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PW: Firstly congratulations on the new album, the 1st thing that I wanted to ask was how come you made the decision to travel all the way over to Texas to record ‘Daemonspawn?’
PC: It was one of those strange situations that crops up once in a while. We got the opportunity to do four weeks residential recording so it was easier to take flights across to America and we knew the specs of the studio which was absolutely first class. We spoke at length with the guy that works there and between us we spoke at length about what we wanted to do, what we wanted to achieve and he seemed like he was on the same wavelength as us so it was the natural step to go to America and do it. There were certain bonuses, we could go and do a couple of gigs, interviews and radio promotion whilst we were there so it seemed like a good way to go and do our first transatlantic show and start making some inroads into the States where people have been asking to see us for a number of years and to be honest something we thought we would never get the chance to do. With the results that have been achieved we definitely think we have taken the right step.
PW: You worked with James Murphy (Testament & Death) how did this go, how easy was it to get into a routine with the recording and how long did it take to get everything laid down out there?
PC: Well the first thing obviously is getting over the jetlag, essentially going so far across time-zones. We acclimatised fairly easily and got into a good working routine with the guy who runs the studio. He liked getting up relatively late so we could go out and sort ourselves out and then rehearse in the morning and record in the afternoon and evening. We had plenty of time to go out and meet people and what have you, so it was, well I wouldn’t say easy but it was different from recording in the UK. The fact that it was residential meant it was easy to get acclimatised to any particular pattern of recording, because we didn’t have to drive miles to get to a hotel or anything.
The timescale was the best we have ever had, usually we are fighting against things with around about 2 weeks of solid recording whereas this time it was 4 weeks and obviously we could really take our time. The system we recorded was absolutely fantastic, we had unlimited tracks to record so we tried all sorts of experimentation and we came away with by far the best sounding Thus Defiled album we have ever done. It’s the most in-depth with the biggest production value and having James Murphy come in at the last stage and master was excellent. When you have someone like him say can I master your album you are not going to say no are you?
PW: You played a gig or two out there, what was this like and how did you find the organisation and the audience in Texas compared to the UK?
PC: The biggest difference is the venues are massive compared to the UK. We played essentially what is a local show in a venue the size of the LA2 Mean Fiddler (1000 capacity), on the same night as Motley Crue did their comeback show in the same town. We still got a very, very good crowd; it was half full, which on that particular night was amazing. We played with Demonseed, one of the best black metal bands in America and Vesperian Sorrow, one of the biggest bands from that area and one of my favourites, Catholicon US black metal and a couple of other local bands from the area. It was fantastic, the people were great and it was organised really well, a lot of press were down and a lot of exposure was gained from the show.
PW: The album took a fairly long time to actually go from recording desk to the shelf, good things do indeed come to those that wait but what was the delay?
PC: It was a case of we didn’t quite finish mixing to our specifications by the time we left, so we had to kind of mix it across the Atlantic if you like, which wasn’t so easy. Then missing James Murphy’s window of opportunity, we had to wait and work around him as well. Naturally it took a bit longer that if we had finished in the time slot and that’s why it took so long basically. Then naturally we had to reschedule our distribution deals so it came out a little later than we would have liked but for the press its garnering as you say in the question, it is worth the wait. We could have mastered it anywhere and got it done quicker but we feel we made the right decision, taking the time out and taking a step back and coming back a little later than planned with a big launch show, fantastic crowd, and turnout and an album mastered by one of the seminal figures in heavy metal history.
PW: You of course released it on your own label. Is this always going to be the case with Thus Defiled? You obviously have no limitations by doing so and I know you have been approached by a few labels but why have you essentially never given in?
PC: Because I always see heavy metal as independent and you do it for the right reasons. We never set out to be a band who wanted to be rich and famous, we want to be seen as a band who do great music for the right reasons every single time and there’s nobody in the world who can say otherwise to this point in our career. I have never said that we won’t sign to the right label for the right deal but the right deal has never, ever come along. We’ve had a substantial amount of deals offered and I’m sure there are good deals out there but they just don’t come along very often. If you want to jump at a deal any band can pretty much get signed very quickly, no doubt about that.
