Artist Interview

It's rare that an artist, much less a cartoonist, can pay homage to extreme metal without the feeling that he or she is laughing at it behind his or her back. Fortunately, with Black Metal, artist Chuck BB and writer Rick Spears have created an awesome tribute to their favorite genre of music that cackles right in its fucking face. Full of quirky humor, riveting plot development, and great heaps of northern darkness, Black Metal tells the tale of Shawn and Sam Stronghand, two demonic brothers whose love of sonic darkness leads them to find a magical sword and overthrow the hierarchy of Hell itself. Revolver reached out to ink-slinger Chuck BB about the task of crafting a worthy cartoon sacrifice to the power of the beast.

REVOLVER How did you and Rick Spears came up with Black Metal?
CHUCK BB At the time I was way into black-metal music, I just couldn't get enough, so of course my drawings reflected it. I started doodling these two metalhead hooligans with corpse paint, but I had very little planned out aside from the fact that they had a sword. I met up with Rick years ago—I already knew his work—and when I showed him some of the character designs, he got pretty into the idea, and I sent him a bunch of Darkthrone and Emperor and he fleshed out the story like a real champion of the deep.

As the artist, how much input do you have on the story behind the comic book? Does Rick send you a story, or do you two collaborate?
It's a fairly collaborative process. Rick handles the writing, but we always discuss where it is going beforehand. And then I end up coming back with notes. Mostly my notes are something like, "Can we change this minotaur into a goat-a-taur?"

Your artistic style is very different from traditional black-metal art—not as much cross-hatching, more clean lines. What did you do to inject the music's atmosphere into your artistic style?
Use a lot of black! Partly that's true, I think that there is a good amount of contrast in the books, that is sort of indicative of those great Darkthrone album covers. Of course the style I work in is very cartooned—and that is something pretty foreign to black metal, which has an image that is taken very seriously. But I think that the subject matter of the genre lends itself to cartooning. It's how I draw, and I love black metal—so it's what I do.

Tell us about Sam and Shawn Stronghand, their origin and design. Though they're twins, what differentiates them as characters—other than a hoodie?
Don't forget their corpse paint patterns are different. Shawn is the de facto leader of the two, because he wields the sword. Sam is the more visceral feral brother, who will get a little more violent and probably says fewer words. But their differences become much more apparent in Black Metal 2, where the twins truly find their individual voices and motivations.

Black Metal Vol. 1 sees Sam and Shawn defeating the ruling Baron of Hell. Where does Vol. 2 take us?
I think Gaahl of Gorgoroth said it best "...Satan." It is those aforementioned differences between the Brothers Stronghand that come into play story-wise.  All the while delving deeper into hell and ascending to the blasphemous bureaucracy of Heaven. We see much more of Satan, and it is very likely that the twins will come face to face with the Bringer of Light.

The figure of Satan Himself only shows up at the very end of Black Metal Vol. 1—why wait so long? Many would think Satan to be the pivotal character in the story of this music…
Of course you can't have black metal without Satan, we knew that—but we wanted to build up to that. And I won't say too much, but Book 2 has plenty of the big guy. Black Metal 2 gives us a pretty solid look at Satan, his origins in heaven and in hell. So Don't worry—Satan is fully covered in the world of Black Metal 2, and he proves to be very pivotal.

A big part of Vol. 1 is Frost Axe, your fictional black-metal band. What went into their creation? In your mind, how do Frost Axe sound?
Initially, I think we had settled on the name Wintre Blade, but after a moment it became apparent that was way too fantasy/power metal. I always envisioned them as sort of an Immortal-like band. Big giant Norsemen, who dress like black-metal wrestlers. I think they sound just like Immortal as well, but with a Burzum-like production value. There is something bigger than life about a band like Immortal, and, on top of having this crazy image with all the posing and wireless guitar playing on mountain tops, they also put out some pretty great tunes. I was able to get Christophe Szpajdel to design Frost Axe's new logo which appears in Black Metal 2. You may know his logo work from a little band called Emperor and many others. It is totally awesome [Check out Szpajdel's work at frostaxe.com.]

