Devil’s Witches | Interview | New Album, ‘In All Her Forms’
‘In All Her Forms’ is an upcoming twelve-track album by the occult Devil’s Witches, out October 28th via Majestic Mountain Records.
Over five years on from the release of their debut album, ‘Velvet Magic,’ Devil’s Witches will make a spectacular return this October with the release of ‘In All Her Forms’; a twelve-track exploration over four sides of vinyl that will see each entry focusing on themes of ‘Maiden, Mistress, Mother, and Matriarch.’
With each theme providing an ongoing narrative that eventually loops back to the beginning ad infinitum, a story will unravel and resolve itself time and time again, before your very eyes and ears. Crafting a self-contained story within the record’s very grooves, as you press deeper into the music, the lyrics, poetry, and thunderous doom on play, don’t be surprised if other less obvious narrative mysteries start to uncover themselves.
From big riffs to haunting ballads and expressive piano instrumentals, Devil’s Witches rarely (if ever) play by the rules. The band was originally founded by the mysterious multi-instrumentalist, Witchdoctor General, but has since gone on to welcome several honorary members into the fold creating one of cult rock’s most enigmatic superpowers in the process.
Available in four vinyl editions/colours – Maiden – Red, Mistress – Black, Mother – Green, and Matriarch – Gold – with stunning artwork, illustrations and photographs shot on location at Holy Island in Northumberland by music and fashion photographer Ian West, In All Her Forms by Devil’s Witches will be released 28th October on Majestic Mountain Records.
“My only escape in my childhood outside of playing music was books, video games and movies”
I remember talking about your band with Jus of Electric Wizard a few years ago. Your band feels like it’s born out of a 70s folk horror movie. Tell us a bit about your background, how it all started for you and how the idea to start the band followed?
I’ve been a musician for most of my life since I was a child. I was multi-instrumentalist from the beginning due to sheer curiosity more than anything but also because I was alone a lot. I grew up in a Christian cult and wasn’t allowed secular friends outside school. So I spent a lot of time in my room playing music. If it made sounds then I was interested in exploring what it could do. I started recording music by using a video camera then ripping the audio off the film and then producing it from there on very primitive software at the time. Over the years I just continued writing and recording. My Grandmother wasn’t part of the Christian side of my life so when I stayed at hers I would get to see late night movies. For years I had these images from the films stuck in my head. Images of female vampires fully nude wearing only their pubic hair and a cloak. I saw my first ever Vietnam war movie at hers, ‘Casualties of War’. The films I would see were so surreal to me that years later I thought I imagined most of them. A few years after my Grandmother’s death I managed to escape the abusive cult situation I was in but was subsequently homeless for a while. I eventually found kindred spirits but we were all messed up from different things. So it was tough in a new way. All I really had at any given moment in my life was music. I’ve studied and written music in most musical styles. The different projects I had created over the years all kind of morphed towards what I now call “Devil’s Witches.” The music I make as Devil’s Witches is the music that’s closest to my heart. Those early fever dream memories of nude vampires and the Vietnam war returned and I captured them in music for posterity. It was to my surprise that other people felt those unexplainable things too and now there’s a Coven of listeners. It’s very overwhelming as I’m just one person trying to make sense of my life through art. I didn’t go out looking for record deals. I uploaded my music like I had done many times before under different names for the best part of two decades. Then suddenly with Devil’s Witches I was contacted by a record label and before I knew it we were here.
Everything you release has a cover art that really captures the vibe of the music. How do you usually work on the artwork?
My only escape in my childhood outside of playing music was books, video games and movies. I had very few things at home but I would sneak things in or read books at night by flashlight that I wasn’t supposed to. All I could due to being cooped up so much and stopped from making friends was live inside the images in my head. The beginning of everything I do starts with the image. I see things in my head then turn them into songs. It could be memories from books, movies et cetera or oftentimes images I think are unique creations I’m conjuring up. But it all starts with the image. So when it would normally become time to illustrate the music it has already been completed earlier in the process. For example having the image in my mind of a nude vampire within the Vietnam War. I will ponder that image like I’m understanding a painting or a photograph and then the story emerges, then the sound et cetera. It feels very organic and almost like I’m a conduit to some other forces.
