Exclusive Interview with DEAD THRALL

Let me introduce you to DEAD THRALL.

Photo credit 📷 Ralph Smith https://www.facebook.com/ralph.smith.543

DEAD THRALL is a Salem Oregon band that is turning heads and new fans are popping up all over the world.

If you get a chance to see this band Live you should absolutely do it and prepare for an intimate moment with the members – you are going to be slayed hard!

Frontman for DEAD THRALL, Brandon, will get in the pit with you as he is roaring out his exceptional and unique vocals. This intense feeling is backed by Justice funkafying you with his bass, Josh stimulating you with his guitar and Tom amplifies it all with his rhythmic energy on drums.

DEAD THRALL is the perfect name for this group. As in a famous video game, DEAD THRALL is a master level Conjuration spell that animates almost any dead humanoid to fight for you. Once you feel their infectious vibe your hooked.

I have personally been a fan of theirs for years. They remind me of a mix between CATTLE DECAPITATION and DETHLOK with a few other metal influences thrown in to create an entirely new sound. Metal As Fuck but very fan friendly and approachable. These guys want to meet you.

DEAD THRALL is:
Brandon Owen – Vocals
Josh Voigt – Guitar
Justice Robinett – Bass
Thomas ToeupGiese – Drums

For more information on DEAD THRALL, visit:

www.Facebook.com/DeadThrallBand
www.ReverbNation.com/DeadThrall5
www.Instagram.com/DeadThrall3

DEAD THRALL‘s new album is titled ‘Goreborg’!
WARNING: YOU CAN BREAK YOUR NECK TO THIS!

Now let’s hear from the guys of DEAD THRALL themselves!!

💀💀💀💀

INFRARED MAG: How were you introduced to music and what made you choose the guitar?

JOSH: I come from a family of musicians. My grandpa on my mom’s side was a professional touring gospel singer. My mom grew up traveling the country with him as a singer, my dad is a worshipping Pastor. Music just sort of fell in my lap. I ended up choosing guitar because for me personally, it’s a huge challenge to play. It’s something that pushes all of my abilities and makes me practice and. I am always trying to better myself. So, that’s why I stuck with it.

INFRARED MAG : What advice would you give the next generation of musicians?

JOSH: Always work hard at your craft be humble be willing to grow and change. Not only as a musician, but also as a person as well. Also, don’t let anyone tell you what your doing is wrong or unrealistic. Dream hard but work harder.

INFRARED MAG : Who is your biggest influences in music?

JOSH: I have had an unbelievable amount of influences. HaHa, I go through phases of influences. Some of my main early influences though would have to be people like Synyster Gates (Avenged Sevenfold) and John Petrucci (Dream Theater). A couple of influences now are Aaron Marshall (Intervals), Periphery and Monumentis.

💀💀💀💀

INFRARED MAG: Tom, please tell me something about Dead Thrall you wish everybody knew.

TOM: So I was a fan of Dead Thrall before i joined the band and jammed out with juice at HEBO when i was with my old band A.W.O. and we hit off right off the bat lol then that whole year we both couldn’t stop talking about each other to our friends and family on how awesome it was to finally play with other talented musicians who know how to use there instruments to talk to each other anyone can play an instrument but to be able to jam feely and use music to talk is amazing thing. So when my old band split up i was sad for a while wanting to get back at it i made a list of bass players that i thought i would like to play with and juice was at the top of my list number 1 baby 😂😂. I was scared cause I didn’t know what i would do if he said no because i have to say I’ve played music with a lot of peeps and as a drummer it’s hard to find a good bass player who you can click with so for weeks i was working up the courage to talk to him cause i felt he was at the top of my list and knowing my luck he’s busy or just would say no. But then i was like you know what fuck it what’s the worst thing that could happen he just tells you no so i picked up the phone and called him and bam here we are 3 years late kicking butt taking names !!

INFRARED MAG: Tom, What is your favorite song off ‘Goreborg’ to perform?

TOM: Anus prolapses is my favorite to perform. I remember when we were writing the song one day and I asked Brandon so what’s the name of it? He tells me the name and i about died laughing im like – I can’t wait to hear you say that live on stage. Then he showed me the words to the song, they made me smile even more. At the time it was our newest song and the first song we all had a part in cause I joined the band way later. They all ready had a bunch of songs, so it was the first one me and Brandon got to be apart of together. That song still makes me 😃

INFRARED MAG: Tell me about the pizza delivery bag you always carry.

TOM: So the pizza bag comes from work and the drummer from The Desolate “Clay” had one for his cymbals. When i saw that I was like…damn! That’s a great idea 💡beats buying expensive gig bags when i work for a pizza place so i have 2 of them. One is for my cymbals and the other is for my snare. Most of the time i just carry for the cymbals 😎

💀💀💀💀

PLEASE check out DEAD THRALL sponsor and use discount code Joshv to get some very cool merchandise.

www.LoganGarments.co.uk

💀💀💀💀

INFRARED MAG: What is a response you would give if somebody told you death metal was dead?