PW: Since the recording of the album you have had some line-up changes in fact half the band! What happened here and introduce us to the new members please?
PC: Our bass player Rob was essentially becoming a dad for the first time. So obviously he had to put things into perspective in his life and we all think he made the right decision. When you have a child you have to reapportion how you live your life. We wish him all the best with his family duties and I believe he is still playing but obviously not to the extent that it will encroach on his family as much as playing with Thus Defiled would have. Realistically there was no way he could go back to America with us for a month and play gigs at short notice.
Our drummer Nick, again it was just the same sort of thing really, not a kid but he felt he couldn’t commit the time to the band anymore, which was a shame because I had played with him for a long time, in fact since the band started. Again he’s done what he’s done for the right reasons, gave us plenty of notice. He’s still playing in local bands and we still go out drinking and hellraising.
We had to get 2 new guys for the band and spent a lot of time bedding them in (not in the biblical sense obviously). Again it’s probably advantageous that the album took so long to come out as it gave them a long time to settle into the band. When we came out to introduce them live at the launch party, everyone was ready to go 100%
PW: They have played in other bands as well.
PC: Yes Chas (Bass) has played in a number of bands and played all over Europe. Yes Liquefied Skeleton was one of his and he has also played in a major touring band.
Stewart (drums) has played in a number of underground UK bands like Epitome, mainly death metal based and has a lot of experience playing live and in fact both of them have added something to the band and put something onto what already exists, giving it that extra dimension. That will start coming across when we do the next recording.
PW: Moving onto the actual tracks on the album; the intro ‘Genesis In Darkness’ really reminded me of horror film scores such as ‘Tubular Bells’ from ‘The Exorcist’ and the score from ‘Phantasm’. Did films like this have any influence at all here?
PC: Not for me personally. The whole point with the intro of this album is it follows on from the outro of the last one ‘Weeping Holocaust Tears;’ bigger, better and fuller a kind of natural evolution, which is how we see the album as a whole. It’s like linking the two chapters of Thus Defiled together and that was the whole point of the intro as you will probably notice when you listen to it.
PW: You state that all music and arrangements are a group effort, how do you build upon ideas to get to the completed song and do you intend to continue group collaborations with the new line-up.
PC: Definitely there’s never going to be someone joining the band who doesn’t have something to add. We don’t see any point in having what would essentially be just a session musician; we have to be a band as a whole. It’s kind of a case of coming down with ideas for songs, see what works and what doesn’t and work out how we are going to make it into a whole piece. Determine what drum breaks work, what bass riffs work and how we are going to arrange the solos, which are quite a big part of our music. It’s a whole kind of growing process. We have never in our 15 years as a band had anyone come down saying “this is our song,” and that’s been what we have taken away as a final version. With everyone from the past right through to the present it has been like a seed from which we have created a song and long may this continue.
PW: One thing I liked was the fact that you attribute the solos in the CD booklet between yourself and Paul F. You were telling me before about how to differentiate between your two styles of soloing, remind me please?
PC: Well I’m much more of a seat of the pants player Paul F is much more of a staid educated player. I think we have a fantastic collaboration between the two of us. My definition is head and heart. I’m heavy metal pure, cut me and I bleed metal and Paul F is the same but is much more educated so if you look at contrasting guitar spirals you’ll find the way we work together as a pair of soloists is a fantastic contrast. It works perfectly, it’s the difference in the way like Iron Maiden and Judas Priest would work, because they are very much cut in the same mould. Awesome pairing but what we do is something a little different and obviously to a different background of music but we are very much a solo inspired band.
PW: A black metal Dragonforce!
PC: Ha yes I can see what you are saying but I mean I have been into metal for 20 plus years and Paul F for a similar length of time so of course we are motivated by the people we grew up with, which was much more solo inspired bands. None of us grew up on the last wave of black metal which is a lot harsher and the whole individuality is what black metal is all about. It has to be a personal thing, if you think you can play black metal and follow someone else’s example you are wrong, absolutely wrong. To get that across in what we do is part of the people who we are as individuals, creating what we do for the right reasons.
PW: Many bands as fast and ferocious as yourselves at times seem to flirt with clean vocal snatches as a matter of course. You are an exception to this rule, ever been tempted?
