This mini-interview is from Kerrang Magazine. The date is sometime in the middle of 1986, because references are made to the upcoming album Beyond the Gates. Please note that this interview is from Kerrang - that's why all the hard 'C's are changed to 'K's instead - I really am a good speller...
Possessed have taken kontrol of me once again and their long-overdue second album Beyond the Gates is due any full moon now. Jeez, the little suburb of San Pablo in Norvern Kalifornia will never be the same again! Should your doorbell ring on Halloween, don't answer it, just bung on 'Beyond the Gates' instead and that should send the 'Trick Or Treaters' skreaming with terror from your house; coz believe you me Black Metallists Possessed have Kome up with a wickedly EVIL offering this time around.
Their first outing, the shockingly titled Seven Churches was described by Metal Forces as 'the definitive Frash album of '85!'. No, don't laugh, coz it's true, it was a good rekord and the only thing that let it down was the shoddy produktion which kould explain why the band hired the services of one Carl Canedy to twiddle da knobs on 'BTG'. The Possessed sound has now become even heavier, uglier, and of kourse nastier than before.
Possessed are Mike Torrao (guitar), Mike Sus (drums) Jeff Becerra (bass/vocals) and Larry Lalonde (guitar and main mouthpiece). I recently kaught up with the morbid quartet in San Francisco to find out what makes these servants of Beelzebub tick! I began by stating the obvious - the similarities between vocalists Jeff Becerra and Cronos of Venom.
"Yeah, people have said I sound a lot like Cronos, but you shoulda heard my voice back in the early days, it was a lot gruffer," snarls Jeff inbetween large gulps of EKU 28 (one of the strongest beers known to man). But people don't seem to talk about Venom much these days, do they?"
Listening to Beyond the Gates, I kouldn't help but notice the amount of references to Satan.
JB: "It's true that we've got a morbid fascination about Satan, but the new album deals more with horror and when the world's gonna end!"
Ah, is that what the song "No Will to Live" is about?
JB: "Yeah, 'No Will to Live' is basically a war trip. After a nuclear war, this poor guy is just sitting there slowly dying and kan't handle life any more, so he just kills himself!"
And the title kut "Beyond the Gates", what's that about?
Larry Lalonde: "It's about praying to Satan!"
And in "Beast of the Apocalypse" we find you 'bowing to the wicked one'?
LL: "Yeah, we're saying by all means pray to the wicked one, but it's your choice. If you want to rot in hell, you rot in hell! And if you don't take it too seriously that's OK, but I don't want people killing themselves to our music!"
Do you sing those sorta lyriks bekause they fit the musik you play?
LL: "Well you kan't sing about the flowers and the trees, I went down to the fields today and I saw some beautiful roses! Stryper might get away woth it, but we wouldn't, it just wouldn't fit the type of musik we play. The flowers would have to die in the first chorus or be used as a sacrificial offering if we were to write about 'em! You gotta put out what the people wanna hear at the right time and right now the world is so SICK in the head that this is obviously what everyone wants to hear!"
And on that note I had to leave Possessed for an appointment with Exodus, but I must say I found them to be a very amusing bunch who kontinually had myself and the lad Kronin in hysteriks - there's nothing like a morbid konversation to whet the whistle, but I'll be keeping off that EKU 28 beer - lethal stuff...
There's an outside chance of Possessed touring Europe later in the year, till then though try lending an ear to 'Beyond the Gates' - you won't be disappointed. Get down, get morbid, and get praying! You're gonna luv 'em!
- Xavier Russell