Sarcator/Self Titled/Redefining Darkness Records/2020 CD Review

  Sarcator  are  a  band  from  Sweden  that  has  had  music  reviewed  before  in  this  zine  and  on  this  recording  plays  a  melodic  mixture  of  black,  death  and  thrash  metal  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  self titled  2020  album  which  will  be  released  in  October  by  Redefining  Darkness  Records.

  A  very  heavy  and  old  school  sound  starts  off  the  album  while  the  faster  sections  of  the  songs  also  add  in  a  great  amount  of  blast  beats. Melodies  are  also  added  into  a  lot  of  the  guitar  riffing  along  with  the  vocals  being  mostly  blackened  metal  screams  and  the  music  also  mixes  in  elements  of thrash  metal.

  When  guitar  solos  and  leads  are  utilized  they  are  done  in  an  80's  influenced  style  of  extreme  metal.  Throughout  the  recording  you  can  also  hear  a  decent  mixture  of  slow,  mid  paced  and  fast  parts  while  all of  the  musical  instruments  on  the  album  also  have  a  very  powerful  sound  to  them.

 The  music  also  mixes  in  a  lot  of  death  metal  influences  along  with  some  growls  also  utilized  at  times  as  well  as  a  brief  use  of  synths  and  as  the  album  progresses  a  small amount  of  back  up  shouts  and  acoustic  guitars  can  also  be  heard. The  production  sounds  very  professional  while  the  lyrics  cover  Occultism,  Anti  Religion,  Blood,  Fire  and  Death  themes.

  In  my  opinion  this  is  another  great  sounding  recording  from  Sarcator  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  melodic  black,  death  and  thrash  metal,  you  should  check  out this  album. RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "Abyssal  Angel"  "Midnight  Witchery"  "Heretic's  Domain"  and  "Purgatory  Unleashed".  8  out  of  10.

https://youtu.be/W-dka_z_aKE     

Kromheim/Self Titled/2020 EP Review

  Kromheim  are  a  solo  project  from  Poland  that  plays  a  mixture  of  viking,  folk  and  melodic  death  metal  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  self  titled  and  self  released  2020  ep.

  Melodic  guitar  leads  start  off  the  ep  while  the  riffs  also  add  in  a  great  amount  of  melody  and  the  vocals  are  a  mixture  of  growls  and s creams  which  also  add  in  touch  of  black  metal.  The  music  also  brings  in  a  great  amount  of  Swedish  influences  and  when t he  music  speeds  up  a  great  amount  of  blast  beats  can  be  heard.

  Throughout  the  recording  you  can  also  hear  a  decent  mixture  of  slow,  mid  paced  and  fast  parts  while  elements  of  folk  are  also  added  into  some  parts  of  the  recording.  When  synths  are  utilized  they  also  add  in  more  of  a  symphonic  style  along  with  some  spoken  word  parts  also  being  used  briefly,  all  of  the  musical  instruments  also  have  a  very  powerful  sound  to  them  as  well  as  one  track  also  introducing  clean  vocals  onto  the  recording.

  Kromheim  plays  a  musical  style  that  takes  folk,  viking,  melodic  black  and  death  metal  and  mixes  them  together  to  create  a  sound  of  his  own.  The  production  sounds  very  old  school  while  the  lyrics  cover  Vikings  and  Medieval  Fantasy  themes.

  In  my  opinion  Kromheim  is  a  very  great  sounding  mixture  of  viking,  folk,  melodic  death  and  black  metal  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  those  musical  genres,  you  should  check  out  this  solo  project.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "Prayer"  and  "Storm  Of  The  Gods".  8  out  of  10.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56xxRBMscbk&feature=youtu.be

https://kromheim.bandcamp.com/releases

https://www.facebook.com/kromheim/ 

Nocturn Interview

1.For those that have never heard of you before, can you tell us a little bit about the band?

