A band that brutalizes you on their records, but are also down to earth, super cool people.  I came into contact with David, a few years ago, through Ebay.  With trying to make some extra change for birthday gifts for my children I sold a lot of my vintage longsleeves and made a rack of cash.  One of my favorite bands has always been Nocturnus, but seeing that David was willing to buy it from me, and I knew it was going to a good home, I parted reluctantly with the shirt, but had the pleasure of many cool exchanges with David.  We talked about the 90’s death metal scene and the present state of affairs in the scene today.  Just a super cool dude, who just happens to be in an excellent band.  The band is committed to their craft, but also very supportive of the scene, bands and most of all their fans.  So sit back and relax and buy their cds, like their FB page, buy a shirt from them, check out their links and give it up for Beheaded-a most dedicated and influential band in the brutal death metal community.

So David, what is going on with Beheaded at the moment, you have the Perpetual Mockery  reissue coming out on Pathos Productions, please go in depth about remastering and any bonus features on it. When will it be out?

Hey Frank, All is good in the Beheaded camp, we are getting things ready for our European Summer Festivals tour in July, things are little bit slow at the moment but steady at the same time. The Perpetual Mockery re-issue is due to be out in a couple of months, it will be pressed on double gate fold vinyl, digi pack CD and old school audio tape. It will also include the Souldead 1995 demo on it as a bonus. This has been something I have been working on for quite sometime now, John from Pathos productions showed interest in re-releasing our debut album and we have taken it from there, he has been a fan of the band for a long time and he’s absolutely cool to work with. We have also chosen Jon Zig from TX (Sarcolytic, Images of violence, Skin Graver tattoo) to re-do the artwork for the re-issue, the result blew us away to hell and back, it’s incredibly awesome. Remastering is going to be done by Pathos Productions.

Are you guys working on a follow-up to the 2012, album, Never To Dawn?  What is the new material sounding like?

Yes, we are currently working on a new album, we have a tentative moniker for the album which I can’t reveal as of yet but it’s a powerful title! The album will pack a solid punch that’s for sure.

On the last album you guys expanded your sound a bit, while still retaining the brutality.  How difficult is it for you guys to keep things interesting in death metal, after all these yrs?

Never to Dawn came out after quite a long pause. 7 years had gone by since the release of its predecessor Ominous Bloodline. All of us have changed to what life actually molded us in, which inevitably influenced the music. With Never to Dawn there was also the introduction of Frank on vocals, whose input was a major addition to the sound, energy and vibe in general. The writing of Never to Dawn was not forced in any way. We wanted to enjoy the writing process and basically express our ideas the best way possible. The album ended up sounding brutal with a melodic edge, which to a certain extent revisited our debut Perpetual Mockery. But this was not intended to be like that, it was just the musical direction that we felt most at ease to take.

You have been in the band for over 2 decades, tell us about the highs and lows that Beheaded has experienced in the music industry over the years and how this helped the band in possibly becoming stronger?

I’ve been in the since since early 1993, I’ve always been a fan of the band since they started in 1991 and I knew Chris and David the founder members quite well, so since I joined I’ve seen a lots of ups and down those being from problems in settling with the right singer from financial situations in realizing our dreams to come true, this has helped the band in many ways.

You guys were on a European tour with Internal Bleeding and Disgorge, how did that entire tour go? †What were some of the most memorable parts of the tour? †Do you like touring in general, since it’s pretty rough on the body?†

Touring with the likes of Internal Bleeding, Disgorge and other killer bands we’ve toured with was another good step for Beheaded in its touring history. The last European tour we did was just fantastic, no drama, no bull shit, no nothing, just pure love for Death Metal and total respect for each other. As for memorable parts of the tour…I remember we had this Polish driver we kept picking on…the guys from Internal Bleeding were calling him Agent Orange (later it was transformed to just L’orange in short) and not cause of the cult Sodom album but cause of this orange space look alike  snickers he was wearing, he could not speak proper English but he just loved to hear that New York accent the guys in Internal Bleeding were speaking…it was funny all the way…good times, we miss both bands.

