The UK has had its share of legacy bands from the world of death metal. Many bands have come along to thrill us with gore, speed, rawness, and technicality over time. However, it has been quite a while since an new band was formed with some of the ideals of the innovators, but had something current to say in a modern sense. One such band is Monumentomb. Recently signed to Metal Music Austria (unannounced at the time of this interview), the band is about to release its brutal and impressive new EP, Ritual Exhumation. Ghost Cult scribe Caitlin Smith caught up with frontman/ lead guitarist Byron Braidwood (ex-Spearhead) via email for a Q & A interview to discuss the origin of the band, the new EP, assorted influences from across the death metal spectrum and the outlook for the future of the local death metal metal scene in the UK.
Can you give us a run down of how Monumentomb came together? Where and how did it all begin?
I was drinking at a metal pub in my local town. The Beherit shirt I was wearing at the time prompted conversation very quickly when Alex noticed it, and we’ve been very good mates ever since. Then after some time, we got talking and decided to form a band, utilising our strong agreement in musical tastes. At the same pub at a separate time, I met Gaius while drinking at a mutual friend’s birthday. I then met Lee at a gig Alex was playing with his band: Infected Dead. Alex heard on the grapevine that Lee was a decent and freed-up drummer and introduced us that night. We all started getting along very quickly and easy with no hassle fortunately.
You have played in some major bands before, namely Spearhead and Archaicus (now Lychgate). Why the decision to start a band from the beginning this time?
Archaicus was the first ever band I joined. I was still in my teens and still at school, we played a few gigs in London but we decided to concentrate on starting Spearhead properly. This was due to the Black Metal scene at the time losing its pull for me. Personally, death metal has always been my main ambition. I left Spearhead due to personal and directional reasons, after we got back from touring the USA. I took some time out and took a step back from music altogether for a little while. Since then, I decided that I want to play a style I’ve always wanted to play and enjoy the sound of, as opposed to just writing/playing for the sheer sake of and becoming completely devoid of passion.
You released your first EP Ritual Exhumation this year. Tell us about some of the lyrical inspiration behind the album.
They’re simply inspired by morbid horror stories/movies and matching the visual themes for us. The themes and lyrics are essentially all based around necromancy and death rituals/rites with an apocalyptic goal, with narratives and side-stories in between. A lot of inspiration comes from the Necronomicon by Lovecraft and related grimoires in terms of direct literary inspiration. I’m an avid fan of 80′s horror and splatter films and comics, it’s usually easy enough to write lyrics to these themes but it’s tough to attempt a new angle when a lot of the subject matter has been broached upon before. So just sticking to familiar territory lyrically just fits and suits the sound we’re trying to achieve.
The album is dripping in old-school death metal sound. Was this something you were aiming for when you started writing material
Not entirely, the production values resulted that way by chance to some extent, the equipment and time constraints we had impacted the overall feeling. The sound itself, would have more than likely ended-up being cleaner if we had more time, but we never wanted to have a squeaky clean production as it wouldn’t compliment the style/character at all.
You mention being inspired heavily by older bands. How do you feel about the current death metal scene?
The current scene is surfacing with some like-minded bands thankfully, such as Decrepid, Hellsworn, Gravecrusher, Sentience, Crypticus etc.. Which is very good to see: Bands that believe that the pioneers of the genre are owed recognition and homage for inspiring the new bands we have today, so to speak. We all have a lot to thank them for. I think the current scene is still going relatively strong, obviously there have been some killer death metal gig line ups in the UK this year so far to demonstrate this.
How did the EP come together? Was it a joint writing effort or did someone take the lead?
Myself and Alex started with jamming riffs, licks and ideas together. As time passed, it then transpired to the riffs and sections for the EP being all written by myself. In essence, someone took the lead, haha.
The EP is mixed by Graham Waller, where did you come across him and why did you decide to use him for the EP?
We originally met through some mutual friends at a local Wretched Soul gig and got talking about his studio and options at first. Then after some lengthy chats at Bloodstock 2013, I was very confident that he would be the right man for the job and the sound we were looking for. His professionalism and technical ability totally surpassed our expectations, also considering the budget we had he did a stellar job on the EP.
Kent has not always been known for its prominence on the metal radar when it comes to metal bands. What is the local scene in your area like?
The local scene is active, and very diverse in terms of the styles of metal. Bands like Infected Dead, Vulgate, Victim Identified, Wretched Soul, Then the Wave Came, Greg(o)rian and Dark Theory: All these bands are valuably contributing to the live scene in Kent. They are all relatively different styles to each other which indicates that there is a demand and interest for extreme metal in Kent. But the attendance of local extreme metal gigs can be very unpredictable in terms of turn-outs.
What can we expect from Monumentomb in the future?
We are still writing material for a full-length to be released next year hopefully. This is in conjunction with playing Beermageddon festival in August, and playing 2 London dates later this year with Krow and Gravecrusher. Label dealings are ongoing too, there will be official news in regards to this announced soon, though. Looking into touring and increasing our live presence is ever a forefront intention for the band as well.
Read our 8/10 review of Ritual Exhumation.
CAITLIN SMITH