Behemoth, Goatwhore and more at House Of Blues (2014)
House Of Blues (Dallas, Texas, United States)
Behemoth, Goatwhore, 1349, Inquisition, Black Crown Initiate
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April 11, 2014
This band is the newcomer both to the Metal Alliance Tour but also for Heavy Metal as well. But BLACK CROWN INITIATE introduced themselves by offering a great offering of Progressive Melodic Death Metal. Hailing from Reading, Pennsylvania, this band seems to be the project helmed by guitar player Andy Thomas and lead singer James Dorton. BLACK CROWN INITIATE started touring just as soon as they completed their EP "Songs For The Crippled Bull". I can describe this band's music as a composite of some of my favorite Metal bands like MASTODON, OPETH, & MESHUGGAH. This is certainly a band everyone must keep their eyes on to see what they put out next.
INQUISITION is an excellent Black Metal band. The minimalistic ensemble produces a rich and infectious brand of sinister-sounding metal that was impressive to hear coming out of only two musicians. Dagon, INQUISITION's singer and guitar player, had incredible presence as he belched blasphemies all throughout the auditorium over drumming of the well-hidden Incubus. After seeing them, I had to pick up their latest release from 2013 "Obscure Verses for the Multiverse" which I have found increasingly enjoyable. Anybody who considers themselves a fan of Black Metal need to check that album our ASAP.
1. Force of the Floating Tomb
2. Spiritual Plasma Exocation
3. (Unknown)
4. Command of the Dark Crown
5. Ancient Monumental War Hymn
6. Crush the Jewish Prophet
7. Those of the Night
8. Astral Path to Supreme Majesties
9. Infinite Interstellar Genocide
Keeping the mood sinister were 1349, the Norwegian Black Metal deities. Just like Inquisition, they were the real deal when it came to Black Metal and brought down the hellfire. They had a natural presence on such a large stage and their music was horrific but in a good way. They are touring to promote their reunion with Indie Records and performed their new single "Slaves" which debuted online shortly after this performance.
2. Chasing Dragons
3. I Am Abomination
4. Slaves
5. Serpentine Sibilance
6. Atomic Chapel
These guys hit the stage very shortly after 1349 with minimal wait in between the sets. The house lights were not dimmed and the atmosphere did not change up until they kicked through the speakers with their first song "The All-Destroying". The room soon erupted into a mosh pit and soon hundreds of people were throwing the sign of the horns at the stage in tribute to the mighty GOATWHORE. These guys spared no time getting through as many songs as their 40 minute time slot allowed and really channeled a lot of the aggression and excitement out of the crowd. It was a great to see if everybody could handle the following set after this much energy and vigor getting dished out to this weekend crowd that had grown rabid for Metal. GOATWHORE proved to everyone that they were every bit as awesome of a band as everyone else had turned out to be. Their new album "Constricting Rage Of The Merciless" will debut later on this year.
2. When Steel and Bone Meet
3. An End to Nothing
4. In Deathless Tradition
5. Baptized in as Storm of Swords
6. Collapse in Eternal Worth
7. Baring Teeth For Revolt
8. Judgment of the Bleeding Crown
9. Alchemy of the Black Sun Cult
10. Parasitic Scriptures of the Sacred Word
11. Apocalyptic Havoc
2. Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer
3. Conquer All
4. As Above So Below
5. Slaves Shall Serve
6. Christians to the Lions
7. The Satanist
8. Ov Fire and the Void
9. Furor Divinus
10. Alas, Lord Is Upon Me
11. At the Left Hand ov God
12. Chant for Eschaton 2000
13. O Father O Satan O Sun
Inferno, how are you doing?
Good, man. It's good to be back.
That's actually the first question I was going to ask you. You guys must love touring North America because I know you have travelled through Texas several times. What have been some memorable moments during the Metal Alliance Tour this year?
