Thrash metal has now been in existence for over 40 years – where a mix of pioneers and their offspring continue to explore the heaviness, energy, and power of the movement. Bay Area act Hatchet since their inception in the mid 2000’s wish to put their mark on the style, releasing four full lengths while gaining an opportunity to establish themselves in a very active global scene. Their latest EP Leave No Soul consists of three original songs plus two special covers, their first release in over six years. We were able to catch up with guitarist/vocalist Julz Ramos on the long gap between releases, the special cover choices, thoughts behind working with Marco and M-Theory Audio, touring experiences/lessons, old versus new thrash bands, how saturation affects appeal for current artists, and where the future lies for the band.
Dead Rhetoric: Leave No Soul is the latest release from Hatchet – six years removed from the last full-length Dying to Exist. How did the band handle the prolonged break from recording/ touring especially in the pandemic years? Were you able to reset and refocus where you want to take the band at this point in your career?
Julz Ramos: Yeah. There was definitely like you said six years there – 2018 was the last full-length that came out. We decided to just at that point slow down, we had toured quite a bit, and we wanted to regroup and the whole pandemic happened at the same time. That turned into a little bit more of a break. We finished this batch of songs that we were working on and put together after the last touring cycle. They were some new songs and not songs we had been working on for years and years. Through the power of the internet, growing attached to being at home, it took a little longer than anticipated to put together these three new songs and a couple of covers.
Dead Rhetoric: Did it also make sense to go with M-Theory Audio considering your long-standing relationship with Marco Barbieri?
Ramos: Personally, we’ve been working with Marco for a long time now. More than ten years now. He’s helped us in everything from publishing to managing, stuff like that. He was really the one who has consistently had the band’s best interests at heart. We had floated the idea of signing with M-Theory Audio before we signed with Combat for the last album, Dying To Exist. There was some speculation that maybe this Combat (deal) would actually take off, and keep going into a bigger thing, which unfortunately didn’t at the time. It made sense then to go with Combat, but this time around Marco has had the best interest at heart. He had been behind the scenes coaching, managing, all that kind of stuff. This was the right thing to do, and we’ve been really happy with things so far.
Dead Rhetoric: Where do you see the three new songs sitting in the catalog of Hatchet material? And how did the special Annihilator and W.A.S.P. cover choices come about – as I feel that it’s wise to choose something unexpected that may turn listeners on to different influences they may not expect from you guys?
Ramos: As far as the covers go, we’d only really done one cover that we recorded on the last album and that was the Vio-lence one (“World in a World”). Between the different lineups, we never could really agree on the right covers at the time we would be recording. The reason we did that was that at that time the band was set to never return back in 2018. Let’s put our own spin on this, put a little bit of a more modern production twist on this and see what happens. Through there we talked about different things. The W.A.S.P. cover “Hellion” was something I always had in the back of my mind, I’ve always been a fan of really kicking hair metal, driving hair metal. That song always gets me going when I am driving, exercising, or doing dishes at home, I can’t help but go crazy with that song. Since I was singing, everyone gave me free reign to try it. It ended up coming up okay. Our bass player Devin, who’s a vocalist in his own band now, he helped me with some of the highs in that song because my voice doesn’t really have that carrier pitch that he was able to do. As far as Annihilator goes, “Human Insecticide” was one of the first songs I heard from them, it was on a Best-Of collection, and I think it was a live version. That was the route that we went as far as the stops and starts in the riff. That was my first introduction to them, and I was like why aren’t these guys more talked about? That went to back an old influence of mine, everyone is on board again.
The new songs, it’s a natural progression. Everyone would know it’s us. It’s something I tend to mention a lot, it’s not a huge, drastic change, but it would make sense to people who’ve followed Hatchet all along. It’s where they should go and should progress to. I think it all came out good – very aggressive and strong. I think people will be pleased.
Dead Rhetoric: For the cover art, you used Andrej at All Things Rotten – do you enjoy that consistency for the band as far as the covers and themes that they’ve been able to develop over the years for the band?
Ramos: I do. We’ve been using him since the Dawn of the End album cover, our second album. I was blown away by him, another local band from this area Fog of War, they were actually using him first. I saw one of their covers and a shirt design and I was just blown away. He is easy to work with, his price is fair, the work always comes out great, we have a really good back and forth dynamic. I’m always trying to convey something with one of the songs and he usually is able to bring things out in a really cool way. Unless anything goes downhill, I plan to keep using him as we have a great relationship.