Many would see writing a comic book about black metal as poking fun at the genre, but Black Metal is very serious and respectful. Is it a hard balance to keep—being funny, but not hating on the music?
I love every aspect of black metal, from the kvlt grimness of low-fi recording to the ridiculous corpse paint—I honestly think it is all so cool. But you have to be sort of blind, even within this genre, by now to not find some things relatively humorous about it. Still, it was very important for us to not poke fun directly at the genre, and this is where I think the style I chose to draw it in comes in handy. The art style is fun, and has some humor to it—but the subject matter is almost completely serious and intense as hell. I think the book comes off pretty reverential to the genre, and metal in general—with many references and capturing the overall attitude of a teenage black-metal kid.

Tell us about your own experiences getting into black metal.
Living in Los Angeles, it may seem pretty hard to identify with a music born out of frost and an overbearing Christian presence—but something about the music just drew me in. From the imagery, to the melodies...it just connected with me. There is something so genuine about black metal, especially the early stuff, it's hard not to admire because it came from such a real place.

You reference tons of bands in the comics, both visually and textually—who are your favorite black-metal bands? Who do you listen to while draw
Yes, we definitely wanted to pepper the book with lyrical reference and visual references. There are just so many great lyrics to quote, Rick and I would just keep emailing each other back and forth with different choice selections. Easily my favorite piece of black metal is Ulver's black-metal Trilogie. I even have all three of the albums on picture-vinyl in the box set, because I am a nerd. Of course, I regularly listen to Emperor, Burzum, and Darkthrone for inspirations, as far as newer bands I'm really enjoying Nachmystium, Agalloch, and Wolves in the Throne Room... I just recently started listening to the new Absu album, and if it is as good as their last, it may go into the Black Metal inspiration pile. The truth is I listen to way too many to even remember everything and some of the stuff absolutely blends together. Beyond that, I am not limited only to metal while I work, and I do imbibe quite a bit of podcasting and Howard Stern.

How have metal fans responded to Black Metal?
I was pretty worried how It would be received by metalheads, that that might think we were mocking the genre or taking the genre for our own purposes.  But the goal was always to sort of write a love letter to metal music and attitude. Thankfully, it has been almost 100-percent positive. I have met a lot of metalheads who love the book. I even had one guy say that Shawn and Sam reminded of he and his brother when they were younger. I think we really connected with the metal mentality in the book, and its kind of the only thing like it in comics. Comics and metal have more of an overlap than it might seem, or at least that is what I've found.

How long do you and Rick intend the keep Black Metal going?
We have always planned on it being a three-volume series—so the next volume will be the last. I know what the end is, Rick has already finished the script...and it is extremely "Black Wizards."

Rwake. The "R" is silent, the band is not. Like the howl of the starving Wendigo in the wooded darkness, the music of this Little Rock, Arkansas, band has haunted the minds of those metal fans looking for something more than the showy prog riffage of Mastodon or Kylesa, something ugly and sludgy and beyond the starched realms of sobriety. And with Rest, their fifth full-length and first album in four years, Rwake have brought a strange, airy sense of down-home tranquility to their otherwise soul-shaking sound.

When this writer connects with vocalist CT, he is watching a movie, sent to him by the desired director of Rwake's new music video, of a pig being tortured. "Not tortured to death," he chuckles, "but it's footage from a hog farm. It's almost worse. I'm like, 'Jesus, kill the poor thing already!'"

REVOLVER Rest seems like a very Rwake album, but it sounds very different from you guys' previous stuff.
CT Thanks, man. We're always trying to grow. That's really what we're doing here, is trying to grow.

Is that a concerted effort, or does it just happen in the jam sessions?
We probably made a conscious effort—we probably talked about it, but even when you talk about it, it's more of a subconscious thing. When we were writing these songs, we didn't want to stop writing them. There were times when we'd finish the song at seven minutes and be like, 'Nah, this one's gotta be 140minutes!' We were having so much fun, and we were so wrapped up in the writing, that we really didn't think any of these songs were that long because they felt so right. We didn't consciously say we wanted the songs to be bigger.

