Oh we are SO back. For our second Profile of the week, we are turning the calendar all the way back to February because there was a certain death metal album that emerged that I have just now been getting around to and I feel compelled to loop you all in. London-based Vacuous dropped In His Blood through Relapse Records and it is a form of death metal that is filled with atmosphere, raw emotion, and is plenty dark. Basically, there’s a lot to love. It may have taken me over six months to get to it, but I sure am making up that time rapidly. So join me won’t you!? Responses to our questions can be found below along with the Bandcamp link. Have at it!

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How and when did you first get into playing music, or metal more specifically, and how did your band get its start? Any pushback from family/those close to you?

M: I got into music via skateboarding in the early 2000s, just listening to what other kids at the skatepark had in their CD or MP3 players, or looking up songs that I liked in skating videos. It was mish/mash of punk/nu metal or whatever was popular at the time along with some classic hard rock like AC/DC. It was all just “rock” to me at that age. I progressively got into heavier stuff like Metallica, Pantera, Judas Priest but the real turning point was getting into Slayer. I’d never heard anything like it, it was a real break from all the “rock based” music I was listening to and I remember being really transfixed how blatantly evil it all was. Still one of my favourite bands!

Somewhere along the line, I decided I wanted to play guitar and was fortunate enough to have very cool parents. They bought me my first guitar, paid for me to take a few lessons and were generally very supportive towards my musical endeavours. My mother took me to see my first metal show, which was Motörhead and my dad let me and my friends make an ungodly racket in his attic throughout my various attempts to form a band in high school. I don’t think either of them has much of appreciation for extreme metal but they respect the work that we’ve put into the band.

I think it’s more or less the same with everyone else in the band’s parents. Most of them have to see Vacuous live at some point in the past.

How would you describe your band and what you play to someone who is completely in the dark?

M: I don’t tend to speak to strangers lurking in the dark, but if I had to describe our band to them, I’d simply call it Death Metal. Going beyond that would be tedious and just by that label alone, they’ll know if it’s for them or not (spoiler: Most people aren’t gonna bother listening to your music as soon as they hear those two words).

Sure, there are obviously lots of nuances to what we do, and we bring in influences from many different genres, from punk to goth rock, post punk, doom metal etc., but in the end, it’s all filtered through the lens of performing Death Metal, or at least what we consider to be Death Metal. I don’t see the point in calling it anything else as to me at least, it’s a genre that gives us a very wide creative palette and allows us to express most of our ideas.

So yeah, no post atmospheric whatever etc….micro genre for us.

Is there anything about your latest album or about your band that no one will find in any interview or review that you care to divulge?

There are some keyboards on the album. I didn’t ever expect us to do that, but we did!

I suppose a random bit about the creation of the song “Hunger” is that the idea for it stemmed from a conversation that myself and Jo had several years ago where we observing how the main riff from the song “One Hundred Years” by The Cure could easily work in a Deathspell Omega song. For some reason that stuck with me, and the original idea was just to try to blend those two elements into a more death metal mold. The song ended up morphing into its own thing in the end, but that was the initial idea! It felt like a bit of a creative risk, but I’m glad we stuck with that one.

Any funny stories from playing shows / tours / festivals, etc?

We are a very “un-rock’n’roll” band by all means so our stories are all pretty tame sadly. I suppose a fun fact is that our drummer Max is the only member of the band who has actually played every single Vacuous show, as we’ve all had to miss at least one show for one reason or another. Don’t worry though, we don’t do that very often!

With that said, Max is by far the most prone to injury. For instance, on the first night of a short tour, we were playing a 70s occult themed dive bar in East London, where the ceiling is decorated with bits of broken mirrors. Max decided it would be a good idea to crowdsurf during Mortuary Spawn’s set and ended up cutting his hands pretty badly. He still played the set (and subsequent dates), but I remember cleaning his blood off my pedalboard the next morning! We also had to cancel a couple shows (and a recording session) due to other mosh related injuries. He’s now serving a lifetime pit ban.

What do you see as some of the great things happening in and around the metal scene (yours or just in general) and what are some of the worst things happening right now?

We are negative people so I’ll start with the bad. I would say the general state of the post-covid world, and by extension the music industry are pretty depressing. In the UK, we’ve got grassroots venue closing left, right and centre, leaving very few places for new acts to cut their teeth. It’s also becoming too expensive for a lot of bands to go out and do proper tours. We’ve also got Brexit here messing things up even more with extra paperwork, taxes etc… Not to mention that our artistic craft seemed even more disposable than as we fight for crumbs of what’s left of people’s attention span in an ocean of pointless (some might even say “vacuous”!) “content”.

