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Martriden is a band from Montana, And they play a mixture of genres. It's pretty hard to pin one on them. Black/Death/Progressive/Melodic. They pretty much cover the spectrum. I got in contact with the band and luckily Kyle "Guitars/keyboards" Made time to grant my interview request.
In 2008 they released the highly praised album. "The Unsettling Dark" and more recently in 2010 they released the album "Encounter the Monolith" with is proof that they didn't just get lucky with that first album. Keep an eye out on these guys folks, They have one hell of a bright future.
Shawn: Good evening, and thanks for taking the time to sit down for this interview. Hows the weather where you are right now?
Kyle Howard: The Weather's recently improved quite a bit. Been kind of weird, the past few weeks though. Winter doesn't want to go away it seems.
Shawn: It's rare to hear real, "Extreme" metal here in the United States. But you guys are bringing it for real! Name if you will some of your personal musical inspirations?
Kyle Howard: Death, Opeth, Vader, Decapitated, In Flames, Entombed, Morbid Angel, Pink Floyd, King Crimson, Genesis...the list goes on and on man...lots of great music to aspire to!
Shawn: After your highly successful 2008 album, The Unsettling Dark. and your 2010 release, Encounter the Monolith. Where do you see things going now? And are you content with the new album?
Kyle Howard: Well we have about 10 songs written and I think from just the guitar tracks and music we've notated...we're just continuing our own personal musical progression... we're trying new things as usual..but still sticking with what we're good at at the same time. ....old fans will enjoy our new material I am quite sure. And hopefully some new people will find out about us too!
Shawn: I've seen you guys are having some lineup issues with the drumming spot. Are you still looking for a drummer?
Kyle Howard: We've had a revolving door with drummers yes...and we still have a ton of respect with our last drummers that recorded with us, Sam Murphy and Jeremy ( Sam did Encounter, Jeremy did Unsettling) they are both amazing musicians...schedules and ability to commit to a underground band such as ours is just not in the cards for a lot of percussionists...but we'll see. We have a guy drumming with us now for some local shows and he's quite good...again he won't be able to continue with us full time due to other priorities..but we're not too worried about that at the moment. We have other guys that are very talented that are interested in working with us.
Shawn: The new album, Encounter the Monolith. Ends with a fucking epic instrumental, but it seems instrumentals are getting rarer and rarer these days. Tell us if you will what was some of your personal inspirations while making this track.
Kyle Howard: Will actually wrote that entire track himself, I don't think he initially intended for it to be an instrumental..but we kind of just decided it didn't need any vocals on it... we'll continue to leave out vocals if we don't think they enhance the song in anyway. Writing lyrics is a pain in the ass and we are not poets by any means.
Shawn: One thing I've always loved about you guys is lyrical content. Can you give us an idea of the concept for the lyrics on Encounter the Monolith?
Kyle Howard: Read Nietzsche's "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" and Arthur C. Clarke's "2001: A Space Odyssey" the movie of the same name will give you a good idea as well.
Shawn: So what do you do outside of metal? Pastimes? Hobbies?
Kyle Howard: We're huge fans of drinking. Mostly Craft Beers... and we do the usual stuff... we go out when we can afford it, play video games sometimes, watch movies and TV shows on Netflix. Don't have regular TV...just Internet at the moment.
Shawn: Any tour plans in the near future? If you hit Atlanta I'd love to see you guys!
Kyle Howard:: We want to! And if a nice booking agency ever decides to do more than tell us they like us...and actually takes us out on a few dates...we will be there in a heartbeat! ..We really do want to tour..but we can't afford it at the moment. We are super poor!
Shawn: I loved the album art for, Encounter the Monolith. What artist did you use? and did the artist have full creative control? or did you have a specific look you were going for?
Kyle Howard: Shane painted it with oil paints...we have it here..the original is pretty damn big. ...about 4x4 feet I think? ...not quite sure. Shane will probably end up doing the next one as well. We really like what the other artists did for us on the past albums but having Shane do it I think makes it far more unique and saves us a good bit of money too.
Shawn: Also doe's the album art reflect of the lyrical content on the album? and if so can you give us an example?
Kyle Howard: haha, just watch "2001: A Space Odyssey" It's a little abstract but the reference is definitely there.
Shawn: Ozzy or Dio era Black Sabbath?
Kyle Howard: I like the older Sabbath songs a bit better. But, I do have to say...Dio's voice is quite a bit better.
Shawn: Well that will conclude our interview, Thank you very much for taking the time to answer my questions. and if there’s anything you would like to add or share feel free.
The final word is yours!..
Kyle Howard: Thanks for the questions...We always enjoy these interviews when we find the time to get them done! Make sure to keep up with us on Facebook! http://www.facebook.com/#!/martriden our website http://www.martridenrocks.com
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