Garza Podcast - 183 - DISEMBODIED TYRANT | Blake Mullens: Deathcore, Axe Fx, Cigars & Bad DMT Trips

Episode Date: June 2, 2025

SPONSORS:LALAL.AI - https://www.lalal.ai/?fp_ref=prettygoodagentsGarza sits down in-person with Blake Mullens. Vocalist & guitar player for the deathcore band DISEMBODIED TYRANT. https://instagram.com/disembodiedtyrantCHAPTERS:00:00 - Whiskey Cheers01:04 - Missouri Venues // Chesterfield03:35 - Muay Thai09:47 - Fractal Axe-FX II12:15 - Blake’s ESP Guitar13:46 - Chug: Blake’s “Chewy” Tone17:41 - Joining DT23:04 - Learning Drums, Guitar & Being Homeschooled27:25 - Dealing with Critics31:28 - 8.6 BLACKOUT38:03 - Riff: 8.6 BLACKOUT41:10 - Watching Movies While Writing Music43:35 - Smoking Less Weed45:17 - Girlfriend Appreciation48:19 - The Poetic Edda51:00 - Riff: Death Empress Breakdown56:17 - Cigars1:02:24 - Strip Clubs1:11:41 - Identity Crisis // Losing 100lbs1:17:50 - Bad DMT Trip1:19:28 - Igorrr1:27:32 - Onward & Upward

Well, Blake, thank you for being here, man. Thank you for having me. I'm on it, dude. You're a fucking legend. Dude, no, you're, well, now I keep hearing, I keep seeing your band name around in you, so. We're getting there. It's crazy. That's fucking sick, dude.

Thank you. So it's 12.30, pretty much. We have some whiskey. It'll be pretty cool to do a quick shot. Just do it. I mean, save. It's been calling me. Oh, cheers.

Cheers, man. Cheers. Cheers to all the success of your band the past few years, man. Thank you. Cool. Thank you. Oh, shit. Mm-hmm. Oh.

Yeah, thank you. Very nice. Thank you to Rob Flynn for this whiskey. I guess Machine Head has dropped the whiskey last week, and I'm not getting paid for that. I actually like it. Look at that. It's like a shotgun. It's a freaking shotgun, dude.

Shout out Machine Head, Rob Flynn. Can't beat it. So you're from, uh, so you're from St. Louis, right? Yeah, well, like an hour and a half out. Okay. In the middle of the woods. Yeah. What was your closest, uh, what's your closest venue?

The factory in Chesterfield. Chesterfield, okay. And then closest from that, which I've seen many shows at, is red flag. In the city, red flag, yeah. Oh, the red flag. Oh, great. Yep, there's factory. Oh, wait, are you serious?

Mm-hmm. Yep, it's in Chesterfield. I saw knocked loose, Kublai Khan there. Well, this is recent, dude. That's a big-ass freaking... It is. I hope to play there someday. I probably won't, but would that be sick.

Would that be considered like a hometown Rick for you? Oh, yeah, for sure. Yeah. Dude, that'd be the dream. It would be. Yeah. The place is awesome. Yeah.

Chesterfield. Yeah. It's kind of not, it's not really a city. It's a bit of a weird. It's not even a city. Honestly, the venue is like almost out of place there. But it's sick because it's like a 30 minute drive from me and it's, you know, Yeah, they do MMA fights and stuff there.

They are fighting there, too? I actually saw a few of my gym mates compete there. I used to be competitive into MTA and stuff. Yeah, I was going to ask you if you're still boxing and doing... Not anymore. No, no, I was before I realized that I could make a living with music and stuff. Yeah. And so I was doing that to kind of fill the void.

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life endless creativity so how old are you when you started training i was 16 17 why i always just thought it was so cool i just thought it was like the sickest thing that someone could do like anytime i met like someone that trained moitai or did did m m i was just like oh dude whoa you're so sick, dude. And I was like, I can just be that. I can just go do that. So I found a gym and I went and signed up and I trained for six years. For six years. So well until your early 20s. Yeah. Yeah. I think I stopped going when I was about 21. And then 2022 is when DT took off. Yeah. So you were competing? Lusely. Very loosely. It wasn't as pro as I had hoped it would be. But I got the absolute dog shit kicked out of me.

Yeah, and it was like by a little Thai man and I was just toast. It's like not the same for me. He was shorter than me. He was smaller than me in every way. I had such a huge reach advantage

and it just didn't matter. No. Just absolutely destroyed me. What was? Is this like his speed? His accuracy? All of it. All of it.

All of it. It was all horrific. Was he from Thailand? Mm-hmm. Oh. Yeah. He was, he was, I was about 20 at the time.

he was I think 17 and he was beat your ass beat the fucking brakes off of me dude has DT been to Thailand yet no this is our second tour

yeah my second tour ever yeah second tour ever holy crap man yeah we went to we've been to Thailand a few times

and we actually went to like the Thailand like more tight fights it's so awesome oh my god it's incredible and it's a little like it's between a club

in an arena that makes any sense and they're just beating the shat of each other and people were screaming it's it's their national sport they love it they're there's so many families this as soon as their kids are a fighting age they just send them into these gyms and then they become the breadwinner for their their household once their father can no longer do it it's a really big culture thing over there yeah it's really really cool it's amazing man dangerous place because they're all fucking savages so they'll beat the shit out of you don't fight anyone no don't fight a native tie dude no Don't fight a native tie. Especially if they're shorter than you.

Yeah. It's dangerous. It's dangerous, man. Yep. Yep. That's one of the gym slash resort things they do there. Boom. Yeah, I train in a moitai in my late 20s.

Awesome. One of the best things I've done. Very empowering. Oh, yeah. Yeah, we've been talking here. Like, if you know, like, a martial art, like, something that kind of happens to you. You're more calm. You're just likely not to get any kind of conflict.

Yeah. You know, I've been to any. Honestly, any trained fighter that eggs on fighting in the street and stuff like that really has no idea what they're talking about. I've seen so many horrible things happen in super controlled environments. Yeah. I cannot imagine just how dangerous it would be to fight with someone in a street on concrete. No way. I remember there was this one time we were sparring on a Sunday, and a couple guys from other gyms were there hanging out.

and they were doing some MMA rounds and the guy shot a double and dude threw a knee at the same time So, okay, so people don't know doubles is when he should be able to take him Yeah, get down, okay

And he, other guy threw a knee at the same time And knee straight to the teeth Wrecked all of his teeth The mouthguard did nothing He pulled his mouthguard out and teeth came out with it Oh no! And that was one of the things where I was like, okay I'm not fighting ever.

No, and then you, you, You do that with like untrained people in the street on concrete. And it's like I can't even imagine the risks. No way, dude. So like no matter what it is, I am not going to engage. I'm going to disengage from the situation to get the fuck out of there. Yeah. Get out of there.

Yeah. No, you don't know. Yeah. People are unpredictable. Especially now people, you don't know if they're carrying a knife or a. Yeah. I mean, fuck that. I wouldn't ever.

No. Just don't make the mad. Just don't make a mad, you know. Be chill. No, because the people that kind of speak, like, the loudest tend to either have a weapon or they have no idea what they're doing. Because we all seen the people, like, I remember when I first got into Muay, seeing, like, you know when you see something, you start to see more of it? And, okay, I know I don't want to be this way. Like, it's, it was like the cliche, dude, lifted white truck and all these fight stickers, I fight.

Yeah. I have a vivid man to drive on the freeway, a big lifted white truck with a big white sticker saying, I fight. I know the type I know the type They always suck too They're never good Yeah No they're always

Really butt hurt people Yeah Yeah I hear people like Like people at the gym Would try to weed those people out Yeah And they do get weeded out Really?

Oh yeah And it's hilarious It's one of the highlights Of being a part of a gym like that Is seeing the The Not so good ones getting weeded out On Sparring Day

It's pretty great Pretty great experience. I remember seeing a guy like that get absolutely mangled by this, this woman, this woman MMA fighter we had, Ashley Smashley. She was an Invicta FC champion. Shout out Ashley.

Sick. He got absolutely just tied up to a pretzel by her. And she was 90-something pounds. He was 200 plus. She was a purple belt in jujitsu and just mangled him. It was a sight. It was beautiful. Yeah.

They get weeded out, for sure. Hell yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I remember close friends that got me into the gym, like, always corner warming, don't be this guy, don't be that guy. Yeah, kind of have like that. There's lots of unwritten rules. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, it's like, it's like, uh, torn or anything you have like these, like, like, like rules. Like rules of respect. Yeah. You know, you don't do this, you don't do that. There's certain lines you don't cross. Yeah. You just don't cross him, man.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Well, do, Blake, thank you for bringing the rig, dude. Of course, bro. This might be the, you. the first time we got a AxeFX 3 out of the rack Ah, very cool

So usually people bring the Like, because it's a pedal board version Correct. Mm-hmm, yeah. I don't even know what it's called. FM3 maybe? Something like that? No, I figured, I mean,

you're Chris fucking Garza, dude. Oh, so if Chris Garza wants me to whip out my Axe effects I'm like, you know. Yeah. I'm so honored, man. It's cool. No, I'm honored, man.

