Interview - CELESTIAL BURIAL (Australia)

CELESTIAL BURIAL (Australia) is a two-man Death Metal band consisting of its founder Matt Ford (Guitars / Bass / Drums) and his close friend Aaron Mangano (Vocals). At the time this interview was done, the duo had already produced 4 singles; Towards the Void (December 23, 2022), Genocidal Extinction (January 20, 2023), Mind Defect (February 17, 2023) and Global Exit (May 4, 2023). The singles are part of the tracks included in their debut album “Genocidal Extinction”, released through Grindhead Records on June 9, 2023.

Questions by The Unblessed

Answered by Matt Ford

Replied on June 14, 2023, 1:57 PM

Hail! Please give a little introduction about CELESTIAL BURIAL - brief history, band members, etc.

Matt: Hello! thanks for having us here. Celestial Burial was originally going to be a solo project that I started back about 6 years ago. However, I was busy pursuing other musical ventures and Celestial Burial got put on the back burner. 

That was until 2022, when I contacted a mate of mine Aaron Mangano and asked if he would be interested in doing vocals in the band and from there, we started working on the music. 

How do you define your music and lyrics? Does Celestial Burial have any attempt to deliver untypical & distinctive Death Metal sound?

Matt: I’d say with this new album “Genocidal Extinction” there is definitely more of a Deathcore influence. It has its fast parts, but also some Brutal breakdowns. We try not to stick to anyone style either, if it sounds heavy and we like it, that’s what matters and hopefully you guys like it as well! 

Lyrically, this new album is based around a lot of different topics. But the main focus is the darkness within mankind and ourselves. 

Please share your conclusions about all the singles that have been unleashed?

Matt: So the four singles we released before the album had some really positive feedback, people seemed to like it. So hopefully they enjoy the album also. 

What can you promise and/or can we expect from your debut full-length “Genocidal Extinction”? Are you completely satisfied with the quality of the production?

Matt: Well, you can expect a non stop heavy album. It’s quite relentless lol.

Sound wise, we did the best we could with what we had and taking that into consideration, I think it turned out quite well. 

Please provide any essential information & facts about the album? Why did Celestial Burial sign to Grindhead Records?

Matt: We contacted Grindhead Records because both Aaron and I were familiar with the label and their love for releasing heavy music. 

So we thought we would send them some tracks, and they liked what they heard. So from there we worked with them to release our full length. They are a great label and very professional, we are happy to be apart of the Grindhead roster! 

What is Death Metal from your perspective?

Matt: Death Metal from my perspective.. hmm, well it’s definitely heavy lol like any music though it has to come from the soul when your playing / writing it and Death Metal is no exception. 

How do you predict the future of the band? Thanks! Any last words from Celestial Burial?

Matt: Hopefully releasing more music, but for now we will let the dust settle on “Genocidal Extinction” and let people get acquainted with that first. 

Thanks to everyone for the support!

http://celestialburial.bandcamp.com

Interview - NOCTURNAL CALL (Mexico)

NOCTURNAL CALL (Mexico City, Mexico) has just released a new full-length album entitled “For Death I Shall Be Forever Alive”, the third from this obscure Doom/Death Metal act after “The Infinite Mirrored in the Infinite” (2018) and “A Blaze of Inner Black” (2020). The new CD in Digipak format has been produced & distributed by the prestigious label, American Line Productions officially on April 8, 2023. Nocturnal Call currently consists of the band founder Héctor Montero (drummer and keyboardist), accompanied by César Caro (vocalist and guitarist) and Kåre André Sletteberg (bassist).

Questions by The Unblessed

Answered by Héctor Montero

Replied on May 19, 2023, 1:42 AM

Hail! Please give a little introduction about NOCTURNAL CALL - brief history, band members, etc.

NC was founded it in 2016 as a personal project, it was meant to be only 4 songs, later on, I invited César Caro to record voices, he gave impetus to complete the idea to form it as a band, and better jump direct to a debut album, ever since the connection has been there and the music is just flowing.

Currently the band is made up of Héctor Montero on drums and keyboards ex-April Morning (Mex) and is currently part of the KAS (Nor), César Caro on vocals and guitars is currently part of The Zephyr (Mex), and Kåre André Sletteberg on bass also a member of the band In the Woods… (Nor) and KAS (Nor).

The band has recently returned with third release, “For Death I Shall Be Forever Alive”. In your opinion, what does the release of this new album mean to the entire career and chronology of the existence of Nocturnal Call during this time?

Without a doubt, it is the best album of the band, we have done a great job both in the composition and in the production of the album, this album transports you to a place where reflection and melancholy take you to another place where your senses meet the darkness and also expresses the chemistry that we have strengthened among the members of NC, the lyrics here are just awesome, a very strong history that makes you think.

Unlike the two previous works, “For Death…” only features one long track, lasting 29:22 minutes. What was the idea? Does Nocturnal Call still maintain the same spirit and strength, or do you want to take this band to another dimension?

The idea arose taking as influence the albums “Light of Day, Day of Darkness” by Green Carnation and “Crimson” by Edge of Sanity and also that the song never ends so that you reflect and feelings do not interfere between several songs, that start and never end.