BRANDON: Well…. if everyone liked it… they would call it POP! Far as commercial success. that goes back to what I was saying about how a genres marketability comes and goes. Hell we even saw hair metal make a brief comeback in the mid 2000s. Grunge is coming back. Deathcore reigned undisputed as king for 10 years and now we see it fall away to Djent bands and Slam. Thing is Death Metal NEVER died… people just dissected it into 5 more different sub-genres. It’s where deathcore, slam, and tons more genres got their sound. I don’t know why every band needs its own genere anyway.. we are way to reliant on labeling things so we can compartmentalize them and process them with out thought.. its sad if you think about it. lol we created our own bureaucracy haha.

INFRARED MAG: Lyrics can be one of the most important things about a song which song does dead thrall play that the lyrics stand-out the most?

BRANDON: Definitely not “Anus Prolapsys” hahah those lyrics were just meant to be gross… UMMM… I’d have to say “The Gunpowder Plot” its a fictional take on a world where its becoming damn near dystopian. The governments of the world no longer pretend to have the interests of the people in their agenda, they rule absolute, and with an Iron fist, black bags and vans type shit. Yet the people stand divided in civil war. fighting amongst each other, over their own agendas All while still fighting the oppressive reign lording over them. It’ss about a 3 front civil war where everyone believes they are the good guy, that the other side is the villain, they are the moral authority and only they can save our humanity. So they fight. It might sound scary familiar to some people these days doesn’t it. But, I personally keep meanings in my lyrics somewhat vague so that the listener can still paint their own story with them, it lets them Identify with it on a more personal level I think.

INFRARED MAG: I know that you have served our country and we at infrared magazine thank you for your service would you like to say anything about this subject?

BRANDON: Well thank you I appreciate that.. but I was just a drop in a very big bucket. It breaks my heart to see what happened to Iraq after we left and I hope some day the region is stable enough again. I would visit it again before I leave this world. I have tremendous respect for the Iraqi people and culture. Wish more people cared about what happened in the little neck of the woods where all civilization began. I mean, they invented the wheel, writing, and mathematics there. Not to mention the food lol. I also hope this polarization of our country ends before it implodes. Don’t people realize they want us divided in half? It’s easier to control 2 hearts that hate each other then one united entity.. It’s bad enough that if I mention being proud of my service these days half the time I’m then required to defend it cuz someone wants to feed me their politics.. Like do you think ANY human EVER gave a damn about politics once bombs started dropping around them? It’s as simple as a war happened, and it was fought.. the end. All sides think they are the good guy..

One thing I’ve learned about the world from being all over it, is that all politics are trash and have their own agenda. It’s seldom the same as yours. I do love this rock I call home tho… America Fuck yea!

INFRARED MAG: Tell me about each one of your bandmates

BRANDON: Dude that’s easy my bandmates are the best. The only other people I’d ever wanna live out of a vehicle with.

I have a Drummer whos the shit. He brings a unique flavor of drumming to a genre that often time uses cookie cutter beats anyone can program with about 5 min of practice on a EZ-Drummer. Don’t get me wrong I love those beats still. We use em, and will continue to. There’s a reason they became genre standards… but lets just say if we sounded just like everyone else why would you check us out. He adds his own brand of spice to it and its tasty as Eff.

Our bass Player is OMG literally the best… I have the best bass player ever.. he’s not human.. I love getting to play music with that guy. He’s actually the reason I joined the band.. I wanted to jam with that guy he was just to fucking good.. I’d put him up against damn near anyone. no one blends that many styles into one and makes it look easy like this cat does. its a real treat. They are some sexy ass bass lines.

My guitar player never ceases to surprise me. He is always trying to learn as much as he can about the business to this business, we will sit for hours, and nerd out on plans and ideas and hatch schemes together, talk shop, marketing ideas, business ideas, and brainstorm on how to do everything we do and somehow its not tedious. We get excited to set goals and them put em into action. and I love how he takes his writing seriously but not himself. He knows what he likes, and what we like and he makes it happen, he’s always showing me new music too.

💀💀💀💀

INFRARED MAG: What is the different sound you are after by playing a regular bass and a fretless bass?

JUSTICE: Well, it’s all about technical advantage for me. My fretted bass sounds amazing when i’m playing slap and I am overall trying to get a fundamental tone out my bass. Whereas my fretless bass cuts through the mix a lot more, so i tend to play more melodic lines on a fretless that I wouldn’t necessarily play with a fretted because of how different the timbre is.

INFRARED MAG: You have one of the most iconic bass faces I’ve ever seen. You let passion flow through you. Was this just a natural occurrence? Please explain the Infamous o face.

JUSTICE: well it’s no secret to a lot of my family that i was very shy as a kid up until i started playing shows in mid 2016. Before my first shows, I looked up metal bassists playing live only to see that a lot of them stood still and didn’t move around a whole lot. BUT FUNK PLAYERS MAN……they grooved around the whole damn stage and made amazing bass faces hahaha. So i essentially just took all the philosophy of performing funk and applied to how i should be performing metal and the Justice Bass face was born.

INFRARED MAG: What is your opinion on death metal and how we can improve the following here in the Pacific Northwest.

JUSTICE: I feel like the way everyone is helping each other out in the scene is really great to see and is in my opinion the best thing for the following here in the pacific northwest. The more we scratch each others backs the better we can build the scene up to be more legit then it has already become.