UN: Being that myself and probably many others are new to Immaculate Fatality, can you go through a history of how the band came together? Were any of you in bands prior to this band?

Ben/guitar: Oh man, kind of a long story. James (vocals) and I have been jamming together since 8th grade. Back then we I guess we could be categorized as progressive rock. We never really played any gigs until we were offered one with a bunch of local metal bands. Being fans of bands like Darkest Hour and As I Lay Dying at the time, we learned and covered various songs of theirs and to our surprise were met with lots of positive feedback. About a year later our longtime friend Mike joined the band, replacing previous guitarist Jacob. Since then we have been going strong, playing various shows around Santa Barbara, and recording demos.

UN: How has the response to your latest demo been so far? Have you pressed it or mainly just been giving it away at shows?

Ben: The response to our 2008 demo has been awesome. People are starting to recognize us and respect what we are doing. Being split up at different universities in California makes it difficult for us to do shows and spread our music that way so we have been mainly been focusing on getting our music out on the internet. Come summer when we are all back from school we plan on recording more stuff and pressing a full length.

UN: Are you guys on the lookout for a record label to help you guys out? Have you been sending the demo around to labels yet?

Ben: Yeah, as a matter of fact we were sending out our first wave of demos to labels this weekend. We are of course hoping to get some recognition from these labels but with all the other awesome unsigned bands around right now we try not to psych our selves up too much.

UN: California seems to be a bit of a hotbed for heavy bands these days. Is there a lot of competition between bands or is there a sense of community within the heavy bands? Any bands youd recommend for people to check out?

Ben: There are very few metal bands in our home town of Santa Barbara. The few that do exist seem to have a pretty tight community. The problem is, there are so few venues to play in town that when something does arise all these bands jump on. Same bands playing together makes for the same crowd and the whole metal scene has kinda remains at a standstill.

UN: Has Myspace been a huge help in getting word about the band around? It seems to be much easier for bands to get attention these days. Do you guys spend a lot of time promoting the band online?

Ben: As much as I would like to deny it, I spend a decent amount of time on the space adding people and getting our name out. I wish I could say we could do without it but the fact of the matter is Myspace is a damn good tool to have at hand for getting out your music. We are able to get feedback from people all over the world and set up shows that we probably wouldnt be able to otherwise.

UN: How would you describe the Immaculate Fatality sound? Do you ever find the band being compared to bands you sound nothing like?

Ben: In terms of genre, I'd classify our sound as melodic death metal. The overall sound is somewhere between a band like The Black Dahlia Murder and In Flames. Not to say we are of the caliber of these bands but we have, to a certain degree, the guitar harmonization of In Flames and the blasting drums of The Black Dahlia Murder. We do get our share of funny comparisons though. The most far fetched we've gotten was a comparison to Cryptopsy. Our drummer was flattered with that comparison being a fan of Flo Mounier, but damn we arent that heavy.

UN: While the band is very heavy, there is also a lot of melody in the music. Is it important for you guys to have some melody added to the brutality?

Ben: Oh definitely. Just about anyone can write a heavy riff. Not that there's anything wrong with being straight up heavy but we try to have some substance in the heaviness. Mike and I are a big on harmonizing guitars in harmonic minor. Just about all our riffs either are written with either a harmony or a lead. It seems a bit pointless if you are gonna have 2 guitars and not differentiate them from each other.

UN: Is it important to have more substance to your lyrics than average death metal lyrics? I was surprised that the lyrics were very well written and had a unique yet dark feel to them that matched the music quite well.

Ben: James writes the lyrics to fit the mood of the music. We try to write the music to portray a sense of darkness so when he is faced with writing lyrics for these songs he looks to the deepest and darkest corners of hell for inspiration. Not to say we satanic by any means, but writing happy inspiring lyrics would just not fit the music. We also want to stay loyal to the roots of death metal. He doesn't only get inspiration from outside sources; he tries to keep the lyrics as personal as he can. Im always really pleasantly surprised when I read James lyrics for the first time for he is a very intelligent and literate person. Im sure he could have a future in literature if he was not so set on astrophysics as his major.

UN: Do you guys get to spend as much time as youd like with the band? Is pretty much the entire band still in school?

Ben: No, not at all actually. The whole going to college thing puts the band at a bit of a standstill. We dont let school stop us from writing material though. Mike and I record and tab out stuff which we send to each other and then eventually send it back to our drummer back home in Santa Barbara. Although when those breaks roll around we are back at it full force.

UN: Is music something you guys would want to pursue full time? It seems easier for bands to tour almost the entire year although after awhile it must start to feel like a job more than doing what you love.

Ben: If we had a change to tour a substantial amount of time, I would, without a doubt, put off my enrollment at school. Just being able to travel and play music every night sounds like the life (to me). The way I think of it is, college can always wait but an opportunity like that does will not. Hell, if the whole band never takes off, all of us in the band have something to fall back on, which is comforting to know.

UN: When do you think we can expect a full length recording from the band? Do you guys have enough material written for a full album?

Ben: Like I said earlier we should have a full length by this summer. We have more than enough material, but weve progressed so much over the years that we just cant put our old stuff on the same CD as our new stuff. We will be including the 5 on our demo and will probably be adding around 4 more that are still being written right now.

Official Immaculate Fatality Myspace