Séb : Hello and many thanks for asking. Vincent and I decided in 2009/2010 to create Nocturn with a bunch of old friends who had already
played together on several previous local metal bands .I was abroad a few years and came back at that time, and as all of us, with the objective to mix
all our influences on a melodic black/death basis and have some fun by playing a kind of duo/duel between the guitars
and the keyboards. We realized 2 EP, had a few line up changes like almost every bands, and we are now releasing our first album,
"Like a seed of Dust".

Vince : Nocturn is a melodic death/black project with various influences. Seb founded the band, then called me to renew our past collaboration in music.
We released a first EP in 2013, had a few live dates until 2015,until we had to face a big line-up change.
We took the time we needed to get the perfect members for Nocturn, and with the new team we entered in studio in summer 2018. The mixing and mastering were performed in summer 2019,
and after a while seeking for a good label, we signed with Sliptrick Records, that we thank for their trust in our project, in february 2020. The next album is in advanced process.

2.In September you have a new album coming out, can you tell us a little bit more about the musical style you went for on the recording?

Vince : We always wanted to play something dark, speed, but with no limits of in songwriting influences or orchestrations. Black and death metal are present in our music,
but also a backing of heavy/speed metal, thrash metal, classical music...
The keyboards orchestrations explore  various parts from choir melodies to teknical beats, we try to keep rich instrumentation's and harmonies between the instruments without becoming a mess.

Seb : The main style is mainly death metal, but we also love other styles and the fun for us was to add something else and different on every song, so you can sometimes find a reggae riff or
some little electro/techno moments. Anything that we liked and without fixing us any limits because it's not "trve"
or something else, just to have fun. A big patchwork.

3.What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects you have explored so far with the music?

Vince : Death, life, war, love, destruction, anger, drugs, hope, duality, fragility of existence... Some texts are allegories told like a story, some are thoughts, some may be personnal. 

4.What is the meaning and inspiration behind the name 'Nocturn'?

Vince : I like the night. The veil of darkness covering the land, predators hungry for flesh, creatures of evil hidden in the shadows or in our hearts...
Not about the Skyrim deadras !

Seb : We tried a few other names but this one was really the one we prefered.

5.Can you tell us a little bit more about the artwork that is presented in the album cover?

Vince : It was created by Jean-Philippe Sonnet at Threadbare artwork. I was seeking for a drawing that represented beauty and fragility of life, decay and rebirth.
Our album is released for the fall, that perfectly suits with the concept.

6.What are some of the best shows that the band has played so far and also how would you describe your stage performance?

Vince : Our best shows were in little and medium stages at Chambéry, at the Brin d'Zinc and at the APEJS. People were completely crazy, it was a killer public both times. Our performance was good, but we always can do better.

7.On the new album you also have a few guests, can you tell us a little bit more about who they are and also their contributions on the recording?

Vince : The first album guest is now part of the band, it was Sophie , singer and composer in her project 'From Hell with Love'. She performed all the clean female vocals of the album
and a part of dual voice with her harsh vocals upon 'The wraith in bloodied wings'. It worked so perfectly that she joined our crew definitely a few while after, and now I share
the microphone with her in dual voices.

Gilles Croset is a saxophonist that we met as the friend of a friend, who gently helped us with his instrument for a very special part in the song 'Under the Darkest Sea'.
We were glad to record a real saxo instead of the emulated sound on keyboards.

The other guests were a surprise for me too, because our two producers Rob and Arnaud who are also extremely talented singers in their own bands,
came behind the microphone to perform backing vocals, and they recorded killing material.

Rob Carson is the engineer who recorded us at his Carsonian Studio Solutions, and the singer of Xaon (they record their 3rd album lately). He came to perform with Léo and I for the gang vocals
on several songs : Pandaemonium, Liberhate and Odyssey. He was also a real support in some complexes studio situations and dilemmas, findind solutions to every production matter we faced.

Arnaud Ménard is the engineer who recorded all the bass guitars and vocal additionnal contents, and mixed our album with this incredible sound in his Sicarius Productions studio.
He is vocal teacher at 'Ecole La Sirène and also the singer of Alkemyst. He performed the vocal harmony with Sophie upon the song 'Infernale', and the melting of their crystal voices sounds incredibly good. 