You love death metal immensely.  Go into your death metal shirt collection a bit and why you value it so much. Talk about some of your favorite designs, L/S and S/S that you have?  Do you wear them all? Also how is the Nocturnus shirt holding up, since I sold it to you-you taking good care of it?

I have been into this Death metal thing since it actually started over here, it’s takes me back to late 1989/1990…I used to play in another band called Biblical Infamy which was actually the first death/black metal band over here in Malta, influenced by old Incantation and Deicide, as kids we were neglected in watching our favorite bands live while in other European countries there were tours happening which we could not attend cause we live on an island surrounded by the sea, that kinda hurt us, however we were able to buy records and merchandise and I was also into tape trading a lot. I have been collecting metal shirts for sometime now, I have always loved merchandise, especially shirts and long sleeves…some of my rare jewels must be the Immolation huge collection and their demo shirts, my Bolt Thrower collection and my Autopsy collection among many, many others which I can’t list here cause it will take forever. Yes, I do wear my shirts, not all…some that are out of size or are too big for me I can’t wear however I still keep them for the sake of collecting. I still have your Nocturnus long sleeve and it’s a keeper, I have that also as a t-shirt (both original Earache), Nocturnus has been one of my favorite bands from the early 90’s, I still think The Key is an incredible debut and my top favorite from them. I only collect vintage and original shirts, no bootlegs! Reprints are cool though …some of the shirts I own go for ridiculous prices on eBay and even if sold privately, I admit I spent a lot of money of them…way too much but as long as it makes me happy, hah!

Outside of Beheaded life, what do you do for a living to help you survive, eat and be able to afford expensive, vintage death metal shirts?

I work in the toy business, I do toys for kids, been working there for almost 24 years, I earn enough to live very comfortably, satisfy my urge in buying vintage death metal shirts and do the things I like.

Malta is pretty close to Italy. †So are their similarities to the culture, foods and language? †I’ve been to Italy, never to Malta, so what would one expect on visiting Malta?

Malta is rich in history. Here we have Neolithic Temples which precede the Egyptian pyramids. The historical journeys of Italy and Malta are quite diverse and the language is totally different. Maltese is a semitic language, which along the years assimilated other words in its structures. Italian is a completely different language to Maltese, with the exception of a few words here and there, which ended up in our vocabulary.  If one is into swimming, one can find a clean sea and awesome beaches as well. Typical food to eat here is the rabbit stew, fish dishes and Mediterranean cuisine.

You guys have had singer issues in the past, as well as other rotating players in the group-why has it been so difficult to keep members and do you feel your present line-up is a solid foundation, moving forward?

We have had a rotating seat in the vocal department for quite a while. Fortunately we came full circle with that in 2009, since Frank joined forces. The majority of players who were part of Beheaded in the past ended up emigrating in the hope to establish a better standard of living in other countries or continents: UK, Canada & Australia. Others just needed to have a go at other things in life. In any case Beheaded has endured all this and will continue to churn out quality death metal. The majority of the ideas for our music since the release of Ominous Bloodline were penned by Omar, and this has remained for Never to Dawn and for the yet untitled upcoming album. So the writing style will follow on its predecessors. I think member replacements become a necessity if a band wants to move forward.

Do you have back-up members, that you can call, if someone cannot commit to let’s say live shows/touring?

Yes we do rely on back up members. We have 2 stand–in drummers, and also another bassist.  Session members permit us to commit for a tour if the permanent member would not be able to make it for some reason or another.

How has Unique Leader Records helped in advancing the band’s career and did they offer any touring support in terms of merch etc… on the last tour?

Unique Leader has released out last 2 records, which in my opinion helped the Beheaded name climb the ranks’ ladder a bit. When asked to furnish us with a number of CD copies to help us cushion the tour expenses, we have always found collaboration. The same thing happened with this upcoming Euro tour – they helped us out with some merch too. So I think they like the music we have released under their banner and in return they have shown respect in this way.

Any final comments for our readers?

Thank you Frank for this opportunity to be featured in your webzine, watch out for the next Beheaded album, also for the re-issue of our debut on Pathos Production. The horror breathes!

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