Dead Rhetoric: What has the band learned being on tour for various acts like Metal Church, Flotsam and Jetsam, Trivium, Warbringer, Kataklysm, Krisiun, and Jeff Loomis among others? What are some of the trials by fire aspects that you’ve become seasoned and learned from to make Hatchet so impressive in terms of your live performances and road outlook?
Ramos: I guess this goes back to 2019 when we were last doing our touring. Touring with a bunch of different bands, even if they are all metal or variations of it, it’s really interesting and you can take a lot and learn a lot from other people. Not necessarily emulation, but ways of things they do and learning from that. I’m also a sound guy for my day job, so I always feel that learning certain things about how other people do things, I will geek out.
As far as performance, it’s an unsaid thing even if you are touring with your favorite band or someone you idolize, there’s always a friendly competition that you want to do your best. Do your best for the crowd that’s there that really wants to see the headliner, open some eyes. A lot of times, the tours that we were on weren’t completely thrash or didn’t go in our vein or style. We were hunting and fishing for tours like every band so we took what we would get. A couple of times, you have to win the crowd over for one reason or another. Going balls out, as hard as you can, headbanging crazy – feeling it, and wanting to feel it back from the audience. People pay money for a show, they don’t want to see you at rehearsal up there staring at your shoes. You want to be entertained, you don’t necessarily need the Judas Priest back and forth dance, but some of that along those lines is fun to bust out every now and then.
Dead Rhetoric: Did you find those tours helped solidify your following? Especially when you are playing on a bill of heavier bands like Kataklysm and Krisiun?
Ramos: As we go back more and more to certain places all the time, there would be more and more people coming back to see us. It was a small handful, but each and every time it was cool. Within our four and a half albums of material, there is enough to pull from and you can make a heavier set – our set tends to be more of the faster stuff. Again, with touring with Metal Church, we could play some of the slower, mid-tempo stuff that could be an ebb and flow in the set. Especially with some of those crowds, they want to hear and see stuff like that. Just know your audience, know the bands and the differences can be to try to cater a little bit to that.
Dead Rhetoric: How do you assess the differences between the original pioneers of thrash metal and the generation that you are a part of within Hatchet? Do you believe it’s been tougher to gain more traction and a following as a second (or third) generation of thrash followers adapt to the changing tides in social media, music consumption, streaming services, and so forth?
Ramos: A good question. I don’t think it’s been more difficult, per se. The first round of purveyors, they almost had it easier in a way because that’s all there was. There was no internet, an abundance of record stores, or different radio options. There (were) usually some radio stations that played hard rock, and what you heard on there was all you would hear. That could be harder too, if you didn’t get on that wave, you weren’t heard. When you got on that wave earlier on, I feel like that was what was there. Now, there are so many more choices and platforms, it’s almost confusing. Also, the attention span is much shorter now. When we were coming on the scene in 2006-08, that was the end of the whole Myspace thing. There weren’t as many platforms as Instagram, Tik Tok, YouTube, Threads that are all related, not that but a part of that. There is a lot more you can get yourself out on there now, but it’s a lot more saturated. It’s harder to get traction.
There are definitely bands that are doing great and are leaders of what this movement is now. It’s harder to pinpoint one great song, or two or three great songs that are like ‘these are the classics of this time’. There are a bunch of good (songs), but it’s getting hard to see what’s going to be able to stand the test of time. I don’t know if that exists anymore.
Dead Rhetoric: When looking at the career of Hatchet, do you have a favorite failure that occurred that maybe set you up for a greater, more successful outcome or learning experience in the end?
Ramos: Being signed to Metal Blade for the first album, that was a surprise to us. We didn’t do a whole lot to have that happen, they approached us. Having that happen, and then being dropped by that label, it’s something that you realize you are going to work harder at to appreciate more. There are great things about smaller, indie labels, but a lot of the power and drive wasn’t there, which took a lot more from us. I’m glad we’ve done things our way, it’s something to learn from. You count your blessings from that.
Dead Rhetoric: What sorts of hobbies, interests, and passions do you like to engage in away from your music activities when you have the free time and energy to do so?
