Dead Rhetoric: As for the new album, it feels like you’re back to doing more technical things. Not like Starve for the Devil wasn’t, but there’s more advanced playing on Unwelcome. Was that a point of emphasis when you started writing for it?
Malone: I had sat out a tour and hadn’t played much of a guitar for a year leading up to starting the writing of this album. I hadn’t paid too much attention to what was going on in terms of modern metal, either. I really had a clear head, like, “I just want to write music again.” Just knowing that Shaun was going to be the drummer for the recording…his style and ability, he really has no limitations. You don’t have to be like, “This tempo is going to be hard for him to hang with, we’re going to have to scale it back.” I had free reign. It’s not like I set out to make it super-technical, but I do like playing some of the quicker tempos. I like that urgent, brutal-sounding feel to the riffs. Being able to have a drummer like Shaun who can hang with all that, was really great. His part-writing is so much more focused than some of the drummers we’ve had…
Dead Rhetoric: …I know who you’re talking about [laughs]. [Darren Cesca’s much-maligned over-playing on We Are the Nightmare – ed.]
Malone: [laughs]. I’m sure you’re picking up what I’m putting down. It’s good know he’ll be putting down some crazy drum parts, but he’s so musical and he makes things fit. It’s not like, “Wow, that’s a crazy drum part he’s playing.” It’s really neat to see him accenting things, but it still flows. Small things like that. He’s crazy with tempos. We don’t play with a click live, but for this upcoming tour, we’re going to. His tempo is usually spot-on. Just in rehearsal, you can see him think about the tempo of the song, and just play it. He’s an all-around good drummer.
Dead Rhetoric: I love what he did on [Corey Hart’s] “Sunglass at Night.” Totally unexpected all around, so what made you give that song a go?
Malone: It was Noah’s idea. He always talked about covering that song. I can remember being on the touring cycle for We Are the Nightmare and being on the tour bus in Kentucky. He was always saying we needed to do a death metal version of the song, but I was sure some of the other people in the band at the time weren’t into it. Fast-forward five years, and he and I had pretty much finished all the writing for Unwelcome. I went to his house on a Friday, and as it turns out, he recorded the intro and the first part for “Sunglass at Night” in a death metal style. I was like, “Oh my God, this is cool, let’s go finish this up.” We ended up bouncing some ideas off each other for the rest of the song in a like a more death metal context.
Dead Rhetoric: The melodic approach with Unwelcome is much like the rest of your discography. You’re definitely in melodic territory, but you never cross that line. What’s your take on blending melody in death metal?
Malone: Personally, I enjoy melody. I grew up listening to a lot of 80’s metal like Queensryrche and Crimson Glory. When it got to melodic death metal, I enjoyed some of the early stuff, but when it got to 2000, it got ho-hum. Everything was in harmonic minor, and in drop-D. One of the few albums in melodic death metal that had clean vocals was Dark Tranquillity’s Projector.
Dead Rhetoric: You actually like that? You are in the minority.
Malone: I know [laughs]. That was a Depeche Mode-worship album. It’s an original album for when it came out. In Flames weren’t doing clean vocals at the time…nobody was doing clean vocals. That one stuck out to me. When every other band was doing good cop versus bad cop vocals, I don’t know…I thought Dark Tranquillity did it better [laughs]. I like melody, but at the same time, there needs to be some parameters.
Dead Rhetoric: If want to go the nostalgic route, what do you remember about your formative years? When it was just you and Mike [van Dyne, original drummer], Willowtip Records, A Celebration of Guilt, etc.?
Malone: One of the first things I remember was being like, “Wow, that’s crazy.” We were like album of the year on Metalreview.com and beat out Lamb of God. I was like, “Why?” The very first tour we did…I traveled some, but I’ve never been to West Virginia or spent much time in New York City. I remember being in awe of the mountains in West Virginia and playing in Queens, New York with Mortician [laughs]. It was definitely interesting.