UN: Decrepitaph was originally started as a one man band. Was it difficult to find members to fill the vacant positions in the band? Was it tough to go from doing everything to just playing the drums? Do you still help with the writing?

Elektrokutioner/drums:: Well, I originally did it as a solo band because I couldn't find anyone that wanted to play this form of Death Metal. I did the Grotesque Dwellings demo in early 2006 and people seemed to like it. I moved to Texas in late 2006 and wanted to start up a band, so I decided to keep Decrepitaph going as a full band since I found people into old style DM. I was actually hoping to find a drummer so that I could just play guitar, but I ended up finding a guitarist, so I stuck to the drums. I still write about half of the material myself, but the other guys also contribute a lot to it. I really appreciate their dedication to the music and the band as well. The guitarists and myself actually have pretty similar writing styles so our material usually blends together easily.

UN: Decrepitaph have a very old school and raw approach to death metal. What is it about old school death metal that hits you so hard? Was it important to have a sound that channels the period of time in death metal that you guys enjoy the most?

Elektrokutioner:: I personally grew up listening to it and it's been my favorite style ever since I was a teenager. I always liked the bands that not many people seemed to care about because they weren't "fast enough" or "technical enough" or whatever. The best music out there is simplistic and to me that will never change. Death Metal to me has always been about being heavy and evil sounding, and all the best bands of the past did that perfectly. We're just trying to continue on in the path of the DM legends and hopefully throw a few different twists in there to keep it interesting! If just one person looks back on Decrepitaph in 10 years and mentions us in the same breath with the greats of the genre, I feel we did a good job keeping Death Metal alive.

UN: Sort of the opposite of the last question, do you still keep up with newer bands? Im sure you stick to mainly the old school flavored newer bands. It seems like the death metal genre is getting a bit overrun with bands trying to be as fast as humanly possible and some of the music is just downright ridiculous.

Elektrokutioner:: You pretty much answered that one yourself! Yes, I still keep up with it quite a bit, but it's harder to find cool bands it seems. I'm really into Necros Christos, Dead Congregation, and a bunch of others, and I can't wait to hear a lot of new albums from the Razorback bands. I simply cannot identify with most new bands these days. I really don't care if you can play a million notes a second if all those notes don't sound good to me. I like those albums where you find memorable riffs and songs from the first listen and it sticks with you. Does anyone really remember the new Brutalificationment or whatever album?? Death Metal has gone from memorable song writing to how "sick" and "brutal" you can be, and the music suffers for it.

UN: How has the response to your Ancient Death Metal promo been thus far? Has it been receiving positive reviews? Has it been easy to spread it around as an online only release?

Elektrokutioner:: To be honest, we really haven't done too much with it. It's available to anyone that wants copies of the MP3, but we don't actively promote it often. We recorded that just to show the fans that we were still around and we were working on a new album. After the promo recording, I sent some MP3s to Billy from Razorback and the rest is history on that!

UN: Youve recently signed with Razorback Records. How did the deal come about? Did they hear your Ancient Death Metal promo and get in touch or have you been in touch with the label for sometime now?

Elektrokutioner:: I actually used to write to Jill through snail mail when she did Mortal Coil in the mid to late 90's. I think Billy found me on MySpace randomly because we liked a lot of the same music, and more importantly, HATED a lot of the same music! I had been talking to him before we did the promo about possibly releasing our CD. He was into what we were doing and the whole concept and theme of the band, and when he heard the promo we worked out a deal for the album! Razorback has always done great stuff, and I think this year with them releasing Crypticus, Hooded Menace, Cianide, Revolting, and Convulsions, we should fit right in with the old style DM roster!

UN: Has the band begun writing material for your debut full length release? Is it safe to assume that the new songs will be similar in style to the songs from Ancient Death Metal?

Elektrokutioner:: We never stopped writing songs really! We like to keep moving on and keep the song writing pace up. The full length should have mostly new songs, but I'm sure we'll be redoing a couple from the promo as well. The new songs are much in the same style, for sure. We found a second guitarist a couple months after the promo was recorded, and he will be contributing a lot to our sound as well. There will be a few more Mick Harris worship blasting parts, a few more doooooooomy parts, some punkish skank parts, and some creepy sounding leads and solos thrown in occasionally as well. But, the main focus will always be Death Metal!

UN: The promo was recorded in the bands rehearsal space. Have you guys put any thought into where you will be recorded the full length? There is quite the metal scene in Texas so I would assume that there are quite a few studios that would know how to record a band like Decrepitaph.

Elektrokutioner:: We're going to find a studio, but so far we haven't found anything. I really really REALLY don't want to use some modern Pro Tools digital studio nonsense. The best sound to my ears is the old analogue production and that is what we will be shooting for. Ideally we would find a studio with reel to reel tapes and a producer that knows more about metal than Metallica. I know what I want this album to sound like, it's just the point of finding someone that can make it be dirty and putrid sounding but with the extra boost of a studio mixing and mastering job.

