Pic courtesy of: Deadnight "I am very angry at the current metal scene. There are too many half assed talentless bands signed to major record labels. The Metalcore crossover shit is taking over America. It’s time to Thrash the ‘core out of Metal."

HK: I listened to your songs this morning and I just got this euphoric rush from them. You see I felt pretty gloomy that time because I remembered this girl who broke my heart, but when your music came in I felt much better. Thanks Deadnight! You guys sound great, where have you been all this time?
John: Waiting for the right time to strike that girl from your memory.

HK: You’re totally cool with your name though? If you ask me, ‘Deadnight’ is pretty generic for a metal band.
Mike: We wanted to keep it simple.

HK: Are you a bunch a kids? Or did all of you grow up in the 80’s and witness Thrash Metal’s glory days?
Mike: I’m 27 and caught the final years of Thrash during the early 90’s.

HK: Keep your ear to the ground and you’ll notice there’s a growing interest in Thrash right now throughout the global metal movement. Does Deadnight have a good shoot at lasting glory?
John: I think what sets Deadnight apart from all the Thrash revival bands is that we aren’t too limited by the ‘traditional’ thrash sound. A lot of the bands coming out are great, but I wouldn’t necessarily call them unique. Like with some of the bands coming out now, you can say ‘Oh, there’s an Exodus riff,’ or ‘Hey, that sounds like ‘People of the Lie.’’ We are not limited in that sense. Our vocals are pretty much Black Metal. We have some blast beats, which were never really part of Thrash. Sure you can make comparisons, because our influences are so strongly 80’s Thrash, but we don’t try to sound like any one band.

HK: There’s a scythe wielding grim reaper on the ‘Messenger of Death’ cover. Are you guys ready to stomach any criticism that it resembles Children of Bodom’s mascot too closely?
Mike: The album cover and concept has to do with Death, respectively (The Grim Reaper), so we thought it was very sinister, and quite fitting. Our next cover will obviously reflect on something else.
John: Haha, I can stomach that. I don’t think that will be our mascot so-to-speak either, we all just really like that one piece for what it is.

HK: But who did the cover by the way?
John: The artist’s name is Ken McCracken, who was miscredited in our album as Ken McCormick. He does art for a trading card game I believe, and he really does some outstanding pieces.

HK: Your songs are like a shot of adrenaline. There’s an energetic rush I get when listening to them, and even if you aren’t doing anything stylistically new- it’s refreshing. Shit, how and when did you compose these songs?
Mike: The last four songs on the album were written in early 2004. If I remember correctly I wrote the main riff for ‘Dance of Knives’ in 1999. I usually record my guitar practice sessions and keep of library of any riffs I come up with. That way, if I feel like I’m out of ideas I can go back and play around with earlier material.
John: When I joined in 2006, we started writing the rest of them and were actually finished by November of that year, along with another song that didn’t make it onto this album that will be released on the next one. Our writing process is pretty much like any other band I would think. One person brings in a riff idea and plays it. Then we expand on it or tweak it until it sounds right. Mike, our founder, wrote 90% of the music on the album, and the members both past and present, tweaked them as we saw fit.

HK: Where is all the rollicking, thrashing, violent passion in your music coming from?
Mike: I am very angry at the current metal scene. There are too many half assed talentless bands signed to major record labels. The Metalcore crossover shit is taking over America. It’s time to Thrash the ‘core out of Metal.
John: Hmmm, good question. I think it’s a mix of our love for more violent sounding thrash like early Sodom, Sadus, and early Kreator, and our general contempt for a lot of modern metal.

	Pic courtesy of: Deadnight "What sets Deadnight apart from all the Thrash revival bands is that we aren’t too limited by the ‘traditional’ thrash sound"

HK: Is Deadnight paying its dues and touring to promote ‘Messenger of Death’?
John: We’ve been out of a drummer the past year. However, we just recruited a very talented drummer named Jeremy. We’re getting ready to play shows again. We are also looking to expand our boundaries by doing a large-scale tour.