8.The new album is coming out on 'Sliptrick Records', how did you get in contact with this label?

We contacted many labels but as a little band we had some propositions that was not always interesting, with A&R good reviews but no good deals in sight before Sliptrick Records proposition.
Carlo, their A&R, and the team took the time to really listen to our album before making us a proposition, and they were honests.
We took the time we needed to find a label, because autoproductions are complicated to promote and it's important for the future of Nocturn. The next album is under preparation and
everyone is hot to play the past and the next songs. 

9.On a worldwide level how has the reaction been to your music by fans of melodic black and death metal?

Some years ago, I started to invite people all over the world to like our music.
I was positively surprised by very good feedbacks, and we have people that liked our music almost everywhere : Europa, Russia, North and South America, Africa, India, Indonesia, Japan...
It's great !!

10.Where do you see the band heading into musically during the future?

Vince : We will continue to play a melodic and technical death/black metal, and Sophie will sing more harsh vocal parts.
The next album will be in the same vein that the wraith in blooded wings, liberhate... with still many types of passages and ambiences.

11.What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?

Vince : When I was young I studied classical piano in a music school during some years, that explain my neo-classical tastes sometimes.
I fell into distorded guitars when I discovered Scorpions, Deep Purple, Van Halen, Clapton, Aerosmith, AC/DC ...
I discovered something that could aggressive and beautiful at the same time and it surely defined my taste for metal music.
I still listen to old school heavy metal, thrash, death black metal. Bands like Iron Maiden, Blind Guardian, Gamma Ray, Angra, Sepultura, Pantera, Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer,
Death, Cradle, Immortal, Dying foetus, Dimmu, Behemoth,Children of Bodom, Godkiller, Summoning, Dissection, The Faceless, Origin, SOAD, Dagoba, Rammstein, Guns'n Roses, Hendrix,
only a part of each's discography; also mostly classical, blues and rock influences, there are countless .
But during the songwriting processes I don't listen much music, to avoid parasitizing the creation and fully express myself.

Seb : About the influences, they are really a lot and really different too ! We could say from Chuck Schuldiner to Jean michel Jarre for example !

12.Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?

Vince : Thanks again to our producers Arnaud and Rob, and to all the artists involved in this project. I hope you will enjoy this album.
Thanks to you and to A Different Shade Of Black Metalzine for your interest, and hails to your audience ! Cheers !

Seb : Thank you again for this interview and your interest in our music, we hope you will appreciate it. Cheers

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Juodvarnis/Nerimo Dienos/Dangus Productions/2020 CD Review

  Juodvarnis  are  a  band  from  Lithuania  that  plays  a  progressive  and  melodic  mixture  of  pagan,  black  and death  metal  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2020  album  "Nerimo  Dienos"  which  was  released  by  Dangus  Productions.

  Viking  war  battle  sounds  start  before  going  into  a  heavier  musical direction  while  all  of  the  musical  instruments  on  the  recording  also  have  a  very  powerful  sound  to  them.  Atmospheric  sounding  keyboards  are  also a dded  into  some  part  of  the  recording  along  with  the  vocals  also  adding  in  a  thrash  style  bordering  on death  metal.

  Clean  vocals  are  also  utilized  at  times  while  the  music  also  gets  very  progressive  sounding  in  some  parts  of  the  recording.  When  guitar  solos  and  leads  are  utilized  they  are  also  done  in  a  very  melodic  style  along  with  the  riffs  also  adding  in  a  great  amount  of  melody  and  when  the  music  speeds  up  blast  beats  can  also  be  heard.

