Interview with John Chavez from Vehemence interview. I would like to thank Heather Parsons from Metal Blade for making this interview possible

Why did you decide to put the title "God Was Created" to your new album ?
We titled the album that because God Was Created by human minds and is only
a ghost to scare you. You do not have to believe in the Sunday fucking fairy
tail to build your own kingdom of happiness. The rule and regulations of
Christ have made humans kill for their Gods through times of war. We are not
only against Christianity we dislike all religions that use their religion
as a crutch to fall on when they do something that is morally wrong. You are
your own savior and it takes a lot of understanding from a atheist point of
view to understand this concept album. This album is our bible and we stand
by its lyrical contents.

How would you compare the new album with "The Thoughts From Which I Hide"?
God Was Created cannot be compared to the recording of The Thoughts From Which I Hide because the overall budget difference we had. It takes a lot of
time and money to create a layered masterpiece. Our first album sounds more studio basic and almost compared to a demo quality recording. To us, we consider The Thoughts album a demo and GWC our first professionally released label album. We still push The Thoughts album because we still play the
songs live at times and some of the songs on the disc are fairly popular like 'Whore Cunt Die and I Take Your Life." We have advanced in musicianship
and the ways we present our CD packaging. You can expect more innovative releases as we push further through Metal Blade Records. Aside from how The
Thoughts album sounds like, the lyrics of the album are more in the gore exploration lyrical style. Also, GWC is a concept album and has no connections with the first album.

Why did you choose the Saltmine Studios to record "God was Created"?
We choose to record at the Salt Mine studios because we have heard good words about the work they have accomplished in the studio. The studio has top of the line equipment including a good variety of amps and rooms to
record in. Bands such as Megadeth and Soulfly have recorded there. We recorded the basic analog tracking with Will Solaris and Mike Schomig in a course of a month. Then we took the project to Juan Urteaga and his assistant Mike Blanchard at Trident Studios in San Francisco. We enjoyed both studios for what they were worth and the good times we shared with the
personnel that worked there. It was Approximately 4 months for this concept album to be completed. All of Vehemence produced the CD but word of advise to fresh signed bands, it is better to start off with your own hired professional metal producer. This saves time and money in the studio and be sure to create demos before any high budgeted album.

How were the songs in "God was Created" composed?
Bjorn and I are the main songwriters on the guitars. We use the computer and
recording programs to create demos before we engage in a studio project. We
try and account every rhythm part, rhythm lead part, harmonized solos, ect
ect. This makes the bands time to learn the songs very efficient. After the
a basic recoding of a song (usually with a drum machine) the rest of the
members begin to see what they could add to the song, Nathan always writes
his lyrics and patterns after the song is completed. The concept part of the
album was created after Track 1 off of GWC which was "Made For Her Jesus" in
November 1999. The song contained a lot of characters so Nathan realized
that he could spawn off 9 other stories involving a twisted storyline to it.
On "She Never Noticed Me" track 3 off the album, keyboardist Jason Keesecker
created the composition and we built guitars around it.

Do you have plans of releasing the Demos that you sent to Metal Blade on
a MCD or something like that?
We give them out as promotional material for God Was Created along with a
personalized letter to anyone that emails vehemence@brutaldeath.net
It is a demo recorded in October 2001 in
a professional studio in Phoenix to test out our sound. We hope to make an
EP of some older songs before The Thoughts album and some cover songs such
as Gorefest "Reality is When You Die" Metallica "Master of Puppets" and
Depeche Mode "Blasphemous Rumors."

Which is the most important side of your music: brutality, speed, melody,
changes?
We like to contain all of those music character traits. Our music contains
influences form death metal and black metal and even some emo. It doesn't
matter what we listen to, all we know is why write as heavy as possible.

I know that you played with a lot of bands...which were your favorite
shows?
Our favorite shows were the ones on our past tour in July 25-August 19 with
Incantation, Impaled, Decapitated, and Dead To Fall. We hope to tour with
some more bands before the end of the year. Look out for us possibly in
November and February. I did a Mayhem, Hate Eternal, Exhumed show with my
appendix wound while healing opened. I still played effectively and it was a
good dosage of metal medicine to play out shortly after my hospital
experience. Any show in Cardies 2000 in Houston is very fun I will add!

How do you see the brutal metal scene in the USA?
There are a lot of bands that storm from America like all Unique Leader
bands. I think there is a lot of kids that know who Dying Fetus is now,
because in 1996 know one had a clue. I am sure Suffocation reforming might
help a lot though. I have also noticed, brutal metal is not recognized if
they are not touring with a big band.

Which are the band´s main influences?
Our bands influnces comes from bands like (Vocalist Nathan Gearhart-old
Pyogenesis, King Diamond, old Arch Enemy, Cathedral), (Guitarist Bjorn
Dannov- And You will know us by the Trail Of Dead, Testament, Carcass,
Gorefest) Bassist Mark Kozuback and drummer Andy Schroeder come from a punk
metal background of Macabre, Agnostic Front and Primus. Keyboardist Jason
listens to Embraced, Naglefar, Dimmu Borgir, Soilwork, and Arch Enemy. I
listen to the same kind of stuff but with Theory In Practice, Symbyosis,
Mutant, Resurrection, Without Grief, Ill Disposed, and Immortal.

Any final thoughts?
If anyone is interested in our godforsaken band, please feel free to email
the band at vehemence@brutaldeath.net for
a free 3 song pre production demo of God Was Created that comes along with a
personalized newsletter. Please visit our band website at
<http://vehemence.brutaldeath.net/> and our label website at
<http://metalblade.com/> or <http://metalblade.de/> . Our new album is sold
directly through Metal Blade U.S.A. and Metal Blade Germany. Thanks for this
interview Music Extreme!