. How do you look back at this process of writing, recording and releasing the album?
We really have fond memories of the resilient and uncompromising spirit surrounding the band during the time of creation of ‘Entropy…’. We worked in unison, rehearsed our asses off, had a clear vision and created an album worthy of our efforts and fuckin’ devotion. We thought we would tour with Revenge, Misþyrming and Ultra Silvam with ‘Entropy Dynamics’ as our calling card, but as you may know Covid-19 had other plans. Still we are immensely proud of what we did and what we are still doing,

Reviews have mostly been positive with some of them being of extremely high praise. But yeah it seems that after six full lengths we are sort of preaching to the converted.  There is a constant flood of new bands, new releases etc and it makes a lot of sense that people won’t drool over our new one. After all it’s rather boring to be so consistent and delivering good albums the whole damn time, isn’t it? Sarcasm aside, those who know the band and get to hear it, or some new people even go to great lengths by saying that the new one is our pinnacle and whatnot, but for some people we will never surpass ‘Atonement Ritual’ and ‘Praying for Absolution’, the good thing is that those old albums are available again, so people please buy our products… Oh pardon my sarcasm again…

Let’s go a little deeper into the album, like many of your most recent albums ‘Entropy Dynamics’ seem to have a deeper meaning. Can you take us with you on your thoughts about the conceptual ideas of the album?
The thematic nucleus of the latest album is the inherent tendency of the human species for all things destructive, the hopelessness as a calm and collected realization and not as an unfortunate development. That is what entropy is about, the repeated cycle of destruction and rebirth/regeneration. It is bound to happen and it is a liberating realization. Nothing has really changed when it comes to the evolution of the human species in the last couple hundred years. Humans are still pretty much a mob, a herd.

On a more personal note, I was talking to an acquaintance of mine in the gym the other day and he told me something that sparked that sort of reference, his quote was that “each of us is striving against his or her personal Entropy”. Realizing that one for better or for worse is bound to perish sooner or later and that our mortal coil, a once almost invincible device, turns to a prison, a mere shell of what we once were. Antonin Artaud also mentioned something similar and abhorred the bodily confines “And truly must it be reduced to this stinking gas, my body? To say that I have a body because I have a stinking gas that forms inside me? (“To have done with the judgement of God, 1947”).

In the last three reviews I have written on recent Embrace Of Thorns material I have deliberated aloud about the musical evolution of the band. In my eyes (ears) Embrace Of Thorns have underwent a distinct musical transition, although without losing much of the band’s roots. How do you look to such statements? And can you tell us about your musical development?
I am probably the last to notice something like this, since it’s a rather organic development. As you said our roots remain intact. I can surely attest to our personal evolution, to the fact that we have grown as persons and give literally zero fucks, when it comes to how our music is going to register with the crowd. There is nothing to be lost man! We are doing what we are doing predominantly for ourselves and we know what we DON’T WANT to do, which is to dilute the concept of the band. Our “scene” is what we hold sacred in our hearts and still cherish, but how much of that scene I’m talking about actually remains?

In addition to the question above, how have things developed for you, as a person, on a musical level. If we compare your vocals throughout the full Embrace Of Thorns discography, that too clearly have underwent a distinct transformation. Judging from your posts on social media you do have a wide musical taste. Can you explain your personal musical growth?
I just love music man! Yes I listen to whatever the fuck I want, provided that it is good music of some artistic value, simple or technical it doesn’t matter. The common denominator is that I mostly love dark stuff. I am adamant in my belief that music has for the most part made me what I am today, has sort of saved my life  and it’s almost a biological need for me to listen to music.

As far as an instrumentalist and vocalist, I also believe that one gets better with age, I think that I/we have a better understanding of music as a whole and we can achieve better results with less effort ,compared to when we were younger. This also has to do with muscle memory and overall experience. However one has to avoid repetition, mind patterns and comfort zones as much as possible. Other than that voice changes with age, there is no denying of that.

While the previous albums are not free from a certain ambiance as well, it seems that the new album is a bit more atmospheric. Personally I like the short breathing spaces that can be found throughout the album, those almost ritualistic ambient parts give the album a completely different atmosphere. How is this being a part of nowadays Embrace Of Thorns?
These non-metal, ritual/ambient parts have always been a part of what we do. Nowadays we are more fond of a musical collage  consisting of spoken parts, either by us or sampled from other sources, noises and actual composed music, mostly composed by Herald of Demonic Pestilence. Yes I believe that they sort of tie the material together and definitely have to do with the concept of each album.