Actually, every show was very good and everything is going better than we expected. Most of the shows were sold out and the band is in good shape. It's been a great response. San Francisco was insane. I think that has been the best show so far. We played for the first time in a big hall with 1,300 people. It was really great. We always used to play at Slim's which is a very nice venue but its very small and has a 500 person maximum capacity.
BEHEMOTH draws a much bigger crowd than that now. I remember when you guys were touring through Austin a few years ago for the last album, you guys played at Emo's with White Wizzard which wasn't too big of a venue.
Yes, I remember.
But now you guys are playing shows at House of Blues which is great.
Yes, here in Dallas.
On the liner notes of Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer, BEHEMOTH's lead singer NERGAL writes "lack of inner drama, lack of inhibition against falling in love with the volatile relieves me from consistency and allows obliteration of established moral & social behavior patterns." When you included this in the album, do you think that NERGAL was saying that this all relates to the rejection of God made flesh? Would that be how BEHEMOTH defines the Post-modern interpretation Satan not so much as a belief in Satanism but more of a belief in the absence of God?
Well, I can only say that the title of that song says to 'Pray For Us Lucifer'. It's from the prayer to Saint Mary and if people think about the lyrics and they are more open minded, they will try to see what's going on with all this shit. That's one of the reasons why this band exists. And this (quote) is it. The Satanist is the title and its says in itself who we are as a band and as a people and that we are stronger than ever.
One the theories I had about why this album was called The Satanist…
Yeah it just fits perfectly.
But I was wondering as to who you were referring to as 'The Satanist'? Is NERGAL the 'Satanist'? Is the audience of the record the 'Satanist'?
You can get it as you want.
"laughs" It is a very thought-provoking album title.
That's what I mean. It gets people thinking.
What I found about this album was that it was definitely more—in terms of the sound, you guys used at one point in the past sounds that were similar to Babylonian ancient historical music. With your drumming, you put a lot of African and Latino influences in your playing style with your use polyrhythmic meters. It's a very tribal sound.
We're always very tribal.
I feel like a lot of the music in the past called back to a lot of historical themes but I thought on The Satanist, its deal with a lot more modern themes dealing with hedonism. There are a lot of thematic elements that deal with hedonism, blood, the flesh and eroticism. NERGAL drops references to French philosopher George Bataille in there multiple times. Do you have any further explanation on that?
It just goes straight from us. And the same goes for us. I can tell you something, when we were rehearsing, I'd say a year before our recording session, we prepared a couple of songs and then had to do some tours and things like that. After that, we threw pretty much everything out into the garbage and we started to write the music again.
For a fresh perspective? For a clean slate?
Exactly. And it was totally different from the stuff we wrote before. And some arrangements we couldn't use a couple of years ago and now we can do anything. We were like 'man, c'mon this riff sounds fucking Killing Joke or Led Zeppelin' and we love to play it. Why shouldn't we?
And you guys never distanced yourselves too far from extreme metal. You can hear a lot of it on the album.
Yeah we play the music that we want to listen to.
Now I don't know if you are a practitioner of Gnosticism or Thelema, but it seems like those two beliefs kind of have a natural affinity for extreme music. So how does the symbolism in Thelema or Gnosticism tie into your live shows as far as the light, sound, atmosphere, etc.? And are they supposed to represent something by being integrated into the live show?
Pretty much everything is integrated. For example, the symbol we have for our backdrop is from the 16th century but we made it in our own style. It's the symbol of the unholy trinity out of a book and we always use these kinds of symbols. And we are interconnected to a lot of different influences for example Thelema. If we use the unicursal hexagram on the Thelema.6 album and then after that we had pretty much the same show up in Zos Kia Cultus (2002) and Demigod (2004).
And these symbols are supposed to be pretty much self-explanatory? I guess on aesthetic value, they have this edge to them but when you delve deeper into what they mean, there's a much darker definition.
It makes the music more powerful. Like our shows, our booklets, and not only the music but everything is important; pictures of the band, the way the stage looks, the sound, everything.