HK: Can you describe the kind of places you play in?
John: Mostly, we have done venues around Chicago, our home base. We would really like to expand beyond this though and promote the album as much as possible.

HK: The Chicago metal scene seems to be very active as I’ve been hearing from a lot of bands coming from there. Who else should I be looking out for aside from Deadnight?
John: A couple of personal favorites of mine are Plague Bringer and Lair of the Minotaur. Both are quite good.

HK: How did the band finally get into a label?
John: We contacted Rotting Corpse Records in mid 2006, and they were immediately interested.

HK: Is Deadnight ready to hit the big time? Do you guys have what it takes to tour cross-country and hit Europe and Aisa?
John: Absolutely. It is our goal to make it over to Europe and do a tour, or get onto some of the big festivals over there. Asia would be great too, as they seem to really love anything thrash over there. I have the Kreator DVD ‘Live Kreation’ and the show they did in South Korea was huge, something like 15,000 people I think.

HK: If you guys shoot to success and finally attain recognition across North America, which bands would Deadnight like to open to?
John: Obviously it would be a dream come true to open for one of our prime influences. I mean, give me the opening slot for any of the big Thrash Metal bands or late 80’s and early 90’s Death Metal bands and I’d be floored.

HK: But as we all know, success comes at a terrible price. Take Lamb of God or Trivium for example, once they graduated to becoming the shining light of modern US metal, people started throwing shit at them. If Deadnight ever earns this caliber of success, do you think you can handle abuse coming from very discriminating and self-righteous metalheads?
Mike: I think we are very discriminating. I don’t see us tuning to drop C and playing chugga-chugga riffs in our future. People threw shit at Lamb of God and Trivium, not at their success, but because they were gay from the very beginning. Their success is due to the fact that the majority of the American population will eat whatever garbage corporate labels manufacture and shove down their throats. Take Sodom and Destruction, these bands never stopped thrashing and their new albums definitely kick ass. What about Bathory? I think a band can be successful and gain notoriety without going corporate. We won’t be abused because we’re not going to prostitute ourselves to appeal to 17-year-old emo girls from Delaware.
John: Well, we are kinda like that ourselves to be honest, hahaha. But I have thought about that, and I have realized one thing; If you get people talking shit about you based on your success, then you have made it. I mean, I dislike a lot of bands, but the fact that these bands have caught my attention means they are doing something right in order to be constantly in the spotlight.

HK: Do you think metal fans are prone to being fickle? That they can embrace a band one second and then totally dismiss it the next?
John: Well, I think that has to do with a lot of things. For the most part, I think if the music is good, then they will have support.

		Pic courtesy of: Deadnight "People threw shit at Lamb of God and Trivium, not at their success, but because they were gay from the very beginning. Their success is due to the fact that the majority of the American population will eat whatever garbage corporate labels manufacture and shove down their throats."

HK: Aside from having released a debut album, what other cool things are happening in your lives now?
John: We recently had a cheeseburger named after us! There is a bar/restaurant in Chicago called Kuma’s Corner that serves these absolutely amazing burgers named after metal bands. We had our album release party there and currently the Deadnight burger is the “Burger of the month.” If you are ever in the Chicago area, it is a MUST that you go there.

HK: What do you love the most about Black Metal and which kvlt bands do you dig the most?
John: I really love the atmosphere created by Black Metal. When done right, it is just so gloomy and evil. Mike would be a better person to talk to Black Metal about, but some of the more ‘kvlt’ bands I listen to are Negator (Germany), Jotunspor, Shining, and Chicago’s Nachtmystium.
Mike: I can always go back and listen to the classic stuff from the 90’s. Lately I’ve been listening to Holmgang (Denmark), Turulver (Hungary), Tharaphita (Estonia) and Metsatöll (Estonia).

HK: Who was the lovely lady who busted your rehearsal?
John: That would be one of Chicago’s Finest (a police officer).

HK: Deadnight is the sex! Thanks for this interview guys. I’m really excited about your music. Will the band be around for the long haul?
John: Absolutely. We are here for as long as we can.