As far as I know you have been with Embrace Of Thorns from the very start, which goes back to 1998. If you’d go for a helicopter view and look back at that quarter of a century of being in this band, how would you describe that almost life-spanning journey?
It’s the largest chunk of my life. I started the band when I was 16-17 years old. Well… we did what we knew, we sometimes should have known better, but our heart was always in a good place. There never were any preconceived notions. We loved and still love what we do, our Black Metal of Death means the world to us…

So at least there are no regrets when it comes to the music we recorded and put out. Other than that, the message was always heartfelt and sincere and we can still stand behind each and every lyric this band has ever put out. All in all, we are content and proud of what we have achieved so far…

You once told me that you were getting tired of Embrace Of Thorns being put in the ‘Bestial Black Metal’ category. Apart from the fact that the music is obviously of a different kind, what is it that bothers you about this mis-categorization?
I’ve got no issues with Bestial black metal as a label, other than it is misleading in our case. I do love tons of bestial bands, but we’ve been around long before the term was actually coined, which was 2008-09 if I am correct. Let’s be honest it’s a microgenre that is mostly characterized by stylistic tropes. Musically it’s a grindcore and brutal black metal crossover, but even back when Praying was released we had way more in our bag of tricks than what is implied by the term bestial. If we said we are still a bestial band it would be misleading, wouldn’t it?

‘Entropy Dynamics’ has been released through Nuclear Winter Records, the label is not only an  obvious quality label, it is also a long-term companion of the band. But, if we take a look at your back catalogue, your albums have been released by labels like Iron Bonehead, Dark Descent Records and Nuclear War Now! Productions. What made you go back to Anastasis’ label?
Well, we chose to work with AV (Anastasis Valtsanis), because he is a brother, whom we’ve known for 15 years and a true fan of  what we do. We still have good relations and ties with our former labels, when it comes to Patrick his schedule was really packed because of Covid  and we were willing to record Entropy in order to have it ready for the ill-fated tour with Revenge, unfortunately it didn’t pan out as we, Revenge and probably Iron Bonehead would have  wanted it to work out. We actually did release an EP through Iron Bonehead (read the review here) and that was the last thing we did with them. Even the fact that we were booked for Never Surrender fest that was rescheduled twice until it was actually canceled, speaks volumes about the scene situation during the pandemic.

Now that we are talking labels… Since you released an album through almost every “bigger” underground label (possibly only excluding Hells Headbangers) as well as a whole series of smaller labels, what is your overall feeling and experience with dealing with all those labels over the past two decades and a bit?
The differences aren’t really anything to write home about. We mostly choose labels because of the people who run them. We’ve never really felt screwed or whatnot. The labels mostly do what they are supposed to. Considering the fact that their promotional tactics do not really differ from one another. We appreciate good communication and transparency when we can actually have those. That’s the most important aspect for us these days.

About your own label, Kill Yourself Productions, you have decided to close that down a couple of years ago. What was the reason you wanted to leave that chapter behind? And can you share us some thoughts, views and anecdotes from that area?
I felt creatively drained, labelwise. It was painfully slow to move stock plus my work schedule that significantly reduced my available time ,all the aforementioned played their role in my decision to put an end to the label. I was in for the thrill of putting out new music by bands I believed in and for running a distro, which was preaching the gospel of underground metal. So I did it inspired by great indie labels of the past and I did it until I couldn’t do it any longer. I am proud of what  I released and have mostly fond memories of the bands I worked with, labels I traded records with, tons of them actually. At one point I carried releases by the majority of the great indie labels.

I miss getting records via mail and spreading the word, but as you know I am still a buyer of physical format and I am not planning to stop anytime soon.

What is it that we can expect from Embrace Of Thorns in the near future? And is there any news on your other bands Serpent Noir and Necrovorous?
Serpent Noir will tour with Gevurah in May 2023, that’s of course good news. Bad news is that I am not able to do the tour because of work, fuck that! Still I wish them to do great and I am sure they’ll do great. There are absolutely no news regarding Necrovorous, which sucks, but it is what it is.

