Without Pepper Keenan in the picture, you kinda got the feeling that this wouldn’t be the southern sludge of COC’s later work, but since the throwback lineup never played Toronto (or anywhere on this side of the border, for that matter), I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect.

Actually, this one starts off slow with the doomy riffs of “Psychic Vampire,” which wallows in the mire until kicking it up a coupla notches, crossover-style, for the chorus. Hmm, not too shabby. “River of Stone” takes almost the opposite approach, more of a Mastodon/Black Tusk chug in the verses, but a solid, slowed-down chorus, bridging the gap between the two eras.

I gotta say, while I’ve got nothing against Pepper’s singing, Mike Dean’s voice suits this material real well. It’s still sorta gruff, but with more of a clean high register than Pepper. This dude can actually sing doom, not just that southern shit!

This record chugs along with songs like the Motorpunk bitchslap of “Leeches,” the melodic doom/sludge attack of “Your Tomorrow,” and “The Moneychangers,” which kinda recalls The Cult on punk-rock bathtub crank—with mellow, desert-style instrumental “El Lamento de las Cabras” thrown in for good measure. “The Doom” is pretty much what the song title suggests, a downtuned, slow-grooving stomper, though it moves into some fast, moshable moments from time to time. Animosity, this is not—and I ain’t complainin’!

First the new Orange Goblin, now this. I gotta say, I’m enjoying Candlelight’s foray away from black metal at the start of this year. They’ve certainly set the bar high for whatever comes next…

(Candlelight USA)

Corrosion of Conformity will be released on February 28, 2012.

By Gruesome Greg

Hot on the heels of their early Rise Above reissues, Orange Goblin return with their first new album in almost five years. But this one isn’t so much of a blast from the past, An Eulogy… picking up where they left off with Healing Through Fire with those southern-style stoner grooves, though this one has a bit more of an epic sludge attack with some Mastodonic leanings on tunes like the opener, “Red Tide Rising.”

There is also a bit of a rough-around-the-edges, Motorhead heavy blues vibe on a couple of these tracks, Ben Ward channeling Lemmy with his sandpaper rasp. See “Stand for Something,” for instance, or “The Filthy and the Few.”

You’ll also find some mellower moments on here, like “Save Me from Myself,” which sounds like a raspier Kenny Wayne Sheppard number, but they’re balanced out with the heavy storm of tunes like “The Fog” or “Bishop’s Wolf.” Hey, variety is the spice of life, right?

If that’s the case, then this dish is one spicy meatball, kicking off 2012 with a badda-boom-badda-bing!

(Candlelight USA)

RATING: 8.5

By Craig Haze

The Atlas Moth released their debut full-length, A Glorified Piece of Blue Sky, in 2009. It was an enjoyable—if not wholly original—album, stacked with rough and ready sludgy stoner jams. I can’t say it resonated with me to any great extent, but the band stuck in my mind as one to watch.

Pre-release chatter for The Atlas Moth’s new album suggested they were leaning harder on psychedelic themes. Being a huge fan of Krautrock, prog and psych bands in general, let alone ones that mix elements of those genres with some dirty metal and post (whatever) rumblings—I was eager to hear if they had made any substantial changes to their style.

An Ache For the Distance is the band’s first album for their new label, Profound Lore—a far more sensible home than their previous label, Candlelight USA. Like many bands from Profound Lore’s roster, The Atlas Moth have set about shattering expectations and fucking with pre-conceived notions about where exactly they sit in relation to any specific genre.

From the moment the ringing guitars kick in on the first track, “Coffin Varnish”, all the way through to the final noisescape of “Horse Thieves”, the band delights in kaleidoscopic twists and mind-expanding turns, plucking ideas and harnessing influences from across the musical spectrum. “Gemini”, with its fragile piano intro, features an archaic Eastern thread mixed in with plenty of undulating and jangling guitars. “Courage”—which is pure gothic post-punk—has its corpulent bass undercut by the subtle use of faintly audible screams. And “Holes in the Desert” begins with a Mongolian-like throat chant before the trippy riffs and juxtaposing shrieking and clean vocals arrive. An Ache for the Distance is nothing if not riotously ambitious.

However, for all the album’s uninhibited deviations, it remains remarkably consistent, which comes down to two crucial factors. Firstly, The Atlas Moth are obviously comfortable incorporating new elements into their overall sound.

While their debut was defined by an amorphous blend of post-metal, sweeping doom and sludgy rock, the new album finds them splicing in classic metal riffs, a little gritty blues and a lot of delicate indie melodies.

