Watching Full of Hell continuously pile up on their fierce catalog has been a fascinating evolution to track. Over the last 15 years or so, the band has gone through the phases by always willingly re-structuring pieces of a large, fragmented grindcore / death metal / noise palette, as it seems they feed off the endorphins of bashing harder when the everyman would ease up.
While laughing in the face of rigid genre categorization, their discography is rich as it is diverse, manipulating sounds that often saturate in volatility and suffocation. Older followers may remember our endearment for Trumpeting Ecstasy, and we've gone a long way since then in appreciating both their early, grind-driven first records, and their later more diverse and acknowledged works.
On a talk with frontman Dylan Walker, we looked a little bit more into the details of creativity, collaborative appetite and the mindset behind one of extreme music's most hardworking bands.
Greetings and welcome to Arson Cafe. April’s European tour concluded just a while ago, how was the experience and what’s the aftertaste for the band currently?
It was fantastic. We tend to go into these things nowadays with very low/no expectations. It’s just the way to be. So, once we touched down and had so many great shows, we just kind of tried to enjoy it as much as we could. Being home is very nice. We need a break, and we are taking one, but it was a very good way to end the touring cycle. It’s left us inspired and ready to go again. Especially back to Athens ;)
We knew we would love Athens and its people. We have friends that have come through and they’ve all had the same experience: Warmth, excitement and passion in the scene. The gig was amazing. Couldn’t have asked for more. The food, sights, culture, all of it was just so cool. We can’t wait to be back.
I discovered Full of Hell with Trumpeting Ecstasy, which is also my favorite. The samples on it are terrifying, especially the Herzog reference on the opener “Deluminate”, now almost synonymous with the band’s work. If not then, was there ever a moment when you realized you’ve now become a “bigger” name? Did the audience grow kind of linearly?
I can’t pinpoint it. I would say that it took so long that when it may have been finally “happening” to an outside observer, it didn’t feel any different to us. Honestly, the more I learned, the more I realized how small this world really was and how little that kind of standing meant in the grand scheme of things. It’s not relevant to anything we are doing either. The audience has slowly grown since inception, and my ego has been beaten down and pulled up so many times that I just don’t care about that stuff like I used to. I get what I want out of this project and it does not involve the size of the band, though it is very nice to see growth!
On your first EPs at the end of the ‘00s, you guys were in your late teens / not even ‘20s yet. When did you first develop the interest to pick an instrument up, and how did you realize what direction you were going to follow?
I can speak for all of the guys when I say this, everyone was kind of submerged into music from a VERY young age. On a personal level, music was always playing in my home and my parents romanticized the medium, always. I started playing shows at age 13 and never stopped. Same story all around, pretty much. The impetus for Full of Hell was to make the band we wished we could see, the dream combination of influences, and that we carry ourselves publicly like we’d have imagined a great band would when we were young (with respect!).
Over the years, have you seen your music as something you shape, or something that circumstances let happen?
I think that when it began, there was a lot of temptation to control it entirely. The older I’ve gotten, the more I’ve realized that it is quite circumstantial and much like an author feels like he’s “finding” the story rather than making it up, I’ve come around to the idea of listening to what the band is, not what I want it to be. This really started to be the mode of thinking when we were finishing up Trumpeting Ecstasy, at least for me.
While the main lineage is always the thread of full-length albums, Full of Hell have multiple major releases with other artists. At the top might be the stunning two-album collaboration with noise demigod Masami Akita, a.k.a. Merzbow (honestly, the transition from “Mute” to “High Fells” is a transcendental occurrence). A decade later, how do you look back to these releases and are you still in touch with him?
It feels like another life to look back. It’s also always hard to look back and think of what you would have done differently. However, that is such a fruitless venture that I don’t do it anymore. I only listen to our old records if we are putting old songs back into the set list that I need to remember. There are so many now, sometimes it takes a good amount of practice to dredge up those old lyrics haha. We are not often in touch with Masami, but there is nothing but good will. We played together twice and as I see it, that’s enough for us. He’s a legend!
I imagined the FOH Noise sessions were concluded with the 2014 compilation, but then you released Part V as an EP in 2020. Is there a plan for another purely noise release, maybe working with another noise artist as before?
It’s safe to say that the FOH NOISE series is no more. It was a fun small way to release little side demos when we had downtime, and that’s about it. I’m not sure we ever had proper perspective on whether or not it should be considered in the full discography, because the ideas were always half incubated. I appreciate them as far as lore goes, since they are hard to find.
Amidst several notable releases, one might miss out on the powerful split with GASP, a name that’s an underground ultra-must of experimental hardcore / powerviolence. Were they familiar with Full of Hell beforehand, and are the tracks there actually the longest you’ve ever made under a non-collab environment?
I think that Gasp became aware of FOH over the years simply through friends, particularly through Cynthia who also sings in the great Despise You. I always assumed she took the good word back to her bandmates. When the time eventually came to do a split, they were the best people to work with. We self released it, as a labor of love. I was very happy to see people receive it well.
The band takes a clearer turn from a grind / powerviolence basis towards metal-adjacent songwriting around 2016 - 2017, and that expands loosely until Garden of Burning Apparitions in 2021, during the transition to Relapse Records. How conscious was that decision across that distinct era of the band?