Embrace of Thorns will play out live as much as possible and will probably start working on new material sooner or later, there will most probably be a seventh full length. After that point I don’t really know what future has in store for us.

I want to thank you again for answering my questions, if I have forgotten anything or if you have anything to add, take the opportunity, the last words are yours.
Those were some great questions Felix! I don’t I have anything else to add.

Embrace Of Thorns

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Undergang – “I am a bit of a control freak, which is something I’ve grown to accept and embrace over the years”

David from Undergang is mired in underground Death Metal lore, whether that be through his countless bands and projects, or his record store and label in Copenhagen. I fired some questions his way, just to see what he’s keeping busy with.

 

Greetings David and thanks for taking the time to answer my questions. How is life currently in Denmark?
Hi Luke, thanks for the interest in UNDERGANG and for your patience with this. It’s always hard for me to find the time from my usual schedule to sit down and devote time for interviews, which I feel like it deserves. Things here are alright, a bit complicated with various matters right now, but all seems to be something we’ll get sorted out down the line and can move on. Keeping busy with all sorts of things death metal in general, which is fun. Life is alright, thank you.

Well, let’s start with the unavoidable question…Could you tell us more about the genesis of the Undergang, how things started, the idea / concept behind the band?
UNDERGANG was put into flesh back in June 2008, after I had been writing songs for the intended band for a few years while trying to find like minded people to start this death metal journey with. I finally found that in Kasper who played bass in the band from 2008-2016 and with Anders who still plays drums to this day. Because of me having already written several songs we we started rehearsing, it went pretty fast with getting it going after that and we played our first local show in September that year, a basement show I set up myself as I wanted to show what we were creating t those interested – likely about 50 people in attendance –  after later the same month we recorded a demo track to test out if the rehearsal room / studio set up of a friend could be the place where we could record what we intended to be our debut album. We liked how it sounded and we then booked time with our friend Morten who ran that set-up to recorded what would become “Indhentet af døden” over the winter of 2008/2009 and in the summer of 2009 when I started preparing and shipping out promo tapes to find a label to release it, we got contact by Jesus of the to be important contemporary death metal label Me Saco Un Ojo Records and we agreed to work with him on the release. We’ve then worked with him on all UNDERGANG albums on LP, except a short run of an album release with Xtreem Music of our second album “Til døden os skiller” in 2012. Playing live was a priority for me and thankfully the other members were up for that so I got arranged lots of small and longer self arranged shows and tours for us around Europe, America, Japan, Australia and everywhere else we could over the course of the new couple of years and through lots of networking, trades and heavy duty underground shows all over the world we got the band established pretty well in the international death metal scene of today.

What are your most memorable moments of being a member of Undergang? And what keeps you motivated to keep going?
Lots of special and great times, having and being a part of UNDERGANG has defined most of my last 15 years, as it’s been my main creative output and thanks to playing in this band I’ve gotten to play and visit and lot of places around the world and met and made many good friends and contacts most places we’ve been, forming my life and circle of various relationships of today that I’m very happy to have. That and having gotten to share all of these experiences with my friends in UNDERGANG over the years is something truly special to me and something I’ll always be grateful for. Music, and especially playing music, is my happy place so occupying myself with all sorts of death metal activities is my motivation for a lot of happiness in my life and that certainly keeps me going. That and getting to share fun shows and traveling to various places around the world is the fuel to keep the fire burning. It’s weird to think back and knowing that I hadn’t even tried flying before we started traveling by plane for various shows with UNDERGANG, so this band has definitely expanded my views on life and the world, bringing me away from the at times trivial life at home.


You are through and through Death Metal, whether that be with Undergang or Extremely Rotten Productions. What is it about the genre that appeals to you / intrigues you?
Since starting my journey through music looking for the heaviest I could get, discovering death metal just really spoke to me and I knew that was where I could unfold my creativity onwards. I love how diverse the genre can be, while still being heavy. Generally riff-driven and just a stranger far-out cousin to good old fashioned rock music, it presents what I love and want to do with music. That and the brutality it can present and likely most importantly, good low vocals. I can listen to a lot of bands with not-so-great guitarists or drummers, but in the end, if the vocals aren’t good that’s where I turn it off.Also, the visual side of death metal has always been very appealing to me, being a horror fan since before diving into the world of music. I grew up loving horror movies and comics and that being associated with the demo tape covers and album covers of the initial death metal bands I discovered, was an important part in making me fall in love with the genre. A lot of things about death metal are just very “David”, haha. I love it.How do you feel that Undergang has progressed in terms of both song-writing and musicianship since your inception back in 2008?