Really. Hell yeah. This is incredible. The X-FX 3 was, again, like, I'm not, I use the quad cortex, but that was the first time why people that used the X-FX, those were the ones. Oh, shit, that sounds good. You know, they had the, what was the first one? The Ultra was the first one? No, Ultra was the second.

The second. The standard, X-Fex standard, I think, was the first. The standard, Ultra, a 2. And then 2, and then 2XL. 2XL. And then now we're at 3. Okay, yeah, three, I think three is the one that well, okay, this is things have caught up. Honestly, I felt that way about the two.

Really? I love the two. I think, well, I'm, I really like processed sounds. Yes. I don't like raw stuff that much. So the more processed something sounds out of the gate, to me, the better for DT's application at least. Sure. And the two had this, the ultra as well to even higher extent.

But the two had this like really like chewy. chewy. Yeah. I never heard some of the this chewy low mid thing in the patches that I made on it that the three doesn't really have but it wasn't really a real sounding thing.

It sounded like artificial and digital in a cool way. The three doesn't really have that. Three definitely sounds more organic. That's what it is. It's more like a blend of the raw but still. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. It's a fucking kick-ass unit. It's awesome. I love it. It was actually a slaughtered to prevail. I always listening to him. Oh, that sounds good.

And I saw the rig. Oh, it's a three. That's the first time I saw X-FX. Okay, that sounds. They're great. They're incredible. The amount of detail you can get into with the patches is so sick. Our entire set is reliant on the scene change happening within the patches.

And to be able to just do that from your laptop, not have to tap dance, not have to do any of that jazz. It's so nice. Nice, man. Okay. So, for those of you only listening, Blake has a beautiful. ESP. Can we do a quick rundown? Yeah, I am so stoked to say this. I'm officially an ESP artist.

Awesome. Congratulations. So stoked. The eclipse was my first ever guitar. So to have the seven-string baritone version of it's incredible. This is a EC-107B It's just stock. Fishman Moderns in there. A 27-inch scale. I'm in Drop G right now. We got, I don't even know what brand these are. I think it's, tuners are always kind of off.

Oh, they're just ESP branded locking tuners. That's cool. And we got the EverTune, which is essential for me. I hate tuning. Yeah. If I can never tune, I will never tune. It would be great. Voice change.

I think this is active, passive. I always use it inactive. Cool. Yeah, thing rips. I think I'm running 10 to 65 on this in Drop G. Oh, 65 for the drop D. Okay. Nice.

The 27-inch scale really helps with that. Mm. Totally. So 27 is actually like a official baritone. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it's really nice for like the, I have a couple solos in the set that go way high up here.

Really? Having the extra space in the frets helps so much. So much. That's 24 frets? Yeah. Oh, six. Okay. Yeah.

It's great. Love it. Well, I heard you doing some freaking chew. chugs, dudes. Maybe, uh... I'll do a chewy chooey chug. Okay, thanks, man. I gotta chew on some, dude.

So, funny story behind this tone, actually. I'll just play it real quick. Very Josh Travis influenced. Okay, cool. What I found when I started DT was that this, just the tritone, I think that's a tritone,

or minor second, whatever it is. I have no idea. Just that classic death core thing, I always felt like it wasn't angry enough for the uses I wanted it to be. I agree. It's like I could hear the notes too much, and it bugged me. So I... Got it.

After listening to Danza a bunch... Shout out to John Travis. Yeah, shout out, dude. Oh, it's just different. So that's a minus one pitch block, blended at 50%, and then an octaver before that. You're putting a pitch something in there? Yeah, a minus one. one pitch block. So it's like down one

semi tone, blended in 50%. There he is. There's our guy. Oh, oh, dude, I'm not... What a beast. We're talking about chugging and I don't even know what you're talking about. This is my world and I'm not... I have no idea what he was happening. Yeah, so it's a pitch block in the Axe effects and it's set to the whammy setting

and there's a mix knob on that that block. And so it's down one semitone, so an F sharp and then that's blended in before the amp at 50%. And then before that in the chain is a minus one octave blended at like 30%. So it just creates this wall of...

It's just unintelligible, just mud, and I love it. So it becomes a percussive instrument at that point. And that's kind of what I was going for. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. Drop my secrets. Crazy.

Yeah, we just... To do that kind of stuff, we would just put like an octave on it. But that's all I really knew how to do. I never heard of someone adding a pitch thing on top of the octave. So that's fucking cool, Blake. Honestly, it came from like a weakness, I felt like, because I had a, I can't believe I'm saying this, but I had an issue for the longest time building tones that I was happy with.

And I felt like when I listened to records that I loved, like cleansing or anything else, when you guys would do the classic condescent death core stuff, it would sound great. But for some reason, when I would try to, emulate it with the tones I had it just sounded bitch made so it's like this was more overcompensating because I felt like I couldn't match the just the the aggressiveness that the bands like yours were achieving at the time that's what I did right sick that's that that's what I do with the corn

I'm like I can't I can't be that nasty how can I be mad nastier right right and now you you took it to a whole other level thank you bro I'm sure other people are doing this that I'm not aware of but this was, yeah, I think it's something that helped make DT what DT is right now. Yeah, you guys really found like some kind of like original sound. Somehow. Yeah, I don't really. I'm just combining a bunch of unoriginal sounds and it kind of ends up being somewhat original at the end of the day for people, I guess.

But for me, it's like I can, I know where everything's derived from in the song. So it doesn't necessarily feel like I've struck gold or anything. thing but it's worked out so I'm just so happy to be here yeah awesome so you join the band Thanksgiving Day yeah yeah wow good good fucking trivia there dude I've only said that like once Thanksgiving Day yeah Thanksgiving Day the the old vocalist hit me up and I joined immediately became the songwriter with no prior songwriting experience yeah I had throughout my whole life I wanted to be a writer but never really felt like I had it in me like none of my ideas I ever felt like were that great so I would always just write like these 30 second demos and then I would mix them I wouldn't try to write them I would just get something out and then try to mix it and then mix the 30 seconds yeah I was I was obsessed with production in mixing because I felt like I wasn't like I didn't have that inner thing that a lot of writers have yeah I felt like I felt like I felt like I didn't have that inner thing that a lot of writers have yeah I felt like I felt like

I didn't have it. So I kind of gave up on music for a long time and started working for like the family business and stuff. And then I would make these instrumental covers on YouTube every once in a while just for fun. And the old vocalist of Disbody Tireant, yeah, the knocked loose one right there on the far right is the one that he saw. And it made him hit me up. And he was like, yo, you want to play guitar for my band?

That song rips. Blake Calder? I'm 25. 25, okay. Yeah. So he saw this and he hit me up and I was like, well, I don't have anything to lose, sure. And then him and the old songwriter sprung it on me. They were like, well, how about you write a song?

And whatever you write, it's going to be our new sound. And I think they had like 800 monthly listeners on Spotify at the time, which for me was a lot. I was like, wow, that's crazy. So I was really nervous writing a song for this band. And I had written one song for like a class. client job out of nowhere a little before that. And that was the only song I'd written at the time. And he just asked me to be the songwriter, so I'm like, sure. And then I write of Brimstone and Fire, which was my second ever song. And it did really well on Slam Worldwide, and everyone was somewhat

stoked on it. I was like, oh, maybe I do have something in there. And then reincarnate, the whole EP Stigmata happened. And then I met up with Sam from Sinastia, and we made the poetic edda happen. And it's really just been fucking insane since. Just huge milestone after the other, after Eta came out. It's been absolutely crazy. It's a huge head trip. Yeah, you guys ain't even put out like a record? No, I know.

It's so weird. It's so weird. I'm like, my discography is like I could not play a headliner set. Like I just physically couldn't. There's not enough material. Which is really crazy to be on tour with FlashGuard. Apocalypse, Shadow of a Ten, and Chelsea Green and all these bands, without a full-length record is mind-boggling to me.

Yeah, I keep seeing your band name so much. I'm like, it's kind of assumed. Yeah, okay, I'm going to hang out with Blake for a little bit, and let me do a little dive. Oh, wait, where's the... There's like nothing. I remember, it goes to show, man, like, we've experienced that. Like, our first tour is we didn't have a record out.

Mm-hmm. And we did that headliner until. I was in six with Osho Perish night like these and some other bands and they're all signed. Yeah. I remember kind of giving shit to Eddie, but remember, you know, we were young stupid kids. Remember, we were at Best Buy.

