[this interview was originally printed in Cimmerian Shadows Issue 1; 2011]
Howie Bentley is the warlord behind two heavy metal excursions - US power metal barbarians CAULDRON BORN and the more recent doom/NWOBHM styled outfit BRITON RITES. Both projects testify to Howie’s steadfast loyalties to metal’s glorious past, along with his commendable tastes in weird fiction and fantasy. So there was no doubt that his thoughts should adorn the parchment of Cimmerian Shadows. Armed for battle…
Greetings from beyond the Atlantic waves Howie. The first CAULDRON BORN demo appeared on tape in 1995 - not the ideal moment for fantasy-themed USPM to thrive. Did you feel hampered in any way by the musical climate of the mid-’90s, or do you think CAULDRON BORN always had a niche audience loyal to your sound?
There was a very small niche audience there, but I felt like CAULDRON BORN could have been the next SABBATH or MAIDEN. There just wasn’t the size of audience to support my ambitions. So, yes, the ‘90s hampered my career.
Were there any local bands at the time who you felt a kinship with, or was CAULDRON BORN always a bit of a ‘lone wolf’ in your area?
CAULDRON BORN was definitely a lone wolf. All of the bands down here were following whatever the trend of the day was.
The unusual rifs and leads that crop up on both CAULDRON BORN albums make me wonder whether you were largely self-taught on guitar… was this the case or did you receive any tuition? You make your living nowadays as a guitar teacher - are you able to impart any heavy metal lore to your acolytes, or do you try to keep your own tastes out of the equation?
I started off teaching myself, listening to albums and trying to pick out what they were doing, because I thought that was what you were supposed to do if you were learning to play an instrument. I felt like I was missing something, so I moved to Atlanta and enrolled in the Atlanta Institute of Music. I graduated in 1989. It was a really cool time to be going to AIM because we had guys like Paul Gilbert, Greg Howe, and Jason Becker coming in and giving masterclasses and private lessons.
What can you tell us about Lionel Baker, the artist whose distinctive work features on both CAULDRON BORN albums and the BRITON RITES debut? How did you first encounter his art? By the looks of it each cover was specially commissioned - how much of a brief did you give Lionel about the scenes you wanted him to portray?
Back in the late ‘80s, my mom lived down the street from a record store that specialized in metal music. Lionel Baker managed the store. He was kind of a local celebrity to some people because of his artwork. I got to know him from going there to buy albums.
I probably give him too much direction on what I want on the album cover, but I have an exact vision of everything involved with my music, so it is hard not to.
You disbanded CAULDRON BORN in 2003, but have since stated that a resurrection is planned with a new album to appear on your own Echoes of Crom Records. Have you been stockpiling riffs throughout the intervening period, or do you prefer to have concentrated songwriting sessions? How do you usually go about recording or arranging song ideas?
I stockpile riffs. I have a few that are left over from the ‘80s, that I still plan on using. Anymore, if I have a good riff idea, I immediately record it on a cheap tape recorder, for future reference. Then I label the tape something general like “CB riffs for ____”, and put it in a box, when I fill the cassette up.
I used to use a Tascam Porta One 4-track for demoing songs, but I wore that son of a bitch out. Anymore I just put the guitar ideas together into a rough draft, then I start writing vocals, and if need be, re-write some guitar parts to accommodate the vocals and actual song. Once the song is finished, I go to Corbin King’s studio, and tell him what I want for drums. Either Corbin plays a basic drum track, or we use the drum machine and make a skeleton of the song. All of this takes a while. But what I do is pretty much one man’s vision, so I want the song as close to my original idea as possible, before I give it to the instrument players for them to arrange their parts to.
I have to ask about the layout of the second CAULDRON BORN album ...And Rome Shall Fall, which I have in digipak format. I like Baker’s bizarre cover painting, but on the other hand there are certain factors that could be better: the logo is really pixellated (and why the obvious ‘™’ trademark next to it?), and the computer-generated scenes inside seem at odds with the cover. Who had the final say on this layout, and would you change anything about it in hindsight?
I didn’t have anything to do with the layout. I sent the artwork, pictures and logo to Underground Symphony, and they did the rest. If I end up releasing it on Echoes of Crom, the layout will be different. CAULDRON BORN was sort of an anomaly on Underground Symphony. They had all of these Italian bands with keyboards and a similar sound, then this American band that no one was quite sure what to do with.
The driving force behind CAULDRON BORN lyrics is clearly Robert E. Howard and fellow Weird Tales contributors, but which other sword and sorcery/fantasy authors helped to shape the lyrics or general ethos of the band? Are there any modern day writers who capture the same spirit in your opinion?