A lot of the influences are still very much rooted in the same as when we originally put the band together, even if we have “new” members in the band too, so I don’t think UNDERGANG has really changed much over the years. Probably mostly just sharpened what we do, as we’ve become better musicians and a more well-oiled machine. Anders especially also have a very unique way of playing drums, where he often tries to come up with equally catchy drum patterns as a riff for a song, something you ca remembers afterwards on the same basic as a good riff can do, which I think can help make the band stand out and sound like us from time to time.I’ve never been one to care much about practicing on my own, so though becoming more steady as a rhythm guitarist, I don’t think I’ve evolved that much over the years, for better or worse, haha. But these years we’ve gotten the band extended with Mads on lead guitar, so that has given the band an extra depth, which I really like. Having both Mads and our “new” bassist Martin do vocals too has added some extra flavour to the songs as well, though still not making any drastic changes making anything sound “not UNDERGANG”. That’s my perspective on things at least, it might be different asking other members or various listeners of the band. I’m sure to some people we stopped being relevant or interesting af “Indhentet af døden”.


This year has seen Undergang being involved in two amazing split releases. One with Japanese Death/Doom duo Anatomia, and the other a four way split with you, Taphos, Deiquisitor and Phrenelith. Will we see more releases from you this year? How do you go about selecting who you will share a split release with? I imagine you can be pretty picky these days?
Being slow as I am, this interview is of course replied to in 2023, so after what was originally represented here, so sorry about that. But the intention was to have a few years between albums released and then do smaller releases – EP’s or split releases with other bands – released in the meantime to still be creative and show that the band is alive and well. The new split with ANATOMIA was planned since before we started recording “Aldrig i livet” and we wanted to celebrate the long friendship between the two bands by doing a second split release, as we already did do a 10″ split release back 10 years ago or so, can’t remember right now, haha. Originally we’re planning on having ANATOMIA come over to Copenhagen and we could do a split release show here, but Corona happened and that got dropped. We had written extra songs up to the recording session of “Aldrig i livet” and the 3 songs from the split LP/CD with ANATOMIA are from that session. Not B-sides or anything like that, more a case of us trying to put the songs in two camps – one fitting for the story we wanted to tell with “Aldrig i livet” and a second one fitting for the shorter experience on the split release.

The “Tetralogy of Death” 4-way split release had been in the process for several years already by the time of the release, our song “Øjne på stilke” for that was actually already written back in 2016 as one of the first songs after we had recorded “Misantropologi” and was originally first time recorded in January 2017 along with the song “Blodhøst”  (that was used on the our split 7″ with German DEAD), but then eventually scrapped as we were never 100% satisfied with the result and then re-recorded both songs with our “new” line-up back in Autumn 2018 or sometime early 2019, I think.  Nonetheless, the release of the 4 -way split was an idea of Jakob at Night Shroud Records and me with Extremely Rotten Productions, to do a bit of a celebration of the current Danish death metal scene, but having each of these four “leading” bands contribute an exclusive song each for this release and make a stamp of Danish death metal anno 2022. I think it turned out great too and all the 4 songs sound very different and very cool in my opinion! Plus the wild enormous art piece on the A1 fold-out cover made by Phoebus of “Liv og Død” art is amazing. AN important piece of document for the current Danish death metal scene, if you ask me. We’re currently having 4 other local bands write and record exclusive songs for a Tetralogy of Death Vol. 2 as well, stay tuned! Will be sick!

And to the last part of your question, split releases do mean something special to me. I prefer not to just have split releases made with any band out there, but it’s always been a document of a relationship between our band and another band we’ve shared something with, that we wish to celebrate on a release together. So all UNDERGANG split releases means something special to me and shows another band that we admire and wish to have any of our listeners check out too and hopefully also become fans of said other band. So even if we’ve done quite a few split releases by now, they all have a special meaning to the journey of UNDERGANG and aren’t just some unimportant release in our discography. Nothing is done by random, everything is meticulously planned and executed in general for what we do and generally who we share things with.

