Track By Tracks: Deadspawn - Pestilence Reborn (2020)

1. Warpath is basically just a short tale of a battle between monstrous overlords and mankind. As the lyrical content progresses is shows the human victors to be just as horrible as their mutated foes. This song was actually a really quick write for the band and a showcase to where the lineup was directing our sound.

2. Ex inferis’ lyrics actually took root from the quote taken directly from the movie Event Horizon. “liberate tuteme ex inferis”. This song was written entirely around that idea and maintains very cosmic lyrical content.

3. The majority of my lyrical content and theme is influenced by one of my all-time favorite writers, Brian Lumley. The name Deadspawn is actually taken from one of his books within the “Necroscope” series. The series basically follows a character that has a gift/curse of being able to speak with the dead. Communion is about his abilities and how the endless dead are actually terrified of him for this. The dead speak with each other beyond life and share their experiences of being tortured, mutilated and then reanimated by other necromancer characters throughout the storyline. Our microscope protagonist, however, is out for the great majority help and support thought out song. As far as the music of this one the structure is very simple and repetitive. A few captivating riffs and melodic vocal sections.

4. Pestilence reborn actually takes us past any kind of war theme that is prevalent in this album's content. It basically describes the leftover wasteland that our battle between opposing forces has left for the cosmos. This song actually presented Deadspawns first opportunity to develop a call and response type vocal phrasing stacked on top of a 7/4 time signature. I think we can safely say this track really allowed us to branch out in our sound and provide a multi-vocal attack.

5. From Ruins is just a biography of our loose themed necromancer story and his abilities. “Share with me your secrets, offer me your voice…The answers I seek, I’ll write in your blood”. That basically is the threat of reoccurring torture. The music in this one took a while to develop since it’s a pretty progressive flow of riffs with a calming and tranquil clean section. Our music isn’t very technical by any means but in this one there’s a lot of open space to play around with different melodies. I think this one attacks the listener slowly.

6. Language of Creation is a concept of utilizing mathematics to manipulate the universe. Once again this track to me brought a lot of progressive elements to the guitar work but stayed simple and heavy. There’s a very audible death metal influence in this one.

7. This Ascension was originally recorded on the 2013 “ascension” demo that Deadspawn released. We rerecorded this one for the album because it was kind of the basis for our lyrical content and theme. Musically it has one of the more enjoyable arrangements by utilizing groovy melodic riffs and heavily layered vocal sections. It brought a lot to the overall start to finish diverse sound of the whole album.

8. Limits of Flesh is actually taken from the perspective of a former human turned monstrosity that our necromancer has conjured. There’s some pretty grotesque content within the “Necroscope” series that has embedded itself into our lyrical content. For instance, within the series one of the tribal warlords is creating his castle fortifications out people. The walls are described to be still breathing. In this track, our former human is now at the mercy of his master in an unknown physical form. The music in this one is pretty aggressive and relentless with a multivocal approach. The final section of the song is based on a triplet feel and to me is one of our heaviest riffs to date.

9. Shiatan is a name of the original warlord in our storyline who’s been banished. This song , however, is from his follower’s perspective. They wish to spread his name and go to any depths to see their prophet return. “We praise the ancient one this night, we revel in his will…Offerings were made, our lives were the trade”. As far as the music goes this track was written during a time when I started playing Floyd Rose bridges. It really allowed my playing to take a new form and in turn led to an outro lead composed of harmonics and dive bombs.

10. The Plague Within I believe would not have been written if it wasn’t for a personal friend and supporter who is no longer with us. Rafe Sweet III (Mökshya, Dying Tribe, Bionic Jove, S.L.U.T) passed away in 2016 of an asthma attack, he offered his home to us during the early stages of this band for practice and for that we are eternally grateful. At the time I was going to school in Flagstaff and my drummer Brian Miller (Detritus, Depraved Heretic, Lago, Malnurture, Ov Lustra, To Be Eaten) would drive up from Phoenix. Rafe would drop everything he was doing in order to help make sure we got the practice we needed at his house. The song began in his home during those years and was shelved for the many years which followed. It became the last song we wrote for the album. Kind of an unintentional ode to our friend.