Karl Edward Wagner. Michael Moorcock. David C. Smith and Richard L. Tierney, for certain. Dave Smith’s The Sorcerer’s Shadow is one of the greatest sword and sorcery novels ever written, and Richard Tierney’s Simon of Gitta novels and short stories are pure gold. Those two guys are the real thing.
Would you agree that fantasy literature and traditional heavy metal can be two sides of the same coin? At their best they follow a similarly otherworldly path that isn’t enslaved by trends, and I get the same feeling looking at the covers of old paperback fantasy books that I do with obscure heavy metal records. The sad fact is that the visual presentation of both has nosedived since the rise of shoddy computerised art. Can you relate to any of that?
Definitely. I agree one hundred percent. There are always going to be rare exceptions to any hard and fast rule, but I couldn’t disagree more with the old saying “you can’t judge a book by its cover”. You can judge a book by its cover and you can tell what a CAULDRON BORN album is going to sound like by looking at its cover. The listener should be able to pick up an album, look at the cover, and know that he is in for a good forty minutes to an hour or so of killer metal music, just like he can pick up one of those old Ace paperback editions of Conan the Barbarian stories with the Frank Frazetta covers and know he is going to get swept away into the Hyborian Age for a while. These album covers and book covers are like the sign on a portal to another world, telling you that you are getting ready to leave the mundane and the tedious behind.
Yeah, I hate computerized artwork. Your average person just wants whatever technology and trends his friends and neighbors have. Ditching a turntable or cassette player because there is something new is just purely idiotic. I have heard of people even getting rid of CDs just because they can store all of their music on a shitty little MP3 player, so it doesn’t surprise me that bands are leaving hand-painted album covers behind. Hell, they may not even be doing it by choice. It might be hard to find an artist who still uses oils.
Given that I’ve already dragged us down the wraith-haunted road of fiction, could you briefly recount your forays into writing, which I believe you pursued in the hiatus between bands? What sort of material were you creating at that time, and did you attempt to get anything published?
I didn’t write much of any worth aside from one story, really. That story was called Call On The War God. It’s a story about the CAULDRON BORN mascot (on the Born of the Cauldron and ...And Rome Shall Fall album covers) and will be the title of the next CAULDRON BORN full-length album, as well. I decided to save it for the concept album. That will be my avenue for presenting it to the public.
Speaking of which, could you introduce the CAULDRON BORN mascot? Was there an influence from MANOWAR’s warrior character (given a more demonic twist), and will he appear on all the band’s future releases?
CAULDRON BORN’s mascot is named Thorn. Thorn is a godlike entity evoked by diabolical rituals involving the rune that represents him. He is a great warrior, as well as a sorcerer and he is sort of vampire-like. He is the author of The Book Of Dead Runes - the source of most of the later grimoires found on this earth. Thorn is a god hunter. He feeds on the essences of other gods and divine beings. He doesn’t care so much for aspirations of man, but he will strike a deal if there is something in it for him. I suppose Christians would look at Thorn as a demon or a devil.
No, the MANOWAR mascot had nothing to do with Thorn. He just sort of materialized out of nowhere. If anything, MAIDEN’s mascot might have had more to do with me coming up with Thorn. It wasn’t a conscious decision, it just sort of happened. I like to hear a little MANOWAR occasionally (mainly Into Glory Ride, when I do) but they weren’t an influence musically or lyrically on what I do.
I plan on Thorn being on every CAULDRON BORN album cover.
Let’s turn now to your most recent activities with BRITON RITES. First up can you explain the band name; is it meant literally, in that you conduct musical ‘rites’ in the footsteps of pioneering ‘Britons’ (e.g. SABBATH, WITCHFINDER GENERAL) or is there some obscurer origin?
No, but that is very cool that you said that. That is a good interpretation of what I am trying to do with the music of BRITON RITES. But the BRITON RITES name came from me speculating on what dark and unspeakable rites the Keltic druids of ancient Britain might have engaged in to call up dreadful Lovecraftian shapes in those eldritch, nighted forests.
Long before the name of Satan was ever chanted in those Briton forests, what knowledge did our druidic forefathers possess from times even ancient in their day?
One day Phil Swanson (BRITON RITES vocalist) and I were talking on the phone and Phil said “do you know what you are going to call it yet?” I told him that I wasn’t sure, but that I had a couple of names in mind. Phil didn’t like the first name, but when I said “Briton Rites” Phil said in an excited tone, “that is so NWOBHM!” So, I told him “BRITON RITES it is!”
