It’s that time of year where we set out to interview as many of the Sophie, New Blood, and Jager bands as we can in the lead-up to one of the most anticipated festivals of the year, Bloodstock. Answering our questions here are Ascaris who play the New Blood Stage on Saturday.
Simple things first – where are you guys from?
We are based in and around Gloucestershire, south west UK.
How long have you been playing together as a band?
Ascaris as an entity has existed for 9 years now, though we’ve been playing together variously in different bands for time beyond memory.
Where does the name of the band come from?
Ascaris is a breed of parasitic tapeworm. The reason we chose the name though, is for its sound. Despite being such a small thing it has a grand quality, like the name of some ancient and warlike god. The contrast is something we greatly enjoy. There are deeper layers of meaning too, for those who look closely, but a good magician never tells all.
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Describe your music. What makes you unique?
Our motto is “Brutality, refined”. The music of Ascaris is fast, heavy, with a liberal application of blast beats and an ear for a good riff. We take various aspects from across extreme metal, the intensity of tech death, the weight and motion of death metal, the esoteric urgency of black metal, the dedication to using music as a battering ram of grindcore. We fuse these elements in our own particular way, careful to keep them properly balanced, and with them create our monoliths of extremity, and then we polish and hone them to a razor sharpness.
What’s your live show like? Why are people going to watch you instead of another band?
In a word, furious. The Ascaris experience is visceral, intensive, and all consuming. It is a rain of most exquisite devastation, the like of which I’m certain won’t be on display by any other act the entire festival.
Have you been to Bloodstock before? What did you think?
A.D. and I are Bloodstock veterans, with his first experience being in 2006 and this being my 10th year in attendance. Chris, on the other hand, will be attending his first festival ever with this appearance! Bloodstock is a festival truly like no other. It continues to grow and improve itself year on year, but has never lost the sense of welcome and community of a much smaller endeavour. Walking through those gates feels like coming home.
Which M2tM region did you win, or did you come through other channels?
A little of both, actually. We won the Bristol region of M2tM, but as Covid restrictions caused the show to be cancelled we were selected by a judging to play. To be chosen from such strong competition was truly an honour.
Can you put into 10 words or fewer how it felt when you realised you were heading to Bloodstock?
Exhilarating. Energising. We were overjoyed. Time to sharpen the blades!
What sort of setlist can we expect?
A direct one! As we suspect Bloodstock may be many people’s first exposure to The House. Live, we intend to give a proper introduction, with perhaps a little treat for those already initiated…
Which other bands do you most hope you’re not squished up next to so you can see them play?
It’s tough to choose, but Conjurer, King Goat, Winterfylleth and Memoriam all stand out. It breaks our collective heart that we’ll probably have to miss at least one of them.
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What are you working on at the moment?
We’re currently putting the finishing touches on the follow-up material to 2018’s The Raised Hand. We’re likely to release the first few salvos as singles, and then from there we’ll see how the mood takes us.
What’s the wildest thing you’ve seen or done at a live show?
Our set, of course! But all jokes aside, there have been a few shows where our mics have failed, forcing us to dive into the crowd and spread the good word in a more… direct manner. Cardiff was once inspired to such fervour that they gave us a continuous thirty-minute circle pit. And there was a show in Oxford involving broken glass and power bombs in the pit that’s probably better left unspoken.
What drink do you throw back to get yourself fired up before going on stage?
We don’t tend to drink before we play, but mainly due to the difficulty of finding a bottle of Macallan No. 6 or Louis XIII in your average metal venue.
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