  Throughout  the  recording  you  can  also  hear  a  decent  mixture  of  slow,  mid  paced  and  fast  parts  along  with  a  great  portion  of  the  tracks  also  being  very  long  and  epic  in  length  as  well  as  the  music  also  mixing  in  a  great  amount  of  dark,  black  and  pagan  metal  elements, sitar's  and  percussion's  can  also  be  heard  in  some  parts  of  the  recording  and  the  album  closes  with  a  cover  A.M's  "Trys".  The  production  sounds  very  professional  while  the  lyrics  are  written  in  Lithuanian  and  cover  Paganism  and  Nature  themes,.

  In  my  opinion  Juodvarnis  are  a  very  great  sounding  progressive  and  melodic  mixture  of d ark,  black,  pagan  and  death  metal  and  if  you  are  fan  of  those  musical  genres,  you  should  check  out  this  band.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "Is  Amziu  Saknu"  "Tik  Dulkes"  and  "Sielos  Dugne".  8  out  of  10.

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The Reticent/The Oubliette/Heaven And Hell Records/2020 Full Length Review

  The  Reticent  are  a  band  from  North  Carolina  that  plays  a  very  progressive  and  melodic  mixture  of  black,  doom  and  death  metal and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2020  album  "The  Oubliette"  which  will be  released  in  September  by  Heaven  And  Hell  Records.

  Spoken  word  parts  start off  the  album  before  adding  in  some  clean  playing  which  also  gives  the  songs  more  of  a  progressive  feeling.  Clean  vocals  are  also  a  very  huge  part  of  the  recording  while  the  heavier  riffs  also  bring  in  more  of  a  prog  metal  style  and  a  great  portion  of  the  tracks  are  also  very  long  and  epic  in  length.

  Blast  beats  can  also  be  heard  at  times  while  the riffs  also  add  in  a  great  amount  of  melody  while  all  of  the  musical instruments  also  have  a  very  powerful  sound  to  them.  When  guitar  solos  and  leads  are  utilized  they  are  also  done  in  a  very  melodic style  and  keyboards  are  also  added  into  some  parts  of  the  music.

  Touches  of  jazz  and  psychedelic  music  are  also  added  on  some  of  the  tracks  along  with  some  black  metal  screams  also  being  added  into  certain  sections  of  the  recording.  Throughout  the  recording  you  can  also  hear  a  decent  mixture  of  slow,  mid  paced  and  fast  parts  and  the  slower  sections  of  the  songs  also  add  in  the  heaviness  of  doom  metal.

  One  track  also  introduces  percussion  onto  the  recording  and  also  gives  the  music  more  of  a  tribal  feeling.  Death  metal  growls  are  also  added  into  the  more  brutal  sections  of  the  tracks  as  well  as  one  song  also  introducing  saxophones  onto  the  album  and  as  the  album  progresses  a  brief  use  of  operatic  female  vocals,  orchestra  and  symphonic  sounds  can  also  be  heard.  The  production  sounds  very  professional  while  the  lyrics  are  a  concept  album  based  upon  a  man's battle  with  Alzheimer's  Disease.

  In  my  opinion  The  Reticent  are  a  very  great  sounding  mixture  of  progressive,  black,  doom  and    melodic  death  metal  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  those  musical  genres,  you  should  check  out  this  band.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "His  Name  Is  Henry"  "The  Dream"  and  "Stage  7".  8  out  of  10.

https://metalinjection.net/video/the-reticent-unleashes-the-prog-metal-on-new-song-stage-2-the-captive



   

Calarook Interview

Ahoy! Thanks for your interest for an Interview. We responded as a band together. Calarook is
Philipp Wyssen: Vocals
Nico Wiget: Guitar
Lukas Mischler: Violin
Yves Locher: Drums
Flavio Pompeo: Bass
1.For those that have never heard of you before, can you tell us a little bit about the band?
We are a Pirate Metal band from Winterthur in Switzerland. We started in 2014 and began to complete the lineup and write first Songs. We are all silly but still serious. Silly about the lyrics, serious about the songwriting itself. We are of the sort who want to make music, which we would listen ourselves, with a theme that we like. We love beer and party, but we know that we have to deliver good shows. We know when it is ok to party and when we have to be serious.

