photos by Peter Beste
(Cirith Ungol continue a strong resurgence with a new album set for release on October 20th by Metal Blade Records, and to help pave the way we present Comrade Aleks‘ interview of the band’s drummer and co-founder Robert Garven.)
Since being formed in 1971, Cirith Ungol has remained one of most long-running heavy metal bands on Earth. They fought for their place under the sun and recorded four full-length albums during their first two decades, but disappeared almost unnoticed in 1992.
The band’s comeback in 2015 was a blast, but they didn’t just gather to play just a few reunion shows, and the new album Forever Black appeared in 2020. They didn’t waste time during the pandemic, and the EP Half Past Human (2021) came out first.
Now Metal Blade Records will be releasing the band’s new work, Dark Parade. After all those years the band includes two original members who stood at its foundation in 1971 — Greg Lindstrom (guitars, keyboards) and Robert Garven (drums). Tim Baker (vocals) joined them in 1976, and Jim Barraza (guitars) came to Legions of Chaos in 1988. Jarvis Leatherby (bass) is the youngest member of the band, but he played a significant role in Cirith Ungol’s resurrection in 2015.
The flame of good old and a bit doomy heavy metal shall burn! And Robert Garven himself found some time to speak about Dark Parade and the stories behind him.
Hi Rob! Thanks for your time, it’s much appreciated, I believe that you’re very busy, as Metal Blade Records announced the release of Cirith Ungol’s new full-length album Dark Parade on October 20th. How are you busy now with the album’s promotion and other preparations?
Aleks, we are very busy right at this time doing lots of interviews and getting ready for an album release show coming up in Hollywood at the Roxy.
Did you receive as many offers of interviews as it was back then after the band’s reunion or when you just released Forever Black? Do you feel that this wave raised in 2015 still carries the band?
I’ve done quite a few since the announcement and I can feel the excitement is still very much there. It’s not every day that a new “Cirith Ungol” album is released, and I think many people are excited to see what we have to offer up to the metal gods!
As you said, the band will play a special record release show on October 20th at The Roxy in West Hollywood, marking the band’s first Los Angeles live appearance in thirty-five years. What prevented you from playing there before? Antipathy to the glam rock scene?
We are about an hour’s drive to the LA area and since the band reunited we are only playing a limited number of shows each year, mostly in Europe where we have a larger fan base. The goal has been to play at as many appearances at larger festivals where we could reach out to as many listeners as possible. It gives the band a chance to play for those who have supported the band over the years, and also to attract new fans to our Legions of Chaos!
We lead not the weak, they won’t answer the call,
As chaos descends, false metal will fall!
Although we have a large amount of fans here in the US, they are spread out over a larger geographical area than in Europe where there’s a very close knit Metal community that has easier access to shows because of shorter travel distances.
By the way, did you ever think what would happen if you accepted Enigma’s offer and started to play glam back in the ’80s?
Ha, I have thought about that many times, and I think everyone in the band would have loved having some kind of commercial and financial success, but at some point, it’s like a Faustian bargain that we were not willing to make at the time. To this day we continue to play what we feel is the heaviest metal known to man, “A Churning Maelstrom of Metal Chaos Descending!”
That makes me wonder… Did you play together with Manowar back in the ’80s? They fought false metal too, and I guess that you have a similar concept behind the albums. Or were both bands different, like Elric and Conan?
I think you are correct and they were Conan and we were Elric! Ha, we never got to play with them but I was one of their biggest fans!
Were there situations when some bands told you that Cirith Ungol influenced them and you were surprised getting feedback of that kind?
Yes, and it’s still happening today. We were always honored and appreciative that other people liked our music enough to be influenced by it. That is how the world works, we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us, and those that come after us will stand up on our shoulders!
Why do you think old school heavy and doom metal bands are more popular in the Old World? Is it really something about a different mentality?
I think it’s more about a cultural difference and basically word-of-mouth and what your friends are listening to. If none of your friends or family are listening to heavy metal and you’ve never been to a heavy metal concert, or heard heavy metal music, it’s easy to disregard it and listen to something that is more popular in your geographic location.
You have one live album, recorded back in 2017, and the show in The Roxy will be recorded too. Will it be released only in audio format, or does the label plan a video release as well?
To be honest I’m not sure of the details but Metal Blade Records will announce more details when they become available.
Metal Blade is preparing a few different editions of Dark Parade to satisfy any demand of fans. Do you have any extra material as bonuses for some of these editions?
