As much as the underground music fan loves a battle-tested road dog band, don’t let anyone fool you: touring isn’t glamorous, and at times not fun. If it wasn’t for the love of music, why else would people do it? This never more true than for your crusty, blackened metal miscreant bands such as Mutilation Rites. Playing 27 dates over five weeks,crisscrossing the country to do it in a van ain’t exactly for the weak. The only stop of any length is for South By Southwest, which is its own little nightmare in and of itself. On the road supporting last summer’s excellent release Harbinger (Prosthetic Records), Mutilation Rites just finished a tour of Europe and has more gigs in the offing. Joined on the tour by the crushing German duo Mantar, enjoying their first time on tour in the USA, this has to be one of the cooler, truer tours of the early going in 2015. Catching both bands in the intimate 51 West venue in Phoenix AZ, photographer Julian Thompson glimpsed the bands both chilling out before the show, and boiling over live.

Mutilation Rites, by Julian Thompson

Mutilation Rites, by Julian Thompson

Mantar, by Julian Thompson

Mantar, by Julian Thompson

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PHOTOS BY JULIAN THOMPSON