2.You got your first full length coming out in September, musically how does it differ from your previous ep?
All three songs of the EP are also on the full length. But we re-recorded them because we had more experience and the possibility to record it in a much higher quality. Our goal was to deliver a good product as possible for the audience. If you compare those songs from the EP with the new ones you can clearly hear the difference.

3. A lot of your lyrics cover pirate themes, can you tell us a little bit more about your interest in this topic?
Pirates were very free, did not allow themselves to be oppressed and wanted their lives to be independent of a king thousands of miles away. They lived their lives and did what they enjoyed. They loved rum, we love rum. So one more thing in common.

4.Originally the band was called  'Calico' what was the cause of the name change and also the meaning and inspiration behind the name 'Calarook'?
When they searched for our old name on the Internet, all the cats came up with pictures, some guns and some company in California. Someone gave us a good tip. Our band is too hard to find, we should change our name to something that stands out in the online search. So early in the band's history this is still unproblematic. To not deviate too much from the old name to our current one, we came up with the idea to call our band Calarook. The name is fictitious.

5.Can you tell us a little bit more about the artwork that is presented on the new album cover?
Patrick Wittstock has done the artwork. He already made some other great Artworks. It was a good decision to work with him. The idea was to make it fit with the title track of the album: Surrender Or Die. Therefore the pirate ship which attacks a ship of the crown. They didn’t wanted to surrender, so they have to die. And we then plunder their ship.

6.What are some of the best shows that the band has played so far and also how would you describe your stage performance?
One of the best shows was clearly the one at the Ragnarök Festival in Germany. It was our first show at a festival. After we had a huge party on the stage, the party went on in the backstage with all the other great bands who played there.

7.Currently you are unsigned, are you looking for a label or have received any interest?
We are looking forward to try to get in contact with some labels after the release of the album. Or yeah, maybe a label will contact us in advance. Who knows?

8.On a worldwide level how has the reaction been to your music by fans of folk and death metal?
Until yet very good. Most people like the music very much. The comments to our first music video are all positive. So it seems we are on the right way.

9.Where do you see the band heading into musically during the future?
In addition to the three videos we want to present our album live. However, it is currently not so easy to plan shows because of the known reasons. A tour abroad is already in the agenda for 2021. But we hope for a soon normalization of the situation. So that everything is feasible again as usual.

10.What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?
Every one of us listens to different kinds of metal music and even punk or other related genres. This leads to the diversity in our songs and its own style. It’s difficult to say which bands had the most influence.

11.What are some of your non musical interests?
All of us like to make party and get shitfaced with friends. Some of us have motorcycles or are studying at the moment. Outside of the metal world we are normal people like everyone else.

12.Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?
Stay healthy and support the entire event industry next year. This is the only way to keep the music alive. Because difficult years will surely come to the entire industry.

Listen to album track "Invisible Pineapples"

Skyless Aeons Interview

1.For those that have never heard of you before, can you tell us a little bit about the band?
Skyless Aeons formed in 2014 in London, Ontario when I (Nathan Ferreira) and guitarist Nicholas Luck were 18 years old. I met him at a Cryptopsy show when a mutual friend introduced us, and immediately we clicked - as a metalhead, when you meet someone else who listens to shit like Adversarial and Antediluvian, it's like discovering your long-lost brother. I wanted to be in a metal band so bad, and this guy not only knew his shit, but was also incredible at guitar, AND he knew a drummer that he was practicing with - and that guy liked extreme metal too! I tagged along to their practice one time, screamed my face off not knowing what I was doing, and they liked it enough to keep me around. Shortly after we found our bassist and we haven't had a single lineup change since, which has allowed us to learn to feed off each other's strengths and create a cohesive, tight, and very unique sound that draws from every type of extreme metal you can imagine.

2. In October you have your first full length coming out, musically how does it differ from your previous ep?
"Drain the Sun" is much more of a complete piece with a beginning, middle and an end. Our last EP was more of a "get every good idea we have on recording" type of release, with songwriting that's more wandering and all over the place. It's good for what it is, but with the new album, we decided to focus more on the death, doom, and atmospheric elements. The songwriting process was much more laborious, with many sections being scrapped, re-written, or just taken out entirely if we felt they did not serve the songs well enough.