There is also a substantial dose of that aforementioned heavy-psych, with the band amplifying the hallucinatory atmospherics. “An Ache for the Distance” is a great example of the lysergic inventiveness that results from coalescing all those newfound characteristics. The song’s icy doom-laden core is cut with a swaggering, melodic blues riff and layered with fantastic contrasting vocals. Pick any track and you’ll come to the same conclusion; every one of them oozes intoxicating promise.

While there’s a lot more added into the mix on An Ache for the Distance, nothing sounds forced or unnatural, which brings us to the second crucial factor regarding the album’s success—the production. The new album sounds less cluttered than the band’s debut. Although that might seem a little contradictory considering there is so much more happening on the new album, the sound is richer and less swampy this time round. The clarity allows for a far greater appreciation of all the intricate dynamics that result from having a three-guitar line-up. And as the entire album reverberates with layers of differing sounds smashing up against one another, its overall lucidity ensures the sonic rewards aren’t smothered in a muddy mix.

The dual vocal work of Stavros Giannopolous and David Kush is a feature of the album you’ll find yourself coming back to again and again. The way they overlap and intertwine means the acidic screams sour the calmer moments and the harmonious, clean vocals soften the astringent tones. It adds a real chromatic depth to the album.

For an album packed full of labyrinthine psychedelic excursions and plenty of mind-bending swerves, there’s nothing soporific or inaccessible about An Ache for the Distance. The Atlas Moth have come up with something truly unique and utterly compelling on their sophomore full-length. With post-metal being such a congested realm, the fact that the band’s new album shows such an obvious development in songwriting terms is not only a welcome surprise, but also an extremely refreshing one. An Ache For the Distance is an exceptional release from an extraordinary band.

(Profound Lore)

By Jonathan Smith

Giving that Falloch‘s website describes their sound as a “wide variety of styles including Metal, Post-Rock and Folk, ” it only makes sense that the first full-length release from the band would be compared to acts ranging from Alcest to Les Discrets to Agalloch. There’s no one description or comparison that fits the Glasgow-based band, and that’s because Where Distant Spirits Remain is one of the most interesting and varied combination of sounds heard yet this year. The end result is a decent album that tends to spend time wallowing in a particular mood at the expense of always keeping keeping the listener engaged.

Opening track “We Are Gathering Dust” encompasses Falloch’s range, moving from more etherial post-metal moments of reflection and calm to (very occasional) raging black metal-tinged riffs. It’s in this variety that Falloch’s song writing does invoke Alcest’s more recent output. “Horizons” is an instrumental which emphasizes the band’s celtic connections, but it’s more effective when seen as a long lead-in to the first epic track “Where We Believe.” The latter opens with swelling synths and a very catchy guitar riff, and as a whole it’s one of Where Distant Spirits Remain‘s finest moments (or ten of them). By the time the album reaches second epic “To Walk Among The Dead,” however, the album has worn out its welcome. Album closer “Solace” would have benefitted from being placed somewhere else on the album; as it is it comes off as more of an after-thought than it deserves.

What’s also significant different from other acts is Andy Marshall‘s vocal style. In Alcest, frontman Neige’s voice comes off as something supernatural that blends into the world that he describes. They are part of the suspension of everyday reality that is entailed in listening to the French band. Falloch’s vocals, however, are always front and centre and very human. The decision to use more or less entirely clean vocals is a courageous one considering that Marshall’s voice doesn’t come off as very assertive. They don’t always match with the instrumental mood that is being created, and sometimes that’s an issue. If part of Falloch’s purpose is to invoke a soundscape focused on “themes of nostalgia, sorrow, nature and longing” (as described by the band’s website), it’s harder to get sucked into the music when the vocals sound taken from much more mundane circumstances.

Where Distant Spirits Remain is not the strongest release of its ilk this year, but overall it’s a good debut that shows much future potential and talent. The biggest issues found here (vocals that don’t always fit in as well as tendencies toward being long-winded) are hazards of the band’s chosen style, and both are issues that could very well be addressed by the next release. Given the amount of support that Falloch seems to be getting from the label, here’s hoping that the band will stay visible and be back soon with another collection of (more and perhaps shorter) songs before too long.

(Candlelight USA)

PROG PACK including 2 RUSH DVDs, a PORCUPINE TREE DVD and CDs from DISTRICT 97 and ELOY

Crappy iPhone photo by Sean

METAL PACK including a MEGADETH DVD, an autographed DVINITY and RAGE CD(not pictured), a SUICIDAL ANGELS CD and a whole bunch of recent releases from Nuclear Blast including ENSLAVED, MELECHESH, FORBIDDEN, DEATH ANGEL and others.

