Interview with KARNAGE THROUGH CROSSING
Welcome to the FILTHY DOGS OF METAL Webzine.
Hell yea Stavros! Thanks for having us man!
Tell us a few things about KARNAGE THROUGH CROSSING (Members, Starting Year etc).
Karnage Through Crossing Started back at the end of 2021 as one of several former bands were falling apart. Back then it was the frontman Rhyse and our drummer Ashton remaining who while auditioning bass guitarists were trying to come up with band names. A former member pitched the idea of having a band abbreviation for a name under consideration at the time, Kaustic X, which Rhyse shut down saying it was too party thrash themed for what we were writing. Several days later Rhyse pitched the idea of Karnage Through Crossing, keeping the abbreviation KTX, in the band name, Sever months later after a couple bass guitar recruits came and went we auditioned Josh Bricker who ended up passing our tests and sticking around long enough to become a permanent member. Shattered Chains is our first publication with him on Bass Guitar.
You have recently released your album ''Shattered Chains''. What is the feedback from your audience as well as from the press?
Despite our early release for loyal followers on Bandcamp yesterday, the album doesn’t even officially drop until tomorrow, December 12th, worldwide; so we haven’t had any time to really see what people think yet. We anticipate we will have a demographic of different fans for different songs however. This album we made a goal to create a true hybrid metal album. With the root of traditional heavy metal underlining alongside our personal influences, we have several songs that mix either Thrash Metal, Death Metal, and or Power Metal into the styles giving an anthem for every headbanger. We would be very surprised if we didn’t receive some hate from fans, while at the same time we expect there to be strong support from almost every song by a select group of people. If you listen to this album and you love one song and don’t care much for one song then we did our job on this record!
Label or DIY and why?
Absolutely independent! We are men of vision, and wanted full control of the creative process making this debut. We understand that it takes time, sometimes several albums, for a band these days to really get traction and make a career out of creating music on their own terms. This isn’t the 80s anymore and bands aren’t making much as much money comparatively so there’s no point signing a recording contract and giving them most of your earnings when you are already more driven then most people you know to the point where you wouldn’t even trust most managers claiming they want to help you. If you got the energy and passion you might as well do it yourself until someone worth your time presents an offer that’s going to favor you, not them. Until then, well, we’ve all been doing this a long time and love doing it. We don’t earn a living doing this so we won’t jeopardize ourselves, we do this because we love it, and won’t give that up to make someone else rich.
Is there any funny or weird story from the recordings or from your live shows that you would like to share with us?
KTX has always faced adversity to overcome, whether it has been constant lineup changes in the early days or breaking equipment on the road, and one time we fought for our lives to commit to our fans and the venue we gave our word! In June of 2023 we packed up our trusty Ford Cargo Van and headed up to Edmonton, Alberta to play a show at the unforgettable Rendezvous Pub. JUST before the town of Leduc the Van blew a tire, in the fast lane ripping 130km/h on the infamous QE2 road, so furious most of the band thought the drive shaft had fallen out and transmission had EXPLODED!! Pulling over to the shoulder of the wild Alberta highway, we discovered we had a rear tire explode, tearing metal in the wheel well, and scarring the van with lashes of rubber transferred to the surrounding body. In an effort to make it to our gig on time we pulled out all the tools we had and started working on changing out the tire, with the van ROLLING OFF THE JACK and dragging the disc on the ground for a couple feet before resecuring the vehicle. Knuckles were scarred, hands were blackened, stress levels were high, and the pressure was on. In a last fatal attempt, between the van and roaring traffic, with semi trailers clacking viciously in the wind, we managed to get another tire on and completed our journey. Kicking in the back door moments for our set we loaded our gear on like madmen and played Heavy Metal with true adrenaline of the road still pumping through our veins!
Do you prefer Vinyl, Tape, CD or Digital Format and why is that?
It’s an odd question to answer, there is a method we prefer, but there’s also a method which is more convenient these days. I mean as cool as Vinyl is, you can’t always bust out a record on the highway or in most peoples houses these days. CDs are our favorite go to being guys who mostly are born in the 90s, nothing is better then putting on a full album in the van CD player, no song changing every 3 minutes, and finding gems you forgot about or never would have known if you didn’t listen to the whole collection. Realistically though we live in a world where analog music playing devices are becoming obsolete. Most vehicles or portable music players don’t have CD players anymore, most people don’t own record players, and everything has Bluetooth capability. Whether you have a music catalog backup, pay for a streaming app, or deal with the ads on YouTube you refuse to pay premium on, it’s more convenient for if not ourselves then at least friends colleagues or fans to go oh hey let me throw some music on, and it more commonly be a digital format. We personally don’t like the politics, but you have to have both these days, because some people won’t buy a CD, while some of us only bought Heavy Metal CDs when we were young because the album art drew us in!
Your music style is Heavy Metal. Which are your main influences (Favourite Artists / Bands etc.)
New wave of Traditional Heavy Metal, Thrash Metal, Power Metal and Death Metal are the influences you will hear on our album. Rhyse wrote the majority of the first album, and while he listens to a lot of WASP, Skullfist, Iced Earth, Lamb of God, Striker, Embodiment, Disturbed, Ambush, ect. we all have different tastes and no clue how we all ended up in the same band. Josh listens to Cattle Decapitation, Hooker Spit, and Dillenger Escpae Plan among other groups. Ashton Listens to a lot of Slipknot, Satanic Tea co, Illyrian, and Alexisonfire, among other groups. Our road trips are a weird combination of “here check this out guys” and “alright that’s enough lets listen to something else”.