And he's like, oh, where's your CD in the stores? Kind of like a funny backhand. A little jab. It was all cool. I was like, but in my head, I want to see it, well, who's headlining? Yeah. No, it's cool.

That's cool, dude. Yeah, you're actually, Blake, you're actually living it with the, with DT. Like you don't, I think there's a pressure. Oh, yeah. Unneeded pressure to write records. Like, you just do what's fucking best for your band and the songs. Yeah, for sure. And you're on your second full US tour.

Yeah. With no record. I mean, a record's coming for sure. Yeah. But it's, but it's, it takes so long to write the stuff. I do the, I face the, the, the. brunt of the workload

out of choice really I just I love the process I love making it happen at whatever cost it may be but there just hasn't been a record yet

because it like the Tower Part 1 pretty much all of those songs took over a year to write really yeah because I was just

I was going through all these growing pains because Edda happened and it became like this huge thing for a lot of people in the scene

and just the fear of falling that up was immense. So I really took my time on dialing things in and maturing as a songwriter as best I could. But yeah, next step is a record, get a full length out, do it again, do it again, do it again, do it again. And then you're going to die. Exactly. And that's basically our lives.

Yep, I love it. Leave behind a big casket. Hell yeah. Totally now So you were You were originally a A drummer right Yeah

Yeah I I started playing in trums at four Yep My dad My dad was Is a drummer Really solid rock drummer He would learn rush songs by ear

And that was about Oh he's a beast I love him And he As soon as I was like Able to comprehend What was happening He had me behind a drum kit

And was showing me Like 44 you know, four on the floor kind of stuff. And then learned ACDC songs and then over time when I was about 10, I started learning rush stuff. And then I got into Dream Theater right after that

and I'd say the pinnacle of my yeah, the professor, dude, so sick. The pinnacle of my ability was Dance of Eternity. I think I did a cover of that when I was 12 or 13 on drums. And I was obsessed with drums. And I had foot surgery.

Couldn't play drums anymore. and I went to my parents and I was like, can I please have a guitar? So I could like learn that, but it would be great. So they bought me a EC-256, same body shape, same brand. And that was my first ever guitar. And I never looked back, never really went back to drums after that. What happened to your foot? I had, like, the bones in my feet were like fusing together for some reason.

It was just like going through all the cartilage and all the cartilage got degraded I guess, and the bone started fusing together. It was quite painful. So I couldn't really walk or run or anything, and my parents noticed, like, me slowing down as I got older. Yeah, yeah. And so I had two pretty major foot surgeries on both feet. Both feet?

Mm-hmm. And I was in, couldn't walk for, I think about almost two years. You could walk almost two years? Yeah. So I think late 12s, I was like almost 13 when I had the first one, and I was almost 14 when I had the last surgery. and I was in either on crutches or a wheelchair throughout that entire time. I became homeschooled around that time too.

I went to school up until fifth grade and then I became homeschooled. Never went back to school. I was just fully invested in music and practicing and everything. My parents were very supportive of that. Yeah. I was going to ask you if you became homeschooled because of your feet. Yeah. Yeah, it was because of the surgery.

We also, 2008 happened and the economy took a shit. And my parents were construction developers at the time. And we got hit real hard. So we lost our house, moved in with my grandparents. Wow. And so when that happened, I was like rather than going into a new school district right before big transition into middle school, let's just homeschool me for a year. And then whenever we get back on our feet, we'll figure it out. But that never happened.

It never happens. Never happens. It did eventually, but by that time, I was 17, and I had finished homeschooling when I was 16. So I just stayed fully invested into music, and then I found fighting and all that. And music came back as a surprise, so. So if you're going to homeschool, you could graduate sooner? Yeah, if you do the work, yeah, yeah. I mean, I'm not going to lie, I cheated a lot.

Yeah, we all did. Because it's homeschool, you know, you can just get away with it. So I would I would just like cheat. I would dedicate 30 minutes a night to just cheat. And then and then spend the rest of the time practicing pretty much. And just like watching YouTube videos about gear, about like. About cheating too? Yeah.

And like the dude. How do I cheat better? How do I cheat more efficiently? I remember watching the suicide silence studio documentaries and the periphery documentary. and just geeking out about that stuff. And it really fed me, fed me well. So thank you for that. Yeah.

That video of you falling through the drum set live. Oh, yeah. Oh my God, so inspirational, dude. And now you're here just in front of me. Oh, my God, it's crazy. I'm geeking. I'm sorry guys, I'm just geek. I'm here in front of you.

That's the, I will never imagine I would be doing this dude. No. For real. I don't believe you, bro. No. Believe you. You're so sick, dude. What we lost, well, why, I haven't seen this in a long time.

well we uh well blake we lost i don't know if you're aware but we lost our career twice uh we put out that record in 2017 and basically lost our money yeah so uh to be able to come back to gain it back a third time you know i wouldn't imagine you know resilience oh yeah resilience you guys do when i saw you at new england uh metal hardcore fest i could caught your guys a set oh cool i was just that's a pro band okay i see now i see that's that's what legends look like Oh, that's what they do. I'm not one of them yet.

So people either call, people either call you a legend or a watchtip has been. So it's a really tough line to. I can't wait. I can't wait, dude. It's going to be great. So the moment, what I come to realize is success is when you start becoming,

oh, there's just that. All DT does is that. Yeah. Once you start saying that, you crossed over. Yeah. So they're just, no, it's like, all he does is this.

All he does is this. Yeah, I'm terrified of it. I lose sleep over it. Yeah. Which is really unhealthy. It's really bad. But I just, I don't know, man. I have a weird relationship with, with, like, online critics.

Because I don't necessarily view them as like. Get out of there, dude. I know, I know. I tell everyone. Get out of there. I feel like it's, I said it was unhealthy a second. I'm going to retract that. I feel like I'm so, I get so invested in the process and in the song in the moment.

And then it comes out and it's like a week after it comes out, I have this whole new perspective on it. And I feel like I'm not as tied to it as I was. Sure. And I can view it more objectively. Okay. So like for instance, our latest song, 8.6 blackout came out not long ago. And there was a post on Reddit that said like, it was like, dude, I know, I know. Just hear me out, bro.

Just hear me out. I have phones on. I'm listening. I promise. It's going to work out. There was a post that was like, it's just me or is new disembodied tyrant, kind of samey.

Yes. I was like. You made it already. I was like, oh my God, I made it. I've read it haters. This is perfect. Not even a record. Not even a record.

And that's what all the comments said. They were all like, how can they be samie? They don't even have a record out. Congratulations, man. Thank you. That's a big deal, honestly. But I was reading that and I was like, while I was writing it,

I was like, you know, I feel like this could be, this could be more compelling. There's honestly a couple parts I feel like I relied on samples a little too much. Nah. Honestly, there's just, I have just my own outlook on the thing. And sometimes haters, I agree with them. Sometimes I'm like, you know what? I think I could be objectively better next time. I think I could have done this one aspect of what I did better.

I'm going to take that and I'm going to, as long as I agree with it. Sure. And if I, it's something I feel like I need to work on that I'm going to do it. I see all these people that are like so anti-criticism from fans that it's like, I don't know. I don't know. I just don't really have that problem. I just, it doesn't really affect me as much as it, I think it should. I think because I had given up on music before and now this is all, this is all like free in a way.

Sure. I just don't have that like super emotional kind of reaction to stuff. like that when I'm in the middle of the process I do like when I'm in the middle of writing for sure it becomes a problem but but once the song's out I don't know I take it all on the chin and if there's something in there that I feel like I could take and admit do better the next time why wouldn't I you know every once in a while I mean I'm talking every once in a while you'll get a really like legit critic yeah oh this is that's you said that to be helpful and I I appreciate that but that's

few and far in it it is few and far in between and to look for that and to look for that you're gonna this is your journey man good luck thank you good look eight yeah so 8.6 blackout so so how how are you feeling writing that song stressed good very stressed I had gotten back from the the Flesh god tour and we had the nuclear blast deal already ready to go and the the original deal was to have it done by new years but pretty early on, we got back from the tour, like, what was it, mid-October? That's Kevin Alexander, just body tyrant's drummer, by the way. Fuck, yeah.

Rippin, dude. We got back, and I was like, oh, shit, I got like three months to do a whole song right now. So I wrote the intro, just credibly stoned. I was really stoned the whole time. And I had watched this. I was just like brain rotting on YouTube, and I found these videos. was about 8.6 blackout, the round. It's a caliber for a rifle.