Sean hasn't quite mastered iPhone photography

So what do you have to do to win? It’s easy!

Leave a comment at the end of this message telling us (1) your favourite album of 2010, (2) your favourite album so far in 2011 and (3) your most anticipated album to be released later on in 2011. That’s it!

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Each method of entry should be a separate comment. Hellbound will use the Random Number Generator to choose 2 (two) grand prize winners. We will then figure out who will win which package by jury.

The contest is open until Sunday, March 6th at 11:59 PM Eastern Time. This contest is open to all inhabitants of planet Earth. Sorry, extra-planetary shipping not covered.

Good luck!

By Jonathan Smith

One of many releases last year to fall through the cracks, Blood on Snow is the first major release by British black metallers Eastern Front. The group’s subject matter of choice is hardly new territory for metal bands. However, Eastern Front‘s claim to distinction stems from the fact that, in their case, WWII isn’t being used as one attention grabbing device among many. With Blood on Snow, Eastern Front join other bands who announce their intentions of getting people to talk about the history that informs their music. Perhaps their educational aspirations are why in almost any write up about them they are so concerned to disassociate themselves from any particular politics.

While it’s not clear how educational their first full-length record might be, musically it’s entertaining enough. Blood on Snow is mostly black metal with some death metal influences thrown in, just enough to distinguish themselves from the pack of BM artists that are circulating right now. High-pitched shrieks are blended with throaty growls, and the whole album more or less lumbers along at a steady pace. A refreshing change is that the opening instrumental is not a track in and of itself — “Stalinorgel” opens with the rhythmic grinding of industrial machinery (probably of a war-making variety) before rushing into the first of the album’s many tremolo-centric riffs. The music often sticks in one’s head, however, as demonstrated by the rhythm sections found in “Unleash The Panzer Division” and “At The Gates of Moscow.” One of the strongest cuts found here is “Blood on Snow,” a title track that definitely seems designed to function as a song upon which to sell the album.

Overall, there’s nothing terribly original here. That said, it’s still enjoyable material that is rewarding even after repeated listens. It does seem odd that Eastern Front would thematically limit itself in such a way; it remains to be seen whether they can repeatedly mine their subject matter before it risks becoming even more clichéd than the subject matter already is. Then again, they would hardly be the first metal band to stick to such a particular choice of topic, and if Blood on Snow is an indication of their potential musical chops, then a sophomore album is welcome.

(Candlelight USA)

Hey Hellbound Readers, welcome to the second edition of  Postcards From Natalie Zed for 2011. We met Natalie just about a year ago now when she won our big year end contest, taking home more than 50 CDs, records, posters and t-shirts. In a surprise move, Natalie then asked us if she could review her winnings for us. How could we say no?

Well, Natalie is all done with her original batch but has decided to keep on doing her postcard sized reviews for us. So, without further adieu, here is part nine of her ongoing series which we like to call “Postcards From Natalie Zed”. This set includes reviews of MITOCHONDRION, GRAF ORLOCK, THE MEADS OF ASPHODEL and more.

Ektomorf – Redemption (AFM)
I have an extremely sensitive palate. Sometimes, nothing pleases me more than challenging myself with food, and savouring the subtle layering of flavours in, say, gorgonzola gnocchi with porcini mushrooms in a veal stock and red wine reduction. Sometimes, I can only be sated by a fucking cheeseburger. Redemption is not complex or subtle. Is is a ground Sepultura and Slipknot sandwich with some Soulfly melted on top. And in the right mood, it’s blunt simplicity is an incredibly satisfying meal for my ears.

Vilipend – Live in Ajax
Listen to this record. Do it. It’s free. Download this series of controlled explosions here: http://vilipend.bandcamp.com/

Graf Orlock – Doombox EP (Vitriol Recordings)
If Graf Orlock was a person instead of a band, he’d have a crooked, shit-eating grin and dirty fingernails. His laugh would be harsh, his sense of humour acerbic and unforgiving. He’d know too much about film to make going to the movies any joy, and would trump your knowledge with just about any pop culture reference. He’d be the sort of guy who makes you feel a little stupider than you are, and always a little off-balance. An argument would be like trying to punch out a garbage disposal. Were Graf Orlock a person, I would be devastatingly smitten.

The Meads of Asphodel – The Murder of Jesus the Jew (Candlelight USA)
Take some black metal. Not typical black metal either, but something already a little weird – a bit psychedelic and experimental, an little bent. Now, feed it through a carnival calliope the way you would force meat through a grinder. Add the bright shavings of a brass section and piss some punk down it’s throat. Force-feed it the plaintive wail of a sitar and salt heavily with hard rock. Pour the liquid from a raver’s glowsticks into its eyesockets and torment it with dulcet female vocals. Then, piss it off.