You can also expect a much more professional and polished album - Era of Famine was recorded live off the floor, in one or two takes, over the course of a single day. With our new album, we wanted to make sure everything was fine-tuned to perfection, so we recorded in multiple sessions layer by layer to a click, with the whole recording process taking months as opposed to hours.

3. This is also your first release in 4 years, can you tell us a little bit more about what has been going on during that time span?
As I was saying above, it took a while to make sure everything was right! We focused on quality over speed, so although we had already had a couple of songs mapped out for Drain the Sun when Era of Famine was released, we didn't actually complete writing until about the end of 2018 and didn't hit the studio until summer of 2019. Simultaneously, we were also trying to play live as much as possible in order to build our reputation, so whenever we had a show coming up we'd be focusing more on rehearsing our set overwriting new material. That, and we all have day jobs, most of us play in other bands as well, and (very) occasionally, one of us manages to get laid...ya know, life and stuff.

Oh yeah and I think there was like a global pandemic or something? That definitely set back the release process a few months.

4. What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band has explored with the music?
On metal-archives, our lyrical themes are listed as "space", "death", and "corruption". That's a good three-word summation.

Our new album actually has a bit of a concept going on with the lyrical themes, if you'll allow me to get a little pretentious. As a group, we're frustrated with how humans over-consume, over-indulge, blindly conform to baseless beliefs to justify it, and fail to recognize that this is exactly what causes us suffering, guilt, and our eventual demise. Each song on this album explains a different way that this happens. "Age of Regression" and "A Consciousness Decays" are about our obedience to ideology being our downfall, "Go Forth and Multiply" laments our relentless urge to breed, and "Dimensional Entrapment" explains how our limits as humans make our downward spiral inevitable. "Drain the Sun" is a metaphor - everyone has their own Sun. For some of us, it is pleasure, for others love, for some it is money, for others it could be power, but whatever it is, we will drain it until we die.

5. What is the meaning and inspiration behind the name 'Skyless Aeons'?
I like to think it refers to the period of time before the earth existed - when there was nothing more but raw matter and void, and the idea of a "sky" could not even be fathomed. Our sound is both an audio representation of that time period, and also a warning of where we're headed if we don't change course and fail to see the error of our ways.

The actual origin of it is much less glamorous - we stole it from an obscure New York death metal band, Haagenti, who has a song titled "Skyless Aeon". Nick thought that it sounded cool, we didn't hate it as much as we did the other names that were going around, we added an "s" to "Aeon" to make it more our own thing, and there you have it.

6. Can you tell us a little bit more about the artwork that is presented on the new album cover?
The cover was done by the talented Sam Nelson/Stigma Art, who has also done pieces for some of our favorite tech bands - First Fragment, Vale of Pnath, Virvum, and a bunch of others - so we were followers of his work already. While we were fleshing out the concept for our album, we came across this piece that visually described what I had in my head so perfectly - there's a beacon of light at the top, and the entire environment seems to be drawn towards it to the point where it starts to block out the light. The relentless pursuit of light creates an eternity of darkness. The album cover actually influenced the songs very greatly, since most of the album wasn't written until we bought the rights to the piece.

7. What are some of the best shows that the band has played so far and also how would you describe your stage performance?
Tough to name a personal favorite. Lots of local shows with good turnouts and killer bands. One of the more memorable ones was our most recent show with Killitorous back in January, which was hosted by a drag queen who interacted with the crowd throughout the night, got people into the sets and got freaky on stage with us while we played. That was definitely different.

Our live performance is tight, focused, and delivered with conviction, but as you might have gathered from the drag show I mentioned above, we don't mind letting loose and having a bit of fun with it - where else do you get to just go berserk without judgement?