Very conscious decision on our part, especially with Spencer and Dave. I think they were just having a moment where they wanted to challenge themselves a bit more and the death metal riffing was a fitting way to go about that. We were feeling a darker sound, one which I think we are turning back to with the new material we are working on now. It’s one of those things that you can’t identify with objectivity in the moment. I didn’t think of it as a closed era when we were making those albums, but it did end up being that way. Even with the art, it was the McCoy era.
Is it more challenging for you when you cross paths with bands fundamentally slower than Full of Hell, like for example, the massive record (review here) with Primitive Man?
No, it’s actually the best possible combo in my opinion. I think that touring with a low BPM band is a really complementary move. Especially when you consider the experience of the live listener. The swing between slow and fast is so crucial, kind of like Chiaroscuro, the light and dark emphasize each other and it makes for a really potent combination.
Considerably more colour is introduced in the aesthetics of your latest full-length album, Coagulated Bliss, which also has a somewhat more rounded musical palette. Did you push for as much creative autonomy as possible on this one?
I think we just all came in on the same wavelength and wanted something that felt like a clear departure from the McCoy era of records. The painter is an old friend of ours and involving him felt really fitting. We wanted something lurid and colorful and we got it. As far as creative autonomy, that is always maxed out, we never limit that.
One of the trickiest albums to get into for me was the collaboration with Andrew Nolan, “Gradual Timeslip” is a really unsettling opening track. How did that record come about to fruition and what’s the concept behind it? Or is it literally, scraping the divine?
Andrew Nolan is an old friend and big influence on us as musicians. That was a long time in the making. We always discussed letting him reanimate Full of Hell stems into something vaguely resembling a dub record. It’s up to the listener to decide whether they deem it as a dub record or not, of course haha. Thematically, the record examines themes of faith, gnosticism, and purpose of prayer. “Scraping the Divine” is a quote from a gnostic author that Nolan is a fan of, referring to dub as the closest one can get to “God” and divinity. Kind of the rhythm of the universe, so to speak.
There are hidden gems hard to find all over your discography, only recently I came across that Full of Health track. Is there any interesting inside info from that recording?
I’m not sure if there’s any particularly interesting info about that release. HEALTH are friends of ours, very talented and great collaborators. It was pretty straight forward though, it came together very easily. We provided stems and they chopped em up. I love hidden gems! The nuance in the layers is the best part of a big discography.
I sense there is a fantasy-related overlay on the latest EP Broken Sword, Rotten Shield, and the main armored characters on the cover are animals. Can you share a bit more information on the conceptual approach on this one?
This record was a quick one, because Spencer had some material he wanted to commit to tape. He had this art concept in mind after losing one of his dogs, a struggle I think everyone can universally relate to. The art was very fantasy inspired, and that is my zone of interest, so it was very easy to base the entire concept around high fantasy and the idea of the dog as a guardian against a cruel world, and the vacuum that that kind of selfless love can leave behind. The feeling of defenselessness in heartbreak.
It’s not the first time such thematics are employed, when contemplating song titles like “Silmaril” (Lord of the Rings) and “Ygramul the Many” (The Never-Ending Story) from Weeping Choir, even though Full of Hell’s lyrics are always open to deliberation. How easy is it to insert text on an often highly diverse compositional rug?
I find it to be really easy, because it’s just the way I write. I try to be more of a descriptive writer than a literal one. There’s clear meaning there, but I feel like the magic would be spoiled slightly by spelling it out and leaving no stone unturned. My favorite writers and artists across mediums always leave a level of interpretation open to the consumer. It’s so important, in my opinion. Intention is everything during the creation but once it’s out in the world, I want it to connect with people, however it may. It’s not mine anymore once it’s out.
With two consecutive releases with The Body some years ago, it seems like your visions dovetail perfectly. Has the close interaction with such a band, or any other artist you have worked with so far, affected your own songwriting process in a more permanent way?
Oh, absolutely. Honestly every collaborative project we’ve ever had has influenced me in some way and changed how I write. The Body is a special example, not only because we did 2 albums, but because they are some of my best friends on the planet. I love them as brothers and they’ve opened many doors in my mind in terms of what’s possible and how to do this whole dumb band thing. Ideally, every collaboration should both humble and embolden everyone in the room when it’s made. The entire purpose is shared perspective, collective creativity. It requires you to be malleable and you should grow from it.
Have you ever thought of releasing a record just with covers? Listening to your version of Joy Division’s “Atmosphere”, the Melvins track from the Amber Mote EP, or “The Butcher” (Leonard Cohen), I feel both song choices and recordings would be really interesting.
I’ve personally never considered it, but I do enjoy playing covers live. I think it’s very unlikely that we’d take time to do a covers record, but much more likely that we will record more covers over the years that might make their way onto EPs or compilations.
Any chance for another batch of Isolation Man merch?
You know your shit! I think we will try and do an Isolation Man drop with FOH every year or so. It’s a really basic and powerful DIY tool to print your own merch, and we are after all, a DIY band forever. It’s quite expensive to do anything anymore, so the work I can put in on a printing press keeps all of this moving. Blood and sweat!
Final comments are yours, close the interview as you like!
The only thing I ever have to say at the end of these is this: If you are reading this and want to start a band and go on tour like we do, go do it now. We had no business doing this and had NO connections or friends when we started. We lived in our van for years because we believed in it, and now we are just so lucky to be here. The door is open. Pour your entire self into your work. Self-destruct for what you believe in. Thank you for the interview! - Dylan
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Awesome interview, band kicks ass
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