Lynora: What can u tell me about the new album being released September 14^th?

Ted: Well it’s called Relentless Retribution and its produced by Jason Suecof who’s done bands like Trivium, Devil Driver, August Burns Red and whatnot.  And it’s actually the most vicious, most brutal, thrashiest album since Ultra Violence.

Lynora: Right now what’s your favorite track?

Ted: Right now my favorite tracks would be “Relentless Revolution,” “Truce,” “Into the Arms of Righteous Anger” and “Opponents at Sides.” Those are my favorites as of now but things will change once the album comes out once we start playing it live I know things are gonna change.

Lynora: How many have you played live just that one?

Ted: Just the one, we played “River of Rapture” live.

Lynora: Who did the crazy album art and why did you go with it?

Ted: Well we were looking around for an artist and our label suggested Brett Elliot so we started looking at his artwork and we realized wow this is some cool stuff.  So Rob, our guitar player Rob and Mark were going back and forth with him about the theme of the record.  How it’s pretty much about betrayal, deceit, revenge, that was the whole vibe of the record.  And they sent him the lyrics and he actually read the lyrics, and from -didn’t hear the music only read the lyrics-he knew where we were coming from.  So, he drew out this artwork of wolves in sheep’s clothing and when we saw that we go wow! That describes our music perfectly.

Lynora: Where are the majority of your songs written, on the road or in the studio?

Ted: Well this album was written in the rehearsal studio we did last year, we started writing in late summer early fall of 09, we just got done w the European tour and as soon as we got done with that we hold in to our rehearsal room and just start writing and writing and you know everything just started flowing. So we started [rehearsing] for about 5 or 6 months and went into a recording studio right after that.

Lynora: I was watching your video blog, I don’t know if you’ve seen…

Ted: I do them!

Lynora: Oh! You do!  Ok, are doing shots with your producer and Ted Danson a normal part of your writing process?

Ted: [laugh] No we’re just a band who loves to have fun, I mean we do take music seriously and we do take writing and recording seriously, but every now and then you gotta break and have fun.  And we’re a bunch of fun guys and you know we enjoy it; we enjoy showing the funny side of us.  It’s a good side.

Lynora: What are your favorite and your least favorite parts of the recording process?

Ted: How long it takes is my least favorite part, but my favorite part is actually taking all the ideas and putting them down to tape.  Yes, I said tape!  Putting all the ideas down to tape from writing and having to get the sound you want and how everything is coming into play.  The end result is the greatest part but the process is also fun cause you get to hear how it’s made what we’ve created and how its coming together.  But it takes a long time and sometimes its just hours and days of going man this is a while but, the end result is great.

Lynora: I see you're touring A LOT!  How much more touring and where will you be touring following the album release?

Ted: Once the album is released, after this tour we come home in August, and the album gets released a month later, we have some dates in Mexico City, then we’re off to do South America, after South America it’s a possibility that we’re going to do South Asia, Asia market.  Then after that we’re going to Europe in November/December with Kreator and Exodus.  We’re going to do a month with Kreator, Exodus and Suicidal Angels from Greece.

Lynora: That’s gonna be a ridiculous one!

Ted: Yea! Then we come back for the holidays. Then we do that 70,000 ton cruise.

Lynora: Oh, I started to hear you guys talk about that, what is that?

Ted: It’s a cruise ship from Miami Cozumel and back, 4 days of bands like Testament, Exodus, Forbidden, Death Angel, Obituary, Fear Factory, Amon Armath, Raven, Uli Jon Roth, Trouble and loads and loads of other bands

Lynora: Who put that together?

Ted: I don’t know. You can look it up. It’s “70,000 tons of metal”.

Lynora: [laugh] oh!

Ted: It’s a cruise ship of all these bands. It’s exciting!

Lynora: In all your video blogs you seemed so eager to get back to tour what’s so great about touring?

Ted: We’re a live band.  You know, I mean we love to go out and perform we love to tour we love to perform for people who come and see us.  The live energy we put out we love to channel it and give it to the crowd and the crowd gives it back its just an intense feeling.  And we love to do that; you know we love it all!  The recording and touring I would say we love touring more after recording but when it gets done oh it’s time to stop touring then we love writing!  Time to stop writing! Then we love recording.

Lynora: Who’s your favorite band to tour with?

Ted: So far?

Lynora: Ya.

Ted: Oh man every band that we’ve toured with has been great.  It’s kind of hard to pick favorites.  We’ve toured with Kataklysm they were fun guys… God Forbid we’re toured with there’s so many bands, Soilent Green, Forbidden, you know we’ve done some tours with Testament.  We’ve done a lot of shows, festivals in Europe, a lot of bands!  Obituary.  Every band that we’ve encountered and been fortunate enough to share the stage with has been awesome!

Lynora: Being seasoned veterans are there any contemporary bands that influence you and if so who?

Ted: There are a lot of bands that we try to follow, like keep current.  We still have our influences from the old days, Metallica, Maiden, Scorpions; you know we pull from those.  But there are newer bands that we like!

Lynora: That was actually my next question, which bands are you excited about hearing that are new, like within the past five years.

