Unfettered and unrelenting death metal, a sound straight out of the underworld, comes Tithe. Actually, the trio made up of guitarist Matt Eiseman, drummer Kevin Swartz, and bassist Alex Huddleston, are based out of Portland, Oregon. However, many might say that Hades himself sprinkles a bit of doom and gloom over the rainy city so frequently it may be one of reasons why the extreme music scene there is booming. Their third installment, entitled Communion in Anguish, out Friday on Profound Lore Records, is a compilation, as with their first two, that seeks to point a finger at the failing systems and festering neglect that are leading to the (inevitable) downfall of mankind.
One of the most powerful and poignant tracks on the record, “At The Altar of Starving Children,” alludes to war mongering atrocities that remain ongoing, even as I’m writing this, and will not have ceased by the time you’re reading this. As with many bands within this genre, if they sound mad it’s usually because they are. Sometimes shredding or screaming into the void is the healthiest way to deal with the countless unrequited wrongdoings we are forced to bear witness to on a daily basis.
“All of our songs have kind of been about the human condition, like mental illness struggles, addiction, humans being shitty to one another. It’s a way of processing it, I guess, and coming to terms with what’s happening in the world. That one’s essentially about the capitalist war machine just crushing over everyone and protesting it, but just feeling futile about everything,” says Huddleston.
Leading up to this new release, Eisman had solely taken on the role of vocalist for the band’s debut and sophomore albums. However, during the initial stages of writing Communion in Anguish they all decided it was time to try and amp up their sound by adding another layer of vocals to the mix. It turns out, Huddleston was the perfect man for the job all along and his deep guttural bellows have intensified their severity. This third full-length is them showing an ability to not only level up, but also a willingness to explore new territory and further their specialties as musicians.
“This is the first album I’ve done vocals on, and I took probably 50% of the vocals over on it,” Huddleston explains. “As of a year ago I didn’t even know how to do death metal vocals, so I just went hard trying to learn it and be able to play bass at the same time. That was definitely the biggest change, and we wanted to up the tempo on a lot of the songs, up the aggressiveness. I feel like I picked up the style of vocals fairly quickly, but the hardest part was being able to play on time with the bass guitar and sync up vocals with that.”
As intimidating as the vocal style for death metal appears to be, Huddleston and Eisman make it look easy, as if they’d been doing this together for years. But just because it’s a recent and seemingly quick evolution for the band doesn’t mean it didn’t take a whole lot of work to get there. Huddleston spent countless hours watching tutorials, taking advice from fellow vocalists, and drilling each song over and over again until it all synced up; brain and body working together to produce the necessary projection. Everything on this album was thought out and meticulously organized, even so far as acquiring home recording equipment so they could test each track before stepping into the recording studio. By the time they got there, they were fired up and ready to go.
“Yeah, we’re pretty excited about how the whole album came out,” boasts Huddleston.
Communion in Anguish is out on Friday, and you can preorder it from Profound Lore Records. Follow Tithe on Instagram for future updates.
Photo Credit: Christy Cather