The songs are pretty long overall.
Me and Jeff [Morgan, drums] talk about our songs a lot, especially about the slower, chiller parts, and it's what we like a lot in the band. I would say that it was more like the band as an entity. We didn't want to make them like Rwake, they just really flowed that way. And honestly, they were gonna be longer. We trimmed every song on the album by at least two or three minutes. Jeff will write a lot of it, and it was a lot of him coming back and being like, 'Nah, guys, that doom part is too long.' That's most of what it was—the editing of the doom part. I'm the kind of guy who always thinks, The longer, the better.

This album, similar to If You Walk Before You Crawl…You Crawl Before You Die, but different from Voices Of Omens, seems to a collection of songs working with each other, creating one sprawling, flowing piece.
I would agree with that. It's hard for me, because they're all our albums, but I definitely felt that connection. It's a lot like that. It's just like… I just finished this film Slow Southern Steel [a documentary about Southern underground metal], and when I finished it, it was nothing like what I started with. All of these pieces and questions and answers became a film that stood on its own. And that's exactly like what this album has been, how Walk is, too. It's almost like the band, together and individually, decided to make it this flowing piece. That's just where we're at. Voices is completely different, more of a collection of songs, you know. I felt that from the very beginning. It sounds like feeling, you know? The way it goes together. It's like a concept, but not a concept, a musical one. It flows together.

It's very satisfying—a band like Rwake does well with that grand, long-form style.
Definitely. I mean, we're all very country, very redneck, but this has a classical feel to it. This album is more like a classical piece, you know. There are only four really big songs, but the rest are more like movements. When I listen to, like, ["The Czar"] off of [Mastodon's Crack The Skye]—those songs are movements. Or musicians like Wolves in the Throne Room. It's very different from a song. You don't really want to put 'em on in the car and drive around. It's hard to drive around jamming to Neurosis. We know that if wrote shorter songs, they'd be more digestible, and a lot more doors would be opened for us, but we're just not into that. I don't know if we'll ever write a short song again, honestly. It's looking kind of grim. The bigger it is, the more we put into it. We're not really ever going to do that…we're all family men, you know, so we have no plans to try and be rock stars on that level. It's like, if you write a four minute song, people might like it, but if the intro to your song is four minutes, that's when you can really get into it! We have to write these big songs to satisfy us. The longer we write them, the bigger movements we make, the longer we have to find ourselves in the song. And that's all we get out of it, you know, at this point.

That's funny, because it feels like most musicians take the opposite attitude—"The music industry's dead. The only way to make money is to tour our asses off."
That's a hard one to comment on, because I have friends out there who are making a lot of money now when [before] they weren't making any money whatsoever, and their songs have gotten shorter. Not worse, not better, but definitely shorter. And I wonder sometimes, Man, Rwake could be making a lot more money with shorter songs, touring all the time. But…for some of these guys, touring all the time is their only source of income. And you gotta wonder when it turns into a bad thing. You wonder which of these guys are still making music for the right purpose, or if it's just to keep the bills paid. It's hard. I hate to even talk about this kind of stuff. But when I hear a band who I know is so incredible, who I know can write some of this shit with their instruments, and they're not doing it, it's sad for me. I like to be that force pushing my peers, you know? Like, it's the hope that they can see you doing something huge, and incredible, and wonder if they can do that too. To us, this is art. That's what we do. It's like painting a picture. That's maybe why we don't tour like that anymore, though even when we did tour, we were never concerned with the money.

The name Rest and the cover of the album are very different from the usual Rwake fare. What picture is this album trying to paint?
It's definitely an album with a feeling behind it. A lot of our friends see the cover and the album title and say things like, "…Is Rwake breaking up?" Which is awesome! It's amazing how you can get people so riled up with such a simple photo. We were struggling with it a little bit at first, with the art and the title. With the songs being so big, we were looking for something bigger, a bigger title. It was around the time when it was taking so long for the album to get out. We get all these these eyebrows raised, people asking, "What's going on?" We like it—make it very simple, get ideas across, put it in your head without us really saying anything. It's a real less-is-more feeling. The title came up around the same time as the artwork—it was a perfect thing that came about at the same time.

