Dead Rhetoric: Any ideas on where the fall and winter albums will take you, or is it too early to tell?
Uttley: I know that the next one will be a fall album and then the winter one. We have talked about it a little bit. Like what we are going to do on the music on those albums. I can definitely say that the winter one, which would be the fourth album, we are going to make it as bleak as possible because it’s winter and everything is dead. I don’t know, I guess it’s too early to say for sure, but anything could happen.
Dead Rhetoric: Looking at both of the album covers, which are fantastic by the way – are you going to stick with some sort of a pyramid-esque object/larger building on all of your covers?
Uttley: Dan Seagrave, we really just send him the lyrics to the album and then he comes up with an idea on his own and sends it to us. It always looks sick so we just go with whatever he just sends us. Honestly, it’s up to him more or less. He sends us his ideas and asks us to okay them. He likes to include scenes from each album cover that re-occur on the following cover, so we’ll see what he comes up with for the next one.
Dead Rhetoric: You started writing for Monarchy just after leaving the studios for The Conscious Seed of Light. Are you doing the same approach this time around or take some time off?
Uttley: I haven’t actually been able to start writing for the next album yet, but I’m pretty sure I’m going to. Like I said, I have a home studio so it’s pretty easy for me to just wake up in the morning and if I have an idea I can record it right away. Ideas are generally flowing all the time. I haven’t actually started writing yet for the next one just because I’ve been really busy with everything going on for this record.
Dead Rhetoric: There seems to be a bit more emotion and atmosphere in death metal in the last few years, like what you and Fallujah have done. Do you think it opens new doors for bands to move into?
Uttley: It would be cool if that were the case. I think that adding atmosphere to your music, it opens a lot of different doors. You can feature the atmosphere as like a lead part of the song, or you can have it sit in the background and have it create different vibes and emotions. You can make a part sound really scary or evil if you have some atmospheric guitars going on the background, or you can have the really epic and sad sounding section if you have it as a leading instrument. I think there are a lot of bands that are catching on to that sound and I think it’s cool because each band does it differently. I think it’s a really interesting sound.
Dead Rhetoric: I think the last few songs on Monarchy are gorgeous (“Terrestria II,” “Circles in the Sky,” and “Suntold”)…
Uttley: Some of the people that I have talked to have thought of those three as one piece of music, since they are all so emotional and atmospheric compared to the rest of the album. Not that it isn’t there in the rest of the album, it’s just those three songs have it more as a focus. Those songs were definitely focused heavily on that atmospheric sound and we wanted to go for a more beautiful kind of, emotional sound on the closing of the record.
Dead Rhetoric: I’m not a huge instrumental guy, but “Terrestria II” is one of my favorite tracks on the album right now, with the way that elevates itself over time.
Uttley: It’s cool because, and it’s probably not something that most people will notice. Our first record started with “Terrestria” (1), that leading guitar line – that melody, it actually comes back in “Terrestria II,” it’s just in a different key so it sounds a bit higher but it is actually the same melody. But it does come back, so we wanted to tie the themes of those two songs together with that melody. If you listen carefully it is actually hidden in there.
Dead Rhetoric: What are your thoughts on the Pennsylvania scene? Seems you and Black Crown Initiate seem to be leading the way there. It seems like there are more popping up there lately.
Uttley: It’s pretty cool. Us and Black Crown, we’ve known them for years. Me and Andy [Thomas] the guitarist of Black Crown Initate, we used to work at the same music store together. Before both of us were even signed. It’s kind of cool to see both of our bands signed and on tours now. But I feel like there are a lot of younger bands in the area that are checking out Black Crown Initiate and us, and getting an itch to make some death metal. It’s cool, because when I was a kid there really wasn’t a lot of death metal around here. There was a lot of hardcore and punk, and to see two younger death metal bands signed and touring from our area is pretty cool. I feel that if I was a kid again going to shows like this, it would be way cooler than when I was a kid going to punk shows. I was always interested in guitar playing and I feel like death metal is a very guitar dominated genre, with shredding and guitar solos and heavy riffs and stuff like that. I definitely think that something is going on. Bands are popping up here and there all around Pennsylvania, it’s cool.
Dead Rhetoric: It seems like you’ve got a pretty cool list of bands that are going to be playing at your cd release show in PA…
Uttley: Yeah, we’ve known most of the bands. Outer Heaven, that’s our old guitarist’s [Jon Kunz] new band. Black Crown Initiate obviously. Divination, those are guys that have been playing metal from our hometown since before we even started. They’ve been around a long time. Younger bands – Resilience and Burn the Empire, those are two bands that I’m actually recording right now. It’s cool to have all different generations of heavy music on a show in our hometown.
Dead Rhetoric: What else will we see from Rivers of Nihil before year’s end outside the cd release parties?
Uttley: We have a tour starting in October, I can say who it’s with yet. It should be announced soon, but it will be with some really sick death metal bands that I think people will really enjoy us play with. So that should be announced and we’ll go from there. That’s it for now.
Dead Rhetoric: I’m sure if it’s anything like after your last album, you’ll be making the rounds quite a bit…
Uttley: I hope so! We will see.