8. Currently you are unsigned, are you looking for a label or have received any interest?
We looked (and are still looking really, if you run a label hmu) for a while, but despite a couple of promising responses, no one showed enough interest to get something going. We're kind of in a difficult spot, because labels usually have a very distinct vision and style that they go for, and we kind of mix a little bit of everything in. We don't really fit on a straight-up black metal label, we're not quite doom, we're not quite death metal...but we're also all of those things? Either way, we'd love to be on a label if possible, but these days it seems you have to establish yourself more independently first before labels will show interest. Hopefully, with this new album, we do just that!

9.On a worldwide level, how has the reaction been to your music by fans of underground metal?
Hard to say what the general consensus is, but it at least seems like most people like it! The overall reaction to our first EP was that it had some very promising ideas but was a little raw and amateurish, which is fair - with our new album, we're looking to tighten all of that up, and so far, the reaction to the new song has been really good. It seems like everyone has a different idea of what it sounds like - I've heard Gorguts, Deeds of Flesh, Rotting Christ, Anaal Nathrakh, Cradle of Filth, and all sorts of the stuff mentioned as comparisons by others...which is funny because I don't think any of those were direct influences. That's kind of the cool thing about music, everyone hears something a little bit different.

10.What is going on with some of the other bands or musical projects these days that some of the band members are a part of?
We like to keep busy and have a lot of other projects - there's no such thing as too much metal!

 Earlier this year our guitarist Nick joined Aepoch, who are a fantastic progressive death metal band that just put out an EP, and he's working on new material with them as we speak. He also plays slam death metal in Existential Dissipation, and they're putting out a split with a huge band from Norway soon.

I've always been more of a black metal guy myself, and in order to scratch that itch I play in two other bands: one is Cryopathy, a DSBM band that takes heavy influence from stuff like Lifelover, Intig, Woods of Desolation and Apati, and we are actually just getting ready to enter the studio to record our first full-length this fall. I also play in Hell is Other People, a post-black metal band. Covid put a bit of a strain on our practice regimen because half the band is in Windsor and the other half is in London, but we've got new songs written that we're fleshing out as well.

Our bassist Stefan has been jamming with a prog-rock band for the past year or so-called Free the Kid - they were about to play live in April before all live music imploded before our very eyes, and they've got some stuff coming out soon. Don't know much else myself, but I heard a raw demo track one time and it was pretty neat, had some Protest the Hero/Scale the Summit kinda vibes.

Martin doesn't play in any other bands because we keep him chained up in the basement. As long as we feed him enough Cheese Nips and don't make the shackles on his ankles too tight, he doesn't complain about it too much.

11.Where do you see the band heading musically during the future?

Once live shows become a thing again, we'd like to get out on the road and play outside of our hometown to spread our sound as far as it'll go. We also have some songs written for a follow-up release already, and we've already agreed that we want to continue going down a heavier and more atmospheric path. It took a bit, but we've found our sound with this new release, so the sky's the limit.

12.What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays/
We all have different tastes in metal (though it would be fair to say we're all primarily metal fans). I tend to go more for black and death metal, Nick likes more modern brutal and tech death, our drummer is a huge Opeth fan and likes a lot of melodic death/doom like Dark Tranquillity and Swallow the Sun, and our bassist likes a lot of black, folk, doom and prog.

We're fans and consumers of metal as much as we are creators, and we're constantly buying new albums and sharing/trading them with each other during our practices. Some bands that released super cool albums recently: Aronious, Defeated Sanity, Wormhole, The Spirit, Ulcerate, Like Rats, The Great Old Ones, Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard, Augury...that being said, like most fans of music, our playlists could consist of anything from Iron Maiden to Psyopus to John Coltrane to My Bloody Valentine. Influences can come anywhere and from anything.

13.Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?
Thanks for taking an interest in our ruminations on humanity's collective failures. Drain the Sun drops October 2nd. Check it out, buy a CD or a shirt, or at the very least write angry messages to us about how we suck. Your acknowledgment of our existence draws us away from the void, if only for a fleeting second. Support underground extreme metal!!!

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