You design a lot of the artwork that adorns the various covers of Undergang releases. All of your work, whilst varied, also follows a certain gorey theme. How important to you is the aesthetic of the cover art? Also, how do you feel on the releases where you are not the one doing the designing? Are you loath to lose creative control, or do you welcome a different perspective?
I am a bit of a control freak, which is something I’ve grown to accept and embrace over the years. So being in control of the visual side of UNDERGANG is very important to me. It has however also often meant that various releases of ours take a long time to be released, as my busy schedule doesn’t give me much time to sit and do artwork either. The first UNDERGANG album cover on “Indhentet af døden” was however as the only album cover not be my, created by my friend Jonas Bjerg, who I also shared an apartment with at the time and who was a local tattoo artists and musicians, sadly no longer with us any more. At the time I didn’t feel like my art was good enough to grace an actual album cover, so we asked him to create a piece for our debut album and he did. Likely the most stand-out album cover in our discovery too, being a lot less putrid than what I’ve usually gone for, it’s still one I’m very proud of.

But also due to me being so slow with getting art done, we’ve hired our friend Phoebus, who did the “Tetralogy of Death” split cover, for a new EP we have coming out this year. It’s of course a bit different than if I had done it, but he’s an overall more talented artist than me and he has captured what I had in mind to do myself great.

Overall, I think the cover of any release is extremely important. Of course you can’t also judge anything by the looks of it, but it’s certainly very important and for attracting anyone to anything. So when I am in control of these things, it means a lot to me that the cover of anything represents the feel and mood of the music I want to present.

 

If you were given an unlimited budget to put on a two day open air festival featuring eight bands on each day, who would you choose? The criteria for who you can choose; Day 1, you can only put on Danish bands. Day two, you can only put on bands you have shared a split release with, or put out through Extremely Rotten Productions. I need to know who would headline, what the festival would be called and where it will be located.
Let’s call it Extremely Rotten Death Fest and on day one you’d have Danish bands CHAOTIAN, DEIQUISITOR, PHRENELITH and UNDERGANG and on day two you’d have international bands MEPHITIC CORPSE , TORTURE RACK, MIASMATIC NECROSIS and SPECTRAL VOICE – The latter in both orders being the headliners, though I don’t necessarily like that term, based on overall popularity. I’d be happy to do the festival here in Copenhagen and at the venue Amager Bio, quite a bit like what you could actually experience this year at my actual current festival Unearthed Morbidity taking place on June 9th and 10th 2023.

You run Extremely Rotten Productions, a label and record store in Copenhagen. What are the biggest challenges that you face in this modern age of digital music, short attention spans and ever rising prices?
You just have to adjust to the climate you live in, really. Everything is getting more expensive in life all over the world and living in a capital city is likely the most expensive place you can live in any country, so I’m also not making it too easy for myself. But at the same time I couldn’t do what I do with the physical store without having a central location in the capital city, so it’s the right thing to do also. Extremely Rotten Productions has been a thing since early 2011 and before that it was a distro in milk crates I brought out to local shows, under the moniker “Torturdød” – which some of you readers might recognise from something else I’ve done, since the mid 2000’s, so I’ve spend a lot a lot of time and years already networking in that sort if business for a while now and thankfully the word of my work is a bit out there in the international death metal underground. Thankfully extreme metal likely has the most loyal fanbase of any genre, so when it comes to actually buying physical releases and merchandise, we’re in a quite favourable place when it comes to death metal. Thankfully, a lot of people – like myself – are nerds who still enjoy getting the full experience presented with music that the artist(s) behind the release intended. You still enjoy looking at the printed cover art, reading the lyrics while listening to the songs, reading where the recordings were done and with who, who might additionally have contributed to the release, what other bands and artists are on the thanklist and could there possible be a new band/artists you really will end up enjoying? There can be a whole lot to a physical release that just can’t be replaced with a digital only release. So hopefully ERP is a part of helping making that product still valid and hopefully still within a price range that the consumer is willing to pay, without not being able to make money off it too, so we can keep producing and releasing new stuff from the bands we think deserves our attention, work and recommendation through our various channels.

