Deep Underground UK - Gods Of War

Gods of War is an extreme metal  band from Liverpool, UK. Formed in 2009, the band has consistently defied subgenre classification, as their music takes influence from many metal subgenres, including black, death, power, thrash and folk metal among others. The band has undergone various lineup changes in recent years, resulting in changes in musical direction.

You’re about to celebrate your fifth anniversary as band. How have the 1^st five years been?

 I haven’t been in the band for the full 5 years having joined in 2012, but the two years I’ve spent in it have been fantastic. I’ve been able to meet some great people, explore playing different genres of metal and forcing myself to improve at guitar both through the new stuff we’ve been writing and learning the old stuff. We’ve recorded, played in different towns all over the North of the UK, supported some awesome acts and are beginning to make a name for ourselves. Couldn’t ask for more really!

You seem to gig quite a bit, what sort of bands have you supported or played with so far?

 We supported Arnocorps back in July which was our biggest gig to date; they’re a punk/heavy metal band who sing songs about Arnold Schwarzenegger films, and we played to about 200 people at that gig, so that was a great success. We also supported Jaldaboath at Warhorns festival in Selby a couple of weeks ago; that’s a folk/black metal all dayer that we were very suited to, and other bands that played included Red Rum, who are touring with Alestorm at the moment, Forneus, as well as Iron Seawolf, which our rhythm guitarist Nick is also in. We also played Mosh Against Cancer in Liverpool which Eastern Front and Lawnmower Deth headlined, and we’re billed to support Hecate Enthroned in Lancaster at the end of this month. It’s been a pretty big year for us really!

Your music is a bugger to pin down. I hear everything from NWOBHM through to Black, Death and even Folk. Where do your main influences come from and how do you get your music to sound so diverse, yet cohesive. 

The great thing about Gods of War is that each member has a different set of influences, but each feed into and compliment each other and we have an overall vision of the way the music should sound. Personally I’m very influenced by bands like Cradle of Filth and Hecate Enthroned on guitar, as well as melodeath bands like Dark Tranquillity, while still being influenced by the standard greats like Maiden. I’ve also been listening to a lot of soundtrack and ambient music of late and I think that’s beginning to come through in the new material we’ve been writing. As for the other members, Jay’s really influenced by jazz and prog and Nick’s mental for folk metal. Danny also worships at the altar of classic black metal bands for his vocal style.

You’ve released a few EP’s over the past few years. I can see they’re available via Bandcamp. Have you not ventured into doing physical releases? 

We have done physical releases in the past but in the very DIY way of just burning cds ourselves, putting them in plastic wallets with the cover and handing them out at gigs. We’re looking into getting some jewel case copies of Tales and future releases made and setting up a professional way of selling them online, BigCartel or similar.

I know you’re working on some new material right now. What can we expect from Gods of War and when will the new material be released? 

As I’m writing this, we had a rehearsal today in which we finished a new song called ‘The Exorcist’. The song is classic Gods of War in that it mixes so many styles that I couldn’t pin it down into a single subgenre to describe it with, but I can tell you that it has parts that sound like blackened thrash, a couple of very Gorgoroth inspired riffs, some sweet solos and folky clean guitar. I also showed the guys some riffs I wrote after Bloodstock that are very Maiden inspired and they seemed to like them, so I think we’re gonna start work on them next practice.

In regards to when the next release will be, I really couldn’t say as it depends how long it’ll take us to write enough songs for another release, as we haven’t decided whether this will take the form of another EP or of a full length album yet. If all goes to plan though, hopefully we should have something out in 2015, and we will definitely release something in 2016. Before that though, we will be playing the new material live, so make sure you catch us if we’re playing near you. ;)

https://www.facebook.com/godsofwaruk/timeline

https://godsofwar.bandcamp.com/

Deep Underground United Kingdom is available for just £2 from Bandcamp

https://sixsixsixmusic.bandcamp.com/album/deep-underground-united-kingdom