This interview was conducted by Philip A. Wickstrand with vocalist/guitarist Chris Birkle and bass guitarist Craig Bridenbeckat Rotture in Portland, OR on March 17, 2011.

With the recent glut of Thrash revival bands, it sometimes becomes wearisome to sort the good from the bad without a bit of guidance. Fortunately the folks at Heavy Artillery have done a lot of the scout work for you already with their fine roster of bands and EXCRUCIATOR are no exception. From the rainy streets of Portland, Oregon, EXCRUCIATOR have been thrashing it up on the local Metal circuit and winning over Metalheads with their catchy riffs, stage presence, personality and perseverance. Be sure to look for their debut album, Devouring, this August!

Phil: You've recently recorded your debut album, Devouring; tell our readers a bit about that.

Craig: It has nine songs; we're going to have one song that was already on our demo.

Chris: Another one which was released to a limited audience but not heard by the masses, so it's going to be pretty awesome.

Phil: “Nuclear Exmortus” is the one that's going to be re-recorded?

Chris: Yeah, “Nuclear Exmortus”, the same one from the EP on the new album.

Phil: How long did you spend in the studio? Like, how's it going to sound compared to the EP? Better budget, better recording?

Chris: Better everything all around; playing-wise, song writing-wise, just everything - it's going to sound phenomenal. We got Gabe Johnson from Falcon Recording Studios to record our album; it's the same guy who did SPELLCASTER's EP and I guess their upcoming album, so I can just give you an idea of what it's going to sound like.

Phil: Yeah, that demo sounded fan-fucking-tastic.

Chris: Oh yeah, it sounded really good, so it's just going to obliterate the EP with everything. It's going to be good.

Craig: Yep.

Phil: Did you turn your bass up to 8.5, Craig? [laughter]

Craig: Yes. Yes I did. It's going to sound good; everything's going to come a lot clearer than on the demo. The demo sounded good, but this is just professional.

Chris: You can hear Craig's solo on the album.

Craig: Bass solo. You couldn't hear any of it on the EP and the same with Marcus's drumming. It's a lot cleaner and you can hear everything that he's doing, he's just going nuts.

Chris: We're working with a better budget and stuff too, so everything should be great.

Phil: Does this recording experience kind of open up your eyes and make you think of what you want to do the next time you go to record an album?

Chris: Oh yeah, definitely. Probably have everything more planned out budget-wise, just with the timeframe because when we were originally going into the studio we were just going to record another EP, but then we got signed by Heavy Artillery and they wanted us to do an album, but we already had time scheduled to do the songs that we wanted to do for the EP and so everything happened really fast with trying to get the money from Heavy Artillery to record it and also being able to pay money ourselves to cover some of the cost.

Craig: It was definitely a learning experience I'd say, because we never really had that amount of stuff at our disposal. It was great. But I think we learned a lot about stuff like deadlines and keeping in touch with people when you needed shit to get done, so definitely stuff we'll bring in for the next one when we have shit more together.

Chris: Way more prepared, but all in all it was a good experience.

Phil: Tell our readers how you came to be signed with Heavy Artillery.

Craig: Was it the Plan B show?

Chris: Yeah, it was the Plan B show we played with VEKTOR and SPELLCASTER.

Phil: The same one where SPELLCASTER recorded the bonus tracks for the reissue of their demo.

Chris: Yeah, that's the same show. We played and all the guys, Craig, Josh and Marcus were killing it, but I was having… I don't even know, but my guitar strings broke, so I got another guitar from somebody from one of the other bands and the cable was going out, I bought these new pants and my girlfriend told me to try them on, I didn't try them on, so I looked like a fucking genie and I thought the show was just horrible.

Craig: I think it went pretty well.

Chris: It went well; it was probably just me in my head.

Craig: We talked to the guys in VEKTOR and they're fucking awesome, they're cool dudes. They put in a good word for us at Heavy Artillery and a couple weeks later, we started getting in touch with them. They contacted Chris and Josh and started dialogue and pretty soon, there you go.

Chris: We sent in the demo to Heavy Artillery and we didn't hear back from them for awhile, we were like, "Oh fuck, we suck!" [laughter] "This is terrible!"

Phil: Not even a rejection letter! [laughter]

Chris: Yeah. "Our buddies SPELLCASTER got signed and we're worthless" [laughter] and right then they called up Josh, I think, and were like "Yeah, we want to work with you guys and give you shot." There we go. Debut album coming up. It's good.

Phil: What are your touring plans for the Excrucia-tour?

Craig: [laughs] I like that. We don't have any yet.

Chris: Not any planned. We don't really know until the release date of the album, but once we know for sure, we'll probably plan something for September. But we're not really sure yet. September/October/November.

Phil: Recommend a book for our readers and then explain why you recommend that particular work.

Craig: I'm a history buff and by the way, I did enjoy the book on Irish history you gave me. (How the Irish Saved Civilization)

Phil: Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

Chris: Yes, Saint Patricius, the ex-slave during the late antiquity. Anyway, that was a great book, so I would definitely recommend that. I was also reading a biography of the parallel lives of General Custer and Crazy Horse. It's pretty cool, a lot of stuff you wouldn't expect, a lot of plot twists and what have you that turn out to be real and the drama that was the Indian Wars of the 1860s, so read that.

Chris: The Count of Monte Cristo's a good one too, if you can read it for that long. It's a pretty long book. And of course everything by Robert E. Howard; Conan, Kull, Solomon Kane and Bran Mak Morne.

Phil: Have you read any of his boxing stories?

Chris: I have not. [laughs] I went to Powell's the other day and I say it there, I almost got it, but I didn't.

Phil: Explain to our readers how "Craig" became the new swear word.

Craig: I was at Jason's and I got pretty drunk and I was kind of a dick, I kind of made an ass of myself and I had a good time doing it, had maybe a little too much fun and got a little too flamboyant, I don't know, but pretty soon I ended up on Jason's perma-banned list on the fridge. So that was fun. But I pretty much insulted all my friends.

Phil: But everybody forgave you, so you're not actually banned. Unlike the other names on the list.

Craig: If you get drunk enough then it's okay.

Phil: Where do you see EXCRUCIATOR a year from now?

Chris: With another album out, hopefully.

Craig: Have a second album out, touring. Ideally, I would like to at least get over to Canada. That'd be fucking cool. Canada or Mexico. Basically, where we're at, just stay in motion, keep doing shit.

Excruciator

Interviewer: Philip A. Wickstrand

July 23, 2011

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TO THE TOP

(Click on Photo to Enlarge)

Formed: 2009
Portland, Oregon  USA
Label: Heavy Artillery Records
Genre: Thrash Metal

CURRENT LINE-UP:

Chris Birkley:  Guitars & Vocals
Josh Kay:  Guitars
Craig Bridenbeck:  Bass & Vocals
Marcus Hartford:  Drums

DISCOGRAPHY:

Demo (2009)
By the Gates of Flesh EP (2010)
Devouring (2011)

PHOTOS BY PHIL A. WICKSTRAND

(Click on Photos to Enlarge)

Check out Peter's review of Devouring here