There are few bands that perfectly encapsulate the pure aggression that sits at the heart of deathcore quite like Bodysnatcher.
Over the last decade, Florida’s finest have put their stamp on the genre, ensuring that the honesty and heartfelt earnestness that sit at the forefront of hardcore are consistently channelled through their debauched and devastating compositions.
Though their all-out sonic assault has never been as prevalent, powerful, or punishing as on their new album ‘Hell Is Here, Hell Is Home’, which is out now via MNRK Heavy. A stunning display of unbridled battery, it’s a collection of songs that allows the band to exorcise their demons in an even more sensationally savage manner than ever before.
And as heavy music continues to recruit more and more avid followers, it is the perfect time for them to be truly hitting their stride.
To find out more about the making of the album and what it means for the band to still allow them such chaotic creative expression, Rock Sound sat down with drummer Chris Whited.
Rock Sound: Considering what Bodysnatcher have become known for over the years – crafting deathcore that is as emotionally dense as it is crushing – it feels like you have really upped the ante in a different direction this time around.
Chris: It’s definitely more pissed off and more angry. Instead of grieving things that have happened, this time we tried to find lyrics that everyone has dealt with, whether we’ve been through it personally or not. It’s a broader aspect of things that just makes us fucking pissed off, and I know it pisses other people off as well. Will Putney was like, ‘You know, whenever people think Bodysnatcher, they think aggressive, angry. Those are always the songs that perform the best. So let’s make a fucking aggressive, pissed off album all the way around musically and lyrically.’
RS: Saying that, that doesn’t mean that some of those personal feelings are still present here. You literally call our your Dad by name in the middle of ‘May Your Memory Rot’.
Chris: That one was a little different, the one that stood out from the rest. We got to the studio on Father’s Day, and I was just pissed off at, not necessarily the fact that my Dad was so shitty. I’ve written songs about him in the past, you know. But it was more the fact that my brother, who passed, had two daughters. So I have two nieces, one is 21, and the other is 17. And then I have a nephew from my sister, who also passed away, who is four, and my mum is raising them now. The kids in my family don’t have fathers. My brother fucking loved his kids; my sister’s baby daddy was a little different. He was a fucking Mexican Mafia guy, and he ended up getting killed. But I’m still thinking about how they don’t have fathers, and then thinking about how shitty of a person my father was and how little respect he had for us as his own kids. And it made me even more pissed off that he is still here.
And I just knew I wanted to say my Dad’s name. When I’m writing lyrics, I’m not a very poetic person. I’m writing them as if I were standing right in front of them, yelling these words at them. So with that one, it was just like, ‘Fuck you.’
RS: The thing is that everybody is bringing in their own sense of that here as well. There is experience, feeling and exorcism of emotion from all four of you planted in the band’s music. You’re not just comfortable sharing it; you want to put it into your art.
Chris: We basically came up with all of these different topics we wanted to be on the record. So, picking the songs we wanted, the lyrics that worked, and talking over everything. Say things like, ‘This part is sick, but let’s make it more direct. Let’s make this more aggressive. Let’s make a statement with these words.’ That was the process with every song.
RS: What are some examples of where you pushed the ante?
Chris: Well, ‘Violent Obsession’ is about finding the person who abused us and getting retaliation on them and making them pay for their abuse and basically doing worse things to them than they have done to other people. But then there is ‘Two Empty Caskets’, which is fucking crazy. That song is basically about a car accident where a drunk driver survives, but then the other driver dies, and it’s about them wanting to get revenge on the drunk driver for what they did.
The thing is, none of us has had that happen to us specifically, but we know a ton of people who have. Our photographer was in the studio with us when we were tracking the vocals to that song, and she was crying. We were like, ‘Fuck, are you okay?’, and she’s like, Yeah, I just got a phone call that my friend back just died, and he had gotten in an accident and died from a drunk driver.’ We were all jaw-dropping.
RS: The fact that even when you’re being more aggressive and direct than ever before, but still making sure that the things you’re writing about are pulled from real life, is very much something that continues to make you different to so many of your peers. Deathcore is a genre full of high drama and worldbuilding, but to keep it rooted in the real world is still so important.
Chris: There are many bands in our genre whose lyrics are made-up scenarios. So, it doesn’t really have any real emotional meaning. And even though a lot of these songs we didn’t go through these scenarios personally, a ton of people have, and that’s what we wanted to make sure we captured. We get tonnes of people coming up to us to say this song or that song means too much to them and has really helped them in that exact scenario. And that’s why we do it. I don’t want to write something that doesn’t actually mean something. Everything had to have an answer to me, and when a lot of people are connecting to that, it makes me really happy.
RS: Especially offering that up at a time when more eyes are on the genre than ever before. But it’s like, you have been doing this for as long as you’ve been a band. You haven’t just pivoted because of the attention it brings.
Chris: I think it’s beneficial to us that there are a lot of new listeners who haven’t necessarily been a part of the “hardcore” scene. There are a lot of normal people getting into it, and if you’re doing relatable lyrical content, it gives those people who haven’t been a part of it more of a reason to listen to it and be a part of it.
RS: Is there anything in particular that took you by surprise in terms of what you got down on paper throughout the making of the record? Anything that you couldn’t believe was about to be a part of the album’s story?
Chris: We just knew we wanted to make things more extreme, musically, in terms of how it made you feel. And that was before we even had vocals or lyrics. The intent just as the songs were starting to come together. So we got to a place where there are certain guitar tones for certain parts that are just way over the top. Even Putney was like, ‘Jesus Christ, this is fucking crazy’. So just the way that the record sounds stood out. Some parts make you really uncomfortable, which is what we have always wanted. It’s what we have always wanted the band to be like.
ember that you should always be your own favourite band. It’s easy for that to get lost in the static, but making sure you are in love with what you are making is so vital to the process.
Chris: Yeah, it’s very hard. Every time we’re writing for a new record, we’re like, ‘How the fuck are we going to make something heavier than the last record?’, you know? And we were so worried about writing this record. We were stressing so hard, and then it all just came together. There are a lot of my favourite songs we’ve ever put out on it.
RS: What does it mean for Bodysnatcher to be still the vessel for you to explore all of these things, both emotionally and sonically?
Chris: You know, with the times that we are in right now, it almost makes it easier to write about stuff that pisses you off. Because every single day you’re seeing something that pisses you off. Music has always been such a huge part of our lives, especially heavy music. We all love breakdowns so much, and I don’t think that’s ever going to change. The same with writing music that is heavy and has so much meaning. It’s going to be easy, because it’s just there and needs to happen. There is something that happens every day you have to deal with, and writing about it the way we do makes your headspace feel that little bit better. When you switch off to these things, that’s when horrible depression sets in, and letting that start to set in is really not good. It’s so much better to express those things. I get that some people get uncomfortable about talking about those sorts of things, but I promise that it will make things so much easier if you do.
RS: The thing is that you’re offering up that way of seeing things to the kids you used to be, who had to deal with it on your own. It’s for the kids like you who are now standing in the crowd, looking for that reassurance.
Chris: And I do see that every single night. I usually don’t think of things that way, and I wish I did. But when I go on stage tonight, I’m going to envision being in that crowd and what it would be like for them to see someone like me playing. 16-year-old me would probably think that it’s so fucking sick, but it’s hard to see things like that when you’re doing it every single day. You don’t see the growth either. Because you’re growing little by little every day, and you don’t notice how far you’ve actually come. But sometimes you’ve really got to take a step back and take a look outside and be stoked on what you’re doing.