And I watched this video and the guy shot a jail block, a ballistic jail block with it. And just the unadulterated violence that that round is capable of was so inspiring to be in that moment. The whole song just kicked off

right from that. Oh, okay. And the vision, I think I said this in the statement when it came out. But it's the first time I've had a vision be so succinct. and just end up exactly how I thought it would

which was really sick really sick it happened exactly as it needed to I think that's the video yeah I love that you knew you just knew exactly what video it was so he so he fires something right yeah he shoots it at some point

you can see the spiral can you crank this jay? Oh yeah there it is oh fuck yeah yeah they don't have a head anymore no it's it's horrifying oh it's absolutely horrifying pull out the back of their fucking skull dude yeah it's just yeah that's straight up decapitation it's crazy yeah it's a gun version of that

yeah yeah so i'm a bit of a gun nerd not as much as i think people on the internet think i am because of the name of the song but i do like guns i like rounds i think it's interesting um but yeah that's how that started and the political themes really came from my girlfriend. She writes a lot of the lyrics for me. Well, we work together on it. So I came to her with the concept. I was like, song's going to be called 8.6 blackout. I really love this round,

and I want to build, like, a kind of an archetype around, like, a certain United Healthcare CEO incident that happened not long ago. Oh, that had just happened. Oh, okay. I saw this video. The timeline, yeah. Yeah, and I kind of just put. put two and two together and I was like, let's tell a story like this, because it's such a huge shift thematically from all the fantasy stuff we were writing about before.

Yeah. And I threw together this video for it just with stock footage and an old, old footage I found on the internet that was not copyrighted. Yeah, I was going to ask you, like, how did, how is this video even allowed on YouTube? It's really not. I mean, it is flagged. Okay. It got flagged to death. which really killed the reach. But the engagement's so crazy.

Like, we have like a thousand likes. Yeah, there's like a part where a guy's being hung. Sorry, 9.7,000 comments, I think, yeah. No description available? What's up with that? Really? Oh, because if there's anything, so if there's anything offensive in a video, they'll actually take out the whole description.

That's crazy. So, uh. That sucks. But, yeah, I mean, it was a Nazi getting hung in there. JFK getting domed is in there Marilyn Monroe with

cross her face is in there which not many people really picked up on her I think got the depth of what that meant but whatever it's a different generation Blake yeah yeah it's like who's that

chick? I guess maybe yeah could be that could be that yeah I was actually I was really nervous when I put when this video came together because I was like it was supposed to to get posted on

Nuclear's channel and it was just too much for that and it had to get posted on mine and I'm like, oh man. So did they tell you hey we can't? Hey, we, I don't know. Essentially, but I knew that was going to be the case. I just didn't really realize how like

on the nose the video is when I was making it because it's just like stuff that my girlfriend and I kind of think about and I give the our worldview a bit. Not that we're condoning, murdering, certain officials,

but it can get pretty edgy, but I just didn't realize it in the moment. And then when I showed it to our bassist, Lucas, he was like, bro,

this is crazy. And I'm like, oh, oh, no. And then we, all as a band, we were like, should we censor it? Should we not censor it?

No, let's not censor it. Great call, yeah. Kevin really pushed, push the envelope there he was like don't fucking censor it bro don't even think about it

yeah it worked out worked out yeah there's those yeah man there's like these these moments where your uh where your integrity is kind of tested so moments where you don't censor when you probably should

I love those same same and I was like I was thinking of like cattle decaps forced gender reassignment I can't watch that I can't either. But like it's so ubiquitous now. But it's like maybe I have an opportunity to do something similar with it getting censored to death. Yeah, and all the cadaver footage from World War II is pretty brutal.

It's the, I think it's the fact that you used real footage. Yeah. It kind of separates maybe like the other videos where you're talking about. It's more like animation. It's more like a storytelling, but this is like you took real. Yeah. Yeah. This actually happened.

actually happened not that long ago. Pretty horrifying stuff. Yeah. Yeah. And it's very inspired by these colors don't run. The architect's song in video. Very, very similar. A lot of the old footage vibe came from that.

Very ahead of its time. Nice. What are you, I was going to ask you, what are you doing in the verse? It's like these, please, oh God. I can't play it. It's not physically possible. Really?

No, it is not physically possible. A lot of DT parts are not physically possible to play. What's you do live then? So live what we do... How about this? We go two semitones down because what we're doing on the records, we're writing on the C,

and there's this crazy pedal that's happening the whole time. So it's... Ditt... And you're having to do that and hit these chromatic notes at the same time. And it's just a fucking nightmare.

And my guitarist and I both tried really hard to get it up to speed clean, could not do it. It just wasn't going to happen. So what we did was we just pitched down to a C. And I don't play it live. I'm just a vocalist for that song. Thank God. But that's how we got around that. So it's a bit of a cheat, but it works out.

So are you doing like a block? It shouldn't be pulled off. It shouldn't be pulled off actually. it should all be alternate picked. Yeah. That's a cool riff, dude. It's all right. It's very lamb of God. That's freaking cool, man.

Thanks, bro. Thank you. It's a lot cooler on the record. Yo, it's listening to my dude. What the fuck's you doing, dude? This shit's crazy, dude. It is crazy. And I feel a little cheap for not playing it exactly how it is on the record,

but I don't know, man. I feel like to really push the boundaries of DT and to do what I hear in my head, I feel like it's just going to be a sacrifice. Like sometimes you just can't replicate what you do. So you actually hear it in your head first. Yeah. Yeah, almost always.

Almost always. Well, actually, that's not true. There's a few parts where it's like, I can hear it second by second where I'm like, okay, these three notes should happen after this one. But I don't know what should happen after that. So it's like I'll fill in half a bar of music at a time sometimes. Okay.

But that riff in particular was actually heard it like half speed, like more like a funk bass line in my head before it became a metal riff. That happened sometimes. Yeah. So I just plucked out the notes three in the morning in my basement and time stretched it 50%. I was like, oh, it's a sick riff. and then now we have that part yeah awesome man

awesome dude yeah I was like what the fuck what that it's brutal it's gnarly do you still do you still write directly after you watch movies yes

all the time I love nothing more than a good movie it's my favorite art medium I think it's films 8.6 the intro was very inspired by Blade Runner the new and old version

Okay. Well, sequel and not sequel, I guess. Sure. Love Blade Runner. Love the crazy transition at the end of 8.6 into the end breakdown, the crazy Oregon, like, do do do do do do part. That was straight from Tenet.

Love Tenet. It's a great movie. Yeah, movies are awesome, man. I love movies. I really like watching, I would for watching a movie, and then during the movie, it's like. Yeah, and then I pause it, and I go. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, that's happened a few times. Yeah. I love it. There's something so immersive about movies that very few other mediums can, just the level of immersion I can experience with a movie is so much higher than pretty much any other medium. Yeah, love movies. They're great. So you live Tenet. Yeah, Tenet.

Oh, God, it's so good. The first watch of Tenet is like that movie kind of sucks. What the fuck happened? I didn't hear anything. None of the shit made any sense. And then the second time you watch it, you're like, oh, it's the greatest movie ever made. Also, it took you like a second. A second watch.

Yeah, took me a second watch with subtitles. Yeah. It's a great movie, though. Okay, so is there parts in a different language? What's the... No, it's just the mix that Mr. Nolan wants is... Christopher Nolan. Yeah.

The mix he wants is so avant-garde and hard to hear. Like, I think his logic is when the characters are in a situation where you can't hear anything, you can't hear anything. Oh, yeah. Yeah, and like if someone's having a panic attack or they're freaked out or something, you're going to hear their heartbeat instead of what that other guy's saying across the room. And so it really leaves a lot of these plot holes in a way that you kind of have to fill in yourself with context clues. and sometimes a second watch will enable that a lot easier than the first. So are you high both times you're watching a movie? High?

Yeah. I used to be, I took a break from weed just because I was so dissociated all the time. And I was like, maybe I shouldn't like smoke as soon as I wake up. It's probably not a good thing to do. Yeah, it got, it got too much, dude. Yeah, it did. It got way too much. My girlfriend was like, I'm going to kill you.

You got to be, like, present. You got to be a person. I'm like, you're right. So I stopped smoking for over a month. I felt great. And then I started doing it again just at night just to hang with the poise. And it's been a much better balance lately. But yeah, definitely when watching these, I was on some stuff.

Yeah, it was great. What's difference now with you smoking when you took off like a month and it got back? Like, what was that? It was just like I did some like introspection. And I was just like, I just need to use it as. a tool rather than a like it shouldn't be who I am it should be a tool in my arsenal in a way so and there's there's moments like especially when working on 8.6 I was sober for the majority of it there were times where it was like I'd I'd work a 10 hour day on the song and really want to

work another six hours but just not have it in me I'll eat smoke come back and for some reason when I smoke, I just get locked into whatever it is I'm doing. So using it in that sense, it's like get more out of me when I'm already kind of exerted what I had sober. That'll buy me another few hours, which really helps save the day towards the end of the process, getting this out. And that helped a lot. Just having a better relationship with it.