I think a big and important challenge is to constantly have to be visible and relevant in the world of social media, which I don’t really like as much, but know is an important feature of the time we live in. Thankfully I also have my wife Jenny to help me with that for ERP, as well as my art promotion pages called Ink Lesions on various social media, so that still gets pushed a bit, even if I’m not great at or using social media too much myself. I generally also couldn’t have done what I do today without the help and support of Jenny, as it was her than went along with us originally buying a new apartment with a store front back in 2018, where I got to have my first ERP store realised, where I only were able to keep it open on weekends when I was done with my normal day job as a janitor at a local college and then eventually to take a sabbatical from said job and in the end quite that job and go full time with no security running Extremely Rotten as a label and physical store. All of my money and time went into realizing this adventure, not to mention countless hours away from being able to hold up my best self as a partner for her at all times due to needing to spend so much of my life in the basement of the store working on the label. Going full time on ERP then led me to needing to upgrade the store to have more space and a better location, so I shopped for a new space and found one where the store is located currently still and moved in on Gothersgade 135 in the heart of Copenhagen in January 2020.

I think ERP has by now locked in on a general specific aesthetic and products within a quite wide niche of everything death metal and I feel lucky to have build relationships with lots of talented and sympathetic musicians and bands within this genre over the years, that we can produce many quality releases a year to both a steady, but also growing group of supporters to enjoy. I love being able to work with people I care about on a personal level too, who produce great mental death and then push them as much further as I can through my channels with ERP and for them to trust me enough to let me do so with their creative musical babies. I love what I do for my job and even if I certainly do not become rich from doing this, it makes me happy and without a doubt beats any other job I’ve ever had.


That is sadly all the space we have. Thanks again for answering my questions, to finish with, can you tell me what to expect in the next year from Undergang, ERP and any other project you are working towards?
Thanks a lot for inviting me into your zine, I hope the answers have given you and the readers a bit of an enjoyable read. 2023 has been a very busy year for me already, can’t believe that by the time of answering this it’s already April. So far we’ve released a fun new EP through ERP in January from my other band SEQUESTRUM, at the same time as we released the 4th album “Apotheosis” from Danish death metal band DEIQUISITOR – co-released with local Night Shroud Records – and we’ve just re-issued both awesome albums from US death metallers TORTURE RACK + some fun re-issues. Lots of more HEAVY releases coming on ERP this summer, we’ll have 4 new LP’s released in early June for 5 of the bands playing at my festival Unearthed Morbidity and more to come later in the year.UNDERGANG will have a split LP with 3 new songs on it from us and a new 7 song EP released in 2023, the split LP coming on ERP and the new EP coming on LP through Me Saco Un Ojo Records and on CD through Dark Descent records, so keep your eyes peeled for updates on those! Very excited to get those released, having been recorded for a few years both by now, haha.

Thanks a lot to everyone who has cared about and supported any of my work so far, I still have a lot to share creatively through my bands and with ERP, so stay tuned!

Undergang

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Majesties – “When those first few melodic death metal records were coming out I felt like they combined all my interests in one package”

Majesties is a band formed by members of Obsequiae and Inexorum that seek one thing and one thing only: to revive the glory days of the Gothenburg school of Melodic Death Metal to the world. It’s no secret that after nearly 30 years since the first works of bands such as In Flames, Dark Tranquillity, etc have come out the genre has undergone quite a transformation. Majesties seeks to return us to those early days and make us fall in love again with killer harmonized leads. I had a chat with guitarist Carl Skildum to discuss the album, future plans and Melodic Death in general.

 

First of all, thank you all 3 for taking part in this interview. As a preamble, I just wanted to ask a bit about the origins of the band. On paper, you are a new band but from what I understand, your origins remount all the way back to 2016. How was the songwriting process divided across the course of all these years, was it spread out or product of a very short time frame when time allowed it?
I had joined Obsequiae as a live member in 2015 and was part of Tanner’s efforts to bring an entirely new band together to perform in support of the “Aria of Vernal Tombs” LP. During a rehearsal session I was warming up with some riffs I had come up with just for fun, and Tanner perked up and asked what they were for. We decided shortly after that to record some of these ideas together with the intent of making a melodic death metal record in the spirit of the earliest examples of the style. “Melodeath” was still around at this time but it had moved on quite a bit from the wilder format of some of those early records that imprinted on us so much, so it was just a way for us to hear, and make, new music to satisfy that missing element in our own listening.

