1. Hi! What can you tell us about your new album, A New Dawn For The Dead?
A: Hey, hows it going??? Well, like you said, it’s our new album, third full length album, and we’re continuing on the classic Gorerotted themes of horror and violence and creating dark and violent atmospheres in music! Hope you like it!
2. How would you compare it to your former albums musically?
A: Well I think it’s a logical progression! If you play each album back to back, or at least a few tracks, you can hear that the principal elements are there, but each time the sound develops, and the structures become much more in depth! This time we have really bonded as far as song writing is concerned, as we’ve been playing together for several years now, and I think we’ve taken our favorite parts and really blown them apart this time!
3. The sound is much clearer then your older stuff, how was it achieved?
A: Yeah, I agree! It was just a different approach to the recording, and that we have all become better musicians over time, so everything is much clearer! We wanted to capture some of the energy that makes our live sound so intense, and it had to remain very natural sounding, but still brutal! I think we came out the other side looking good!
4. Why just one vocalist this time?
A: Well there’s actually 2, myself doing Bass and vocals, and Ben on main vocals! One is the high pitched screams (me) and the other is the guttural death vocal!
5. Lyrically, the album seems to have the usual amount of gore, and the regular morbid sense of humor in the song titles, what would you describe the content being about?
A: Like you said, it’s violent and aggressive, but Gorerotted has always maintained a certain sense of humor in our music! So many bands act all serious and mean, and they are actually nothing like that in real life! With Gorerotted, what you see is what you get, and we’re very honest in our music, our demeanor, and our live attitude! It’s really just about our lives, drink and drug abuse, drunken violence…blah…
6: I had a hard time thinking of your most hilarious song title, and went for Gagged, Shagged, Body-Bagged, what's your favorite?
A: Yeah, that is a classic one, and one of my favorites! I think my favorite is Severed Sawn and Sold as Porn, it’s funny, yeah, but it’s clever in it’s word play, and I love the lyrics in that song too!
7. Though the basis for your music seems to be technical death metal and grind-core, there are certain riffs and melodies that sound more rock or rock n' roll like, how do you write your music, and how would you define it?
A: Dude, you know exactly what we’re all about here! Although I’ll find it hard to define exactly what we are! We write extreme metal, in many of its forms, from death meal, through Black Metal, and yes, there is so much punk and rock and roll in there too! We don’t write it in a specific way, just what comes naturally to us, and sounds good in the studio! I’m glad it comes across that way!
8. The album also includes a DVD, what's in it?
A: It’s a cool DVD, it’s got 2 live shows, and the Only Tools and Corpses music video that we made! One of the live shows is from Summer Breeze festival in Germany last year, and shows us in the big festival arena, and another club show, which is up close and personal! It shows 2 sides to our show, and we thrive in both environments!
9. You also did a cover for Emperor's I Am The Black Wizards, why that certain song?
A: Well it s a great song, and Emperor wrote some amazing music! The thing about picking a cover, is something that I find difficult, and I think a lot of bands mess up! For example, death metal bands may pick a cover, and say it’s Cannibal Corpse, and all they do is end up recording some carbon copy of a song and don’t put their own mark on it! The Emperor song for us was perfect, because we could stay true to the original, and put our own “sound” into the song – I love it, I hope Emperor would too!
10. The New album's artwork seems miles ahead from your older stuff, who did it, and where did the idea for it came from?
A: Yes! I agree! I liked the old art, and it suited those albums, but it would have been so wrong for this one! The music has evolved, and is much more dark and sinister, so the artwork had to reflect that! It was done by Mick Kenney, who does art for Napalm Death, Anaal Nathrakh and other extreme bands – he is a real weird guy, I’d hate to see what's going on in that head of his!
11. You guys come from all over England, apart from Wilson, who's imported from Scotland, how do manage a working order when everyone's living quite far from each other?
A: Yeah I was still living in Glasgow for about 6 months being in the band, and had to get on the bus for 9 hours to go the rehearsals or go to shows! I’ve been living in London for 3 years now, but 3 of the other guys are still about 4 hours away! It’s difficult, but we get together for a few days, and do full days in the studio, and get drunk afterwards, so it’s good fun!
12. The album's title is taken from George Romero's classic zombie film, did you like the new version, and did you see the new Land Of The Dead one already?
A: I loved the new version – I know that so many people will say that’s shit, because it seems these days that you're not allowed to like new versions of anything, but I loved it! It stayed true to the original, and brought the zombies up to date – they were really fast like in 28 Days Later! I haven’t seen the Land of the Dead one, didn’t even know it was out, but I’ll be checking it out as soon as possible!
13. You have a tour planned with Decapitated, where will it take place, and is it your first time touring with that certain band.
A: Yeah, it's our first time touring with them, but I think it should be cool! We head out in September, right through to October – we start in Prague, and work our way through Europe, back to England and Scotland, to Norway and Sweden, and back to Europe – check out our site, the full dates are there!
14. Who or What is Dusty Bin, how was it lost, and is it the guy using the bong, or the bong itself?
A: Dusty Bin is Junky Jon’s bong – it went missing when he was doing a tour in the UK with some other bands! It has been on many tours with us, and I’m sure many other bands will miss him too! Please bring back Dusty Bin!
15. What do you think of Becks's new tattoo, the one in Hebrew he did on his arm?
A: I think it’s crap, not that it’s Hebrew or anything, but my tattoos are way better than Becks, I’d kick his ass, then drink his beer, and not shag his wife cause she’s a minger!
16. Are you a supporter of going on-stage the Anselmo way, meaning, stoned, and after three pints of Guinness, or are you a staunch supporter of sobriety?
A: We laugh in the face of sobriety, and it’s more like 10 pints of Guinness! Nah, I have done some shows pretty pissed in the past, so I prefer to get drunk after the show, and I mean completely drunk! Tim does like to have a few before we play, and Jon has been known to be completely off his face, but he still drums like a machine!
17. How is the band doing in the UK, where metal has not been doing so-well in the last decade or so?
A: It’s OK here, the UK is very fickle when it comes to metal! One minute you're amazing, and the next thing, your old news! The UK fans seem to be led by the media, and take whatever they are spoon fed, and that’s sad! But the thing is, you can’t win everywhere we just have to keep battling on!
18. Plans for the future of the band?
A: Try and stay out of jail, and hopefully not end up dead – if we achieve that, then we’ll have a few more albums in the future!
That's it, thanks for doing this interview!
Cheers,
Alon Miasnikov
