Interview: Manticore

This is the interview with Ixitichitl Bass and Vocals of Manticore.

1. First of all can you tell us a little about the band name and bio?
-Hails. A Manticore is a beast with the body of a lion, the face of a man, and the tail of a scorpion, we thought that conveyed our music and message perfectly. We formed in 99, when Satanael and I (Ixitichitl) finally found the time to bring together some ideas we had had since 95 or so, while writing the Ritual Cleansing of the Whore demo, we hooked up with the Maggot Wrangler, and Manticore was born. After playing shows in Europe in 02 with Black Witchery, Avenger, Krieg, and Armagedda, we returned home to release Bowels of the Holy Annoint Us in Evil. Playing some shows and writing we then released For Rats and Plague at which point Ixitichitl took a 3 year break due to family obligations and was replaced by Duaniac. In Oct 07 Ixitichitl returned at which point Duaniac switched to guitar and Satanael left the band. That is where we are now.

2. Hows the scene at Ohio, is it very big, are there plenty of metalheads?
-The scene here is OK at best, years ago it was much larger than it is now, but I am sure most places are like that. But even so we have plenty of bands here: Blood Coven, Decrepit, Soulless, Nunslaughter, Crucified Mortals, Midnight--plenty of good bands to support.

3. Since your first demo up to your last Full Length (For Rats and Plague) do you notice any change musically speaking? I mean, is it the same sound in the band in your personal point of view?
-Definitely, i notice some changes. Mainly, our drummer was very young and new to the scene when we started out, i think he has made the sound thicker with each release, otherwise, we have stayed pretty true to our original sound of raw chaos.




4. Why choosing black death metal?
-This is the music i have always listened to. i started in the early 80's with thrash and kept getting into more and more underground music, plus i was into the occult and satanism for even longer, so it an extension of me and the rest of the members in manticore.

5. Besides metal music what other music do you like?
-I am pretty closed minded when it comes to music. We all listen to metal, everything from Sabbath to Morbosidad, but it is always metal.

6. At the time you are composing a new song, who is the one that bring the main idea of the song, or do you all participate on it?
-All of us bring in ideas for new songs, usually what happens is, at practice someone starts playing something that grabs everyones attention, from there we work out the drums and start writing, usually songs come really fast this way.

7. What would be the main musical references in Manticore?
-I don't know that there would be any more influential than any others, maybe early samael, archgoat, hellhammer, venom, the wrangler is much more into old cannibal corpse, terrorizer, things like this so anything that is extreme has influenced us in one way or another.




8. Hows been the relation with Hells Head Bangers Records? Tell us a bit about it.
-The guys at HHR have been great... we have known them since before they started the label as they live about an hour away from us. They are some of the most dedicated, supportive, hard-working guys you will ever find in the underground. We have never had any issues about anything with them, anything we want to do, they do what they can to help us out, it is nice to have support from a label.

9. Where does the lyric theme come from? Why having this topics in lyrics?
-The lyrics reflect our feelings and thoughts on life and religion, i have always hated organized religion since i was young as i feel it is just a tool to control the weak and feeble. This has been something i have always opposed and mocked, so it is just a natural progression for it to be a main topic of ours.

10. Is there any other metal bands in Lakewood?
-Lakewood is actually next to Cleveland, so it is all the same for the most part.

11. What are your plans in the near future?
-Right now we are gearing up to play 4 shows in Mexico with Morbosidad, Obeisance and Thornspawn from March 26-29, after that we are playing a couple other shows (Nashville, TN and Detroit, MI) and hitting the studio some time soon after. We are planning on a new full-length, as well as a couple of splits that are in the planning stages right now.

12. Anything you wanna add?
-That covers it all i think. thanks for the interview and for spreading our plague.

13.- For last, what do you expect from the Mexican M-etalheads, do you hear something about Mexican crowd?
Duaniac has toured Mexico before(with Incantation back in 94-95?) he has said to expect the best(or worst!!!!!) all i know is i expect the mexican hordes to be sicker than the fucks in germany (who are fucking dedicated sick drunk bastards!!!!!----hails!!!) as long as we are brought our goat nightly we shall be fine, we will scavenge our rats and unleash our plague upon mexico finally, we await the bloodbath!!!!



You can check this guys on:
www.myspace.com/manticore666