Mitochondrion – Parasignosis (Profound Lore)
Deeply unsettling. This album reminds me most of Portal‘s terrifying Swarth, but with more groove and organization, less discord. This album has terrible plans. It menaces and smothers, never backing down but also never boring, always backing the listener into some new corner. I don’t headbang; I rock back and forth to comfort myself.

Elvenking – Red Silent Tides (AFM)
I have a profound weakness for power metal and folk metal, and so I am predisposed to like this album. Elvenking, however, have a few extra things going for them that make Red Silent Tides a delight for my earholes. They shake things up with the instrumentation, playing very traditional folk passages on keyboard and electric guitar rather than violin and acoustic (though there’s plenty of that too), red hot distortion cutting through the wispy melodies. Also, Damnagoras’ voice is lovely, operatic in range but with some real darkness in his lower register that gives me the shivers. This album provides an equaling compelling soundtrack to my weekend D&D sessions as it does a snowy walk through post-apocalyptic Toronto.

The response was pretty much positive across the board as to participating in the poll. A few writers did politely back out from submitting, feeling they hadn’t heard enough Canadian albums released this year, fair enough, and some submitted only one album for their list. However, the final outcome of this list has not been tampered with, changed, fucked with, etc. etc. by anyone – the bands are listed in the order they were voted by our great contributors. So, without further adieu, here are the Top 10 Canadian Metal Albums of 2010, counted down from #10 to #1 with a brief write up on each. Please enjoy.

#10: RUSTED DAWN – The Black Tides Of War

(Diminished Fifth)

Cold, endless rain, stark, rocky terrain and more snow than the polar ice caps seem to have lately? Canada’s East Coast is the perfect breeding ground for berserk metal, a mission accomplished with New Brunswick beasts Rusted Dawn on this full-length debut. Blending thrash classics like Testament‘s The New Order and Nuclear Assault‘s Handle With Care makes for a vicious explosion amplified by the guttural drive of Motörhead and Discharge. Yet when they hone in on aspects of Mayhem and Obituary, The Black Tides Of War‘s ravenous bleakness, sinister chug riffs and overall rabidity makes even the friendliest of metallians feel like swallowing a fistful of razorblades, washing it down with a fifth of whiskey and getting into a fistfight.
Keith Carman

#9: STRIKER – Eyes In The Night

(Iron Kodex)

Striker are really leading the pack in Canada for traditional heavy metal. There have been a slew of bands coming out with a lot of love for NWOBHM but none of them impress as much as Striker’s Eyes In The Night. Like a slab from ’83 with modern production and catchy as hell song writing, this is a fist pumping, head banging classic. What you hear on this album, they can pull off live as well: vocalist Dan Cleary is an absolute monster and blew me away. Pick this album up and keep your eyes on this band!
Jason Wellwood

#8: DIVINITY – The Singularity

(Candlelight USA)

Released here in Canada by Candlelight Records late in the summer, Divinity‘s The Singularity layers just the right amount of progressive elements on top of a solid base of crunchy technical death metal. The food metaphor is apt; it’s an album that is heavier and more substantial than an initial taste might suggest. The Calgarians’ many tempo shifts, occasional more-or-less-clean-vocals, and ambient fills are anchored down by their heavy grooves. Any moment of quieter contemplation is soon squashed by the next wave of riffs, many of which invoke fellow Canadians Into Eternity on steroids. Proving once again that the best albums often demand to be savoured before their true flavours are revealed, The Singularity has moved from being just another summer offering to becoming one of this reviewer’s favourite Canadian albums of the year.
Jonathan Smith

#7: ANNIHILATOR – Annihilator

(Earache)

In a time when we’ve got new thrash wannabes popping up and getting famous every 20 minutes, Annihilator has created an album that can easily be set beside classics like Alice In Hell and Never Neverland. Annihilator highlights not only the underrated guitar playing of Jeff Waters but, his consistently catchy song writing as well. Dave Padden returns for album number four (a record for a vocalist in this band) fitting like a glove and bringing out all the authentic anger, frustration and rage that most of the new wave of thrash bands have to fake.
Jason Wellwood

#6: ION DISSONANCE – Cursed

(Century Media)

In all honesty, I lost most of any faith I had in these Montreal tech bruisers ‘n abusers about half-an-hour after the release of their second album, Solace. In fact, I was taken by surprise when news hit they were coming back after a self-imposed, 18-month hiatus; I didn’t even noticed they were gone. But shit, what a way to return! Cursed hearkens back to the late-90s when bands exploded with equal amounts of head-shaking complexity and violent fury. This album is irascible, sarcastic, bitter, utterly relentless and a great accompaniment to those nights spent holed up in a windowless room hating the fucking world.
Kevin Stewart-Panko

