Who are the band members that make up WEREWOLVES and what other bands have they played in previously or currently?
Cop a load of this: Matt Wilcock (guitar) – The Berzerker, Steel Affliction, The Antichrist Imperium, Akercocke, Belligerent Intent, Abramelin, Shotgun Mistress. Sam Bean (bass/vox) - also from The Berzerker and The Antichrist Imperium, The Senseless, also played in Mithras and Wretched Pain. But Dave Haley (drums) is the biggest band-slag out of us all – Crisis Act, King, Ruins, The Amenta, Abramelin, Blood Duster, Consummation, Prophet of Abhoth, The End of All Reason, Disseminate, Pestilence, Aborted, Blade of Horus, Nervecell….and some band called Psycroptic. Plus a bunch of others, probably.
Basically, if you play in an Australian band for long enough one of us will join.
Labels & webzines often like to write at the end of a bio or review with the term ‘for fans of’ such & such bands. But really I think the band itself should be telling us this. So enlighten us if you would. WEREWOLVES is for fans of?
For fans of fuck you, that’s what. Everyone wanting to talk about “French grip vs American grip” or which pickups have a better tone can suck our ass. If we’re going to talk about the virtue of different musical instruments, it’s which one works best as a club to batter people to death with. This music is for everyone nostalgic about when you used to go to gigs to get the snot beaten out of you.
WEREWOLVES is for fans of ultra-aggressive death metal delivered with great vengeance and furious anger.
What is the motivation behind this band & it’s music & what are you trying to achieve with it?
We just want to bring people together so they can recognise the beauty in each other’s souls and reach their full potential as divine beings. Whoops, wrong band, we’re all really about making modern panzer-division Marduk metal that crushes the weak and celebrates hate and intolerance, performed with the least amount of effort so we can get back to crouching on mountain tops and glowering.
Who is responsible for writing the slabs of barbarity that WEREWOLVES have fiercely spat out thus far?
Musically & lyrically?
Matt writes the riffs, Dave writes the beats, and I write the lyrics. The writing goes in that order too. The good thing about how quickly we write is that we don’t have time to interfere with each other.
You guys are prolific writers, with your first album ‘The Dead Are Screaming’ released in April 2020 & now just 9 months later, your second album ‘What A Time To Be Alive’ has just been released. I also believe album number 3 has been recorded & is it possible album number 4 has already been written?
Will you be releasing every new album at the rate of human gestation & trying to set a new world record for most death metal albums released in a decade?
Yes.
The artwork for both albums has been gruesome & spectacular. Who do we have to thank for these stellar efforts? Have you given the artists a concept of what you are after as an album cover or have you given the artist free reign?
Mitchell Nolte. Great, isn’t he? We give him the lyrics and a theme like “harrowing violence” and then leave him to it. I reckon a lot of the response we’ve got for the latest album is down to people seeing the artwork first and going WOAH. It’s about as extreme as you can get before becoming degrading or slipping into porn. You can feel the mindless hysterical savagery radiating off the cover. So many teachers and parents will be quietly binning copies of this, it’s gonna be awesome.
WEREWOLVES have an awesome ‘don’t give a fuck’ vibe about anything & it appears you hate everything & everyone. Is there anything at all you do like?
The smell of napalm in the moshpit and blastbeats. We shamefully crave blastbeats. We can’t help it.
If a metal punter is reading this interview & is teetering on the edge of buying your album, what would you say to them now to convince them to part with their paypal money or credit card & grab themselves a copy?
I wouldn’t. Anyone who isn’t already headbutting their order into the keyboard and screaming, we don’t want them on our wagon. Fuck off and go buy the new Tame Impala you poseur piece of shit. They can get with the program in three albums time and hear about how much better we were now.
Favourite Australian bands and / or releases?
The Amenta are always worth watching. Psycroptic are the kings, and Abramelin are great live. Berzerker ‘Dissimulate’ had great aggression, and the last Senseless release ‘The Buried Life’ was amazing. Yes, we’re in all these bands.
Given the plague is here to stay for a while & I’m gonna need shit to check out, recommend us a killer:
Movie: Grotesque (Japanese)
Series: Chernobyl
Podcast: “Into the Necrosphere”, particularly for their amazing 2-hour interview with myself
Band: Akhlys (particularly their recent release)
Album: Bestial Warlust “Vengeance War ‘Til Death”
Apart from Jon Schaffer, if you could pick 5 musicians to storm our capitals parliament house, who would they be?
Rokk from Sad Ex, because of the slim chance that he’d make it through to the PM’s chair, form a majority in the mayhem, seize emergency powers, and become dictator. Maybe send in Attack Attack to create a distraction and soak up all the bullets. This is an excellent plan. Do they have wives and kids? I’d sleep peacefully.