UN: Would you say that the music is influenced at all by horror films? There is definitely a creepy sinister vibe to a lot of the riffs. What are some of your favorite horror flicks? Are you guys into Italian splatter at all?

Elektrokutioner:: Yeah, definitely. Three of the band members are huge into horror movies. As you probably guessed, the horror I like is the old style before CGI killed everything. A few favorites off the top of my head would be Basket Case, Slime City, Black Roses, Devil's Fetus, Deep Red, The Beyond, Rocktober Blood, Naked Blood, Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, Evil Dead Trap, Silent Night Deadly Night, as well as some modern style ones like Battlefield Baseball, Wild Zero, The Eye (the original of course) and many others. I don't really take influence from newer movies usually, although some are fun to watch. I guess the old Italian giallo style is the most influential to me.

UN: On your webpage it has a list of the films you guys are into and I had to laugh when I saw Hard Rock Zombies and Rock n Roll Nightmare. Both awesome movies I must add, but where is the love for Trick or Treat? Thats a classic in its own right, although unlike Rock n Roll Nightmare it doesnt have Thor in it.

Elektrokutioner:: Hard Rock Zombies is a classic!!! Yeah, Trick or Treat should probably be up there, but I take it as a given that I like that movie I guess haha

UN: What are your thoughts on newer horror? It seems like as far as newer movies goes you guys are mainly into the Asian side of things. Do you pay much attention to the more mainstream side of horror these days?

Elektrokutioner:: Ugh. I haven't seen a good solid new American horror in a looooooong time. Everything is remakes of clearly superior Asian films like The Eye, which is a favorite of mine. I don't totally dismiss new American horror, but very little of it has made me want to invest in more of it and less on Asian horror or DVD releases of classic Italian flicks, if you know what I mean..

UN: What topics do you guys touch on lyrically? The song titles seem to be about religious topics as well as horrific topics as well.

Elektrokutioner:: After we write a song I usually listen to it a few times and see what kind of vibe I get from it, if that makes any sense. The guitarist wrote a whole song that was on the promo, and after hearing it, I was getting a horror/splatter vibe from it, so I called it Beyond Putrid Decay because I thought it fit. We just finished up a new song that will most likely be the closer on our CD and I decided to call it Crawling Out From The Crypt because that popped into my head when I heard it. I like to cover different themes rather than have every song be about horror movies or anti-Christian or whatever. It's always going to be a dark band with morbid lyrics, but I'm trying to keep them from being like when people think of Deicide they think "Satanic lyrics all the time" or that type thing.

UN: Do you guys get the chance to play live much? I didnt notice any upcoming shows on your Myspace page. Are you guys looking to play live more in the future?

Elektrokutioner:: We haven't played live yet. Obviously when I started the band, it was just me, so that wasn't an option anyway. Plus, I'm an old man now and I was never big on playing shows all the time or touring or any of that. I would like to play occasionally, a show for the CD release, maybe getting on the Texas dates of a bigger tour with good DM bands, that type thing is fun. But, I want to make the shows count and not just play live for the sake of playing live.

UN: How would you describe the metal scene in Texas? Ive heard quite a few brutal death metal bands from the state over the years, but there doesnt seem to be all that much going on for old school influenced death metal bands, although I could be wrong.

Elektrokutioner:: You are not wrong. I haven't heard much, if any real old style DM here. There is a band from Dallas called Cunthammer playing somewhat traditional styled DM stuff, although it's much more technical and modern than what Decrepitaph is doing. There is also a great 80's metal band called Crimson Thirst that absolutely rules if you're into real Heavy Metal. There's too many lame Pantera rip off bands here, and half the bands that rip Pantera off don't even know they're doing it. I've only lived here for a short time though, so maybe there's some other good bands hiding out there that I haven't found yet. But yes, far far far too many brutal DM bands from here that I try to not pay attention to.

UN: What would you say was your favorite year for death metal? Was there a year for you when it seemed like every new album was fresh and violent and death metal was still true to what it was started as?

Elektrokutioner:: 1991. That was the easiest question of the whole interview! Although I was a teenager, I'm grateful that I got to experience what it was like to be around for this era of DM, because it will NEVER be like that again. So many classic bands playing metal for the love of the music and not for money, trends, or because they wanted to be part of some brutality contest. I'm glad to be part of Razorback Records now though, because they seem to be the closest thing to the glory days of metal to me. They have a huge appreciation for good metal and together with the other bands I mentioned before, hopefully we can make 2008 a memorable year for Death Metal for all the real fans!!

Thanks for the interview!!!!!

Official Decrepitaph Myspace