Yeah, for sure. And you have your lady to thank for that, right? Yes. I have my lady to thank for just about everything. There's a saying, I'm sure we all know it, behind every successful man is a very, very great woman. 100%. And that is 100% my case.

She is a rock for me. And like I said, she wrote the vast majority of the lyrics for 8.6, which honestly made the song for a lot of people. And she's the one that they have to thank for that. Kind of dark lyrics. Huh? It's kind of dark lyrics. Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah. You better not smoke. You better, listen, you might be that fucking, you might be that tall. Dude, yeah, no, no, she's number one. She's my love of my life, for sure. How long have you guys been dating? Almost five years. Five years.

So I think four, four years, but almost five. It'll be five, no, it'll be five this December. Yeah, so four years. That's awesome, man. Yeah, I've been dating my lady for five years. Beautiful. I introduced her to people out in about, oh, this is the town. for suicide sounds.

Yeah. Oh yeah. I would not, this podcast wouldn't exist or the band wouldn't be. Same. Yeah, it's same. 100% same. Yeah, she's, every time I falter, she's there to help me and to guide me where she thinks I should go. And she's pretty much always right.

So, yeah. Yeah, don't ever tell her that. She's a great cook, too. Sick. Cooks a lot for Kevy. Oh, yeah, dude. That dill sauce? Get out of here.

Unreal. That's why I kept a buff. Yeah, dude. Getting fed. well, dude. So sick. You gotta have a buff drummer, dude. Oh, I know. Dude, when my guitarist

knew him and he was like, this guy needs to be our drummer. And when I saw a picture of him, I was like, there's no way this fucking guy wants to play drums for me. Look at this savage. He was on tour with Beyond Creation at the time, and I was like, man,

there's no way this guy's going to say yes. And then what was it? You heard Averent? Yeah. He heard Averent. He was like, oh, man, bro. Sick. Yeah, he's the best.

We love it. Great choice, man. That's cool. Got an aqua man, dude. Jason Momoa, ripping the kit, dude. Crazy. Crazy world we live in. Well, luckily he's a very handsome man.

Oh, my God. Yeah, well, dude, my manager FaceTimed us in the car the other day during rehearsal, and I put Kevin on for him, and he just stops and he goes, man, I forget how fucking handsome you are. You're so handsome. I'm like, yeah, dude. It's my guy. Yeah. It's great.

I don't even like, man, it's a privilege to have him in the band for sure. Do you need a good drummer? Gotta have a good drummer. You need a... I love all my boys.

Lucas is a fucking savage bass player. He can play like the fucked up riffs that Dom are guitarist and I can't. He could just play them on bass because he's got all these fingers

and fucking he's slapping and popping shit. Speed of light. Dude's a savage. Yeah. That's great, man. So the, I want to talk about a couple of songs off the poetic era.

Yeah. The title track, that first solo, it's like a violin going with it. Oh, my God. Oh, it's a fucking, yeah. What the fuck are you doing there? That, oh, man, I wish I remembered writing that, but I was some stuff. Oh, okay, I'm seeing a pattern here. Yeah, yeah. Okay, I remember the beginning beginning.

I was honestly trying to rip off and vent animate animate. I was like, I really wanted this super atmospheric, big, like, ambient lead thing going on with this, I don't know, some kind of chug pattern, but it just ended up being what it is.

And then out of that, I just heard, I was really into Inveh at the time. And I was like, I needed to do some Ingve shit. There's no one in Death Corps is really doing neoclassical shred stuff. Oh, got it comments.

And so I, just kind of wrote that solo out of nowhere. I mean, I maxed efforted it for like three days. It was a really long time. It didn't end up being what it is. I remember showing one of my producer buddies, and I was like, bro, I feel like this intro and this

solo just sounds like two different songs. Like, I feel like I need to split these up and do something else with these. And he was like, don't you dare. This is one of the sickest combos I've ever heard. And it kind of clicked in my head. I was like, oh, this is kind of a sound. of a thing yeah like I can combine these the whole song and and make a song out of it and that's what Sam and I did yeah it's still to the day to this day my favorite song that I've worked on really yeah yeah it's so dynamic and I tried really hard

and it just turned out a certain way that that I hold very dear in my heart yeah we got wolves in the video so that's serious yeah I'm not too stoked on the video now no no because I mean I just know where all the I know all the footage is stock footage. A lot of people didn't know that, and I felt a little shitty for that not being clear, but it's, uh, yeah,

it's just, it looks cool, but it looks awesome. I'm much happier with 8.6's video. I feel like I've matured a lot in the video making process. It's kind of hard to talk to that one, dude. It is.

It is. I'm like, I've already, I'm already talking with my girlfriend. I'm like, we got to think of something even crazier for the next one. Got to keep one up in this. Yeah.

Yeah. That's, that's the bar setter. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Hey, Jay, go back to the track, track listing. I was trying to look at it. Let's see.

Yeah. Oh, it's a death. Death Empress. Yeah, that, that's our big one right now. Like, what is that? That, I don't even know how you would, how did you describe it. I was called it, it was kind of like a, the way you're picking like the breakdown. Oh, yeah.

I can, so that's a Lorna thing, at least in my head. Yeah, the crazy super fast trim pick stuff. But I find when I do that, like, in real time, it just kind of sounds like... It doesn't really have, like, the... Try to find that breakdown, Jay? It's maybe like a... No, no, no, it's not... Are you talking about the really fast one?

Yeah, yeah. It should be like a minute or so. Yeah, so it's like... Yeah, it's coming up after this. Yeah, here it is. Yeah, that part. Yeah. Do you how, okay, so how are you picking that?

It's just, it's just straight up. Is it? Yeah, it's just, it's really all it is. But what I do on the record is different, um, because that just kind of sounds like white noise. But it's why it works. Yeah. Really? It's all it is.

Yeah. But on the record, I track at half speed and then I speed it up. There you go. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm probably missing a note or there because it's like, it's so fast.

But on the record, I track it. I track it half speed and time stretch it to, so you get the bloom of the low end. And it sounds like kick drums whenever you do that. And it's just so much better than doing it full speed that I just don't, I have no shame with it. I'm like, if it sounds better time stretched, the producer in me is like, it's going to be that way. And as long as we can play it live, it'll be fine. Even if we have to nerf it a little bit, if we can play it and it sounds close enough to the original, I'm going to be fine with it. What's that last breakdown?

It's chuggy. People thought, someone said, I don't know who it was, but someone was like, oh, bro discovered spice, like splice loops for the first time or something. And I was like, ugh. But that's, yeah, shut up, whoever said that. Tell me how to fuck up. But it, that was from a, it's from a contact library called Vocalized 2. And they have these really cool motif, motif things in there. And I just combined a bunch of them, time stretched them to be way faster than they were, reversed them, duplicated it, harmonized it, all this crazy stuff.

And then that's a harpsichord piece. Not a harpsichord, that's like a, I don't even remember what that instrument that was. The most replayed is where it's at. so uber generic deathcore breakdown here very boring to me now but here that's that contact library nice yeah nice you guys are you guys are fucking crazy thank you for i wrote this this this breakdown was me but um sam from senestia wrote the majority of this song like the riffs and stuff a lot of this was his um edda was mainly mine winter was very 50-50 um um um um Yeah, the whole EP was a really good time collaborating with him.

It was awesome. He's a beast. That's just fucking match just heavy, dude. Thanks, bro. Thank you. Now, just something about your weight, you just chug. It's just like a nasty. It's really the only thing that I've cared about.

Like, I'm really not, like, I have crazy solos in our set that I sometimes don't nail. But I'm really a rhythm player at heart. I love chugging. I love riffs. That's my whole, that's my whole. that's my whole thing. I hate playing solos. I hate solos so much.

But I do it. Oh, that Tampa show, dude, that was brutal. I almost passed out like three times during the song. Really? It's hot. Oh, it's so hot. And I don't know what it is, but playing and screaming at the same time is so fucking taxing. Sure. It's like I could just feel sweat everywhere.

It's dripping down my pant leg. Yeah. Oh, I'm drooling. It's brutal. I think I dropped my pick in this, too. Terrible. I always drop picks. Yeah, I'm really bad about it.

Dude, I have to fucking get one of those mic stands that has the pick holder on it. Yeah. Gotta have that. I can't believe I don't have it right now. We got to go to your guitar center. I need a wireless mic too. I'm tripping over my mic cable and shit. Sucks.

I don't think being high helps. No. Well, I'm never high when I perform. Oh, no. No, never. Never high when I perform. No, I save it for after. You wait for the edibles before you go to bed, right?

Oh, yeah. Yeah. So sick. So you're a cigar guy. Yeah, I love cigars. Nice, man. How did you know that? I guess.