But it’s not all bad. I feel like the era of “big trends”, particularly in metal is over, which to me feels like there is somewhat less pressure for bands to look and sound a certain way if they want to “make it”. In fact the idea of “making it” in metal (particularly extreme metal) seems so outdated and absurd, I’m not even sure why you’d try. But anyway, I think that does lead to bands being more creative and individual, taking creative risks and worrying a little less about fitting in. I think there’s also a greater degree of open-mindedness in the metal scene, both in terms to openly appreciating other types of music, but also being more accepting to a wider and more diverse range of people.

Most folks have passions for a cause or causes that are close to them. What, if any, are some of the most important issues (social/political/humorous/etc.) for you / your band and how do you insert those issues into your music?

We’re not a “political” band by any means, but I think we are all fairly socially minded and we have used the band’s platform to contribute to various causes in the past. We’ve done merch runs to raise funds for Stonewall (LGBT Charity), Doctors Without Borders, Medical Aid for Palestine and others. A couple of us also work in the charity sector as well.

Do you have day jobs or hobbies you want to share?

We all have to work day jobs as playing death metal sadly doesn’t come anywhere close to paying our bills.

Let’s see… Our bass player Zak works in a health food store. Our drummer Max works for a food sharing/recycling charity. He drives a forklift and would love to talk to you about forklifts. Our vocalist Jo is a barista at a nice coffee spot in South London. Ezra works in the facilities team at the university where he currently studies. As for myself, I work for an international NGO that develops and supports kidney transplant programmes in lower and middle income countries.

In terms of hobbies, Zak makes Chain Maille based jewellery in his spare time. You can find his work online at Silent Illumination Jewellery. Ezra is fascinated by all insect life forms, which he is currently studying. He loves his bugs. He’s also an illustrator and runs a fanzine called Charred Vulture. He also brews his own beer.

Nothing too crazy!!

What advice do you have for music critics and outlets out there? How can we all better serve the genre in the eyes of a hard-working musician?

I would say focus less on the drama and more on the music. I understand that controversy gets more attention/views/clicks and therefore ad revenue, but long term I think that’s ultimately been counterproductive and short sighted. I also think album reviews are maybe not as relevant as they once were, given that you can easily check out an album online and make up your own opinion, rather than reading someone’s description of what is sounds like. I’d love to see more editorial pieces on bands or specific music scenes and more in-depth and researched interviews, that actually make you want to delve deeper into an artist. The zine/website Bardo Methodology is a great example of what I mean. Their interviews are all really well researched and put together and actually make you want to spend time engaging with the artist’s work.

Any specific long term goal(s) in mind?

No big lofty goals. We just want to keep the band going for as long as we can, while still making music we all enjoy. We want to keep exploring new sounds and styles on each release and feel like we’re not repeating ourselves.

In terms of places to play, both the Underworld in London and Brutal Assault Fest in the Czech Republic are personal bucket list ones.

When you’re not obsessing over your own material, what are some of your favorite albums to listen to currently?

I have a very old and shitty car with a CD player, and I’ve recently reacquired a box of old CDs from when I was a teen. At the moment, “October Rust” by Type O Negative has been on heavy rotation when I’m driving. Outside of that, I’ve been spending a lot of time with the three Negative Plane records, a very overlooked band, in my opinion!

In terms of recent releases, I really enjoyed the latest album by Crippling Alcoholism, “With Love from a Padded Room”, a really dark, emotional and catchy record. “Heavy” without actually being heavy. In terms of metal stuff, the Black Curse and Defeated Sanity albums are probably what stood out to me the most last year.

What is the near future outlook for you or your band? Any specific events on the horizon that the masses should be aware of?

Our new album “In His Blood” drops on 28 February via Relapse Records. We are playing a special release show at Life After Death Fest in London, which is a really unique event curated by the record shop Crypt of the Wizard. Following that, we’ll be doing a headlining UK tour in April alongside Cavalerie from France. They are a great band that more people should check out. We’ve then got a few European festivals lined up for later in the year, which we’ll be announcing in due course. Other than that, we’ll see what happens! We’ve begun work on our third album, but it’s way to early to give any kind of timeframe for that.

Summarize your band in one word.

Bleak. Vulnerable. Chaotic.

Many thanks to Vacuous for the time!

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In His Blood is out now through Relapse Records. For more information on Vacuous, give them a follow on Facebook or Instagram.