Through all of the sludgy, progressive metal that's come out of the American South in the past few years, Rwake has always remained scary. Why? Is it something about Arkansas as opposed to, say, Atlanta?
It's much more small town here. Where I live right now is kind of a small little suburb, but right down the road you're surrounded by woods. The mentality is so small here. It's what you think of—racism, bigotry… I mean, I don't want to live anywhere else. It's the most beautiful place in the world. But it is fucked up as Hell at the same time. It's like going back in time here. We have a member who lives about an hour out on the side of a fucking mountain. All of this kind of stuff really has to do with our music. A lot of the stuff comes out when you're alone out on the side of the mountain. When your wife and kids are gone, it's just you alone out in the woods in the darkness. I think it's atmospheric—you're surrounded by woods, by darkness. Whether you know it or not, it effects your psyche. A lot of these bands from here, from places in Louisiana and Mississippi, have that. If you're sludgy and doomy, you're going to be even more so if you're from a shit town in the middle of nowhere down here.

The 'R' at the beginning of your name obviously has to do with your Robitussin use, and many folks I know who have seen you guys live have commented on your cough syrup use onstage. Is that inherently part of the band?
Totally. I mean, we don't only drink cough syrup, and we don't do it as much as we used to, but we're really down with the totally awesome way it feels. It's crazy how some fans take it to heart—we have kids in the front row of our shows where I'm like, "Dude, you're a fucking zombie." It's just our thing. Especially in small town spaces—a lot of kids around here will chug cough syrup, or huff shit, whatever's over the counter. That's where we come from, that's who we are.

Mushroomhead frontman Jeffrey Nothing is releasing his first solo album, The New Psychodalia (Suburban Noize), on October 11. But you can hear the record, in its entirety, below. You can purchase the album from iTunes here, and check out his tour dates with Mushroomhead below the album.

Mushroomhead Tour Dates:

10/05 - Minneapolis, MN @ First Avenue
10/06 - Joliet, IL @ Mojoes
10/07 - Dayton, OH @ McGuffy's
10/08 - Flint, MI @ Machine Shop
10/09 - Buffalo, NY @ Town Ballroom
10/11 - Lexington, KY @ Buster's Billiards & Backroom
10/12 - Lancaster, PA @ Chameleon Club
10/13 - Towson, MD @ Recher Theatre
10/14 - Worcester, MA @ Palladium ("Rock N' Shock 2011")
10/15 - Pittsburgh, PA @ Altar Bar
10/16 - Poughkeepsie, NY @ The Chance
10/18 - Jacksonville, NC @ Hooligans
10/20 - Houston, TX @ Scout Bar
10/21 - Tyler, TX @ Click's
10/22 - San Antonio, TX @ Backstage Live
10/23 - Dallas, TX @ Tree's
10/24 - Lubbock, TX @ Wreckers
10/27 - Sauget, IL @ Pop's
10/28 - Columbus, OH @ Al Rosa Villa
10/29 - Cleveland, OH @ Agora Theatre
10/30 - Hillsdale, MI @ Dawn Theater
10/31 - Louisville, KY @ Phoenix Hill Tavern
11/02 - Knoxville TN @ Valerium
11/04 - Fort Wayne, IN @ Piere's
11/05 - Bloomington, IL @ Catle Theatre
11/06 - Kansas City, MO @ Beaumont Club
11/08 - Columbia, MO @ The Blue Note

Iced Earth are releasing their new album, Dystopia (Century Media), on October 18. But you can hear the title track right here below. "I'm proud to debut 'Dystopia' on RevolverMag.com," says Iced Earth founder Jon Schaffer. "I hope Revolver readers like it as much as we do." Let us know what you think of it in the comments.

Photo by Justin Borucki

American Idol season 10 finalist James Durbin–who performed on the show with Zakk Wylde and Judas Priest, exhorting viewers to "give metal a chance," and is featured in the September/October issue of Revolver–is releasing his debut album in November on Wind-up Records. Titled Memories of a Beautiful Disaster and produced by Howard Benson (Papa Roach, Theory of a Deadman, Three Days Grace), the album sees the California-bred rocker working with songwriters like Marti Frederiksen (Aerosmith) and James Michael (Sixx:A.M.), as well as Swedish rockers Hardcore Superstar. Check out the album cover below.