It's almost more theatrical now.
Yeah. And our set list, we changed it totally. We have five tracks from The Satanist on the set list.
And that's a good chunk of the album because it's not very long, about 40 minutes long.
And this set list is more focused on the atmosphere then brutality and extreme stuff. You can really feel and see it.
In your song "In the Absence ov Light", you recite some lines from a play written by the Polish author Witold Gombrowicz. I found it very profound how you tied him into this album because of how Grombrowicz despised criticism and considered it a corrosive force in art and literature. Do you feel like BEHEMOTH, by including the Grombrowicz excerpt, is expressing that the band, or perhaps Extreme Music Community as a whole, has a burning desire to escape criticism?
I can just say that this part of the poem fits perfectly with our statement and the lyrics on this album and our philosophy. Nergal just asked his wife if we could use it on the album and she was like 'Wow! Fuck yeah, this is great'! And not so many people like him in Poland. He's a controversial figure.
I could see why since I was reading some things he wrote before this interview about how he hated criticism. He wrote about how writers who write for the sole purpose of criticizing other writers or artists are a toxic element within the art community because its just breaking people down into labels and putting barriers on their art as to where they can and can't go. And so I felt that BEHEMOTH, by putting that on the album, was making a similar statement that criticism has no close relation to the Metal community because it inhibits you guys.
Alright.
I noticed that The Satanist seems to revolve primarily around NERGAL mostly because of his health struggles and his life in the public eye. I felt like the album was sort of an expression of his inner feelings but do you think you and BEHEMOTH's bass player ORION has equal input into the album as he did and do you think your contributions were equal to NERGAL's or were you guys going into this record fully supporting what NERGAL wanted to do?
I can say that in my personal life, things changed totally over the last two years. I changed pretty much everything except for the band. I experienced some pretty serious health problems too. We were supposed to play Rock Mayhem Festival last year but I had last minute surgery on my appendix. Take a look at my scar. (Inferno stands up and shows me the scar on his abdomen, which look like three or four quarter-sized craters in his skin from where his appendix was removed)
Oh my God! Jesus! That's nasty!
It was a huge infection. I couldn't play for eight months.
Eight months?!
Yeah. And if I had waited one more hour for the surgery, I could've been dead. It was last minute surgery.
Was it about to rupture?
Yeah.
I couldn't imagine doing any sort of double-kick drumming with an appendix that's about to burst!
It's still disturbing but I can drum fine now.
I think that's another theme I got from this album. When you and NERGAL forced your own mortality in the face and then…
Man, now we are even stronger than ever. And if anyone expects any changes about our ideas or philosophy, it's not going to happen.
There was so much work put into The Satanist. I think you guys really raised the stakes as far as to how much hard work and talent goes into producing a Heavy Metal album. Are there still things you can find about albums like Satanica & Thelema.6 that you think have stuck with the band even to this day or has Behemoth just evolved completely away from the music you released 10 years ago?
Yes, of course! A lot! It's us, it's our style, so we cannot just turn back and not be ourselves.
Have you guys had any time to reflect on the people you were 10 years ago when you were doing those albums?
It was just our way to the point to where we're not. We are more major now and more professional musicians too. We never thought about this band being successful. We just play the music that we want to listen to and we don't give a fuck. I don't really care about this popularity. Of course if people like it, which is great, that's even better. If not… we cannot do what we've done before.
I got the impression that even if people didn't like the album, it didn't matter to you because BEHEMOTH is being honest on The Satanist with yourselves, with the music, and with the songs you chose to put on the album. Its 100% honest and there is zero bullshit on this record.
We are always 100% of us on the records and everything. It took two years to make the album but it was a four year-long break from our last record. But… exactly.
Inferno, thank you so much for this opportunity to talk with you. I hope it's been a great interview for you as well.
My pleasure, man. Thank you.