Do you still have any thoughts on “The Infinite Mirrored in the Infinite” (2018) and “A Blaze of Inner Black” (2020)?

Of course, our past records also have a great feeling, “The Infinite Mirrored…” is a dark piece of a more classic Doom Metal full of melancholy and darkness, “A Blaze of…” is a step forward to progressive rock, without a doubt these are records that make you travel to introspection, and inner strength through sadness.

The band has been working with American Line Productions since the beginning. Everyone knows that it is a long-running and cult label. How close is your relationship with Joel Morales Castro? Doesn’t Nocturnal Call want to extend the deal with any label from Europe or Asia?

We have known Joel for many years, the album he produced first is from The Zephyr back in 98, that’s how they start their friendship, that’s why César make the approach with AL since the beginning, right now we are happy and satisfied with the great work and support that Joel has given to Nocturnal Call he is a great person, but answering to your question, yes we are interested in expanding the deal with another label to take Nocturnal Call to more ears in the world and why not present our proposal in another country live.

In a precise and profound sense, how is Nocturnal Call best described? What exactly has inspired you?

Many times we have bad emotional streaks, we turn those emotions into music, describe melancholy, darkness and reflection. 

Last question: why should we listen to Nocturnal Call? Thanks.

Like I mentioned before, in NC you can find that strength that we need to endure life itself through sadness, darkness and sorrow, in our music you can find that inspiration that make you bring out that Black shine to last till our friend Death takes us to another astral plane.

http://nocturnalcall.bandcamp.com

http://alprods.bandcamp.com

Interview - PROTRUSION (USA)

PROTRUSION (US) is based in Lafayette, Indiana. The four-piece recently unleashed a 3-track Demo on April 14, 2023 which is really excellent. A band like this, perhaps on the basis of the experiences they have gone through in addition to their skills and deep knowledge of what they do, is indeed capable of producing something of high quality even if it is the first release.

Questions by The Unblessed

Answered by Colin Foster

Replied on May 17, 2023, 6:37 AM

Hail! Please give a little introduction about PROTRUSION - brief history, band members, etc.

Colin: I played drums in a lot of death metal bands up until around 2019 but was never entirely satisfied with my experiences. Something was always missing that I craved. I wanted something simply heavy and dark but also raw and honest in its composition. I decided I wanted something new and playing guitar in a real band was something I hadn’t done before. Sometime in 2021 was when I first sought out Kevin Baum to play drums and we started writing. Shortly after that, John Elston (Bass) and Kyle Christman (guitar) were brought into the mix, and since then we’ve all been working hard at making Protrusion the best it can be.

The “Protrusion” Demo sounds killer, ultimately! Have these experiences been a big part of the strength in this band?

Colin: Between the four of us, we each have a lot of experience from playing in other bands including some that were much more intense and demanding. The difference musically is that Protrusion gives us more time to breath and focus on expressing the atmosphere of death metal at its roots. Our strength comes in our primitive and crude simplicity.

On the other hand, what exactly inspired you all during the making of the 3-track demo - in terms of songwriting, music arrangements, recordings & the sound preference?

Colin: We were inspired by the morbid and dark sounds of 90s death metal. Our goal was to make music that could have existed at that time including the riffing and production styles found in that period of time. We recorded and produced everything on our own. Of course the recording equipment from the 90s is hard to come by so we had to adapt modern recording equipment to replicate those 90s analog sounds.

Tell us some information about the production and distribution of the demo - the self-released tapes, the CD version on Sevared Records. How was the response look like? Also reported that the EU editions available through Unholy Domain Records, please tell us more details?

Colin: When we finished recording the demo we didn’t really have a set plan on how to release it. At first we shared it digitally through YouTube, and started getting tapes prepared to distribute ourselves. We made our own j-cards and dubbed the demo to as many tapes as we had. We put the first 30 tapes on Bandcamp for sale. The response was overwhelmingly positive. We started receiving all kinds of requests from labels to produce their own versions of the tape. Unholy Domain Records was among the first labels we made arrangements with. We were also getting a lot of requests for a CD version so we partnered with Sevared Records to get that done. There are a handful of other tapes coming out around the globe but those haven’t been officially announced yet.

Old-school Death Metal is always the best and has become a cult. Are you against the presence of modern death metal? What is Death Metal according to your perspective?

Colin: I personally lost interest in “modern” metal long ago. To me death metal should be authentic regardless of style. These days most people believe that bands need to have “top-notch” production quality. The concensus is you have to buy lots of fancy equipment or digital tools so your band sounds unreal. To me that attitude is very disappointing and has become harmful to the very qualities that death metal originated with. Raw, aggressive, unhindered death… that is what is important.

Tell us some gigs and tours that has been done by Protrusion? What have you learned from each shows?

Colin: So far we have only played two shows. The first one was actually a benefit show after the passing of a friend of the band, Ryan King. The proceeds from the show went to his family and it ended up being an awesome event. Our very first hometown show is this Friday so we are looking forward to playing for all our close friends. We have a few more scheduled later this year that we will announce when the time comes.