#5: BISON B.C. – Dark Ages

(Metal Blade)

As I wrote in my postcard review of this album, what impressed me the most was the weight of it. Dark Ages handles suffocatingly heavy sections and eloquently nimble passages with equal panache. Bison BC are just as skilled at crushing their listeners, leaving them screaming “more weight!” like a victim of peine forte et dure, as they are pouring supple phrases of molten gold into our ears. There’s a great deal of menace to this album, a disquiet in the guitar work and an eerie quality to the brass section, but no matter how uncomfortable this album makes me I always deeply enjoy listening to it. Dark Ages is both deeply challenging and profoundly enjoyable, and that makes it extraordinary.
Natalie Zed

#4: WEAPON – From The Devil’s Tomb

(Ajna Offensive)

After impressing us last year with their debut full-length, Drakonian Paradigm, Edmonton black metal quartet Weapon returned this year with an even better sophomore album. Tighter playing and much better production propel this new album far beyond what they accomplished before. Weapon has progressed dramatically as a band. The four musicians play together in perfect sync. The songs on this album have hooks, nuances and tempo changes that require tight musicianship, which they have in abundance. The upgraded studio quality makes the band sound even more menacing, more threatening than on previous releases. The sonics are better, and this makes the songs that much heavier. Weapon also gets the award for the best song title by a Canadian band in 2010 for “Lefthandpathyoga.” Nicely done.
Sean Palmerston

#3: BLOOD REVOLT – Indoctrine

(Profound Lore)

Today, via Catherine Owen (possibly Canada’s most metal poet), I came across the quote “Poetry is the art that responds to the anxiety of living.” I think Blood Revolt does the same with Indoctrine. Their response to the anxiety of living is first to distill and magnify our most visceral fears, and then to tear straight into them for 42 nerve-rattling minutes. This Irish-Canadian collaboration is about pushing the limits, both musically, with C Ross and J Read’s chaotic onslaught, and thematically, via vocalist AA Nemtheanga’s chilling first-person portrayal of fanaticism and martyrdom. The trio’s fearlessness makes for one of the most extreme—and best—releases of the year.
Rob Hughes

#2: KATAKLYSM – Heaven’s Venom

(Nuclear Blast)

Every Kataklysm record is a battle cry that rolls with every punch. This year, Maurizio Iacono divided time between Ex Deo and his Montreal- based horde to create Heaven’s Venom – an album based on a struggle-to-gain concept with solid musicality and a signature hyperblast beat. The content on the record is theatrical at best, as the music depicts imagery of successful stage presence to scenes from historical epics, utilizing movie quotes effectively to nearly miss being called a cliché. To call Heaven’s Venom a fresh approach by Kataklysm would be false, but that’s what makes the album great, for the band proves that they don’t need to add obscure elements but rather stick to being themselves to capture the attention of a worldwide metal audience.
Ola Mazzuca

#1: MARES OF THRACE - The Moulting

(Arctodus)

All it took to inject some welcome new life into Canadian metal was a blast of brutality from a band comprised of two talented women from Calgary. Who knew? But we’re sure as hell glad that Mares of Thrace gave us The Moulting, an unrelenting noise/doom hybrid that turned out to be heavier than most male bands with twice as many members. Fitting neatly between the styles of Unsane and Neurosis, not only is this record a punishing one, with Thérèse Lanz‘s churning baritone guitar riffs punctuated byStefani MacKichan‘s massive, jazz-influenced drumming, but it’s plenty accessible, as well. The duo displays tremendous restraint at times, creating palpable tension, only to completely shatter it with cathartic payoffs, Lanz spewing her eloquent, darkly poetic lyrics. Factor in a formidable live presence that turns more heads with each performance and you’ve got one of the most promising Canadian metal bands to come around in a long time.
Adrien Begrand

Check back on Friday for the individual writers lists.

She’s reviewed all the original CDs and is now reviewing newer things that have made their way to her. Here is part eight of her ongoing series of what we like to call “Postcards With Natalie Zed”

Bison BC – Dark Ages (Metal Blade, 2010)
It’s all about gravity. At times, leaden as a dirge, a barge carrying corpses, the weight of dirt on a coffin lid. Crush injuries. At others, nimble as a rapier tip, precise and merciless as it is weightless. It’s impossible to keep your balance. Dark Ages knocks you around. Whether funereal grey, brass-bright or red hot; crushing heaviness or suffocating vaccuum; whatever the weight, it’s perfect.