Oh, my God. Nailed it. I love cigars. Cool, man. How do you, so I do like cigars, but I guess, I think a lot of guys like cigars. They don't know where to start. You know, how do you, I think you started with that. I found a website.

I can't even remember the website. Yeah. This is terrible. I can't even remember. But they had like a bundle deal. It was like a huge variety of cigars gets into you in this bag I should do a bundle Yeah

I thought about that And that was like the only way Um actually And you try them or what? Yeah yeah I just tried them I mean my I gotta give my girlfriend even more credit It started because I watched the Sopranos

For the first time like a few years ago And never knew Never knew anything about the show Um And I watched the whole thing Like I bingeed it And she had known that And they smoked cigars all the time in that

And she was like He'd probably appreciate if I got them the same cigars that the Sopranos were smoking in the show. So she got me these crazy cigars and they were the strongest fucking things. It made you want to puke. Yeah, if you get strong ones, which I made that mistake because you're a guy, you have ego. Like, I'll get the strong one. Yeah.

Same. Same. And it just beats your ass. Yeah. Beats you up. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I almost peeked you three times.

So I smoked half of one and I was like, this is sick, but I can't finish it. So then I found this other website. Got a bundle deal. Okay. I was like a bunch of discounted cigars was like 40 bucks. They sent me a bag of like 20 cigars. It was awesome. Holy crap.

Yeah, there's like really, really small ones, really big ones. I don't really know the terminology that well, but I just love a good cigar. Did you try them all? Actually, I brought them on this tour. I think they're in my suitcase. No, I did and I left them. I brought them on the last tour, but we never even smoked one on the last tour. I think I'm down to like four or five.

Yeah. Have you found one that you enjoy yet? I like them all. I like them all. I mean, there's a few. They're just way too strong. But I'm really not picky with what I put in my lungs of being honest. Well, yeah, you have that fucking, you have, you have vape juice around you constantly. Yeah.

You watch that. Yeah, so. Yeah. Yeah. Honestly, it's a whole family thing for me. Like my dad, my brother-in-law, two of my aunts, like all of my friends all raped or smoked. And so as soon as I turned 18, it was like,

just locked in. I'm fucking locked in, dude. Locked in, dude. Hell yeah. Yeah, so it was something like that. Yeah. I think it wasn't, it wasn't brand specific, but yeah, yeah, very similar. So just different brands.

Mm-hmm. Okay. Mm-hmm. I believe it's, so when I started talking to people about smoking cigars, it's the darker ones are stronger, correct? I think so. Okay. And, and the lighter.

ones are the ones you want so then I went from like getting like the dark ones I go to San Diego with my chick and we'll just go to like a nice like cigar shop really cool and you know you ask like the guy that's kind of counting which one well you see some guy so you give me like this fucking dark ass it looks like a piece of shit yeah yeah you know it's like really hard little turd dehydrated piece of shit you know I'm that one you know and you feel like shit and then I'm sort of asking more question okay well no it's like you want to get the lighter ones And the ones that are a smallest, so I'm trying to build myself up to it.

So now I've been getting the more, like, lighter ones. And it's great. It's really enjoyable. Yeah, I'm not afraid to say I'm a bit of a bitch when it comes to cigars. I can only handle, like, the Sopranos licensed ones were literally this big. I could get through. Oh, yeah, dude. Under half of it, and it's just like, I got to lay down.

Yeah. No, we cannot do that, dude. No, no way. And it's hell on your voice, too. Oh, is it really? Yeah. For me, it is. Actually, smoking is really bad.

for my voice. So when I'm on tour, maybe after the set, I'll take a drag. But before, absolutely nothing, nothing in a way. Can't do it. Especially not high.

I actually played my, I got really sick and lost my voice on the like the tail end of the last tour. And we had to do a couple instrumental sets. And one of them, I think in Salt Lake, I took a rip of a weed pen before we went on. And it was one of the

greatest things because it was just instrumental I didn't have to be a front man or anything I could just rip my guitar and that was so much more comfortable yeah that's that's it that's it yep those things are scary dude is that called chow I don't know

C C a O that's okay I love that they have comics it's just comic sands on the yeah so it says so the cigar that they use in the soprano it says C a O at yeah I guess I don't know I feel like there's an H in there

Is there? I don't know. 36 bucks? Not a big calf. No, it sells the four, four pack sampler for 30. So you get four, 36. And one is enough for like two months. Oh, yeah. If you're a normal person.

Oh, yeah. They're intense. Yeah. Dude, I would just put that in your freaking butt, dude. To fucking, that freaking cigar butt plug, dude. That fucking hit hard. Oh, my God. I'll tell you, when I was golfing with my brother-in-law one time,

we had big cigars. I was like, I was 18. We had these big cigars and we had dip too. I'm from rural Midwest, so just about everyone dips too. So we had that. We had the cigars with the wood tips. We had cigarettes. We had vapes.

And we were just chieffin on all this nicotine. And I remember, like at whole nine, I was just, I got to go home. It's a problem. I was like, you get drunk. You get drunk if you get enough nicotine. It was really crazy. I'd never, I've still never experienced anything like it.

What a great day. Sounds beautiful. It's a great day. So you said you live an hour and a half outside of St. Louis. Yeah. Did you ever go to Pops? Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. And Soggett, Illinois. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I've been there once or twice. Place sucks. Yeah. Play sucks. You guys haven't played there yet, though.

No. Okay, yeah. No. I don't know if we ever, we might play there. So they have two separate areas. It's one like a bigger stage and there's a corner side stage. And separated by just a curtain.

Yeah. And this club is in between two strip clubs. Wait, is it? Yeah. I didn't even know that. Maybe I haven't been there. I might be thinking of somewhere else. I don't know.

You said you've been to a show or two there. I might be getting a mix up. We play there so many times A lot of bands Have come through there Yeah It's just

That's just I don't know how a smaller bigger band goes You go to Like you play a pops And I'm not like a I'm not a I'm not a strip club guy

Yeah I've never been No dude I've probably been to I'm 39 I've probably been to Under 10 strip clubs

And one of them was Because they have two So one of them I popped in for a drink The other one Like It's when they were get lunch and didn't even look up.

Went there were a good to say. Because there's not, there's nowhere to eat. Yeah. Yeah. So I've never been a strip club guy. So you've got to do what you got to do. Yeah. Yeah. I never liked it. I never paid for a lap dance. I never got a hooker before. Yeah. Me neither. Me neither. I would be, oh my God. I felt, I just feel weird, man. No, I can't. I can't do it. I'll go with friends. I'm like, ah, I just don't. No. Same. Exactly the same. Yeah, when we were in Vegas last time, everyone was like, oh, let's go to a strip club.

And I was like, I just get nervous, man. Like, I don't know these women. Put your clothes on. I don't want to see your tits, dude. It's fine. I don't, man, I don't even like tits. Put those things away. I don't know.

It's just a weird, it's just a weird thing as a man for me to just be in an environment like that. It's just, I feel, I just, even just by association, I just feel like a pervert in the worst way. Yeah, it's like, we're already a pervert. Why do I want to maximize it? Yeah, I don't want to bring that out in me, you know? I don't even want, I don't want that to be a suggestion, really, you know? It's like I just, I don't know. I love my girlfriend.

That too. Hell yeah, dude. Oh, she will kill you when now. Honestly, no, she was like, do you guys go to a strip club? I want you to take pictures, dude. Oh, my goodness. Like, and actually, I want to be there. It's so sick.

She's really cool. She's super awesome. She loves party. with us and hanging out with us when we're rehearsing. Yeah. She's like another member of the band, honestly. She's a huge integral part of the band. She's doing my taxes right now.

It's awesome. Oh, I think I do taxes. Dude, I know. I know, bro. Shout out to my beautiful girlfriend, Ray, for doing my taxes for me. Oh, my goodness. What a woman. What a woman. Man, you better... I can see why you... A good woman will make you...

I think we're talking about earlier. A good woman will make you a good woman will make you a partner will make you quit something or they say let's be honest with you be honest like a good if you actually care about it and go oh shit I got to stop no matter what I think it is

yeah um gotta stop or try to or at least try to evolve as a person I think that's what for men tend to show love we tend to say it less women want more like the you gotta say it yeah every five fucking minutes yeah man we're

we show it because we're men are naturally in our DNA is stubborn. Yep. We're just stubborn in our fucking DNA. And I think you meet like a really cool, you know, partner. That is what makes you change your actions. And for someone to change your actions when you're a stubborn piece of shit, to a man, that's a lot.

It's very important. I need to change this. Holy shit. I would have never even thought about. Exactly. Exactly. You know. I think we're all very self-centered in a way to, especially musicians.

