Premiere: Cara Neir — Pain Gel of Purification

Interviews, Metal, Premiere, Uncategorized

By megachiles

November 15, 2021

1584

Rise and grind, gals! It’s a Monday morning album premiere!

Are you tired?

Are your aches and pains putting a damper on another beautiful Monday at the office?

Are you distracted by general malaise, ennui, and a deep, unknowable dread??

In these unprecedented times you need RELENTLESS, MAXIMUM SPEED relief from your physical and existential pain. That’s why you trust Cara Neir™ Pain Gel of Purification for immediate, unyielding comfort.

Now with Ceaseless TrueCold™ Pain Reliever, for that cool, tingling, unending relief you and your family trust!

“Cara Neir™, for CEASELESS MAXIMUM SPEED PURIFYING RELIEF today!” **

*In comparison to leading menthol-based pain relief ointments

**Please consult with your doctor before using over the counter Cara Neir™ Products. Side effects may include difficulty sleeping, eating, breathing, feeling joy, and finishing sentences, difficulty maintaining an erection, erections lasting longer than 48 hrs, gout, Everlasting Cold, slipping into timeless realms beyond known reality, phantom limbs, pica, and Morgellon’s disease.

Today we’re pleased to premiere the latest, freshest, piping hot slab of grind from Cara Neir, Pain Gel of Purification!

Out this Friday, 11/19/2021 digitally on Bandcamp, and on hand-dipped swirl painted cassettes by Tomb Tree Tapes. For the Limited Edition-philic among you, there are some super extreme limited edition (5 total!) pain gel jars up for grabs as well. Word on the street is there are also shirts, and tie-in hot sauce coming in the near future. It’s all about that merchandising, baby!

I wonder what flavor these hand dipped tapes are?

Don’t get it on your perineum.

“But wait!” you might say, “Surely you write in jest, megachiles! We all know Cara Neir has gone full blackened screamo 8-bit trip-hop dubcore with their latest release, the widely lauded Phase Out!”

To which I would reply, “Too bad, nerds. It’s time to bump n’ grind.”

Pain Gel is a 26 minute jaunt into Cara Neir’s less black metal side. Grind, powerviolence, noise, and other -core influences form the rich mélange of Pain Gel’s sound, harkening back to some of Cara Neir’s earliest records. In some respects the music hews closer to guitarist Garry Brent’s death metal solo project Sallow Moth than it does to some other Cara Neir albums! So if that latest spacefaring Lepidopteran death metal epic scratched your chainsaw riff itch, the deathgrind adjacent sound of Pain Gel may prove a therapeutic unguent.

So slap that play button below, get grindin’ and windin’, and then keep scrolling for a quick chat with 1/2 of Cara Neir, Garry Brents!

megachiles: Howdy Garry, thanks for agreeing to an interview! To kick things off, first, how are you doing, and second, can you tell us a little bit about how this latest release fits into the narrative you kicked off with the last Cara Neir album? At first blush from the song titles and artwork it seems like it could be a standalone album, but I suspect that may not necessarily be the case!

Garry: Doing quite well as of late! Staying busy, hunkered down at home, constantly writing music.

Certainly. This album actually sits completely outside of the 8-bit/video game purview Phase Out resides in and could be considered a standalone album! I would say the narrative here has quite a bit of range and not all tied to one story like Phase Out. Chris mainly expresses many bits of tongue-in-cheek short stories, some being grievances or pokes at daily mundanities or even frustrations with life in the food industry (where he works). Overall, the album art and themes are having a bit of a laugh at product placement and how inescapable it is in our lives. Not necessarily new commentary, but our fun spin on it to try something completely different between Phase Out and the sequel releases that will follow it!

Greasy Joe Marinara: A true hero amongst mortal men.

m: Hunkered is a good word for how I feel most days. But my hunkering isn’t nearly so productive as yours! Between Pain Gel of Purification, Phase Out, your Phase Out spin-off band Gonemage, and the three Sallow Moth releases in the past year or so you’ve been prolific! Can you share a little bit about what else you have coming down the pipeline?

G: Totally understandable! I have been quite fortunate to have a streak of extra free time.

Certainly, at the time of this writing, I released a new project/album that I impulsively concocted in about 13 hours called Homeskin. It’s considered a darker and angular counterpart to Gonemage, perhaps a “daytime” version as it’s set in reality instead of dream realms. Essentially, the vibe and daily life of being a homebody making black metal in a lower-middle class suburban neighborhood. No forests here, I’m afraid. More things in the pipeline are a slew of Cara Neir releases next year and 2023 in the form of splits, EPs, and 2 more full lengths. There will also be more Gonemage in 2022!

m: You’re a machine my guy! As a former resident of the Dallas suburbs I feel you on the no forests thing. You mentioned to me that this release (almost) falls on the 10th anniversary of Cara Neir’s second album Stagnant Perceptions. Congrats on the anniversary! When I look back at things I wrote or did from 10 years ago it can elicit a whole range of feelings—nostalgia, embarrassment, sadness, joy, the works— I’m curious how y’all see and experience your past work! What does listening to Stagnant 10 years later make you think about or feel?

G: Thank you very much! I think we can relate to that too in various ways. It is strange listening back to that album as it’s from a totally different time in our lives, creatively and personally. However, it feels fresh revisiting it as I haven’t listened to it in quite some time. It was a special album for us, a budding foundation of where we would venture with our long list fusing influences and interests in many styles.

m: Speaking of influences, what is some of the music (genres or artists) that inspires you? And what have you been jamming to recently as you‘ve been conjuring up all of this new music?

G: I’ve been fortunate to have the time and inspiration striking at once for sure. Some big influences of mine: Ulver (all eras), The Appleseed Cast, Edge of Sanity, City of Caterpillar, Akercocke, Ekkaia, The Depreciation Guild, Slint, Eikenskaden (still criminally underrated BM).

Some stuff that I’ve been jammin recently quite a bit! Fax Gang, latest Orphan Donor, Locktender, Rotten Sound, early Mercyful Fate, Darkthrone’s Soulside Journey, Bloody Keep, Fire-Toolz, Tenue.

m: Oh man Eikenskaden is a new name to me, but they absolutely whip. I can see how you’d feel they were under appreciated! And now that you mention it I feel like there’d be a significant number of listeners down for Cara Neir to go full Mercyful Fate worship at some point. Just sayin’, I bet Chris’ falsetto is on point.

Two last questions for you: what lies Beyond the Gnar? And are there any side effects one should be aware of when applying Cara Neir brand Pain Gel of Purification™️ for ceaseless, Maximum Speed pain relief?

G: The Last Dance is probably my 2nd favorite black metal album behind Bergtatt. I probably wouldn’t be making the music I make without those 2 albums. Chris has been working on his falsetto! Maybe one day we’ll apply it in some future material.

Blastbeats and greasy pizza lie Beyond the Gnar. Side effects may include destruction of an attention span, appreciation for satire, and having a desire for some extremely hot sauce, perhaps to go on some greasy pizza.

m: Thanks again for taking time to chat Garry and for reminding us Matthew Lillard seems like a pretty chill, authentic dude!

G: Thank you for the opportunity. Side note, I almost had a chance to meet Matt at a horror convention but I met Skeet Ulrich instead since his line was infinitely shorter and I also brought a Jericho graphic novel to get signed by him. Cheers!