For a group with 12 years of experience, Daylight Dies has a relatively small catalogue of releases. The gloomy group from North Carolina has only released two full-length albums and while the group might be short on quantity, it has never faltered in quality. Their first proper release, No Reply laid the foundation for what would become the Daylight Dies sound. This critically-acclaimed album combined subtle melodies with down tempo rhythms and deep, death metal growls.
It took the group four years to create the follow up to No Reply. Dismantling Devotion showed a leap in terms of maturity. Their signing to Candlelight Records marked a new beginning for the group. Whether it was the darker breed of bands that inhabit Candlelight or Jens Bogren’s mix, whatever factor attributed to this change, the coming of Dismantling Devotion brought a greater amount of attention to the band. The successful of this album was apparently a factor in the group being chosen for their first North American tour, which included Moonspell and Katatonia.
On June 24th, Daylight Dies released their sophomore album under the Candlelight banner and their third overall. Lost to the Living stays consistent in style, but like its predecessors, reveals an ever-maturing group. The group has released a limited edition EP with a preview track of the forthcoming album, which they made available to their fans while on tour with Candlemass. Other previews came via the stage, where the group performed two of the new tracks. Before Daylight Dies took the stage in Fort Worth, Texas, drummer Jesse Haff spoke with Blistering.com under a scorching, Fort Worth, Texas sun.
Blistering.com: You release Lost to the Living in a couple of weeks. What are your thoughts on this album?
Jesse Haff: We’re really proud with what we put together on this album. We think it’s a good progression from Dismantling Devotion. The songs are really strong; there is a good variation of material. We can’t wait to get it out there! We have been playing some of the songs on this tour, and the reception has been very good. Hopefully, people will like the album when it comes out.
Blistering.com: Jens Bogren (Opeth, Katatonia) mixed the album at Fascination Street Studios in Sweden, and you recorded the album in Volume 11 Studios. What brought you back to these two studios after using them on your last recording, Dismantling Devotion?
JH: We were happy with the result of Dismantling Devotion. Volume 11 Studios is a studio in Raleigh. We try to record everything as inexpensive as possible, so we can use the limited budget that we have on Jens. I think he’s talented and he brings our music to life in a way that we want. Basically, we liked what happened with Dismantling and we wanted to repeat it.
Blistering.com: Stylistically, I hear similarities between your band and Opeth and Katatonia. Jens also worked with those bands. Were you going for that sound?
JH: Originally, that wasn’t the intention because the first time we went to Jens for Dismantling he hadn’t done an Opeth album, yet. I think he did Viva Emptiness for Katatonia, but the main reason we went there was we heard the Bloodbath album Nightmares Made Flesh. It had such a massive production, and it didn’t have a particular sound. Some studios, like Studio Fredman or Abyss Studios, have a sound that tells you an album came from there. We wanted something that was more individualistic, something that didn’t sound like a clone production. We felt like Jens is really able to get that. That’s why we went to him for Dismantling. Obviously, the work that he has done since then on Opeth and Katatonia is phenomenal and fits them for their style. All of his productions don’t just sound the same.
Blistering.com: Online studio updates are becoming quite popular. Tell me about the decision to record your studio sessions?
JH: It’s another way to communicate with people who are interested in what we are doing. It is also a way to record for ourselves. When we get older, we can look back at what we did. I felt like we didn’t record well the last time, and we sort of regretted not having something to look back on for our own memory. This time we tried to amp it up a little bit.
Blistering.com: The word “loss” occurs in one form or another throughout your album. The album’s title is Lost to the Living, and two tracks contain this negative word—“At a Loss” and “Woke up Lost.” Is loss a central theme of this album?
JH: Believe it or not, the album is not a concept album, but there is a thread that seems to appear throughout the lyrics. This time—I think you hit the nail on the head—loss is one of those threads. We looked back at some of the song titles and lyrics after everything was done and thought, “Oh shit, this has become a theme.” It wasn’t our original intention. The album goes with a lot of varied subjects, but one of the subjects is about getting older and learning to deal with it, losing youth and losing a lot of things as you get older. I didn’t write the lyrics, but I believe one of our songs is about losing a friend. As you get older, you do tend to lose youth, friends and other things. It deals with really happy subjects like that (laughs).
Blistering.com: Nathan Ellis is your main vocalist. He uses a death metal vocal style. However, on a couple of tracks, Egan O'Rourke inserts his clean voice. Why did you only use his voice for these two tracks?
JH: We consider ourselves a death metal band in regards that we have death metal vocals. A lot of people are sensitive about the way that you use genre markings. Some people say we’re doom metal, some people say we’re not doom metal, some say we’re doom/death, gothic or whatever. I don’t care, I think we are just a metal band, but we want death metal vocals as our main vocal style. Obviously, we think Eagon [O’Rourke] has a great voice, and he adds a dynamic that makes everything more interesting and varied. We like to use him, and might use him more in the future; however, we have no intention of using all clean vocals like some other bands. That’s a trend we would like to avoid.
