Interview: Talking with the guitarist Jack Simmons of Slaughter to Prevail (eng)

RiskTheDeath: Can you present yourself and the band to people that don’t know you? 

Jack Simmons: Yeah,  we’re an extreme metal band. We like pissed off angry music. So that’s what we write. And I think that for us, we do something a little bit different than what anyone else is doing right now. I don’t think there’s a lot of bands like us in the scene. Doing what we’re doing. And we just want to push it further. Experiment further. Make something fresh new. And if you haven’t heard us, go check us out. If you like heavy music I think there’s going to be something in it for pretty much everyone that listens.

RTD: According to YouTube or Spotify, you have a huge fanbase. How did you manage to grow up that fast ? Few deathcore bands are growing that fast.

J.S. : I think it’s been quite natural for us. But we try to focus on like a couple different things that I think bands kind of, don’t quite do. For us, the music is the most important and then also the brand and how we are. We want to tell a story with how we look and everything else. We’re not scared to do what we can to get our music out there. We just want people to hear our music and if that’s on tik tok, if it’s on Spotify, or if that’s because they bought a CD, we don’t mind, we just want people to hear it, so we do everything we can to make sure that our music gets to as many people as we can get it to.

RTD: Few russian metal bands are emerging at an international level, do you have any idea why ?

J.S. :  So I’m actually from the UK. I’m from England, but obviously, with everyone else from Russia, looking at their scene there and looking at the bands they have, I think that it is something fresh and something new. I think it reminds me of the Australian metal scene, maybe 15 years ago, but with less people looking at it. But the Russian scene is very interesting. It’s a very fresh take on a lot of stuff that’s going on sort of in deathcore and metal.

RTD: After “Misery Sermon”, Evgeny Novikov joined the band as the drummer. What did it change for the band ? Did his way of drumming changed or influenced the way the band sounds ?

J.S. : So I think his drumming style brought a lot to our songs for sure. Everything’s written by myself and Alex, but bringing in Janja, definitely brought a new level of drumming. I think it made our sound way more intense and it added a lot more drive to it. With the other drummers we’ve had in the past,it was more technical, not to say Janja is not technical, but it was more impressive without thinking about the song. So with Janja, he’s really been able to pick up the riffs and the vocals and give it more punch !

RTD: “Agony” was released 2 years ago, “Demolisher” 1 year ago and “Baba Yaga” 1 month ago. Why did you decide to release these songs so long before the album was released ?

J.S. :  We write music very just consistently so we don’t really write with an album in mind. By the time “Misery Sermon” came out, I’d already written « Demolisher« . We had a few problems internally with the management and the label so we had some delays. And we were really trying to get new music out there. And it took a very long time. We just try to write as much music and think about what songs we should include. We have maybe two or three new songs for the next album already, and we just keep it going. If we are inspired, we’ll just keep writing. There’s a couple tracks that we did not include in Kostolom. Because we didn’t think it fit. But we still have the songs, so whether we do it for another release, or whether we even released them, we don’t know, we just we try and get it. We don’t want an album with 20 songs, and five of them are gray, we want every song to be the best we can do with that.

RTD: Talking about released songs, “Baba Yaga” feels very different from “Misery Sermon” songs. We can hear some “clean vocals”, and also many musical influences that are different from “pure deathcore”.  Were you inspired by something in particular ?

J.S. : We definitely wanted to do something different. When we wrote « Misery Sermon« , we listened to a lot of deathcore and we put that into an album. With « Kostolom« , we went in with a very different vibe of what we wanted to do. We also want it to sound catchy. Some of our favorite albums, whether they’re metal or not metal, wherever they are. There’s always something to them that drags you in and we just try to bring that to our sound. If it’s clean vocals, or if it’s the riffs a big catcher, or if it’s the songs fast the whole time or slow, it is simple little things, but we try to do it in a way where we make a big impact on the music. What we like with « Baba Yaga » is that if you take out the clean vocal or certain parts it just sounds like a normal slaughter song. And so we try to add these new flavors into it to make something more unique and a bit more interesting for the listener.

RTD: According to previous declarations, “Misery Sermon” was inspired by the hate and misery seen in everyday life. What is the main theme for “Kostolom” ?