PC: No! Well it depends what you class as clean vocals, we have had some spoken parts on earlier albums but as for sung parts, no. It’s just not our thing. Some bands do it very, very well and some very badly. It’s not to say we won’t do some more spoken parts. I think a good dark orchestration to accentuate a certain piece of narrative is a very good thing in the right place. We don’t want to be the sort of band who relies on certain hooks and clichés to get into someone’s psyche. We do what we do and Thus Defiled is a pure full-blooded metal band, which has no place for clean vocals.
PW: Sakis was involved on ‘And They Shall Fear The Night’ sure everyone is asking you this but how did this collaboration come about?
PC: Again it was just one of those coincidences. I’ve known Sakis for a number of years. He’s been into the band since the demo days, which I think is great praise from one of the icons of the European metal scene. They are a very underrated band. He just asked what was happening with Thus Defiled at that point of time when he e-mailed. We said we were going to America to record the next album and he said he wanted to sing on it. We thought yes we will make this work somehow and what we did was I went away and looked at the lyrics and there was an obvious place which was a lyrical composition between the archangel Gabriel and Samael and Sakis was the perfect person to play Samael. We worked out his lines and he did them at his studio in Greece and sent us the material over. We dropped it onto what we had done in America and it worked out perfectly. It was one of those things that was meant to be and it couldn’t have been done any better.
PW: You are responsible for all lyrics and it is obvious a lot of thought is put into them. A recurring theme is a deep contempt for religion, statements such as “your messiah was spawned from the cunt of a whore,” pretty much make intentions clear. Would you care to expand upon your ideals and beliefs?
PC: I get asked this so many times. Generally I was much more vociferous many years ago when I was quite a lot younger and I think half the problem I find with black metal is that people are vociferous without an intellectual standpoint on what they do. I find that most bands that purport to be a mouthpiece of Satan are generally ridiculous. I’d like to think that people who read my lyrics can take something from them personally, so I don’t really believe in trying to put words into people’s mouths. I would rather someone takes it away and comes up with their own interpretation. I’m sure nobody would take them away and come up with something of a deeply enlightening and spiritually uplifting sense but I think they will find something within their personality, their psyche, their belief structure from the lyrics that I write. Be it something basic and deliberately obtuse like ‘your Messiah’s spawned from the cunt of a whore,’ or from something a little more profound, a little more interwoven into the text. I wouldn’t seek to say, this song is about this because for them that set of lyrics is what it was for me. Particularly when you are dealing with specific lyrics, for example one that will probably spring to your mind is Astaroth The Art Of Balance In Darkness, which is obviously my personal interpretation, my experience over many, many years with a particular entity. Other people may have a different interpretation of that, maybe through contact, maybe just through a general idea of what it would stand for as an essence. For them that’s right, for me that’s right. What you take away is the empowerment of the lyrics.
PW: Staying with the lyrics there is a real apocalyptic vibe to much of the material here. It’s as if you are foretelling a battle and a final dawn for mankind. ‘Daemonweilder’ and ‘Dreamraper’ for instance attack like a demonic behemoth, well that’s the vision that springs to mind to me. Is this apocalypse inevitable in your mind, does it allude to mans destruction of planet earth, or am I just reading into the fantastical side of things too much?
PC: To an extent but I guess if you look at things going back to Fire Serpent Dawn with the dawn of the final war quotes. That was much more from ancient prophecies rather than, this will happen. I believe firmly that there is a time of testing that is going through this period of evolution. Again you can take that as you will in that if you don’t think people are being tested on many levels, be it personal, physical, spiritual, then you are just denying your own existence. I think again there is something within the fabric of the lyrics, which I hope people can get into a little deeper and maybe take a little more out of rather than if they just skimmed the surface.
PW: Obviously you have not had the media attention in mainstream circles like Cradle Of Filth but I was wondering if your lyrics and T-shirt back-prints have ever caused you any trouble with conservative factions being offended by them?