Oceano – Contagion (Earache, 2010)
Stuff a gorilla’s throat with steel wool and beat it ’til it sings.

Scythia – ...Of War (self-released, 2010)
I would have adored this when I was fifteen, seventeen, maybe even twenty-one. I still appreciate the competence and musicianship of this album, the richness of the piano and violin. But there is an earnestness here, lodged like a barb in the vocalist’s throat, a hitch of sincerity in his voice that makes me cringe instead of swoon.

11 As In Adversaries – The Full Intrepid Experience of Light (ATMF, 2010)
Like Gloiror Belli has a headache that nothing but trepanation could cure. Letting a little light and air into their grey matter released some strange, surprisingly alt-rocky spirits. Strange, novel, a little tiring. Something to be gotten out of one’s system. Unusual impulses.

Winterfylleth – The Mercian Sphere (Candlelight USA, 2010)
So much black metal is cold. The drumming is inexorably glacial, the strings gelid. Winterfylleth, despite the chill in their same, is not afraid of the thaw. So much of this album is deliciously warm, the guitar as buttery-gold and warm as fall leaves, the tempo soothing as melt-water. Winterfylleth are equally comfortable evoking the tenderness of spring as they are giving their listeners blistering frost burns. Their pagan influence shines through in the appreciation for all four seasons.

Thrall – Away From The Haunts Of Men (Moribund, 2010)
This is Thrall’s first full-length monster. It isn’t a work of perfection. At times the seams show, and here and there you see where some flesh could have been trimmed away, the incisions made cleaner, the stitching tighter. But for the odd bit of ganglyness, for the shamble in it’s walk, this is a lovely abomination. The sound is simple without any hint of deliberate underproduction, punishing and malevolent but with style, meditative without self-indulgence. A sensitive monster.

By Justin M. Norton

Traditional black metal is almost painfully straightforward: Satanism, paganism and malevolence. But the music has changed since its beginnings (Venom, Bathory and Celtic Frost) and the second wave of black metal. Instead of a method of railing against organized religion black metal also offers a way to map scarred psyches. Plenty of recent black metal albums are the work of an individual or strong creative spirit surrounded by contributors: Leviathan, Xasthur, Vrolok and Shining to name a few.

While this trend has spawned numerous bands derisively called basement black metal it’s also produced its share of stellar music. New Jersey’s Krieg is among the most notable acts. Krieg – fronted by Imperial – broke out with the 2006 album The Black House. His latest album The Isolationist, Krieg’s first for Candlelight USA, might be even better. Imperial (also of the black metal supergroup Twilight) spoke to Hellbound from his home in New Jersey.

You are from Somers Point, New Jersey. If I remember correctly it’s close to Ocean City and Avalon. That part of the country doesn’t scream out black metal to me. How did you find the music in that atmosphere?

I grew up in Ocean City. I had a small group of friends that was into death metal and thrash. We’d listen to a radio show out of Stockton College every week. At some point in 1994 they started playing black metal. It was just the basic stuff… Darkthrone and Emperor, stuff that was easier to get. It spoke to me a lot more than death metal. It had more of an emotional connection instead of raw aggression.

I liked Samael’s Blood Ritual and Darkthrone’s A Blaze In The Northern Sky. Those were the two that grabbed me. The Samael record used an atmospheric approach and was different than anything I heard. It seemed to blend so many sounds. I wasn’t accustomed to music that used keyboards that way. I was used to keyboards in 1980s new wave.

Darkthrone had that level of rawness. At the same time the use of the distortion gave it an almost a visual aspect. You could hear things in the guitar that would bring images to your mind. I was 14 or 15 so obviously the aesthetics I got from it weren’t mature – it was stuff like dark forests and caves and ugly, brutal people.

Did you feel disconnected from the environment you grew up in? When I think of the Jersey shore I think about boardwalks and arcades…

I grew up around people into old hardcore so I wasn’t around a lot of the shore culture. We were the people that were hanging out under the boardwalk getting high and talking about bizarre childish shit. As far as feeling a disconnect? Since I can remember I’ve felt disconnected from my surroundings…just a feeling of being different and alienated from how you see people living their lives.

Is Krieg your way of trying to articulate some of those feelings through music?

It definitely plays a role, if it’s not the main thing behind it. Black metal isn’t just considered normal by societal standards so it will obviously express a disconnect with normal ethics and morality.

When did you make the leap from listening to a radio show to writing music?

Almost instantly. I was in a death metal band called Abominus. I didn’t write much. But I had the tools in front of me to start creating and once I heard black metal it was natural to pick up a guitar and bass and start working. It was just a few weeks after the first time I heard black metal. It was like how every band who heard The Sex Pistols started their own punk band that same week.