Of course, that is why we love Metal Blade Records so much. With every project released since our reunion, they have exceeded all our wildest expectations in creating some really amazing packaging and content. The Dark Parade box set includes the demos we recorded when we were writing the songs, a tote bag, and art print of the cover, 2 posters, and a booklet, all housed in a foil embossed slipcase! When we were younger, we dreamt that someday we’d have an album that had a gatefold!
Are there any old re-recorded songs in Dark Parade, as it was with your previous EP Half Past Human? Or did you write all the songs from scratch?
Oh no, just like our last album Forever Black, this is all new material we started writing as soon as we finished recording that album! There is no filler here my friend, just true metal forged in the pits of Ungol!!
I don’t mean fillers; I just remember that you used some of your old songs in composing the Half Past Human material. However, how much do your equipment settings differ now from those you had back in the ’80s? Did your technical approach change a lot since those times?
Half Past Human was a very special animal and not to be confused with our regular studio albums. It was just a one-off to take up some time during the pandemic, but it turned out pretty cool. Forever Black and Dark Parade is all new material that we recorded and wrote for the specific albums, wanting to leave a legacy of new material as opposed to digging up the past.
The band is often tagged as doom metal, but it looks like the old bands which are known as doom bands or proto-doom bands just were sure that they played heavy metal partly based on some Black Sabbath or Blue Cheer patterns. When did you learn that “Cirith Ungol is a doom band”? And how do you see this status?
I’m not sure we fit into any specific category, but our music is definitely doomy, and has been for a very long time going back to some of our very earliest writings such as “Death of the Sun”.
There are just three years between Forever Black and Dark Parade. How do you see the difference between the albums?
Dark Parade would have come out even sooner if it had not been for the worldwide pandemic. Our last album Forever Black was released almost simultaneously when the pandemic hit, sending the world and the music industry into a global shutdown. Even though the album got rave reviews, with some even calling it the #1 heavy metal album of 2020, almost all of our shows, including some headlining slots at large festivals, were canceled.
The band could not go and support the album, and the last thing we wanted to do was release another full-length studio album while this tragedy was ongoing. That is why we released Half Past Human, as a placemark just to tide everyone over before the release of the next studio album, Dark Parade!
You started to write new songs soon after Forever Black’s release, which means the pandemic caught you in the middle of composing the songs. How much did it affect the way you work and your lyrics? Back then it seemed to be catastrophic, and a lot of bands and labels took a pause waiting to see how it would turn out, but it didn’t stop Cirith Ungol.
I can’t say if it would have changed anything about how the lyrics or music would’ve turned out, but definitely there was a swirling darkness enveloping us all. As with our last three albums, Paradise Lost, Forever Black, and Dark Parade, side one has songs with “Sword and Sorcery” and varying themes, however side two is reserved for Tim‘s dark vision of the collapse of mankind!
The official press-release points out that “it was the perfect backdrop for our doom-laden message of a world on the edge of destruction.” What kind of message did you put in Dark Parade?
The name Dark Parade conjures up the latest searing entry in Cirith Ungol’s ongoing chronicle of man’s never-ending fade into Doom. Nightmare tales of pain, suffering and corruption – a Dark Parade into the abyss…
And for sure the end is nigh. It’s said that there is a “Dark Parade” saga in the album, and it includes three tracks — “Dark Parade,” “Distant Shadows,” and “Down Below”. How are these songs connected?
The songs are all connected by the overall theme you asked about in the previous question. The saga actually begins with Looking Glass, the beginning of the descent into madness. Another waking nightmare or is it just a dream? The path along the Dark Parade is filled with both. Gaze into forever, gaze into your Doom.
Do you create your songs still jamming all together in the studio? Did the pandemic change this approach?
All our studio albums were composed using the same secret recipe from the band’s earliest days. Cirith Ungol forges a song, the same way a master blacksmith creates a heroic battle sword, precisely blending the correct alloys, to make it strong and true.
We then hammer these elements of molten metal to add strength and character, finally quenching it in the blood of the unavenged! By the time it is completed, we all have blood on our hands, our hearts are blackened, and our souls are scorched! The goal is to make grown men weep!
Did you record the album in The Captain’s Quarters with Armand John Anthony again, as you did when you worked on Forever Black and Half Past Human? How smooth was this session?
Yes, all of our projects since the band reunited were done there! Armand knows the band and he has helped the band achieve our goals of constant improvement in the recording process. His talents in a studio are second to none! The recording went pretty smoothly, but we had a deadline, and like all bands we probably wished we would’ve had another year or two for mixdown! ha
But I believe that it makes you more focused when the industry sets the deadline and you know what will be the next move. Did you think to record some parts in your home studio? A lot of bands organize it that way, and with all the technologies we have now, the process may turn out pretty organic.