You’ve been quite open that you have no aims to reinvent the wheel with BRITON RITES but instead let your own take on the classic sound speak through your songs. Would you be content for BRITON RITES to be called ‘regressive’ metal? This word potentially has negative connotations, but in this climate of over-produced, overly sub-genred metal it could almost be a mark of honour…
It is fine with me if someone wants to call it that. I really just wanted to make some music that had the feel of earlier SABBATH and WITCHFINDER GENERAL, and to a lesser degree, early TROUBLE. Whatever that stuff is called, that is what BRITON RITES is, in my mind.
The BRITON RITES website labels itself “a doorway into a world of Gothic horror and the occult”. Does your interest in the occult go beyond its sinister atmosphere and symbolism to involve practice or belief of any kind, or do you approach it as just another facet of the grim human imagination? You listed the Tarot for example alongside mythological and literary influences for the CAULDRON BORN song ‘The Sword’s Lament’ - does this mean all these sources are interchangeable in your view, or do you approach occult topics on a separate plane?
I like to think that my own personal magick is in my music. So, the occult is of paramount importance to my artistic pursuits. To me, there is a presence in the works of artists as varied as H. P. Lovecraft, Clark Ashton Smith, Robert E. Howard, Edgar Allen Poe, Baudelaire, Le Fanu, Stoker, Clive Barker, H. R. Giger, Frank Frazetta, Goya, Dario Argento, BLACK SABBATH and so on. Even though they create what are obviously works of the fantastic, all of these individuals are related by a strong presence of the occult in their chosen medium. SO, to my mind, all of the sources are interchangeable.
In an interview for thelefthandpath.com, you said “you either succeed artistically and fail financially, or you succeed financially and fail artistically”. Can you expand on this statement? Are there any exceptions that spring to mind?
The exception would be IRON MAIDEN (or Clive Barker to get a little broader than music here). There are obviously exceptions, but what I meant was if you pursue only artistic satisfaction and let nothing stand in your way, you are most likely going to live in poverty, or have another means of income that seldom allows you time to give your art the attention it needs to be the best work possible. I am not so sure that most musicians who succeed financially are smart enough to know the difference between art and a steaming pile of shit. Again, there are exceptions to what I originally said, and I don’t hold it against someone for being financially successful with their music, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it is likely that I will like their music, either. Generally to have something that will be commercially acceptable to the masses, it will require a great deal of formulaic dumbing down, watering down, preconceived notions about “what the public wants to hear”, and on and on. You know, the usual.
H. P. Lovecraft said “to have the reader in mind is absolutely fatal to true art”. Keep in mind though Lovecraft lived on an inheritance and didn't have to work. You do what you feel you need to do as an individual.
I was excited to learn that a second BRITON RITES album has already been written. Whereas the songwriting between the first and second CAULDRON BORN albums did morph noticeably, I take it we can expect exactly the same brand of pummelling doom from the next BRITON RITES release! Can you reveal anything yet about recording plans and the lyrical themes you intend to cover this time round, and is Phil Swanson still aboard to do vocals?
I have another BRITON RITES album written, but it is on the back burner and CAULDRON BORN is on the front burner, right now. I do hope to record at least one or two BRITON RITES songs this year just to let everyone know that we are still around. I teach lessons six days a week. I have one day to record on, which is Sunday, and right now Corbin has me coming to the studio every other Sunday because he is busy rehearsing with this band every other weekend.
I plan for the next album to be more demonic in nature as far as the lyrical themes. Some of the songs were a bit too long and slow, so I am going to re-write parts of a few of them, to make them more ‘pummelling’ as you say. Last time I checked with Phil, he told me he was in for another album.
Let’s finish with a shameless reversion to weird fiction - could you name your single favourite short stories from the great Weird Tales trinity (or a small selection by each if you find it impossible to choose), which you would select above all others if your were destined for some sickly, bone-strewn desert island where a wine-dark tide laps tepid against the rotten sands…
I couldn’t pick just one each, so I had to go with three for each author…
Robert E. Howard: ‘The Shadow Kingdom’, Kings of the Night’ and ‘The Scarlet Citadel’.
H. P. Lovecraft: ‘The Dunwich Horror’, ‘Dreams in the Witch House’ and ‘The Festival’.
Clark Ashton Smith: ‘Ubbo-Sathla’, ‘Empire of the Necromancers’ and ‘The Return of the Sorcerer’.
That’s all from me. Thanks a lot and please add any closing remarks...
Thank you James, for the opportunity to do this interview. When you told me the name of your ‘zine, I could not refuse. Thanks to all of you for taking the time to read this.
By This Axe…
Howie
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