San Jose, California deathgrind maniacs Deathgrave are back with their third album, Hell is Evil, and Decibel has an exclusive early stream of the new album for your listening pleasure. Formed more than a decade ago by veteran musician and engineer Greg Wilkinson (Autopsy, Brainoil, Earhammer Studio), Deathgrave have maintained a steady stream of releases and live activity.

On Hell is Evil, Deathgrave open themselves to outside influences, pulling more from thrash, death metal, punk, noise rock and even industrial than ever before. As a result, the 32-minute record is packed to the gills with action and you can get in on it by streaming below. The album is out officially tomorrow, August 21, on Tankcrimes (digital here). Keep reading for an interview with Wilkinson about the new album.

It’s been about three years since the last Deathgrave album. What’s changed in the time since? 

Literally the world in not a totally awesome way. I’m getting distracted. In regards to Deathgrave, we were able to explore more musical boundaries and fully develop our sound. We started writing our previous album, It’s Only Midnight, when Clint [Baechle, drums] joined in 2018. A lot of songs were pretty old hat to us by the time the album came out. So, for Hell is Evil, we really all got to musically understand each other and lean into expanding our sound with a more solid focus. The album from front to back was freshly composed, new and exciting for us while creating it.

What musical ideas were you focused on with Hell is Evil? Some of these songs are very grindy, while others are definitely more punk in their songwriting. Was that a conscious choice? 

We have always been a band that straddles multiple musical genres. To me, this aspect is no different than before except I focused on blending the styles and transitions to feel more seamless. Each song was written with a musical motif in mind so some songs lean more in one direction or another.

Does the album title relate to the lyrics throughout the record? The title track seems to focus on a fictional depiction of Hell, while “Born from Death” is about Georgia’s inhumane anti-abortion laws. 

No, each song has its own theme and set of lyrics.

Chris Reifert is featured on “Hard to Swallow.” Did that collaboration come out of your tenure in Autopsy? 

I mean, it made it easier to have him come down! The short story was Andre [Cornejo, vocals] wanted a rant during the section where Chris sings. He hit a block there while tracking. Andre and Fern [Alberts, bass] were talking in the kitchen while I was sifting through tracks and they mentioned how cool it would be to have Chris come down and do his thing. I wrote Chris and he was down at the studio within an hour or so. He even wrote his lyrics for that section after reading Andre’s lyrics and discussing what the song was about. Super fast and professional as always.

You also recorded/mixed/mastered Hell is Evil. Does that make it a more seamless experience for the band and allow you to work on songs until they’re where you want them? 

In a way, yes. I wrote the basic skeleton of every song before anyone learned anything. Everyone wrote their parts and immediately tracked. This is how all of us work. Our recording process is almost like an ad-lib. We could have technically done this anywhere with this process but it was great just doing this ourselves on our own schedule. When it came to mixing and mastering, I didn’t want to overwork anything. Deathgrave is an untamed beast and needs to sound that way. Who better for the job than ourselves?

On a personal level, when I record my own music, I tend to grab the inspiration while it’s there. If a song or part isn’t working, I won’t beat it to death. It goes straight to the can or the holding cell for a potential revisit in the future. There were two parts on the record where I compositionally changed the sections while tracking because they weren’t working as I envisioned. We have to facility to do this and wasted the 20 minutes to redirect the parts. It happened in real time while Clint was tracking the drums.

In both instances, they served the song better. I believe if the song doesn’t bloom during the creation process, it may be best to let it die on the vine. If it is something magical, it will come back during another wave of inspiration, most likely. The important thing is to constantly create new ideas so losing some along the way is a huge part of the process. It is important to keep a fair amount of improvisation within the writing, layering, composition and recording. We are, in theory, trying to capture lighting in a bottle. If it takes a long period of time and labor to capture a song, it is no longer an encapsulation of inspiration. So doing this ourselves on our own schedule, in my studio, and on our own terms is definitely the smoothest way for us.

The post Full Album Stream: Deathgrave – “Hell Is Evil” appeared first on Decibel Magazine.