Especially needs to be. And it's like artists, it's almost like you have to be selfish in a way to get the art out. But you can't let that bleed into your personal life, really. And she's been integral in helping me find that balance. And I'm still trying. You know, I'm only, how long as 2020? So almost, it hasn't even been, hasn't even been three years yet since DT's been a thing. So I'm still very much a, yeah.

And I'm still kind of like up here, I'm still a 14-year-old in a way. You know, 100% Especially with all this crazy shit Like on tour with Chelsea Grand And like Yeah, yeah There's Tom Barber's just right there It's like wow, it's crazy

And then I'm here with you I'm like oh my god This Chris Garza I'm like a kid right now I've been a kid this whole trip It's been awesome But to have a woman that That brings you up

And reminds you That who you remind you Remind you are And who you should be And who you need to be And how you need to grow And just be better We help each other out like that

It's a really special thing I'm incredibly blessed Yeah, man. And also a good one would be. Yeah, they, they see something in you that you don't see yourself in that moment. Yeah, yeah. That's massive. It's so huge. Yeah. It's like, what do you even, what do you even see? So it's probably, it's crazy for, for your lady because as she's, you guys were dating before the band. Yeah. And that was a, we had a lot of growing pains through that. But it, we really, we really worked it out. What you do? Just communication. That's really all it boils down to. And that's why stopping weed was so important to me because I would just, I would internalize everything, but I had no ability to articulate it. Sure. So even though I could, like, I could discern what was going on, I couldn't really see others' needs in the same way that you can when you're sober. Yes, true.

And having that, that experience was huge. But yeah, we were together for two years before D.T. was a thing. and three years before we realized like, oh, this is going to be our breadwinner now. Like this is what's going to facilitate the rest of our lives. Wow. So having that opportunity as a couple

and of course she's involved in the creative process now writing lyrics and stuff breaking through all those barriers and being comfortable talking about That's cool, man. Yeah, all of this stuff is a really huge part of the band and a really huge part of my mind too. Well, it's a really huge part of my mind too.

Well, it's, yeah, I can definitely see it in your band. Thanks, bro. Yeah, I think it's really important when you have a partner that is there before shit happens. Yeah. Oh, it would be so hard now to find somebody. It'll be almost impossible, man. Remember, when I was 26, 27, me and my fianckey split up, and I was like, I'm not dating anyone until I'm 35. Done.

I'm going to do suicide sounds, and that's pretty much it. and then I met I met this woman and literally right before that I was so close-minded but you know who helped me open my mind was like you know I want

suicide to be back and I want to be financially stable before I bring another person to my emotional selfish fucking being and then you know who fucking made me change my mind it was Connor McGregor really yeah I was watching

oh I guess that makes sense I was watching old old docks on him before he blew up he was just like living in a piece of shit flat i think i've seen that same and he had he had his chick yeah d devlin i was like and that kind of made it it it planned the seed yeah i was like oh what actually what do i want in a woman do i want her to come in when i'm successful or if i want someone to grow with me through all these growing pains Exactly. And seeing all these lows in a band.

And that kind of planned to see it. And then shortly after I met my chick, and she's seen, you know, us pretty much through, she met me through the worst part of our career. Yeah. And now she's seen like, you know, we played down the street in front of 50 people in our hometown because our record flopped.

And now she's seen like, now we're at the House of Blues. Yeah. So having someone, I really. Having someone that understands the journey that you're in. And there's in it, man. And they just help you like, I wish it.

I wish, I think I was 33, 34 or around that age. I wish I did it sooner. I wish I went through growing pains a little bit sooner. Yeah. I'm grateful to have all this happen now for sure with her. She's, they make up, there are better halves, you know, the better half for sure. Yeah. Look at us.

Yeah, look at us. Who would love? these freaking idiots. Yeah, I mean, she saw me at my absolute worst. I was I gained a bunch of weight like two years, like a year into us being together. We both gained

weight and I got really fat. Yeah, I was at like, yeah, I was at like 260 or something and I was DT... You were 260? Yeah, dude, oh god, it's a whole thing. I was 260 and we were, I just met all the guys and we had just gotten the band together and we We were all like, oh, let's go to New York and film these videos.

So we did, and I didn't really, I was like going through an identity crisis because it was fat, right? And I was like, oh, should we wear like eye makeup? Should I wear a fucking wig because I'm bald? I was like, going through all these crazy, these crazy mental gymnastics to like just have an identity. And we shoot the videos. I get the footage back. And I'm like, this can't. This can't come out.

We have to reshoot this. Yeah, we spent, I think, seven grand on these two videos for Aberyn and Malfasian. And we flew to New York, the whole thing. And we got the videos back. And I was like, this isn't me. This isn't who I should be. This isn't what we should be. This isn't the image at all.

So I made the call to just throw them, just toss them out. And on my birthday, my 24th birthday, I started doing these five-day water fasts. where I would not eat anything, not drink anything other than water for five days. And then I did that for about four months. I would do five days and then a few days off, five days, a few days off, five days, a few days off. Five days, a few days off. And I lost 100 pounds in three months. And then that summer.

100 pounds and three months. Roughly. Yeah. That might not be the exact footage. I was stoned all the time. That's really when the weed stuff started, just to get through the hunger pain. As I would, I would start smoking during the day because it was like eating. in a way. When you're that fasted

and you're in a starvation state I mean I had all this fat so I had pretty nutrients to go around to keep going but just to get rid of the hunger pangs the weed was really instrumental in that so I lost 100 pounds in about three or four months and then I used

that time to also kind of rewrite Aberrant and Malthasian and then we got video guy out to out to Troy on the property and got the videos done

and got those back and I was like okay all right we did it that was a good call so seven grand

well actually 12 grand and uh a year later 100 pounds gone reshot the same songs

honestly was probably the best thing I could have the best decision I've made how do you convince a new band that has no fucking money

to not put some to not like that honestly we had money because the honestly like the streaming is

pretty substantial and it was at that point. I'm sorry, you guys own your shit. Yeah. Yeah, all of the, everything apart from 8.6 was independent. Yeah, oh my God. So all of the streaming was straight to the band and I reinvested almost every penny.

I took out enough to just sustain myself in my life and maybe we'd go out to dinner once a month or something, but all of the other money got reinvested into the band. Really for that. because that was a huge cost to scrap that and then do it all over again. But yeah, just reinvested pretty much everything and still have really.

I still haven't really gotten my, I haven't really taken any money out yet. But it's all just back into the band because that's what matters. You're almost there, man. Yeah, we're getting there. We're getting there. Do a hundred pounds. Yeah, there was a lot. It was a very spiritual experience to fast for that long and to have to smoke that amount of weed

and just write and in a fasted state like that is really crazy, really crazy experience. I've heard, which I still rip them off. I heard this is from the edge of you too. He mentions like, go right, going a little bit hungry. Yeah. And it's kind of. I still hold that. I still hold that logic.

When I'm at home, I don't eat until I've accomplished something. Wow. Because as soon as I eat, it's like a certain drive gets kids. 100% even when you eat healthy yeah it's like yeah that's being like a little bit hungry you're just jamming it's there's something yeah and then you don't eat for five days you can imagine the kind of the weird feeling you get into yeah it's a really special thing yeah what songs what song or songs came out when you were like five days in I was working on I was working on Averent Waltz and Malfasian those were the two that I was working on okay Yeah. Improved. But it did. It was more the benefits of improved mood and cognitive function. But yeah, it was a really crazy experience. I remember going on a, it was in the middle of winter, too. And I remember going on a walk one day. And it was like six inches of snow on the ground. I was shirtless just in my car, heart, just four days into a fast. Because you're just getting this weird state. Like the fourth day comes around, three. fourth day comes around and you wake up and you're fine it's like your body kicks into like full on ketosis and you're eating your own fat and so it's starting it's like really transitioned into um i think it's called fat adapted okay you become fat adapted and i remember waking up and i had all this

energy and i put my headphones on i just discovered turnstile at the time and uh i put on their their latest record and I just jogged outside in the in six inches of snow shirtless with a cart heart on for like that entire full length just ripping I was seeing stars and like here and like I was having these crazy auditory hallucinations really yeah it was a very spiritual experience it was very cool and I uh I came to a lot of after that during this weight loss journey too I did a mescaline trip uh we ordered this my girlfriend and I it was actually her idea idea. She was like, I'd be curious to see how you'd react to this because I did DMT when I was a teenager. Okay.

Had a horrible experience. Horrible. Full-on ego death, 16 years old. I was a waiter at an Italian restaurant and a few of my coworkers had the liquid form. It's like drinking mud. It's disgusting. And they took me back to the apartment. We were just chilling. And they fed me that.

And I just had a full on out-of-body experience for X amount of time. It ruined my life for years. So I had a terrible relationship with psychotic. Sorry, not psychotic. What's the? Psychedelic. Psychedelic. There we go.