“‘In All Her Forms’ we are firmly in the realms of the avant-garde and surrealism”
You will have a brand-new double album coming out, October 28th on Majestic Mountain Records, what’s the story behind it?
‘In All Her Forms’ is something very different from ‘Velvet Magic’. That first album is what they call in cinema”a period piece.” Everything that went into it was a deliberate attempt to transport the audience to an earlier historical time – from melodies to production to presentation. You could also argue that it held elements of magical realism too. It had a linear narrative, albeit within a kind of poetry that’s not instantly accessible for everyone. In short it has more immediately identifiable elements that are very typical. However with ‘In All Her Forms’ we are firmly in the realms of the avant-garde and surrealism. There are much less typical elements for you to hold onto and immediately identify with other than the sounds. The album is constructed as a thematic quadrant of triplets from the generating themes of Maiden, Mistress, Mother, Matriarch. It is within the album’s forms that you will find its meaning.
Would you like to talk about the tracks?
I actually want to refrain from translating into words here what already exists in its purest form when you listen. I think it’s important that this album is a participatory experience. I rarely had anyone offering their unique experiences and understanding of ‘Velvet Magic/Cherry Napalm’. Almost everything I read or people expressed to me was my own explanations I had given in articles. There’s only a couple of individuals who seemed to make it their own. One of them wrote a really great essay for university on care ethics and the other wrote and starred in their own short stage production for their degree. They took the narrative and wrote this beautiful play about repressed homosexuality between two Vietnam soldiers. It was absolutely stunning and featured performances of the songs. With this new album I don’t want to hand down something that’s a kind of artistic dogma. I want to encourage listener autonomy in everyone’s relationship to this music.
What would you say influenced you the most? Have influences changed during the years?
I don’t think my influences have changed very much. What has changed is my confidence to express myself in ways that might not seem conventional. Putting out songs about sex toys or menstruation can raise a few eyebrows. It takes a bit of confidence to not overthink those reactions and to trust in your instincts and reject the pre-ordained conventions that govern most things. There wasn’t a simplicity of things that influenced me on ‘In All Her Forms’. It is so multi-layered in every aspect that it would take me some time to deconstruct it all and explain it back to you. At that point I would have undermined the album in my opinion as I would have neutralised and tamed it.
Can you share some further words about how the album was produced?
I wrote this album like I write most songs and that is on acoustic guitar. This comes from my habit of always having one in my hands as an extension of my body. From there I’ll bring the song into a recording state with regards to how complete it is. With most tracks it’s usually not too long in the recording stage if I’m feeling it. A day at most usually. The longest part in my process is scrapping and re-writing ideas until I feel something. I have no control over that because it comes from a deep emotional reaction I have towards something I write. It just happens or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t I very rarely ever write with my head. I only use my head to finish something up at the end. But everything else is all instinct. The images instinctively pop into my head, the music writes itself in response to the images and the recording sort of just happens as a by-product of those other elements being successful.
How would you compare it to your debut album, ‘Velvet Magic’?
I wouldn’t compare it to ‘Velvet Magic’. In fact the response that album elicited in people intimidated me for the longest time and really screwed with my ability to tap into following the instinctive writing process. It’s hard not to filter your new musical ideas through what you know people already love. But I eventually came to a place where I completely blocked ‘Velvet Magic’ out of my mind and ‘In All Her Forms’ came from its own unique place. That is until one day I was finishing up one of the tracks and an element I won’t mention (spoilers) returned. I want listeners to experience this moment, at least on their first listen, the same way I did when it happened. It is here that things will come full circle for them but not in the way convention would dictate. It’s a special moment on the album for me. But please don’t compare ‘In All Her Forms’ to ‘Velvet Magic’ . Go into it without any baggage.
Would you speak about your gear, pedals and effects?