PC: From time to time but we haven’t had the major scandals like the Cradle Of Filth t-shirt. We get, I would say for a band of our style and stature quite a lot of what we deem mainstream attention as I consider us as an underground band. Yet we still get in with the biggest magazines and the biggest stores with our CD’s and so on and so forth. Underground’s a very odd term of phrase, personally having been underground for years and years and years, I understand what it means to me but I don’t understand the terminology in the ‘scene’ today. What it means to me is something entirely different to what it means to the average gig goer. I guess today well someone who gives out a dozen MP3 tracks is underground. Back in our days for example someone who sells a thousand cassettes was underground. That’s the route we took and that’s the route Cradle Of Filth did but I guess those kind of figures today are just undreamed of because it’s an entirely different scene. Everyone’s changed; I mean the world has changed.
PW: You are one of those bands that are oft (for want of a better word) disrespected by forum trolls on internet message boards. What are your feelings when hard work is put down by generally such non constructive criticism or do you just completely distance yourself from them?
PC: I just don’t give a fuck in the slightest. Personally it just makes me laugh, especially when you realise what bands these people play in. 9 times out of 10 they are talentless, moronic and pre-pubescent. Don’t get me wrong there are some very, very good underground bands in the UK but there are many who try to glean success by running their mouths, many of whom have been caught out I have to say in certain ways. Generally armchair spectators are poisonous! Pointless, pointless people, they should really look at what they are doing themselves rather than criticise people who are beyond the reach of what they could hope to attain.
PW: Another clichéd question but as you were just mentioning it, what is your opinion of the current UK black metal scene, would you say it is a healthy breeding ground for new talent at the moment?
PC: I think there are a couple of bands who maybe able to put their heads above the parapet of trend but the problem that the UK has always had and its not just now but its been for years and years, there is no sense of unity from the UK scene. It’s all disparate, it’s all very clique and it’s like there’s certain groups of people that are all banding together to slag off other groups of people. Generally they have all been into black metal and I’m being generous here, for maybe 5-6 years and to my mind they really don’t have an understanding of the music they are trying to portray. That’s probably their main problem. If they had a deeper understanding of what they were purporting to be, they would probably not be so vociferous in their condemnation of other people, if they had that greater understanding or if they looked at themselves a bit more before shooting their mouths off.
PW: Thus Defiled were asked to contribute music to Phallusifer ‘the 1st black metal porno.’ How did this cum about and have you seen the movie yet and where’s my fucking copy?
PC: Funnily enough I got the movie a few days ago. Yeah it’s err what you would expect, there’s studs, leather, fucking and black metal. What more could you want from a porn movie? Seriously it beats the usual 70’ cheesy soundtracks. It does what it says on the tin. Its hardcore fucking with a soundtrack you will enjoy whilst you’re entertaining yourself. Again it was one of those things. The guy e mailed around saying do you fancy blah, blah, blah and he said what style he was after and Shadow And Storm seemed to fit that particular criteria and I believe although I’ve only seen it once that she’s taking it from behind during that scene. I could be wrong but there’s certainly some shagging going on.
At this point the couple who have sat on the next table and just had food delivered look somewhat nervous but keep their resolve and stiff upper lip, pretending to ignore the conversation.
PW: You are planning a split CD with oddball fringe loons The Meads Of Asphodel. Them doing punk covers and you metal ones. There is obviously a cover of ‘Black Magic’ on ‘Daemonspawn’ too. How much argument and thought has gone into your choices for the CD?
PC: Again it’s another of those odd coincidences. The Meads approached us to do a split CD with them. I got back to them saying this is what we were planning to do, which was one new song and some heavy metal covers. They came back and said, well we were planning to do one new song and a bunch of punk covers. When we got down to discussing what we were going to do there was a certain amount of, well not argument as such but we all put ideas into the hat so to speak and there was some obvious choices like ‘Creeping Death’ by Metallica a great band, a classic band. The only rule we had was the songs we did had to have that dark edge to them. So we couldn’t do for example most of Metallica’s songs. All the songs that I would say were dark but not black enough at getting their lyrics twisted to our form particularly with ‘Creeping Death’, which I think personally you will quite enjoy. We are also doing ‘Hellion’ by WASP, ‘Evil Dead’ by Death and ‘A Mansion In Darkness’ by King Diamond, plus one original piece with an intro to go with it. So we have got 4 classic metal songs, which have to be taken to their blackest extreme, kind of in the same way as we reworked ‘Black Magic’. It’s true to the original and has that same Slayer feel from the 80s’ but it’s not too clinical, not too clean, dark as hell and it just works fantastically well. I have such a passion for our cover of Black Magic its untrue, I absolutely love it.
