John Abernathy of Conducting From The Grave: The hbih Interview

Let’s face it, there are way too many scene kids out there ripping off Gothenburg style riffs and throwing in whiny vocals and passing themselves off as a metal band. It’s hard to appreciate melodic death metal anymore (thanks a whole fucking lot, Massachusetts). And then there’s deathcore, a genre cluttered with chugging riffs, breakdowns at every turn, and a general lack of doing anything different.

But that’s not to say there aren’t good bands out there that make use of these musical styles. A lot of bands have their roots in metalcore/deathcore add their own flair of nuance and progressions that make everything seem interesting again. Between The Buried And Me, The Faceless, Arsonists Get All The Girls, August Burns Red; all great -core bands.

Sacramento based metal group Conducting From The Grave are a band that I feel don’t get enough recognition for what they do. They take the melodic death metal sound and add technical flair and subtle progression that makes for a great listening experience. I had to opportunity to interview their guitarist John Abernathy to discuss the music scene, their upcoming album, and future plans for CFTG.

For those that don’t know, who are you and what do you do?

I’m John Abernathy. I play guitar for Conducting From the Grave mainly, but also recently joined Embrace the End and a small local band with a kid I was giving guitar lessons to called Aurelia.

Marching Towards Extinction

To me, it’s refreshing to hear you guys. I mean, you’re smack in between deathcore and metalcore, which have been getting fairly boring in the last few years. It seems that you take the good aspects of both and you make something that stands out from the rest of the mediocrity. Do you have any comments on the scene in general?

Thanks man! I don’t have much to say on the “scene” but as far as those two genres go I definitely think its very flattering to hear someone say they think we are doing something a cut above the rest because that definitely is what we strive for. That is definitely my biggest complaint about the genres or “scene” of both metalcore and deathcore is that they are so watered down with shit generic bands yet it definitely seems like kids going to shows support some of these other bands (I’m not gonna name names) far more than they are willing to support us. We don’t sit around writing like “man bro this next breakdown is gonna be soooo br00(00×10)tal, kids are gonna mosh soo hard bro!” we try to just be passionate about writing some killer riffage that’s progressive and forward thinking and structuring it in a cohesive manner that makes sense (like put breakdowns where they will be good for the song as a whole, not just filler for kids to mosh to), whereas it seems like there are so many no talent assclown bands out there that just play breakdown after breakdown after breakdown.

Are you familiar with the term “Sumeriancore?” If so, how do you feel about that label and it being applied to CFTG?

hahaha a while back some girl commented our myspace saying “you guys sound great, but you are on Sumerian, where are the polyrhythm breakdowns?” To which I responded “Well we have been a band for longer than Sumerian has been a label and we have always just written the music we would want to hear and that is fun for us to play.” So in essence it doesn’t make much sense to lump us in that category, we were playing progressive off time metal with sweeps and whatnot back in 2003, we are just fortunate that Sumerian recognized us for what we do and wanted to sign us. We definitely don’t compromise who we are as a band to fit some stereotype of what our label wants, but I think the material on our upcoming album does have a more modern sound since all 11 tracks were written in a few months as opposed to the last album which was songs spanning over 5 years of writing. Thus our influences have changed over time since we are constantly growing as musicians, but I think we definitely still have our own touch to the sound as you said in your first question that hopefully will set us apart from the pack.

What bands do you find yourself drawing inspiration from these days? Any new albums out that you’re really digging?

I gotta give it up to Tosin Abasi/Animals As Leaders I’ve been a huge fan of his guitarwork since Reflux. The new Red Chord doesn’t seem like its been getting the love it deserves. I have become somewhat of a right hand rhythm picking nut since joining Embrace the End thanks to learning their set and jamming with their lead guitarist Spencer, so shit like what The Red Chord does really rules my face. We all are really big Between the Buried and Me Fans, and also to be touring with Arsis coming up in May is going to be a real treat for me since I’ve been a big fan of theirs since I first heard Diamond For Disease 2 or 3 years ago. Other than that as far as albums go I’ve just been listening to a lot of the realest pimp to ever to spit on the microphone: Too Short.