[Pestilence’s Technical Wizard: Patrick Mameli ] “Well, you have to realize that the album has already been available to the fans in Europe for some time now and it’s been received pretty well. But I’ve always been a guy who doesn’t play sunshine because I’m always dealing with truth. That’s just how I am. There have always been people who talk bad about Pestilence. We’ve had some bad reviews as well like ‘it’s not the real Pestilence without Martin Van Drunen, blah blah blah.’ That’s just my stigma and it’s something I have to live with. Those are people who are just stuck in the past. This is Pestilence 2011 and we’re just trying to deliver some good music. That’s what it’s all about.” – Patrick Mameli

[Diabolical - All Life Ends] “Nowadays we try to play live as much as possible. I think for the most part our music translates live pretty well. We try to think of that aspect already when we write songs and when we are in the studio. We play moderately complex stuff so keeping riffs at least somewhat simple is good for live purposes, otherwise you’ll end up hating yourself ‘cause you have to spend endless hours of practice just to nail your own riffs when you play live. We’ve done that mistake in the past, ending up staring at our instruments instead of headbanging.” – Carl Stjärnlöv

[Morbid Angel – You Have Been Warned ] “We do what we do. I’m used to this; it’s nothing new that people have diverse opinions of the band and I welcome it all. Positive, negative, in the middle…there hasn’t been much in the middle. It’s really interesting to me because it causes people to have a reaction. If things are just so easy that people mosey up to a McDonald’s drive-thru and they get their Happy Meal and it doesn’t taste any different than the last one, we don’t know. Are there more preservatives? Are the fries hot, cold, or soggy? Sometimes we don’t even make these distinctions.” – David Vincent

[Morbid Angel – Illud Divinum Insanus Track by Track Breakdown ] The dust has almost settled on what is easily the year’s most controversial album, this of course being Morbid Angel’s Illud Divinum Insanus. Because there’s such a flurry of opinions surrounding it, we figured breaking the entire friggin’ thing down was the right thing to do. So that’s what our own resident death metal expert Mike Sloan and your quasi-esteemed editor decided to do…

[Tyr - Onward Into Battle] “We take a lot of pride in it. We’re very honored to be the representatives for people hearing about our country for the first time. I’m not fond of national pride in itself. Because where you’re born is arbitrary – you have no control and it can very easily get pointless and cheesy. As for striking the elbow, I’m all for it. We’re often mentioned when music from the Faroe Islands [is discussed] in general; we’re one of the names to come up and so I think it’s evident we’ve made some impact.” – Heri Joensen

[Vex – A Wilted Memoir] “The poem advances a view of death as not so much a tragic end as a triumphant entrance into nature: ‘Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again, And, lost each human trace, surrendering up Thine individual being, shalt thou go To mix forever with the elements.’ This is thematically similar to the lyrics that I was writing for the album at the time, which both celebrate and resent the futility of human life in the cycles of nature and the grand narratives of history.” - Ciaran McCloskey

[In Flames - Destroying the Gyroscope] “You want to become your heroes; you don’t find your own sound. Today we’re more influenced by ourselves or what’s around us. In the early days, it was like, ‘You have to do this. You have to sound like this. You have to be part of the scene.’ Even though that’s what we wanted, we were a little more unsure of our place in the world. It’s a part of growing up. I’m super-proud of those albums and they are fucking amazing for what they are. I’d never be here without them. But The Jester Race Part II will never happen and if we tried, it would sound terrible.” – Anders Friden

[My Dying Bride – Floating In Darkness] “Not that hard actually, but tiresome as we had to listen to every single riff we've ever written from the original demo to the current CD, make notes of them and rearrange them, then try to explain what we wanted to classical musicians, which wasn't as easy as we'd expected. But ultimately, it was great fun. It is indeed [experimental], but much more in the vein of gothic/classic which our fans are in love with. It's like the sound track to the darkest, melancholic and yet passionate movie never made.” – Aaron Stainthorpe

[Degradead – Watch Them Feed] “Yes, it was really cool to record in the same studio as many of our favorite bands and bands that we look up to, creativity is flowing. When you say ‘ghosts,’ Jonas [Kjellgren, producer] told us this ghost stories of the old wreck mental hospitable that is just 300 meters from the studios, and h also told us that the studio is haunted and one of the bands that where recording there did not dare to sleep in the studio. But we did not notice any ghosts over there even if it’s a little scary, but I guess we are lucky ha-ha!” - David Szücs

[Tony Choy - The Genesis of Synkronizity] “I know how to do an album, make an album and promote an album. I’ve been a part of 28 albums and if I don’t know how to do an album now, I should just quit! These labels don’t give a shit about you. So if you are in a band or a musician, save your money, do it yourself and do it right. I have the money to do this and I have surrounded myself with really good, professional people who I can trust. You don’t need a label anymore; they are a thing of the past. All they are is a bank, man.” – Tony Choy

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