J.S. : We don’t really have a consistent theme for our album. But what we do have is that in life, everyone goes through psychological struggles and it could be for anything, and not just psychological but even physical and this is about pushing through that. Breaking your own bones to become better, become stronger, and to overcome and achieve what you want. About « Agony« , that song is about putting yourself through agony, to just come out where you want to be, to grow as a person. If you’re trying to start a business and make a new career, or even just work harder at the gym, or wherever you’re trying to do. You hit a lot of difficult moments, and this album is about trying to  inspire you to go out and get it. And, be yourself and stay true to yourself.

RTD: What is your global feeling about this new album ? And what can people expect from it and how would you describe this album for a layman / newcomer?

J.S. : I would say this album is angry. I think it’s aggressive. I don’t think we really fit into one genre anymore.I don’t really think we’re a deathcore band, I like to just call it metal. We’re just a metal band to people that aren’t familiar with the different scenes. And I would say that these are just pissed off angry songs. And they’re also fun. They also got different moments in him. I think we have a lot of different dynamics throughout the whole album.

RTD: Bears, Vodka, russian roulette, Slavic fairy tales, Made in Russia t-shirts… Is « Kostolom » an ode to the Russian culture ? Are you proud of the culture of your country ?

J.S. : Yeah. It is definitely, and I think just Eastern European culture in general. A lot of folklore and a lot of interesting cultural things are present in this part of the world. It is definitely paying our respects to Russian life, Eastern European life and all of that. This  is one of the things that for us is quite important for the band.

RTD: Was the pandemic impactful on the album recording ?

J.S. :  Yeah, it was. It delayed things a little bit. It did, but not massively. We had problems with guitar recordings and stuff because of the pandemic. And I think that it didn’t have as much of an impact as it could have done. We managed to work around it and do what we can to sort of fix it. It was more just the recording process, you know, being able to have studios open or closed and things like that. On that just laying outside of it to be honest.

RTD: What is your favorite song on the album ? And why ?

J.S. : I would say “Bonebreaker”, the first song. I just like this song. I really like the riffs and the end. I just like this song a lot. I think there’s a lot of big moments on the album, a lot of big breakdowns and stuff like that, like « Demolisher » and all that. But this song for me, I could just listen to it over and over again.

RTD: Alex is doing a lot of covers, what would be the best featuring for Slaughter to Prevail ? And is it something you would be interested in ?

J.S. : We definitely want to work with people. I don’t really have anyone that just springs to mind like that. I think there’s some people I know Alex would love to work with like Corey Taylor.  I think it would be also interesting, mixing our would with maybe a couple of rappers or hip hop artists and, and get their feel for tracks, for the sound. And even go even more extreme. It would definitely be fun. Whether we can make it happen or not is another thing, but it would be cool. Just for us features never worked out. So it’s just not a thing that right now we’ve done that much. But we’re definitely down.

RTD: You already toured with big names from the Deathcore scene in the previous years, can we expect an upcoming tour ? 

J.S. : Yeah, for sure. I think so. I mean, we’ve got a lot of offers at the moment, with a lot of bigger deathcore bands and all that. We love deathcore, both me and Alex, we grew up listening to deathcore, we started a deathcore band, and we love deathcore. But I think for us right now, we want to bring deathcore to new people, we don’t want to leave it behind, not do that thing that some bands have done, but we just want to bring it. If we can get on a tour that’s bigger, and be the only deathcore band on the tour and bring this whole new sound and everything to them, then that’s what we want to do. That’s what we’re interested in and we want to talk with Hatebreed or Rammstein. Anyone you know we want to go on the road with them guys. And we want to show these people what deathcore is and what extreme metal is.

RTD: About using Alex‘s Channel to promote on Youtube…

J.S. : It just made sense to be honest. Alex‘s channel does very well, he has a lot of fans from his covers. I think that having it on his channel is great for us, is great for him. It makes sense for both of us to be able to put on a bigger platform, like his channel, and to also promote his channel and promote the band.

RTD: A last word for your french fans ?

J.S. : I mean, we want to come play in France. Thank you for enjoying our music and streaming and do whatever you want to do with it. Order some merchandise. We have loads of it. So, you know, we ship to France. Hopefully we get to come to you guys and drink with you guys and party and play music for you. Hopefully next year. Thank you!