The music video for the track "Lucifer" off Behemoth's 2009 release, Evangelion, has hit the internet and can be viewed below. "Lucifer" is the final track on the album and one of the Polish blackened death-metal bands longest songs, clocking in at over eight-minutes long. The video was shot in Wroclaw, Poland, stars the song's guest vocalist, Maciej Malenczuk, and features plenty of blood, boobs, and blasphemy.

Behemoth are also releasing a re-released and newly repackaged version of Demonica, which chronicles their earliest recordings. Demonica will include two booklets: a 28-page booklet and a 16-page booklet with rare photos and lyrics that were not included with the original release. Assembled by the band, and in particular, frontman and founding member Nergal, who had this to say about compiling lyrics:

"Finding and collecting all the lyrics was a difficult task, demanding patience and time. With an aim of preserving the so-called historical authenticity, I have resolved to forward the lyrics in their original form, even though some of the language mistakes in them may obscure the overall meaning of the work… The fact that none of them has ever been published before, speaks of their exceptional collectors or even historical value… All the lyrics, despite their imperfections and just terrible English, depict me from the time of their creation. I still believe that it was a very straightforward and honest material, which had its mighty influence on who I am today."

Demonica available in North America November 22 in North America, with the track listing below:
Disc 1
1….Of My Worship
2. Summoning of the Ancient Gods
3. The Arrival (Instrumental)
4. Dark Triumph
5. Monumentum (Instrumental)
6. Rise of the Blackstorm of Evil
7. Aggressor
8. Goat With a Thousand Young (Instrumental)
9. Bless Thee for Granting Me Pain
10. Cursed Angel of Doom
11. Transylvanian Forest

Disc 2
1. From Hornedlands to Lindisfarne
2. Thy Winter Kingdom
3. Summoning (Of the Ancient Ones)
4. The Dance of the Pagan Flames
5. Blackvisions of the Almighty
6. Fields of Haar-Meggido
7. Deathcrush (Mayhem cover)
8. Moonspell Rites
9. Blackvisions of the Almighty
10. Pure Evil & Hate
11. The Oak Between the Snows (Instrumental)
12. Spellcraft & Heathendom

Ohio-based thrashers Skeletonwitch are releasing their fourth full-length, Forever Abomination (Prosthetic), on October 11. In anticipation of the new album, the band is unleashing the new track "This Horrifying Force (the Desire to Kill)" right here! Read what vocalist Chance Garnette has to say about the song below, and let us know what you think in the comments.

REVOLVER What's this song about?
CHANCE GARNETTE The song, "This Horrifying Force," is about the actual unseen force that drives a person to despise and therefore  want to viciously end all human life.

Which part of it did you come up with first?
With Skeletonwitch, we hash out all the music first. I show the guys where the lyrics and phrasing will be, and we make sure nobody is stepping on anyone else's dick. Then I turn the vocal rhythms into the actual lyrics. Most of the time, the first words of a song aren't the first words I will write down. Whatever part comes to me first, I'll write down and build around that part backwards and forwards. But with this song, I started at the beginning and wrote from the top. Odd for me, but, shit, as long as my brain is working and I'm being productive...

And what was the inspiration?
In the past, I've written songs about the desire to kill and the act of killing, etc. You know, "Evil dude coming to get you." With this, I wanted to go a layer beneath that and focus on the "thing" that makes a person cross the line, go nuts, and therefore desire nothing but human blood.

Was this an easy song to write or record? Why or why not?
For me, lyrically, no songs are "easy" to write. I go through several drafts, changing, improving, and tweaking the words until I know it's exactly what I wanted to say. My song book is a mess with scratched out sections and notes. So when it comes to recording, I'm ready. I've been over it so many times by then I'm definitely prepared to record. Now come on, voice!

What sort of feedback have you gotten on this song so far? What kind of reaction do you want to get to the song?
Well, at this point the album isn't out, so feedback is limited. But I've played it for people and the reaction seems consistent that this was the perfect song to open Forever Abomination with. Something a little unexpected yet still 100% Skeletonwitch at the same time.

System of a Down frontman and solo artist Serj Tankian has contributed a track to

Batman: Arkham City – The Album, the upcoming soundtrack to the highly anticipated video game, Batman: Arkham City.