So you're coming out with your sixth full-length album later this summer, "Constricting Rage Of The Merciless".
Ben: Its kind of a lengthy title.
It is a lengthy title. So you're doing this with your old friend and producer Erik Rutan. This is the fourth album you've done with him and this time you've recorded most of the tracks on the album on 2-inch tape. Was this based on a budget decision or is it a stylistic decision?
Sammy: Well if it was a budget decision, you'd need– the whole fuckin' thing on tape! But I think it was more of, you know, everybody's using the whole Pro Tools thing and cheating, copy-and-pasting their way through a fucking album; being fucking pussies and not playing shit the way they should play it when they go to play live. It proves how much of a shitty musician that they are, that they can't pull it off 'cuz they play the riff once and then copy-and-paste it enough times to arrange a song. We want to prove a point that we're not a shitty band and we can pull our shit off live or on tape. There's no fuckin' copy-and-pasting on 2-inch tape. Yes, I'm going to talk shit!
Ben: The drummers especially – it puts a lot of strain on drummers to do too much because it's got to go through completely fuckin' solid. And its not even just that, it's the tone and quality. The sound is the first thing. They haven't been able to duplicate that tone yet through digital ways and its kind of a forgotten thing but its unique.
Its very relative to the earliest roots of metal too because bands from all over the world too—Sweden, Norway, the United States as well—they were all using cassette tapes.
Ben: We were lucky Rutan had the machine too. That machine has a lot of history.
Sammy: It came from Morrisound Studios.
Ben: Yeah, it did all the early Death Metal albums like Suffocation's "Effigy [of the Forgotten]", the Morbid Angel records…
Sammy: …the Death records. All of the legendary Death Metal records were recorded on that machine.
Ben: When he opened up, he bought that machine from Morrisound because they were getting rid of it.
Really?
Ben: Yeah.
Wow! So this decision with the 2-inch tape, it seems like a retroactive decision, not in terms of progressing the songwriting, kind of coming back to an older tone. Do you think its more of an album for the older fans of GOATWHORE? Would you say it's more for them rather than the newer fans, the people who've never you guys before?
Ben: Well, everybody hears things differently. I can't speak for everyone. When we go in, it's us there going 'this is what we want this album to sound like', you know? I think it's for all the fans but definitely the people that would appreciate it are the older school kind of people into that kind of idea and everything like that, for sure.
This next question is for Ben. Thinking back to your past with Soilent Green, do you find yourself amazed that 10 years after your car accident you're still touring with this much energy and this much passion?
Ben: Yeah, I mean, it was a little mountain to climb. But I mean I enjoy jamming with these guys. I enjoy playing live. That was the thing that drove me. Also, you got to confront your fears. People say [to me] 'I can't believe you can get back in a van' but anything can happen at any time. You can't let one thing wreck it and be 'Aw, I'm never going to do this again'. You have to just overcome that and climb that mountain in full.
So what have been some of your favorite moments from this year's Metal Alliance Tour?
Ben: Dude, this tour's been really fuckin' good so far. The whole—the bands really fit together well. Sometimes, with tours, they cram a bunch of different styles together, even though it's Metal. And it makes the crowd kind of variant. If there's a band that plays earlier and they all want to see the later bands and part of the crowd leaves because they're not really into it. Here, it's just solid the whole time. It's definitely more in that vein. Even though we all offer something different within the style we do, we all fall in that category that goes together.
I know this isn't the first time GOATWHORE has toured with Behemoth. Do you feel like you guys have grown closer over the years of playing touring together?
Ben: Oh yeah, definitely! You do after you tour a few times together, you create a relationship. Now when we see each other, its really comfortable. We've toured with 1349 in the past and we've toured with Behemoth in the past. And now when you show up, it's not a new crew when you're like 'oh hey man' and you introduce yourself as the tour gets going. Here, its just right there, off the bat, everybody knows each other and it flows from there on.
