Rockezine.com interview with Severe Torture on Sep 07, 2002

with Patrick on Sep 07, 2002

One of Holland’s most extreme death metal acts, Severe Torture, are back with their brand new demolishing second official release called Misanthropic Carnage. This certainly is food for every extreme death metal fan on the planet. The songs have become more intense and the band have grown compared to their previous full length Feasting On Blood. In the meantime Severe Torture has played almost every Dutch venue and they even toured the U.S.A. with Deeds Of Flesh and Disgorge. The future looks bright for Severe Torture; so here’s an interview with bass player Patrick to provide us with some extra information.
		It does not happen that often that an extreme Dutch death metal act gets the opportunity to tour the USA with none less than Cannibal Corpse and Deeds Of Flesh. How was that experience? Well I have to correct you on that; we did tour the US but not with Cannibal Corpse (Oops, TJ). We will do a European tour with them in Sept/Oct. We toured the US with Deeds Of Flesh, Disgorge and Disavowed. That was a great experience; we had already played there a year before, but this year we got the chance to do 25 shows in the US and Canada. It was an underground tour, so it was really hard, but the shows were great. It seemed that many people knew us and the response was amazing.
		Can you tell me what the nice parts and the less nice parts of touring are? Touring in the US was hard, we had a 9 person van for us and Disavowed, in which we traveled all the way trough the US and Canada. We had to sleep in the van; but sometimes we had the opportunity to get a hotel. It was not your typical rock star tour, haha. The nice parts of touring are that (at least in Europe) you have your tour bus in which you have your own bed, you get plenty of food and beer and you meet new people every day. Your average day consists of building up your gear, walk around in the city you have to play at, eat, play and get drunk! Touring is just great!
		I think Misanthropic Carnage has become an ultimate death release. How have the responses of the press and the fans been so far? Thanks for the compliment; the reactions have been great so far. It seems that we created a worthy follow up. You can hear that we have grown as a band and that we know what we want. If everyone is as positive as the people have been so far, then we will be very pleased.
		I personally think the riffs have become more complicated; they also are built up in several layers sometimes, and on the whole this release has become more extreme where possible.
		What are, according to you, the differences between Feasting On Blood and Misanthropic Carnage? Well the riffs are faster, so that’s why they sound more complicated. But I believe that our new album is more accessible than Feasting. After Feasting we decided that we wanted more slow parts and that the fast parts had to be faster. It is more diverse this time and in my opinion the songs are more memorable.
		What made you guys decide to record in the Recording Kitchen again; and did you have more time for the recordings this time? I can imagine that a band sometimes have the urge to try out something new and different? We were very pleased with the production of our first album and it was nice to work with Bertus and Robbie. This time we didn’t really have more time to record it, but we knew what we wanted. Maybe in the future we will try another studio, but right now I don’t see any reason to change studios.
		Can you tell me if Severe Torture has a band philosophy concerning the lyrics and the artwork? And what is the content of the lyrics? Well, we believe that the artwork has to fit the music. Our artist, Joe Malone, fits our music very well. So we have a really brutal cover again. Our lyrics are a combination of gore and anti-religion. We hold that you can’t have a shitty cover for your album, the total picture of an album has to be perfect. The lyrics have to fit the music too.
		Which bands influence Severe Torture and what is the musical taste of the other band members? The biggest influences are all the old school death metal legends from the US as well as from Europe. Bands like Cannibal Corpse, Deicide, Suffocation, Dismember, Grave, Immolation. Also new bands like Cryptopsy, Dying Fetus and Hate Eternal. All of us mostly listen to death metal and some other styles of metal; I also like bands like My Dying Bride, Primordial, Anathema, and stuff like that; our guitarist Thijs listens to those bands too and also the Swedish stuff like The Haunted. Seth, our drummer, listens to all kinds of shit and Dennis, our vocalist, is a true metal maniac, he listens to all kinds of metal.
		What will happen to Severe Torture in the near future? Shooting a new video, touring? Well, we will tour Europe with Cannibal Corpse in Sept/Oct and we have had a few offers for tours and shows that we are still looking into. We hope that we can do some festivals next year and do another US tour too. Of course we will do some club gigs in Holland after the CC tour. Maybe we will do a new video clip, but we are still not sure about that.
		What do you think of the Dutch metal scene at the moment? The Dutch metal scene is one of the best; there are many great bands and there also are many great shows you can visit; and everybody is always very cool to each other.
		What is the official Severe Torture web domain? You can check for the latest info and all kinds of stuff about us at www.severetorture.com.
		Any last words for the fans? Hope you all find your way to your local record store and buy Misanthropic Carnage, it will destroy you. Come visit us on tour with Cannibal Corpse and get drunk with us! Cheers!
		(Teun Jans)