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BACKGROUND

Artist Bio:  Spaghetti western/Americana black metal from Missouri

Genres: Black Metal / Americana / Spaghetti Western

Band Lineup: Hodag (Brett Tharp), Parker Maertz

Website: https://darkwatcher.bandcamp.com/

Most Recent Release: Hymns of a Godless Land (EP, April 2021)

Sputnik User: Gameofmetal

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INTERVIEW

I caught up with Sputnikmusic staff member Brett Tharp (Gameofmetal) about blending black metal with spaghetti western, Dark Watcher’s 2 EPs, collaborating with Allelic, and more.

 

Give us the story behind Dark Watcher. How and when did the project start? What obstacles were encountered? At what point did you know it was definitely something you wanted to pursue?

Dark Watcher came about sometime around the beginning of 2019. I was living in Arkansas and going to college. Music had been on the wayside for a while, it had been difficult to continue practicing regularly within a schedule that busy and my creative focus had been turning towards writing in recent years, still doing some reviews and testing the waters on a few short stories. As silly as it sounds, the renewed interest in music coincided with the release of the game Red Dead Redemption 2, which had a really fantastic and often unorthodox score. I think one day I just thought “hey, I wonder what western black metal would sound like”. A little research showed that while there had been a few bands taking stabs at it here or there, it was very much not something broadly explored. That’s changed somewhat in the last couple of years though with a modest wave of American bands diving in head first.

The obstacles at first were shaking off the dust. I hadn’t consistently played guitar for three or four years. I also felt, because my original vision was of “true” spaghetti western black metal, rather than the broader vision I have now, that I needed to do some learning. I spent a lot of time digging into music theory again and dissecting Ennio Morricone’s iconic scores. It’s an ongoing process of course and I still hope one day to make a true incarnation of the spaghetti western black metal epic.

I knew to stick with it once it succeeded. The self-titled EP did pretty well relative to what I had experienced before (basically no success at all) and I felt like I was on a good path from all the positive feedback I got.

Dark Watcher has a bit of a unique wrinkle that might catch some listeners off-guard. What gave you the idea to mix Black Metal with Americana/Spaghetti Western (aka cowboy vibes)?

Besides the aforementioned Red Dead Redemption 2, I’ve just always been a big fan of westerns, especially in terms of their scores, and I’ve always been a believer in the malleability of black metal. Black metal so easily attaches itself to disparate sounds, why not country? Why not the stuff of Ennio Morricone? And as far as metal goes I tend to prefer black metal the most.

If you’re willing to blend such polar opposite genres, it’s safe to say that you’re a pretty fearless musician. Do you consider yourself to be a genre-bender/experimentalist? Do you feel like the unorthodox approach has given you any traction in terms of getting your name out there to listeners so far?

In some ways, sure. I take a little pride in having a fairly unique voice in the musical landscape, but in other ways I think I could be far more inventive. Having an oddball way to bill myself has definitely drawn some eyes all on its own, but other challenges arise as a result. The aesthetic becomes more important, you can’t look to what a million other black metal bands have done with their art, their logo, their look, you have to make something representative of you with fewer references.

Your eponymous debut EP features another one of our Sputnik musicians, lalchimiste (of Allelic) on vocals. What was it like collaborating with him? Do you feel like any influences were transmitted in either direction?

Integral would be the word. I had tried to work with several other musicians met online throughout the year leading up to its release and they just kept falling through, as no one who has tried to do online collabs before should be surprised by. He slammed out some great vocals really quickly and even added in some acoustic guitars on a couple tracks that proved very interesting. I don’t know if I gave him anything from the experience, but he reminds me that acoustic guitars can be an incredible texture even on extreme metal.

Dark Watcher’s most recent offering is another EP, Hymns Of A Godless Land, and it came to us in April of 2021. Aside from the change in vocalist, how would you compare it to your debut? What improvements/enhancements were made? Were any previous approaches to songwriting altered, or was it more of a doubling down/homing in?

