Interview by Jason Schreurs
Misery Index vocalist/bassist Jason Netherton recently talked with us about the death metal band’s latest album, The Killing Gods, sharing a drummer with Pig Destroyer and his new book about, you guessed it, death metal.
How are you feeling about the new album?
Pretty good. I stopped listening to it a little while ago, once it was done. You go through that little honeymoon period where you listen to it all the time, and now I’m kind of sick of it so I probably won’t listen to it until it comes out.
Are you critical of your own stuff?
Yeah, I nitpick and I never reach 100 percent satisfaction, I guess. Once it was all written we were pretty happy with most of the songs and how they were set up, but the majority of nitpicky stuff takes place during the mixing, so once you get through that you come out pretty happy. And with this one we’re happier than ever about the mix we got.
How does The Killing Gods fit in with the rest of your catalog?
For the first time we weren’t writing under any duress or pressure. We stopped touring in 2012 and we sat down and started writing and we had other things going on in our lives, so the writing process was a lot more relaxed, a lot more part-time. Because of that we went in with what we felt like were the best songs we could have written. So there was a lot less pressure and more flexibility to turn in something that we were totally satisfied with.
What are some of the tracks on here that you are most stoked about?
We’re all really happy with the way the album starts with the 15-minute song done in five parts. I like that a lot. And Darin [Morris], our new guitarist, wrote three songs for the record and those are really good.
What was it like having Dying Fetus’ John Gallagher involved with the one song?
That was cool. I’ve been friends with him since we were in school together, so whenever something like that comes up, it’s pretty easy. He was home at the time and we see each other pretty often when we’re not touring, so it was just a matter of him stopping by Darin’s house one day and getting to it. We always like to bring him in if we can.
What about the decision to do the Ministry medley for the bonus track?
Season of Mist likes having those bonus things for the deluxe editions. [Guitarist/vocalist] Mark [Kloeppel] always liked those Ministry songs, so he did a death metal rendition of them. It was the last thing we did for the album. He had his own take on it and it sounds like a Misery Index song.
How has it been sharing [drummer] Adam [Jarvis] with Pig Destroyer?
Pig Destroyer have always been a part-time band and it coincided with some changes in Misery Index that happened a couple of years ago where we went part-time. And we all moved away from Maryland except for Adam, which is funny because he’s not from Maryland. Mark moved to Missouri, I moved to Canada, I live in Ontario now, I got a job at a university here, and we wrote the album separately, pretty much over the internet and it kind of works out with Adam’s schedule because both of his bands are part-time, so it’s not too much of a conflict.
How do you like Canada?
I like it a lot. I don’t like the weather though, that’s for sure. It’s probably the most brutal weather I’ve ever experienced here, but there’s definitely some good vibes here.
Can you tell me about the book that you put out?
It’s called Extremity Retained: Notes from the Death Metal Underground. I started it in 2010 as a part-time thing during our touring. I started recording conversations with my peer musicians who I would go on tour with and meet backstage. I started cataloging all of these interviews over the years and I thought it would be cool to create this oral history text for the scene and break all of the interviews down into certain sections and categories and give it some structure. It worked out pretty good and it coincided nicely with the release of the new album.
What’s the meaning behind the title The Killing Gods?
That’s an exploration of the reasons why some people have such a passionate belief in the afterlife that they almost put it before life itself. It’s not meant to criticize any one particular religion, but maybe religion in general that fetish-izes the afterlife and death. It’s about the aspects of religion that don’t celebrate the here and now enough.
It just dawned on me when I was listening to the album that you sound a lot like John Tardy from Obituary. Do you ever get that comparison?
Yeah, I’ve heard that pretty consistently in the last few years.
So I guess you’re sick of hearing about it by now?
As I get older my voice has gotten more in that range.
How has the band changed style-wise since you began?
When I started this band I was definitely more into grind and a lot of crust and hardcore/punk, so I just wanted to work with that and death metal. I think it’s fair to say in the last five years we’ve come back around to be a full death metal band. I lost a lot of interest for exploring those other things for the band, so where we are now is a death metal band.
Misery Index‘s The Killing Gods is out now on Season of Mist.
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