PW: You are off to Texas to record this and playing with Acheron and doing The Milwaukee metal fest whilst there I believe?
PC: Indeed, when we got the opportunity to play Milwaukee, well its one of the famous world festivals, and we jumped at the chance. The opportunity to play with Acheron doing the ‘Rites Of The Black Mass’ set the night after is a personal bonus for me as I’ve been a fan of them since the demo days. I just can’t wait; it’s got to be one of the most evil performances ever. I think there’s about 10 bands playing on the Acheron festival, I don’t know maybe 100 bands playing Milwaukee. Engorged are playing who are one of my favourite bands, off the cuff Virgin Steele another favourite. Deicide are playing and it will be cool to meet up with those guys again.
PW: You are involved in another musical projects that our readers may not be aware of, tell us about those?
PC: I have a solo project called Dreamfire, which is much more film score based. There are no guitars, it’s not metal in the slightest but its epic and dark as hell. So if people are looking for something different that has that epic feel that you can only find in metal then I think that is possible what they would be seeking for. There’s certain musicians that have done it in the past but to a lesser or greater degree done OK or missed it by a couple of miles. With Dreamfire I like to tie into ancient legends, it’s kind of a musical interpretation of the dark side of legends, stroke history. I would say it was a unique style, I don’t even know how you would consider defining it. Dark ambient was a genre to itself and it certainly doesn’t fit into that. The phrase I used to use was ‘this is where music meets infinity’ that’s the best I could do. I guess that’s an esoteric way of describing what’s going on.
PW: Most people that throw a launch party simply play a few tracks off the album but you actually put on a show with 8 other bands and organised everything yourself, what are your memories of the day, must have been a bit of a blur?
PC: It was fantastic, not a blur in the slightest. You were drinking more than me. It was great to put on so many good bands. From the likes of NFD playing support to us, a fantastic band, right through to Discarnate who opened up, had deserved a place on that show. The crowd that turned out, I have so much respect for them, rammed the venue. It was a perfect day and I think one that shows that British metal in all its forms from death metal to black metal, through to Goth tinged heavy metal is the fucking best in the world. With 9 bands and Devilish Impressions coming over to do their stuff as well, it was just a fantastic showcase for British metal.
PW: It is evident that you have evolved one hell of a lot since you used to play way back in your career with corpse paint and pig’s heads, what lessons would you say you have learnt along the way?
PC: It’s not so much the lessons that we’ve learnt it’s just the scene has changed so much that we want to be distanced from it. The black metal scene that we started with was a world apart from how it is defined now. What it is now, we just do not understand, it just isn’t black metal. Black metal is not a sound, it’s a belief. Everybody now follows a sound as a career path and to me that is disgusting. If I define black metal as anything that comes under the banner of heavy metal music with an occult standpoint that is black metal. Therefore if you had 4-5 people from Sunday school playing Mayhem covers, would they be black metal? The answer is fucking no, but the amount of people that would say, they sound just like Mayhem and worship them as black metal would be untrue. They are all fucking wrong and I hate it with a passion. This is the biggest problem I have with black metal, people do not understand what it is anymore. They see it as a sound not a belief and as soon as people see it that way it defies the whole ethos of the scene. It was never like that when we started and all the great bands have never been like that, they all sound different. I mean, do Venom sound like Rotting Christ or Mayhem or Emperor? No they don’t and they are all great black metal bands. How many bands sound like Emperor and aren’t great black metal bands? There are loads, they just are not black metal. It’s the biggest travesty on extreme metal in the last 10 years and I hate it.
PW: Final question, do you want to transcribe this for me?
PC: No, no, no, no.
PW: Well it was worth a try and I think it is fair to say that this is a very opinionated insight and one that makes a lot of sense from a spokesman of a group that have essentially been around since the early 90’s and the genesis of black metal, watching it involve and perhaps even stagnate, corrupting in on itself.
 | Daemonspawn is out now on Shadowflame Distribution. Resources: |
Interviewed by Pete Woods