Ted: I’m really excited with what Warbringer is doing, I’m really excited about them they’re a good young band.  They’ve really, really been touring a lot and I got to check them out a couple of times and they’ve been awesome.  The Swashbuckle guys, they’re fucking awesome…

Lynora: Yea tonight’s the first time I saw them and the crowd was going nuts!

Ted: …yea, and Mutiny Within also.  I wanna mention other bands like the new Fear Factory album; I’m looking forward to the new Stone Sour record that’s coming out.  It’s hard there are so many bands to try to keep up with.

Lynora: And you’re going to think of them later.

Ted: Yea but I’m really looking forward to the Stone Sour record, the new Fear Factory record, and it’s been out for a year but The Blackening Machine Head album.  And Death Magnetic.

Lynora: Are there any bands that you’ve gotten compared to that you didn’t like being compared to?

Ted: Not yet!  Well form my view not yet if you ask Mark, Rob, Will, or Damien you’ll get a different story.  But for me not yet.

Lynora: What advice would you give to a young band that is just getting started?

Ted: Write songs.   First of all from the music aspect keep writing and writing, the more you write the better you get.  And just try to get your music out there as much as you can, start playing a lot of shows start fliering.  Take advantage of the internet, you know there’s myspace, facebook take advantage of that and try to get your music out.  Once you get signed get a good lawyer!  You know, get a good lawyer.

Lynora: What the most over asked interview question?

Ted: Hmmm here I got one, “So tell us about when you first got started!”

Lynora: And I didn’t

Ted: Thank you!  You’re a good cookie!

Lynora: What’s the best metal act out there right now?

Ted: To me?  Hands down it’ll always be Metallica.  Always be Metallica, there’s great bands out there, but I started Metallica from Kill ‘em All, followed there career, hands down, say what you will about them, they still put on the greatest show.  And I think like I said that Death Magnetic is a great release, it was a step in the right direction.  It’s better than their last releases I will say, but I still think Metallica.

Lynora: What other then music and your own genius, influences your own music?

Ted: Life, life in general we write about a lot of things.  Personal experience things that are going on in the world, a lot of things influence us.  Every tour every city we hit, people that we meet that influences us.  The vibe of each place that we’re in influences us.  Every year and everyday we get older and get wiser and that influences us too.  And life in general you hit ups and down in life and that influences us too.  When it comes down to writing.

Lynora: What’s next!

Ted: Well the album comes out September 14^th! The fourteenth!  It’s called Relentless Retribution it’s coming out on Nuclear Blast and after that we’re just gonna keep touring and touring and touring to support the record.  And while we’re touring, we’re going to be writing the next record as we’re touring.  So right when we’re done recording we’ll go right into the studio instead of: ok now that we’re done recording let’s start writing!  We’re going to tour relentlessly hence Relentless Retribution.  We’re excited, we’re very excited about the record I think a lot of people are going to be excited about he record we put a lot of heart and soul into it.  And I think a lot of people who miss the intensity and fierceness of Ultra-Violence are really going to like it and people who love the way Act III was with the melodies and the craftsmanship, its there.

Lynora: It seemed like a fusion.

Ted: It’s a fusion of everything.  And that’s just a little taste.  I mean, it’s very Death Angel. It sounds, I would say, very modern.  We got Jason Suecof to produce it and - I’m just gonna keep going.  We got Jason Suecof cause we liked the sound that he got.  We were turned onto him by our guitar player Rob, you know he teaches guitar and one of his students said hey man I’m into this band called August Burns Red can you show me how to play some riffs.  So Rob started learning some of August Burns Red songs and he noticed that the production was intense, fierce, and crystal clear.  We were writing and Rob goes, this guy might work with the stuff that we’re writing, so, we went with Jason and he just captured us.  He gave us such metal tones, and he pushed us to do faster tempo and a lot of double bass and fast beasts, so.   But he didn’t make us sound like a band from today… We’re still Death Angel but with the sound of today.  He didn’t tell us to do a breakdown here or scream.  It’s still Death Angel music but he captured the sound more.  He takes your vibe and makes it more intense.  And we captured it and we’re happy!  Jason Suecof, we’re happy!

Death Angel's Ted Aguilar

Interviewer: Lynora

Formed 1982
San Francisco, California  USA
Label: Nuclear Blast Records
Genre: Thrash Metal

CURRENT LINE-UP:

Mark Osegueda:  Vocals
Ted Aguilar:  Guitar
Rob Cavestany:  Guitar
Damien Sisson:  Bass
Will Carroll:  Drums

DISCOGRAPHY:

The Ultra-Violence (1987)
Frolic Through the Park (1988)
Fall From Grace  (1990)
Act III  (1990)
The Art of Dying (2004)
Archives & Artifacts:
                        Boxed Set (2005)
The Long Road Home:
                        Best of/Comp.(2007)
Killing Season (2008)
Sonic Beatdown:
                    Live in Germany (2009)
Relentless Retribution (2010)

(Click on Photo to Enlarge)

July 26, 2010

(Click on Photos to Enlarge)

PHOTOS BY LYNORA

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