Ramos: I do live sound for a living, so that seems to take up quite a bit of my time. I enjoy geeking out on that, reading up and learning more about that area to be the best as I can on that. I’m starting to get into some venue management production stuff. Work with some bands in a different capacity. I hang out, spend time with my dog. Enjoy my me time, I don’t have a whole lot of hobbies.
Dead Rhetoric: How do you view the current landscape of the music business? Where do you find the biggest areas to navigate over the course of the career of Hatchet?
Ramos: What I touched on early, the saturation and the amount of people that can make themselves artists now. It’s a double-edged sword. It’s great that people can do that and there’s a lot of great stuff out there, but there is so much material now. You can’t tell the difference between who’s in a band, who is a one-person outfit. Even us too, with this EP, we are taking advantage of the internet and that whole world. Back in the day of the purveyors, you had to go full circle with the touring, the recording, the marketing. That can be hard – it gets hard to get seen these days.
Dead Rhetoric: What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received – which either applies to your personal life or your music career? And if people seek you out for advice, what tips or words of wisdom do you try to share to them?
Ramos: That’s a broad question. The best advice… I guess I don’t know if I’ve received any advice on the road or by touring people that really stuck with me. The general golden rule – be a good person, don’t be a dick, clean up after yourself when you are on the road. Especially around the headliners – it’s their show, it’s their tour. Learning how to have the etiquette of the road. That’s more just (life) advice than advice that applies here to.
I would say, anybody that is trying to be in a touring band, I would not necessarily discourage it but also not encourage it. The saturation of what’s going on there, it can be an easy business to get lost in. With what’s out there, it’s hard, and a lot of people have these delusions of grandeur as far as touring and what that’s all about. It’s very different than the 80s and 90s, it’s a work horse aspect now until you get to a certain level. We are not at that level, and there are certainly other bands bigger than us, you’d be surprised how much work still goes into this. Just be happy with being a musician and be happy with what you play.
Dead Rhetoric: What are the three most important metal albums that helped shape your outlook on the genre?
Ramos: I could go on forever thinking about what those would really be. Off the top of my head, ones that really stuck out for me would be Iron Maiden – The Number of the Beast. Definitely Metallica – the black album or Master of Puppets. Master of Puppets, “Battery” is what got me into thrash, that was insanity for me. I heard the black album before that, but that was mainly a gateway especially for mainstream people. Probably anything that’s Judas Priest for me. You can’t go wrong with that as far as influential, legendary, almost every album has really good songs. I would probably go with Painkiller and Defenders of the Faith.
Dead Rhetoric: When you think about the word success when it comes to your work as a musician, how do you define that term – and has it changed from your initial start to where you are today with Hatchet?
Ramos: Yeah, I think that’s a really weird word to throw around for a musician, success. I guess if I look back with what I started to do with this band, I definitely more times over surpassed that. Once we started to do this, getting signed and start touring, that really changed the outlook of where I wanted to be at that point. As a kid when you start, when you want to play at the biggest local venue, or open for a large band, have people wear your band shirt for the first time, that was the only thing I wanted to do when I started this. The Phoenix Theater here in Petaluma, California, was one of the ones I wanted to play at. It ends up becoming something else, or sometimes exactly that. For me, it started there, and now releasing four albums, labels, tours, different lineups – that was never anywhere in the books when I started of where I have gone. That’s a good thing, and it’s really cool.
Dead Rhetoric: Considering the many lineup changes, how do you feel about the current incarnation of the group?
Ramos: I feel good about it. Right now, we are all spread out a little bit more in terms of geography. Since the last tour, our personal lives got scattered out slightly more from the Bay Area. It makes it a little harder to get together. This is the lineup that I want to play with moving forward. We are sitting in a good, solid lineup.
Dead Rhetoric: What’s on the horizon for releases, tours, festival appearances, or other activities over the next twelve months for Hatchet?
Ramos: Right now, there is absolutely none. I don’t mean we are not going to do anything. I’m coming to a point in my life where I’m having to do more adulting, having a house and that makes touring and dropping things at the drop of a hat much more difficult now. It’s hard to say. The power of the internet keeps us together at this point, and our musical vibe going. Any tours or future recordings, I have nothing that I am pressuring myself at the moment. If something were to come up that was cool, we’ll entertain it. At this moment, we are all enjoying our day-to-day stuff quite a bit. We will see how the response goes to this EP.