Featuring 12 new original tracks by Coheed and Cambria, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, the Damned Things, and more (full track list below), Batman: Arkham City – The Album will be released on October 4, two weeks prior to the game's North American release on October 18. The Batman: Arkham City Collector's Edition of the game will include a download code for the album along with additional bonus content. Check out "Total Paranoia" below and let us know what you think in the comments.

The artists featured on Batman: Arkham City – The Album approached their contributions to the album with their own unique interpretations of the stories surrounding Batman. The track listing for the Batman: Arkham City soundtrack is:

1. Panic! At The Disco - Mercenary
2. Coheed and Cambria - Deranged
3. The Duke Spirit - Creature
4. Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - Shadow On The Run
5. Blaqk Audio  - Afterdark
6. Raveonettes  - Oh, Stranger
7. ††† (Crosses) - The Years
8. The Damned Things – Trophy Widow
9. Daughtry - Drown In You
10. The Boxer Rebellion - Losing You
11. Serj Tankian - Total Paranoia

*Bonus Collector's Edition track
12. A Place to Bury Strangers - In The Shadow

The highly anticipated videogame will hit store shelves for the Xbox 360 video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, Games for Windows PC and the PlayStation 3 computer entertainment system. Published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and developed by Rocksteady Studios, Batman: Arkham City builds upon the foundation of Batman: Arkham Asylum, sending players into Arkham City, the new maximum security "home" for all of Gotham City's thugs, gangsters, and insane criminal master-minds. The sequel introduces a brand-new story that draws together a new all-star cast of classic characters and murderous villains from the Batman universe, as well as a vast range of new and enhanced gameplay.

Fans can visit www.batmanarkhamcity.com to sign up to receive updates regarding the game and join the discussion on the recently launched community site at: http://community.batmanarkhamcity.com to participate in forums, read upcoming developer diaries and stay abreast of all the latest Batman: Arkham City news.

Vocalist-guitarist Brian "Head" Welch, formerly of Korn, will release a new single, "Paralyzed," digitally on October 4. Below, you can hear the track and see his tour dates.

About the song, Head says, "'Paralyzed' was one of the first songs co-written with Producer Jason Rauch. He came to me with the idea and we both dove into it until it was all there. Jason is really helping me get back to crushing riffs. My first solo CD was an experimental album so the riffs were definitely lacking. Today's a new day and I'm excited about the future. 'Paralyzed' is only a taste of what's to come."

Brian "Head" Welch Tour Dates

Oct 01 - Rock on the River - Ashland, KY
Oct 02 - Christ Temple Church - Huntington, WV
Oct 07 - Lucky Mule Saloon - Abilene, TX
Oct 09 - Beaumont Club - Kansas City, MO
Oct 11 - Mojoes - Joliet, IL
Oct 12 - The Intersection - Grand Rapids, MI
Oct 14 - THE ATTIC - Dayton, OH
Oct 15 - Emerald Theater - Mt Clemens, MI
Oct 17 - Gramercy Theater - New York, NY
Oct 18 - Toad's Place - New Haven, CT
Oct 21 - ELEANOR RIGBY'S - Jermyn, PA
Oct 22 - The Chameleon Club - Lancaster, PA
Oct 23 - Big Sandy Supercenter Grand Ballroom - Huntington, WV
Oct 24 - Norva Theatre - Norfolk, VA
Oct 26 - The Masquerade - Atlanta, GA
Nov 03 - Speaking at the Church on the Eastern Shore - Fairhope, AL
Nov 11 - Private speaking event at Boonville High School - Boonville, IN
Nov 12 - Boonville High School - Boonville, IN
Nov 19 - Speaking at the Fairview Arts and Education Building - Fairview, OK
Dec 03 - Speaking at Cornwall Church - Bellingham, WA
Dec 03 - Speaking at Cornwall Church - Bellingham, WA
Dec 04 - Speaking at Cornwall Church - Bellingham, WA
Dec 04 - Speaking at Cornwall Church - Bellingham, WA
Jan 07 - Speaking engagement at the Crossing Church - Elk River, MN