The biggest thing I was looking at for Hymns was blending the two sides of the sound together more cohesively and intimately. In some ways I think I succeeded. Minute by minute there’s nothing there that I feel is out of place like a few parts of the self-titled were. I think I kept a pretty good hold on being cinematic in my writing while just writing straight up better riffs. Some stuff I miss though would be the acoustic guitars and the samples from the self-titled, I had to change my recording setup quite a bit between EPs so I wrote the vast majority of Hymns just on an electric guitar. And the spaghetti western samples I used on the first one were nowhere to be found on the second so I’d like to bring back some of that for future releases.

You credit yourself as Hodag on your site’s official Bandcamp. How did you come up with this alias? Do you consider it a persona — sort of the musical Superman to your IRL Clark Kent?

Unlike a lot of other bedroom black metal bands I don’t really care that much about my anonymity, you can find me pretty easily if you try, I just think stage names are a fun tradition in black metal. I did some reading on American folklore and took the name from a dog-like creature in folk tales from the northwest US. It felt apt enough.

Rumor has it that there is an LP on the horizon (yes, I did read the comments section of Dedes’ Hymns Of A Godless Land review!). How is that coming along? Do you feel like the Americana/Spaghetti Western influences will be more or less pronounced this time around? Without spoiling anything, give us a few hints about what we might be in for.

I have indeed been demoing new songs, there’s just been a lot of side activities getting in the way. Some of them being music, there’s a split with Dark Watcher’s name on it that should come about this year if all continues to go well. The main goal is just to write a whole album, I’ve only even done EPs and demos before. Stylistically I aim to be more cinematic, more sonically eclectic, and really blow everyone away.

Have you toured at all? If not, is that something that you see in Dark Watcher’s future?

Nope. Touring sounds fun, but I don’t think I’d ever do it without some real financial stability beneath it. So probably quite a bit further down the line if at all.

You might not remember this, but this is not our first interview. I caught up with you in 2016 as part of an at-the-time brand new “User Spotlight” series, and you were apparently the guinea pig. Let’s catch up really quick: do you still despise The Bunny The Bear? Do you still play League of Legends? Are Abominable Putridity/Motorhead/GY!BE all still in your musical library? Oh, and far more relevantly, did anything ever come of those Soundcloud demos? I still remember “Unmixed/unmastered demo version – Usurpation (The Beginning)” being quite the banger.

I do remember that. The Bunny The Bear still suck. I do play League of Legends, but not nearly as much as I used to. I got pretty good for a while even, but then it got in the way of both school and more meaningful ventures. All three of those bands are still in my library too.

My first time releasing anything by myself was a deathcore EP written from basically the same sessions as Usurpation. That was another sputnik collab, this time with user Xfingthesullen. Didn’t come out until a couple years later and more to dump out some stuff I’d spent time on than something I was passionate about.

https://anoldfiend.bandcamp.com/album/terminal

The fact that we’re conducting this interview means that you are obviously a member of this quaint little website, which you officially joined in 2013. What was going on around these parts back then? Who was popular and who wasn’t? At what point did you decide that it was best to step down to emeritus status, and do you ever see yourself returning to the active staff? Thanks again for your time, and feel free to leave us with some truly metal words of parting wisdom.

Sputnik in those years is such a blur to me now, so much and so little seemed to be happening all the time. Me stepping down to emeritus coincidentally coincided a little bit with me getting back into music with Dark Watcher, but it wasn’t really because of that. I spent a little time with a few blogs and webzines before settling at Astral Noize, a UK-based online publication with a politically left-wing bent. I doubt I’ll make a return to staff, music critique has fallen somewhat down my list of priorities in the last couple years and I really just like doing a review or two every couple months, give or take. Thanks for the interview and my only advice would be for people to listen to Motorhead more. Make it a daily ritual, you’ll be happier.