Ha that’s way too modern for us, although come to think of it I think Jimmy sent a few solos off to the studio.
It’s said that you put some “disgust to humanity” in Dark Parade. Were you influenced by certain cases or is it a life-long experience? I remember your story about playing in the festival organizers against the war in Vietnam and how it all happened there. And now it doesn’t look much better.
I think that’s a common thread that runs through her last several releases! I think the fall of mankind is an ongoing process that started so long ago. I think the lyrics to “Brutish Manchild” sum it up pretty well;
So long ago, years untold
When Man-Ape found the Vein of Old
Its very first steps were led astray
Down the path to us today
With a brutish glare on his sloping brow
More than an ape it seemed somehow
Intelligence lay behind those eyes
And yet its first few words were lies
Cirith Ungol’s name will always raise questions like this, so how do you like the Netflix series The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power? Honestly, I didn’t find the courage to watch it. Maybe one day.
I think it was OK, but not as good as Peter Jackson’s handling of the other J. R. R. Tolkien material.
Since so many ask about our relationship to the LOTR’s and our album covers it is important to take a step back in time to look at where we originated. Greg and I were in an advanced English class in 7th grade, which would have made us about 16 years old. We were assigned to read The Lord of the Rings, which at that time was not the cultural mammoth it is today. It was a big influence on us, and led to our discovery of many other “Sword and Sorcery” works of literature and art.
Many people mistakenly feel that because we took our name from the books, that we were overly influence by The Lord of the Rings, or the Elric series we featured on our album covers. The truth is these incredible works of art influenced us, but were never intended to be something that defined us as a band, especially our music!
Rob, you’re also a fan of H. P. Lovecraft. Do you have Cthulhu Mythos-influenced songs in the band’s discography?
I have always been fascinated by Lovecraft since I bought a book when I was around 11 years old. It was a compilation of horror stories by famous authors. Included was the The Dunwich Horror, which immediately made an impression upon me, I have been a Lovecraft fan to this day. Last year we played an HP Lovecraft Necronomicon Convention in Providence, Rhode Island, where the author lived. After our show we went on a walking tour around town where we witnessed many of the locations in his stories. It was an unreal and amazing experience!
I kept telling the guys that the imagery I was getting from the music itself and the title of the song “Dark Parade” reminded me of a passage in the H.P. Lovecraft story The Horror at Red Hook. What I envisioned was a scene from the end of the story where there is a subterranean grotto connected to the sea, and along a dark dank dock, there’s a parade of unspeakable monstrosities marching toward an obscene phosphorescent swollen figure, squatting on a golden pedestal.
By a strange coincidence the main character of this story is one Thomas Malone, the same name as our good friend who stands in on bass, when Jarvis is on tour with Night Demon. I guess you could say the song came first, but my vision of the atmospherics of the song I relentlessly proselytized upon my fellow bandmates!
Haha, that’s the good story! Cirith Ungol was formed in 1971, and the band celebrated its 50th anniversary two years ago… It seems to be impossible when I think about that. What makes you keep on rumbling and continuing your mission?
We are on a lifelong mission to raise the banner of True Metal high as a beacon for all who are drawn to it. The legions of chaos will embrace you with our outstretched arms and welcome you to the fold as you “Join the Legion”!
Cirith Ungol’s first twenty years were filled with indifference and constant searches to find the way out of the underground. How rewarding is your current experience? Do you feel yourself satisfied with the way Cirith Ungol goes?
Our dream was to conquer the world and extinguish the horror of false metal, so we have not succeeded in our task, so we must carry on! The task before us is great but not finished. Here is a quote from the letter we sent out when “One Foot in Hell” was released. “As you now join the swelling ranks of the Legions of Chaos, together we will drive before us, the cringing herd of False Metal, crush their spinless lackeys, and purge the world of their Mutant plague!!! A little harsh but the sentiment still remains. Ha
Thank you very much for the interview. Did we skip something important? How would you like to finish the interview?
I would like to thank you and all of your readers for taking your time to read about our latest creation Dark Parade! The band is calling to all to come out to one of our rare appearances in 2024 to see the band live. We now call upon you, oh ordained priests of Chaos, to redouble your effort to spread the news of our just cause to the mindless stuff which is the breeding ground, for the Minions of Ungol!
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https://cirithungol.bandcamp.com/music
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https://www.metalblade.com/us/artists/cirith-ungol