Which things do you think a band should sacrifice in order to succeed? Have you ever sacrificed anything in your life for a better future for your band?
Everything! You can’t be in a traditional marriage or have a traveling academic career while writing your first albums. You can’t be caring for sick family or raising a litter of kids and go on tour. If you truly want to succeed your not going to be able to go the bar with your homies every weekend, or go on dates multiple times a week if you’re writing songs, in recording studios, rehearsing for gigs, and managing your group. Everyone and their damn dog has a band these days, but if you want to actually go somewhere you have to be good with having a day job you can take time off from once in a while, a relationship that supports what you’re doing or not be in one, only see your friends once in a while because you’re always busy for those first several years, be dedicated, disciplined, not afraid of being uncomfortable, tired, and working late nights. We’ve sacrificed more then everyone will ever know.
Describe your ideal live show as a performance band. Have you already experienced that?
The ideal live show?!! God damn we haven’t gotten there yet brother. Once someone else sets up on stage and we can have a dressing room where we can warm up for half an hour while sipping on a glass of whiskey before set then we’ll let you know when we think we’ve experienced it. Until that time what we can tell you is that as much hard work and long nights as they are, we have some of the coolest self built stage props in our region, dawn the biggest banners, and sweat our asses off in the dopest leather gear!
What attributes do you think that a new Heavy Metal Band should have in order to gain identity and be unique?
Courage, vision, discipline, and charisma! You are going to be direct competition to what everyone is fighting for and no promoter wants to take a chance with someone they don’t know. No one will say it, but unless your friends with everyone no one will want you to succeed more then them and you will face constant resistance. You have to be able to take it, and keep pushing forward anyway!
Do you believe that Digital Platforms help the new Heavy Metal Bands? Which, do you think, is the ideal way for a band to promote its work?
Only to publicize bands, otherwise most of them are thieves, and we’re already seeing CEOs getting shot in North America. Dispute the Nuremberg argument or the sick form of Stockholm syndrome consumers are getting sucked into with their addiction to dependency but it won’t last forever. Either musicians will get tired of playing the increasingly fast and competitive game they pit us against each other with, or fans will start seeing worse and worse quality in each generation of mainstream music until they stop supporting major labels all together. If you have talent and a vision you have to do the legwork yourself if you want to operate on your own terms. Bands are going to have to research, manage, and prospect their own markets, publicists, venues and festivals to get themselves out there, and it is going to cost you money; it always has just bands are use to owing a record label money for those costs in the past. The only way someone will do it for you is if you give up some sort of freedom. Nothing is for free.
Do you see any differences between the Canadian Metal Market & the EU Metal Market (Labels, Bands, Fans etc)?
Clearly heavy metal, and especially nwothm, is way bigger in Europe. North America is obsessed with Death Metal and Grindcore these days. People also still make regular efforts to go out and support the huge festivals in Europe, while people don’t go out as much in North America. Sure every city has it’s local scene, but we don’t have these huge festivals like Europe, we don’t see metal in our culture like we do in Europe, and North America is so spread out geographically people can’t go to as many festivals as Europeans who can see several countries in a single day.
Tell us a few things about the New Underground Metal Scene in Canada (Bands, Fanzines, Webzines, Metal Clubs etc.)
In the Western regions of Canada where we’re from we have a lot of regional festivals popping up and growing because fans are tired of not having anything here. Just about every province has some sort of growing festival that is 5-15 years old and more people are coming out each year. These festivals are still nowhere near what Europe has but it’s a good change from back in the 2000s when the only things people in Canada had was the traveling festivals like warp tour or monsters of rock or whatever it was that came through. We’re also seeing way more musicians and bands with passion and talent forming in our communities in our time, inspired by the handful of groups that worked their asses off and got out of the local bars to go tour the states, Europe, Australia and beyond. The scene is growing exponentially but its to be continually stoked because it’s not big enough yet to get Canada on the map.
Do you know anything about the Hellenic Metal Scene?
Not a clue. Never heard of the Hellenic Metal Scene. Rock the fuck on though, wherever you are in the world, you’re doing the headbangers work that we all know!
In the last 4 years, worldwide in the world, we have faced many dark, strange, and new situations in our everyday lives (covid, lockdown, etc.). Did all of this affect you positively or negatively?
There is always a choice. You decide how you deal with tough situations. In some way we were lucky we were writing, playing in our first bands, recording debuts, and not internationally touring. The dark times gave us time. We had time while the world shut down to get ahead, to prepare, to escape from the slavery of the modern world and commit more time to the things we love! Was there things we couldn’t do, sure, but it didn’t stop us from playing music we love!
What are your future plans?
With several festival submissions in Canada we plan to promote our debut album this summer playing as much gigs as we can, and release an EP for our second album, already being written, anticipated to be released no later then 2026.
Thank you very much for your time & keep up the good work! The closure is yours.
Thanks to the FILTHY FUCKIN DOGS OF METAL for all the hard work you do and for reaching out to us heavy metal headbangers! Stay in touch and hear every new rockin track we slam out at:
https://ktxmetal.bandcamp.com/
https://open.spotify.com/artist/30ep5EKRT5KRTTfUJ1BkME
https://www.youtube.com/@KTX_METAL
By Steve the Filthy Dog.