So do Behemoth and 1349 feel comfortable touring the United States with GOATWHORE?
Ben: Uh… I guess so. I really can't speak for them but we're all getting along good. And usually the first day is pretty crazy and shits all over the place but the first day went smooth, everything went smooth, times went well.
Everything is really organized at this show, I've noticed.
Ben: Yeah. Its been really good so far.
So speaking of Behemoth, knowing that Nergal was a coach on the Polish version of The Voice…
Ben: Yeah [laughs].
Could you see yourself vocal coaching other people at all?
Ben: Oh, I don't know. When you look at that video when he was doing it, they have a very different approach on how they do things as far as how they do it on the American show. If you saw an episode of The Voice here, you'd see its all rock and country and R& B and things like that while over there, they have more Metal stuff involved.
So you're saying you couldn't see yourself teaching a young singer how to…
Ben: No. [laughs]
[laughs] I guess it's just something you have to learn yourself.
Ben: Europe's a different thing with it. They embrace metal more than in the U.S. Even though you have a show like this where every shows were sold out, it's still an element where its still an oddity.
Yeah. It still seems like it has this vein of taboo running through it, obviously with the dark imagery, but it seems like people can't move get past the superficial elements of Metal to get into the more denser…
Ben: Yeah. It seems like they're a little scared. Instead of just flowing with it and having a good time and enjoying it, they're like 'I like it, BUT'… Fuck the 'but', just fuckin' go with it!
'Fuck the but'; Exactly!
Sammy and Ben: Fuck the but! [laughing hard]
So how serious is GOATWHORE about Satan?
Ben: There's variations in ways. I'd say pretty serious.
Sammy: Each member has their own take on that.
Ben: There's different approaches and ideas within the band. But we all mold with it. We all have our ideas, thoughts and perceptions of how things are but it all works together.
And do you think you draw power out of your perceptions of what Satan represents? My personal perspective of Satan isn't exactly an attack of God or the anti-God, it's more of an embodiment of the absence of God.
Ben: Well that's the thing. There's so many variations of it. Even if you go into it, there's so many variations on how it can be perceived. With us, we have all these different ideas that we all think but we all combine it and work with it like that. It is a powerful tool to utilize but everybody's got to be in that same ship even though some of the ideas are varied.
Right, and that goes back to the scaring people off. Satan does scare a lot of people in the States still.
Ben: Of course! People fear him. I like the idea of [John Milton's] Paradise Lost where Satan is the anti-hero. If God is so powerful and mighty, he could've struck him down at any moment but yet he emerges and he perseveres over everything to get back to the top.
Yes it does get very baroque in terms of studying details…
Ben: So there's so many variations and it goes so deep. That's the thing too. I think people are still scared of it because of the lack of knowledge about it.
And maybe people are scared of Metal because it dares to delve into discovering more about that rather than just being scared of it.
Ben: Metal does definitely dig in really deep. Not only is it 'underground' but it goes into the underground of the psyche as well.
Last question, looking ahead for 2015 and 2016, do you see GOATWHORE sticking to your guns, sticking to what's been working so far or do you see the band in the future maybe experimenting with differing sounds and ideas?
Ben: (to Sammy) What do you think, are you going to experiment, man?
Sammy: I can't predict that! I can't predict what we're going to do!
Ben: I think 2015 is going to bring some more touring actually. You know how we get, as soon as a record drops, we're on the road. We'll pretty much touring for the good part of a year and a half, two years after the record. So our writing kind of chills down and then we tour and push and push and push. We don't really set ahead and make an idea of what its gonna be. Sammy has got some songs that he's throwing around in the studio and we got some more things but we don't really jump the gun and kind of just do it. And as things come along we just gets placed together.
You guys, thanks so much for taking the time to talk with me! It's been great!
Ben: No problem!
HAIL GOATWHORE! Be sure to pick up "Constricting Rage Of The Merciless" which debuts this Summer on Metal Blade Records.
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