At a horrible relationship with those. And my girlfriend was like, you know, it's been a long time. Let's give you something easy while you're doing this fast. Because I was struggling with the identity thing with DT at the time too. Just not really knowing who I was. So she recommended that and I got it. She processed it for me, got it into liquid form. and I drank it in the middle of one of these fasts and it was raining outside.

And I walk out all so shirtless with the cart hard on. And I go lay on our dock. We live on a lake. And I laid on our dock in the pouring rain with Igor cranked in my headphones. And I was just, I don't know, something just clicked. Something clicked in that moment. And then I did another Misklin trip not long after. And then something else clicked.

And so just all these little spiritual experiences that, that I've had throughout the course of, not the title of the creator record, the artist Igor. It's Igor with three R's. They're like this really crazy French. Yeah, those guys. Really crazy French band.

Oh, this looks crazy. Oh, they're insane. They're incredible. Some of the most thought-provoking stuff. Can we jam a quick tune? What's the... Go to Opus Brain live at some festival. And I'll give you the timestamp.

That's jam like 10. seconds of this oh it's gonna rip dude so there's a oh my okay like go like go like halfway oh you're listening to this when you're tripping oh yeah oh you're fucked up here we go this whole this whole is this going to get you copyrighted if it's under 10 seconds it's fine oh this is longer in 10 seconds I'm sorry you can go forward 10 seconds if you want the crescendo here is one of the most enlightening things I've ever heard I mean it's I'm sure it's like... You can go again. Another 10 seconds.

Okay. You can do it again. It's coming. One more. Oh, this is sick. Oh, it's amazing. This is sick. Yeah. Okay, I got a friggin jam this. Yeah, jam this. Jam this.

Jam this shit, dude. It's... It's so... I steal so much shit from it. So much shit, I steal from this. Yeah. They're incredible. What were you thinking about when you, uh... so you had a bad experience with DMT so there's there's the after effects yeah there's like

there's what you think about like a year after or two years like what were you at so the first three months I didn't really leave bed after the trip it was uh well it's like DMT can really it's a serious thing it is like it's scary it's fucking horrifying I was stuck in a void

for what felt like just absolute eternity because your concept of time when you're in that stage is completely severed from reality it felt like I was in there for 10,000, thousands of years just alone in it

like all of these voices in this void were just screaming at me the whole time but I couldn't, it was unintelligible it was just these primal noises just directed at me for thousands of years in this black void I was just floating in

And it was this horrific. And it was just one of the worst things that you could imagine. It's what I imagine hell would be like. And I went there. I was at a really poor place mentally when I did the DMT trip, which is why I had such a horrible experience. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it was, I mean, that doesn't even do it kind of justice. But it's a pay.

You can't really, like the inner workings of your own minds when they're cranked up on something like that is, is crazy. But the first three months, I didn't leave bed, really. I barely ate. My parents really had no idea what was going on either. Oh, wow. They didn't know. No, no, I kept it secret. They know now.

They know now. I kept it secret just because of fear, really. Well, now the world knows. Yeah, now the world knows. But no, they're cool. We're cool. We're all cool. But, yeah, throughout the next three, four years, it was really just like, it felt like a traumatic event.

And it felt like something like when I would, I couldn't smoke weed. I could get drunk, but I couldn't smoke weed. If I smoked weed, I would, like, get back in that weird... A little bit. It would trigger it a little bit in a weird way. So it took a long time to come out of that. So I was sober for the majority of my late teen years. Yeah, overall would not recommend it if you're not in a...

If you're not comfortable with yourself, if you're not okay in a way, I wouldn't recommend to in DMT. It can really show you some... Maybe it was something I needed. you know, maybe I was a conceded dick as a teenager and I needed the humbling. I don't really know. But for whatever reason, the universe or God or whatever felt the need to put me through that. And while I'm here now, so maybe it was a core event that, you know, that's kind of how you have to look at it. It's like maybe if that wouldn't have happened, I wouldn't be here with Chris Garza right now.

You know, maybe there's something in the chain of events that set this off, that that was a necessary. necessary event, you know. That's how I try to justify it and live with it at least. But it's always there. It's always lurking. Yeah. And it never leaves you.

Hell, never leaves you. No. No, it's in there. And I think maybe it gives me a yeah, flashbacks. Persistent psychosis. That's something I was dealing with. Persistent psychosis.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, it was very, very scary. Like to feel like when, even when you're Stone Cold sober and Stone Cold's over for six months. Yeah. And you wake up and you feel high for some reason. It's a very scary, very scary thing.

Very grateful to have gotten over it, for sure. Very grateful. A lot of people don't. Yeah, you got out of the other side, man. Yeah. Yeah. And now I'm here. That's great.

Yeah, it sounds like you might have went through, you want to went through like your personal hell. You know, that's what a, that's, that. Yeah, maybe. That's what some people are coming out now that have passed, that have actually died. And some people have different experiences, but a common one is people are going to hell, which basically they describe like it's black or them black. Like black isn't even like a color.

That's exactly what I would say. Darkest and people are sounds or screaming at you. And they're literally like torturing you. Yeah. That's what, uh... Yeah, it's very... I'm sure that will stay with you forever. Yeah, probably.

But it's like, I don't know. You have to live with it, so it's like, if you can justify it and spin it any positive way that you can, that's really how I cope. Yeah. Same. Yeah, anything that's happening in my life, it's like, well, it got me here. Yeah, I can't like... Exactly. Yeah.

I mean... Yeah, I can't scream at the world and be like, why did that have to happen? It's like, well, it worked. It worked out. It worked out. You're safe. You're healthy. You're happy.

You're sitting with Death Corps legend, Chris Garza. Oh, man. It's absolutely surreal. Absolutely surreal. You can't get mad at it. No. If you get out of the other side, it's so fucking special. Anything terrible that's happened in my life has developed my integrity and character.

For sure. And I personally, I think when terrible shit happens to you, how you react to it, it's really special. Yeah. It's everything, really. It's, it says a lot. It says a lot about who you are. And it informs who you are a lot, too. Yeah.

Very important. I feel as, that's why I believe in God too. I'm like, man, like, unless you had to, this, this wouldn't exist if I didn't go through all those lows. Yeah. I probably would have stayed a fucking even more stubborn and selfish. Exactly. You just, you just, you, you never change. Never change without it.

Exactly. So I can't. I think back to who I was when I was 16. And I'm like, man, if that person hadn't have been sat down and been like, look at it. Life will. You know? Life will, if you won't sit down, life will make you fucking sit down. Exactly.

Exactly. And then if you don't learn the first time, it will be. It'll do it again. And here, sit back down, bitch. Yep. Yep. And some people, some people just live like that. I know.

It's crazy. Yeah. Well, it sounds like, sounds like you're one of the lucky ones, Blake. One of the lucky few. It's cool, man. Did we, I know, I know, I know you got, you got. You gotta get back to the venue. Anything that we miss that you want out there about you or the band?

I don't think so. I mean, we're on tour with Chelsea Grin right now. We're playing the Observatory, right? Tonight. Very stoked. Both the shows have been absolutely incredible. I cannot thank my managers, Chris Wiseman, Scott Lee. Sick.

Enough for helping me get these opportunities. And obviously Tommy Jones from Nuclear Blast. really been making stuff happen for us. So shout out to those guys. Shout out to my lovely girlfriend, Ray. Shout out to you. Kevin and all the guys are gone, but shout out to them as well.

Yeah, they're gone. They're probably taking the shit together. Probably holding each other's. Weeners? Weeners while they pee. Yeah. Lots of that on the RV. It's great.

Oh, there's me. Oh, that's horrifying. Ugh. Crazy. I'm still trying really hard to get like the front man. thing going. I thought you were doing it for

forever. It's great. No, it's very new still. You're a very quick learner, man. Thank you. It's badass. Thank you. I'm terrified that you're going to be watching me tonight. Terrified. Hell yeah. It's going to be great. It's going to be great. Well, it's think that I'll be there drinking beers. All right, let's drink a beer after, for sure.

Cool, yeah. I mean, I like, my favorite thing to see show is drink a beer, man. Yeah. It's dope. Now, let's watch. And when you fuck up, I get stoked. Oh, thanks, God. Thank God. because you're going to hear a lot of it. Good. I love when bands is fuck up.

That was the best. I made a career. I did doing that. Dude, seeing you how low your fucking guitar was and how violent your right hand was, it was very inspirational to watch those videos of you. Thank you, man. Yeah, very inspirational.

Well, Blake Mullins, thank you for your time and congratulations all this success of your band. And yeah, I will see you tonight, brother. Yeah, dude. Rippin. Ripin, dude. All right, everyone. That's it. Later. Peace.