We met weekly starting in 2016 to write at Tanner’s home, just passing the guitar back and forth and finding that the ideas were flowing out very quickly and generating something like 20 song ideas that we whittled down to ten for an album. We had the track sequencing decided in 2017 – so we’ve been listening to this album in rough form for a long time. We went through a few different configurations that included friends of ours in different roles, and each of those changes involved time for familiarization with the material. For various reasons due to timing and availability we found ourselves in 2019 back where we started aside from having Matt onboard for bass. We just decided to finish the album as a trio. Everything was done aside from vocals when the pandemic hit, and that slowed us down a little bit as well. It’s been a long journey!

Something I found interesting was that many of the riffs encountered on the album were already written in some way over the course of the 90s/00s – such as the verse riff from The World Unseen dating back to 1997. What was it like scouring through the riff tapes and the selection criteria for what would make it to the album and what to amend?
I know for myself I had a very specific handful of old riffs that I have always wanted to use. Some of them had been on riff tapes that I made in the 90s, like the one you noted in The World Unseen, and the tapping lick at the beginning of Seekers of the Ineffable. In all those years I never forgot them and would just play them while practicing – that’s how I knew that they were priorities to find a place in these songs. There were several other riffs that I dug out from my archives that we recorded as well, but ultimately didn’t make the album. The 10 songs we ended up with here just ended up being our overall favorites out of this first burst of writing.

Majesties is obviously very indebted to the foundational works of the early Gothenburg pioneers, with its emphasis on harmonized riffs. No doubt this pool also influences your other projects to some extent (Obsequiae and Inexorum). How do you go about ensuring a separation of writing for a Majesties record versus the others? Or did you find yourselves incorporating ideas that were meant for those bands but ended up here instead?
All of the material that ended up on Vast Reaches Unclaimed was written before I started working on Inexorum material or even had a concept for that band. Tanner and I had finished that first batch of 20 or so song ideas when we took a break to digest all of them, and that’s when I started kicking around ideas on my own for Inexorum. There’s obviously a connection between all three projects in the amount of guitar harmonies, but they are all distinct enough in my mind to stand on their own.

But those early riffs all came out of my love for that early death metal, and before that, thrash and NWOBHM. When those first few melodic death metal records were coming out I felt like they combined all my interests in one package – and strangely enough, they were a gateway into my appreciation of black metal. When I listen to Skydancer or Subterranean they have elements of all of the different genres that I love, so it makes sense that those records provided a guidepost for what we tried to do here.

I feel one of the more challenging parts of paying tribute to a certain musical era is reconnecting with the mentality and circumstances of the time period. Those early works by bands like In Flames, Dark Tranquillity, No Fashion Records bands, etc were all great, but part of their charm was the youthful inexperience of the bands and willingness to push the conventions of what a good harmony should sound like. You’re all seasoned musicians with +20 years experience with your respective instruments, so how was it like revisiting those records and tapping into that mindset? Did having those old riff tapes help significantly with this?
When Tanner and I first met we bonded over our enthusiasm for those records pretty much from day one. I know for myself that I’d listened to them so many times that they were imprinted on my brain, and when we started playing guitar together it was obvious that the harmony approach was almost like a musical shorthand that we both understood instinctively. The tapes certainly helped, but so much of this being written in real-time with Tanner meant that it was just a matter of one of us starting an idea and the other adding to it. Once we cleared the decks of those handful of old riffs we wanted to use the bulk of the material was written on the spot.

What are the immediate plans for the band besides promoting the record, are there tours or concerts in mind?
We’re focused on writing more music. We’ve continued to write on and off even since finalizing the songs for this album, but it’s rolling with more purpose now. Tanner recently moved from Minneapolis to Boston so the in-person writing sessions aren’t happening with the same cadence but we’ve also streamlined our process for writing remotely. We just welcomed our friend John Kerr (Noltem, Pyrithe) into the band as our drummer, so that opens the door for future live performance. But right now the four of us are just really thinking about writing new songs, so I think that’s the focus for now.