I’m not really a gear head at all. I admire that whole world but I’m terrible at remembering technical details in that way. I have a Chuck Schuldiner signature BC. Rich that his mum gave away in a competition many, many years ago . I bought it from the winner. I used it throughout ‘Velvet Magic’ and I see it as being a very magical guitar to me so I used it again on this one. I used my Gibson SG on some solo stuff on the new album. Then for a lot of heavier riffs I used my KS Dean which is Karl from Nile’s signature guitar. I’m a big death metal fan so tapping into some of those sounds was important to me. For amps it was mostly orange dual terror and there was a couple of classic Marshall ones on solos et cetera. I actually used a Mesa Boogie dual rectifier on a few of the heavier tracks too. The fuzz comes from either Minotaur fuzz and burn or classic fuzz face. This album I also added some extra gain from the pro co rat pedal. Effects are always mostly double tracking then sometimes chorus, sometimes flanger and usually in that order of hierarchy. Oftentimes a double track can be enough to really make it sound like there’s more effects going on when there’s not.
Are you planning to go on tour to support the release?
The short answer is no. The long answer is found in probably every single other interview I’ve done, haha.
I bet you’re full of weird horror flicks, tell us some less known films we should check.
I actually don’t watch horror movies all that much. The films of Rollin or Franco I don’t particularly consider horror as they are much too fantastique. I’m sure many will debate that. Then there’s the golden age of adult film with Bob Chinn, Metzger, de Renzy films and American exploitation genre Russ Meyer, Doris Wishman et cetera. The glossy Italian romps of Tinto Brass. Then the grindhouse classics like Ms. 45, Thriller – A cruel picture, Savage Streets. And not forgetting the Vietnam war films of Kubrick, Stone, Coppola. I specify all these as they pertain to the influence on ‘Velvet Magic’ and some subsequent singles. However almost all of those, apart from Rollin, have absolutely nothing to do with the new album ‘In All Her Forms’. French avant garde, new wave, surrealist cinema has been utilised in my current output. Currently I am watching films in the “cinéma du look” movement. One I’d recommend is Betty Blue but only if you enjoy oversaturated visuals, dysfunctional relationships, isolated and frustrated youth and the pastiche of pop culture. Some say style over substance but I say an exploration of cinematic form over content. I would also like to mention that when most other people got sunk into streaming sites these past few years I got further into books. I’ve recently been reading the works of Angela Carter – a writer most prominent in the 70s and 80s primarily. Her stories are all at once magical, subversive and feminine in a way that is defiant of being categorised. Many would describe her writing as feminist but then even some prominent feminists such as Dworkin argued against this. This is not some blanket set of ideologies for women – it’s the real expression of her lived experience told through a twisting of fairytale conventions.
Let’s end this interview with some of your favourite albums. Have you found something new lately you would like to recommend to our readers?
I try to listen to music from a wide variety of genres. However I’ve not found very many new albums or artists recently that resonate with me. There’s definitely new music I like but most of it isn’t sticking with me long term and I can’t find myself relating to the lyrics or the artistic presentation in any deep way. I don’t know if it’s just the place I’m at inside myself artistically. However, I became aware of an artist last year from the 70s called Dory Previn. Her music is filled with some of the most dreamlike magical poetry I’d heard in so long. It’s trippy, acoustic guitar based with soft electric elements scattered throughout some tracks. It’s very 70s but that’s exactly what I love about it. Her album ‘Mythical Kings and Iguanas’ is probably the only album I’ve consistently listened to recently and took to heart. Her track ‘Angels and Devils The Following Day’ is such an interesting exploration of female/male heterosexual power dynamics. What she describes in the song about two polarities of Male sexual expression and more importantly her response and desire (or lack of) towards them feels positively daring.
Thank you. Last word is yours.
Thank you very much for giving me a platform to discuss the things I’m interested in and to promote the upcoming album. ‘In All Her Forms’ will be available from most major retailers and independent record stores. However if folks could support Charlie Company and Majestic Mountain Records first then that’s the surest way of seeing your investment going straight back into the music. But if it’s more convenient to pick up at your nearest stores then I’m thankful to you always. Thanks for reading and I can’t wait for you to hear the album!
Klemen Breznikar
Devil’s Witches Facebook / Instagram / Bandcamp / Bigcartel / YouTube
Majestic Mountain Records Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Bandcamp / YouTube / Bigcartel