A few hints about your next recordings/releases and some last words from Protrusion? Thanks!

Colin: We are wrapping up the writing portion of our full length album and we plan to focus on that for the second portion of this year. I’d like to thank everyone that has shown us their support this year by picking up a tape, a shirt, or a CD. That is very meaningful to us. Cheers.

http://protrusion.bandcamp.com

Interview - DALISAY (Philippines)

DALISAY (Philippines) has launched their debut full-length, “Ang Trahedya ng Dalisay at Ketungin” on September 15, 2021. This is sort of an impressive album, containing 7 tracks of old-school Death/Thrash aggression. The CD version was released by Surrogate Records (Ukraine) while the cassette edition was available through Screaming Skull Records (Norway).

Questions by The Unblessed

Answered by Jorel Torres

Replied on May 16, 2023, 1:30 AM

Hail! Please give a little introduction about DALISAY - brief history, band members, etc.

We are an Old School Death/Thrash from the Philippines that spews out subjects relating to socio-political issues. Founded in Cavite around 2006 by me (Jorel Torres), Gio Herrera, Jeffrey Batoctoy, and Jet Bartolome. Now, I’m the only remaining founding member.

The band suffered from a lot of line up changes, even after the release of the debut album. Currently, the line up consists of me on guitars and vocals, Mark Saguibo on bass, Khristian Virtudazo on guitars, and Toots Book on drums.

Explain more about your recent album “Ang Trahedya ng Dalisay at Ketungin”. The musics are extremely kills and the band is more comfortable with lyrics in the native language. Please further comments.

Our debut album, “Ang Trahedya ng Dalisay at Ketungin” is a 7-track concept album. All songs are sung in our native tongue, and tied together by character narratives, touching on familiar social issues in our country. It can also be seen as a cautionary tale of how poverty, famine, desperation, and dark past can lead someone into a downward spiral path to corruption.

Since all songs are reflections of our country’s social ills, in my opinion, there is none more potent way of delivering it other than using the local tongue, in terms of sincerity, authenticity, and impact. I think that applies to all countries and their respective local tongues.

What hugely influenced you all during the making of the album, especially in terms of songwriting, recordings and the entire sound preferences?

Lyrically, the inspiration behind is what I see not only on the news, but what I personally see on the streets, and on the neighborhood. 

Music-wise, we wanted to have same vibe and grit as those  bands that we look up to like Death, Obituary, Slayer, Sepultura, etc. but without being just a watered-down clone of said bands.

Everything was done DIY. We recorded and mixed almost all songs except “Sa Bunganga ng Pagkabaliw” on our own. Same applies to the album cover, which I painted on my own too. I wanted to give the album a highly striking image to represent visually the message it conveys, most especially to the local audience. Given that Philippines is a catholic country, the image of the Madonna and Child is a very familiar and sacred image to almost everyone in the country, and to which the album cover was inspired. I thought it was perfect to picture the leprous Lazaro in the same composition as both the Mother and the Child. Lazaro, who was left alone by her mother at a young age and acted out as the mother to himself on his path to desperation, corruption, and insanity.

Do you dislike and even completely reject modern Death/Thrash Metal?

No. Let’s just say we prefer the grittier and way more sinister appeal of old death/thrash sound. 

What about the responses you received for the album? How do you see the cooperation from the labels towards Dalisay?

We are very happy with the how it was received by extreme music fans, it inspires us to do more. Of course, we are also very grateful to Screaming Skull Records, Surrogate Rec., and Harrowing Industries in helping us release this debut to a wider audience, as well as to the zines and critics who wrote about and supported our debut, that includes you, RAISE THE DEAD! Cheers! If only we could ask more, we hope to have it release in vinyl too! Haha.

Does Dalisay play gigs and do tours? Tell us about it.

When we released the debut, our drummer at that time is based on USA, so gig was not possible. Though recently, since Jux had to leave, our new drummer, Toots, as well as our new axeman, Khristian, are both local based so we plan to return to playing in gigs soon.

A few hints about your next recordings/releases and some last words from Dalisay?

The follow up album is already on the works! It’s more subject-specific and fact-based. I had consumed documentaries and history books regarding the topics on this album. Haha. As much as I wanted it to be relentless in delivering my interpretation of the truth, I wanted to be more cautious on the veracity of the messages that we will be delivering to the audience. Though we sounded evil to your ears, we aim to do good for the society and not make things worse than they already are.

Soundwise, it’s faster, more aggressive, and melodies are more infectious than what was served on our debut. I promise you that!

http://dalisaypinoydeath.bandcamp.com

Brief Introduction:

Hail all living corpses!!…

I have just started an underground music oriented blog/zine called RAISE THE DEAD. I am not sure if this name has been used by any other publication before, forgive me if there is a similarity, but this one is Malaysia-based “Raise The Dead”. The focus is extreme Metal genres (death, black, thrash and doom!!!), where I will do interviews (with bands, labels, etc) and also reviews (based on music products on bandcamp mainly). Therefore, if interested please contact me at email: rtdeadzine@gmail.com with no doubt. Salute!

Blogger/Editor: The Unblessed