by Chip Lerner, The Crawlspace,
Extreme metal band Mangled Carpenter have finished their first full-length album titled "UNDER THE SHADOW" and we've heard the song SLICES, and it's a banger. We recently sat down with founder, songwriter, guitarist, vocalist Seth Metoyer and asked him some questions about his new song, the band, and his faith.
Mangled Carpenter have finished their first full-length album titled "UNDER THE SHADOW" and we've heard the song SLICES, and it's a banger. We recently sat down with founder, songwriter, guitarist, vocalist Seth Metoyer and asked him some questions about his new song, the band, and his faith.
Christian Crawlspace: How would you classify the overall sound of Mangled Carpenter? Seth Metoyer: Mangled Carpenter is mostly focused on being heavy. We have elements of death metal, deathcore, slam, thrash, and some experimental stuff. We love blast-beats and heavy guitars. I'd probably classify us closer to "deathgrind" than any other genre.
CC: Tell us a little more about how Mangled Carpenter was started.
SM: Back in 1992, my bro Kristeffor Olson and I were in our Senior Year of High School. We were totally into Christian Heavy Metal bands like Deliverance, Vengeance Rising, The Lead, Believer, Holy Soldier, Barren Cross, Bloodgood, Seventh Angel, The Crucified, Haven, Tourniquet, Sacred Warrior and White Cross etc. At that time we didn’t actually have anything but a busted acoustic guitar my dad found in the garbage and fixed up for me to use. Then Kristeffor got ahold of a set of drum sticks and began banging away on a weight bench because it sounded cool and we didn’t have a drum kit. Needless to say, a lot of air guitar and head-banging occurred. We had a buddy named Jeremy Crane who played bass and he dug the idea and also had long hair, so one day we just said, hey, let’s start a band. It doesn’t matter that we can’t really play well yet, but let’s come up with a cool name and see where it goes. So we decided to list out a few name ideas that we had, and we literally snail-mailed a letter to the band Haven asking them what name they thought sounded the coolest. They actually responded and said they liked Mangled Carpenter the best. So we went with it.
Kristeffor, myself, and our buddy Jeremy eventually moved to Redondo Beach California to attend Pastor Bob Beeman’s church “Sanctuary”. We immediately fit right in, and actually moved into a place known as “The Beach House” where we had about 10 guys or so living there. Most were dudes who moved to California to attend Sanctuary. In fact, while we were there, Jeremey ended up buying the very bass that Roger Dale Martin used on the first two Vengeance Rising albums. While living at The Beach House, guitarist Stacy Puckett joined our band for a bit, but we unfortunately never got around to recording any music before everyone moved away from the Redondo area.
Years passed and in 2005, I found myself all the way in Connecticut of all places, living near my bro Kristeffor. We still had this idea for Mangled Carpenter and we decided to finally record a demo. So we did that and recorded three songs back in 2005. The demo has actually been remastered and we are planning to release the songs eventually after our upcoming full-length album is released.
I eventually moved from Connecticut and currently live in Monterey, CA where I produce movies and write movie scores in addition to audio engineering. About a year ago in 2019, I decided to once again work on Mangled Carpenter music, which I wanted to remain primarily focused on biblical themes, and this time with updated studio equipment I wrote the first single “Mary’s Seven Demon’s” which released last year. We just released the single “Slices” over the 4th of July Weekend and I’m currently working hard on writing and record the full album. Once that’s completed, we’ll probably look into signing with a record label since we are currently unsigned.
CC: What are some of your musical influences?
SM: I consume a lot of heavy secular bands such as Cattle Decapitation, Volturyon, Pig Destroyer, Deranged, Dying Fetus, Insision, Aborted, Wormrot, Cephalic Carnage, Kraanium, Brain Drill, and Bear Mace to name a few.
As far as “Christian” bands, I jam to a lot of Fleshkiller, Becoming the Archetype, Revulsed, Abated Mass of Flesh, Crushing The Deceiver, Extol, Demon Hunter, Soul Embraced, Crimson Moonlight, Living Sacrifice, Fit for a King and of course older bands like Vengeance Rising and early 90’s Mortification are a very big influence on our sound.
CC: What was the premise behind writing the song “Slices”?
SM: I study a lot of philosophy and theology and the idea of the “Stations of The Cross” found in Catholicism, and in Lutheran and Methodist theology has always fascinated me. There are 16 Stations of the Cross, and I thought it would be cool to add the concept into a song. You can read the song lyrics to SLICES here.
CC: A lot of faith-based bands seem to dislike the term "Christian Band" as a definer. What's your take on that, and where do you stand as far as religious faith goes?
SM: Yeah, over the years that term has really been muddied. I even remember back in the early 90’s Robert Sweet from Stryper didn’t like that label. Some bands believe the term “Christian” has thwarted some potential success and other bands that happen to be Christian often steer away from the label.
I personally don’t care what people refer to us as. Mangled Carpenter is a concept; a project, and has always been focused on heavy music with biblical and theological themes. Our personal theological beliefs don’t really show up in our lyrics, however, the lyrics are all biblical. I was raised in a protestant Christian home, and have always believed in God. I’ve gone through phases where I’ve sought out God more times than others. There have also been times of doubt and I’ve been a bit down the agnostic road, where I believed there’s probably a God but there’s no way to “scientifically prove” that entity exists. I think we all go through valleys like that. These days, my relationship with God is very personal, I seek more, and I read my biblical devotionals every day through the Holy Bible app. I love to absorb writings about physics, philosophy, theology, and other religions in addition to Christianity. In fact, I’ve recently discovered from my DNA ancestry that I’m Ashkenazi Jewish. So there’s, even more, to read up about and ponder. I simply love learning and discovering new things about life, God, and the universe. My goal is always to learn more about as many things as I can.
All that to say that my spirituality is very important to me and as a believer, I feel that God has always looked out for me, even when I didn’t deserve it. Which is probably most of the time.
Email: mangledcarpenter@gmail.com Follow Mangled Carpenter on Social Media: Facebook @mangledcarpenter Instagram @mangledcarpenter Twitter @mangledsongs
Follow Seth Metoyer on Social Media:
Facebook @sethmetoyer
Instagram @sethmetoyer
Twitter @sethmetoyer
Email: mangledcarpenter@gmail.com
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