Besides the Gothenburg bands, it feels there is a lot of versatility within the genre that can be explored. Bands like Eucharist, Sentenced and Fall of the Leafe had a more technical edge, whereas others like Intestine Baalism or Apophis played with a more brutal approach and there are others that flirt with black metal. What facets would you like to see explored in this genre or what would you like to incorporate on future Majesties releases?
You hit on one of the key elements in that all of those bands you mentioned have their own recognizable style. At this point in my life I’ve developed songwriting characteristics that I lean on to speak in my own voice, and I feel like Tanner’s style is immediately recognizable and distinct as well. So I think we’ll continue to look at this as our twist on melodic death metal without hewing too close to any one band. I think it’s great to have various moods and approaches represented. For me I just want the songs to retain a core of heavy metal. I’m not so much interested in looking outside of metal for elements to graft on – I like electronic music, crust punk, regular-ass rock, hip-hop, but I’m not going to petition to add them to this project. I feel like sometimes when I listen to some of the biggest names in melodic death metal today that I don’t hear a whole lot of death metal outside of the vocals and an occasional blast beat here and there. Which is still cool – but some of it feels like you could almost have Dave Grohl singing on it just as easily as someone growling. Thinking about the songs we’ve come up with for the next release I think that they have the same fire and excitement that we put into Vast Reaches Unclaimed, but with maybe a little bit more self-assurance in knowing what we want to be doing.

Talking more broadly about Melodic Death at large, it seems we all agree there is a substantial difference between early Melodic Death (let’s say 91-97) and what came after. What do you think caused this shift? Some people lay the blame squarely on Slaughter of the Soul, but do you feel there are other factors at play?
I love that record (SOTS) and the immediacy of it all. I remember waiting to get that when it first came out, having already gotten a hint of where ATG were going with their prior record Terminal Sprit Disease. Those songs felt like they were meant to be played live and just get people going bonkers, and I think it was that record (along with Heartwork) that reached so many people and almost reestablished a new standard template for what most everyone though melodic death metal was. After that there were a lot of records that took those streamlined songwriting approaches and ran with them. I love a lot of that stuff for sure, and I definitely don’t blame those records for being amazing and connecting with so many people. But like anything, when you get so many bands chasing that same rush, eventually everyone starts getting hungry for something else. Around the 00s there was that whole New Wave of American Heavy Metal that had a lot of the twin guitar harmonies melded to metalcore that felt like the last gasp for a while.

Similarly, while old school death metal has gone through a large resurgence since the late 00s as a counter and rebellion against the perceived staleness of modern death metal. Why do you think something like hasn’t materialized yet as much with Melodic Death metal, where it seems many people are not even aware of the differences between early and later Melodic Death?
So much of it comes down to access – I had to order all of those earlier, more obscure records via mailorder, many times without hearing a note before taking a risk based on a cool description in a catalog. It wasn’t like I could go to just any record store in a Minneapolis mall and find No Fashion or Wrong Again – fortunately there were a couple of great stores that specialized in metal that started to bring those imports in. But eventually anyone could go into Best Buy and grab Heartwork, SOTS, and more as the genre exploded to a larger level of awareness. As I’ve been hearing people talk about our record and how they came to discover In Flames or Dark Tranquillity in the 00s or 10s, those bands had shifted their own approaches quite a bit from their earliest days, and people just discovered them later on in their discographies. But it has been fun to see a handful of people who recognize where these sounds all started and excited to hear something that has maybe a bit of the same vibe.

What are some (or just one) underrated melodic death releases from the golden era that you feel deserve more attention?
If you haven’t heard the first two Fall of the Leafe albums, do yourself a solid and check them out. They were hard to find for a long time but are being reissued in physical and digital formats now. I’m a big fan of Eucharist’s first two albums, which are pretty interesting to compare to each other as they highlight a structural shift. The 93 record “A Velvet Creation” had that same kind of youthful riff bounty that early In Flames, ATG, Dark Tranquillity had where it was idea after idea in a linear fashion. The  follow up “Mirrorworlds” came out in 97 and was much more streamlined but to me it was no less effective. Both are absolutely worth checking out.

To conclude, if you have any closing thoughts you want to say about the record, band or melodic death at large
I’m just really glad that this record seems to be making a lot of people happy. For the last decade or so there have been waves of revival from everything from party thrash to Stockholm/HM-2 OSDM worship to cavernous death metal hearkening back to the primitive New York sound. All of that stuff was exciting when it first burst forth and now new generations are discovering it and taking it into the future. Melodic death metal has remained as a genre descriptor all this time but it has evolved a lot from the wild recklessness of those early days. We just made the record that we wanted to hear and if it inspires anyone to dig into some of those back catalogs to hear the real foundational gems, that’s a pretty nice outcome in my book.

Majesties

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