So you had a bunch of kids in New Jersey starting their own black metal bands?

Nah, that’s just the best metaphor I can use for my involvement. As soon as I heard it I knew this was something I wanted to be a part of.

The new album is called The Isolationist. In 2003 you had The Black House. Your music touches on themes of despair, pain, depression…are these things taken from your own experiences?

Krieg’s music is entirely autobiographical. I don’t follow any religious path so I don’t feel I have the right to sing about Satanism. So that takes that topic out. But I’m constantly thinking and reading and trying to learn so that alienates me from a lot of brain dead war metal stuff that comes out in the U.S.

I’d rather write from experience. All of my favorite artists express themselves through their own viewpoints and experiences. I like music that honest. The things that I’m writing about, even if they are metaphors, they are more real than singing about Satan.

Have you experienced a major depression? You know the experience well enough to write about it.

The last ten or 11 years have been a major depression. I’ve been on various medicines. The only that stuck was when I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder last year. They started medicating me with Depakote and a few other things. That’s taken a lot of the edge off. But I’ve been deeply, clinically depressed for at least ten years now.

How did you manage to get through the past decade? What were some of the most difficult moments?

It can’t be said that I’ve made good decisions most of the time. I’ve tried to learn from my mistakes. But just because someone suffers from an illness like depression or bipolar disorder it doesn’t mean they are suicidal or have a death wish. That sort of thing to me is self-pitying and weak.

Two things that were the worst? In 2001 I came home when I was living with my mother. I was pretty young. She was dead. It kind of affects you when you try to do mouth to mouth on your mother’s corpse. It fucks you up a little bit, I imagine. The second was when I decided to end Krieg. That’s the lowest point I can think of. I was making horrible decisions and I thought if I took Krieg out of my life things would get better. I somehow associated it with a lot of hard times when music for me, especially Krieg, is therapy and catharsis. It keeps me a lot healthier than I would be without it.

From what I know about bipolar disorder one of the defining traits is impulsivity. I read a book where the author was watching the Berlin Wall come down and decided he needed to be there. He went and got on an airplane. Did you have any experiences like that?

The years from 2004 to 2007 were completely like that. I was making bad decisions and it cost me. I can’t pick out any exact moments like the Berlin Wall. There was nothing like that; there was just underlying pressure. Fortunately I don’t have bad issues with impulse control.

Did you find you needed to exercise more control in your life … that you couldn’t go on long tours or do a lot of partying?

Within the last year I’ve shown a lot more discipline. It doesn’t mean I’m making a lot of healthy choices but I’m taking greater steps to stay in control. Fortunately, the Candlelight deal means I’m not working with someone in their basement or garage. I need to stay disciplined to not get lost in the shuffle.

When listening to The Isolationist I noticed you do touch on the things we’ve been talking about but there are also elements of defiance and a push to live through pain. Is that accurate?

Suicidal behavior isn’t something I want to be a theme. So there is an aspect of trying to overcome the obstacles that living like this presents.

Did you hook up with (producer) Sanford (Parker) through your work in Twilight?

I met him at a New Year’s Eve party with Blake (Judd) from Nachtmystium a few years ago. We talked about recording but I never thought I’d been able to get myself together enough to record with him. We did the Twilight record last year and we kept in touch. He’s really good with listening to what the people he is recording want rather than putting his own trademark like you’d get out of Abyss Studios or Sunlight.

Did you come to him with the material already written or did you work out ideas in the studio?

It was about a 50-50. I had skeletal versions of songs, full songs and ideas. We ended up writing a lot in this scummy shithole hotel outside of O’Hare Airport in Chicago. I was in Chicago eight days in February earlier this year.

Was recording there in the dead of winter the right environment?

Chicago gets hit with such bad weather that there aren’t many available distractions. You can’t be in the studio and go “I want to go get a sandwich” or get a beer. You can’t do any of that. You just have to buckle down and focus. It gets so goddamn grey and depressing and ugly that it’s a good emotional environment for recording.

I visited your MySpace page recently and you again put out a post that said Krieg isn’t a political band. Why do people misinterpret what your band is about – because you have a German name?

There are a few reasons. There’s this huge belief that everything German is Nazi oriented. That’s complete bullshit. The word was around hundreds of years before the 1930s and 1940s. Another thing is that I’m friends with bands that are political. It doesn’t mean I follow their beliefs it just means these people are friends. I’m friends with people from all walks of life. You are going to meet people and not necessarily agree with their beliefs but that doesn’t affect your relationship.

The other reason is that people want to tag bands with some political name; especially if you don’t denounce the group they say you are a part of. I won’t denounce any political movements. One, I’m not a part of them and it’s not my place. And two, I believe in free speech and free expression. If someone wants to go out and be a part of a movement even if I don’t agree with it it’s not my place to step in. I’m not an activist, I’m not as politician. I have enough problems of my own and I don’t need to start a war with any specific movement.

People have said the Nazi thing for years. It’s really funny because Krieg is a band based on nihilism and personal darkness. These things don’t go hand-in-hand with the national socialist ethos.

Nachtmystium got kicked off the Scion festival for having a German name and it doesn’t look like the promoters even listened to their music.

That whole thing was just a witch hunt. It was right around the time the economy was tanking and these companies don’t want anything to tarnish their reputation when people already don’t want to buy a car because it’s too expensive. People also want to say “look at this good deed I just committed. Come buy a car. Come get a shirt.” That’s what that was about.

He (Blake) also gets grief from people who say he isn’t black metal enough anymore when he was playing the music when he was 17.

I’ve known Blake since he was in high school and I don’t have anything negative to say about his musical evolution. It’s exactly what he feels and what he wants to do. Its shows an open mindedness to add these influences to black metal. But people are always going to be shitting on more successful people because they are jealous or because when a band gets a larger audience it’s no longer their own. He’s been a victim of both.

Isn’t part of the black metal ethos doing your own thing?

Exactly. But for so many people it’s no longer about a freedom to express it’s a fashion show. It’s groups of people in these little clubs with stupid rulebooks and lists of people you should or shouldn’t listen to based on what a person was wearing on a given night. If you show up at a serious black metal show in a pair of blue jeans they are all going to throw away your record. It’s childish and a byproduct of the fact that black metal is so easy to come by that anyone can be a part of it.

One of the songs that intrigued me the most on the album was “Photographs From An Asylum.”

It’s an old song, one of the first I wrote when I started Krieg. It’s a metaphor for being locked in your own mind – an asylum without any windows or a sense of time or being. I’m fascinated with stories and pictures of these old institutions that were run like prisons. They were supposed to be there to help people but they were horrible places where people were abused and mistreated and died without getting attention for ailments and illnesses that are completely curable or at least treatable. These buildings had such a build of negative energy that your hair would stand up when you walked in.

Compositionally, I wanted it to be a movement of three parts, a more traditional Krieg riff in the beginning, something almost nauseating in the middle and this caveman nod to Beherit and Archgoat at the end.

Did you ever see the movie Session 9 that featured Danvers Asylum? It’s about these people who go insane as they try to renovate this closed asylum in Massachusetts.

No, but it sounds right up my alley

Did you ever visit any old or abandoned institutions?

When I was much younger there was one – I don’t even remember the name – but it was near the studio where we recorded our first two albums. It was in New Jersey right outside of Philadelphia. We would park and hang out on the grounds and try to see as much as we could without security kicking us off. I think it’s a strip mall now.

It’s remarkable that people were put in these places and tortured for things that could now be treated like high blood pressure.

People had their complete sense of self stripped for things you would take two pills in the morning and one pill at night for now.

Krieg is personal music…what is it like to play live?

I don’t really notice the crowd. It all blurs together. It is intensely personal and I don’t release lyrics and I don’t talk about lyrics too often. I give vague ideas. Yet here I am singing these songs in front of people about personal trauma and isolation. Still, I really enjoy playing live, it feels good. It gets your endorphins going and it’s a way to relieve periodic stress. You go punish yourself in front of people and it’s like a public exorcism.

You’ve often talked about how you were influenced by authors like Bret Easton Ellis. Has anything else you’ve read lately influenced you?

Most of what I’ve read in the past six months is personal correspondence of authors I like, the letters of William Burroughs and Charles Bukowski. Bukowski was incredibly prolific which is odd because he was the town drunk and womanizer living in a shithole motel. Underneath all that you have a deeply sensitive man.

I haven’t read any new fiction that’s really grabbed me. I know Ellis has a new book out. I went to get it. He takes five to seven years to write a novel. It’s about thirty bucks and the fucking thing was like 115 pages. I’ll wait for the paperback.

Could Krieg in a strange way provide a lifeline to people who’ve had struggles like yours?

It all depends on what they get out of the music. Music, even if it’s about flowers and bunnies, can be a lifeline. There is certain music that kept me completely grounded and it had nothing to do with what I was going through. If someone gets that out of it good, I’m glad, but I never want to be someone who tells listeners what they should get out of it.

The Isolationist is out now on Candlelight USA