I remember seeing you guys at the Golden Bull in January of last year – the destruction of the Bible onstage really sticks in my memory and I remember that paired with the stage candles could have burned the place down. How was that show in hindsight, from your perspective?

Vomit Christ: I consider the show we played at the Golden Bull last year to be one of our best so far. As a new band at the time, our performance seemed to take the audience by surprise. We played our songs at full force and we were all pleased with the outcome. Tearing up the book of lies is something we do at many of or larger gigs. It is a way for us to both provoke the crowd as well as to repel weak individuals from our cause. The simple fact that tearing up a Bible makes many people feel uncomfortable reveals how complacently ingrained Christianity is in our civilization. This complacency is something we oppose.

Taserof: We were glad to play with such a fitting line-up for that Oakland show and also the previous night in Santa Cruz with some of my favorite Californian Black Metal bands. That show we felt things come together and we might have played the songs faster than we usually do. The Bible destruction is not something we regularly do because the intention is always there, the sound is Black Metal therefore blasphemy and hate. Too bad the ripped bible paper didn’t light the place on fire, we might of incinerated some confused hipsters, Hah! The interlude/background song while we showed our disobedience to the Bible was performed on a 12 string Lithuanian kanklės and played with a bow and some added reverb.

Storm Hunger: Someone donated Bibles to us and I can only think of a few proper uses for books like that. I’d say it was successful aside from some sloppiness. That was our third show and glad it was able to be with bands playing a similar vein of music.

Tell me about the band’s current lineup.

Storm Hunger: Vomit Christ & I were starting a death/black metal band now called Befoulment Ritual with a couple of other guys. He had the two songs from Chalice written/mostly written prior to us starting with that other project yet they were too black metal to fit in there. We decided to make another project for those songs and here we are. I played bass in one of Taserof’s previous projects and knew he would be a good fit. We initiated him in a cave and drank a lot of vodka on a beach afterward.

Vomit Christ: The band’s current lineup is: Taserof on bass/vocals, Storm Hunger on drums, and Vomit Christ (myself) on guitar/vocals. Each of us contributes something important to the overall dynamics of the band. Many of my riffs are influenced by bands such as Grand Belial’s Key, Katharsis, and Satanic Warmaster, whereas Taserof writes a lot of stuff akin to Drudkh, and Blazebirth Hall. Storm Hunger and I are both big fans of war metal and crust punk. These influences and more are all evident in the music. Along with influences, each member of the band has a unique style of playing that ultimately shapes the end product. If any of us were to quit the band, Blood Omen’s sound would change drastically.

Taserof: The band all came together after going cave diving in the Hell Hole. We went back to Vomit Christ’s house and listened to very good Black Metal including the first time I heard the earliest Blood Omen recordings. I imagined a lot of room for the bass to expand upon and it was quickly brought up that I contribute some type of intro or outro.

Your single Bandcamp track “Chalice of Eternal Flame” is a lengthy 13 minutes of raw black metal and features a drawn out and dramatic intro. Discuss its creation.

Vomit Christ: Chalice of Eternal Flame is a rehearsal demo that we recorded early on in the band’s career—I believe it was July of 2017. It features our two oldest songs “Traversing the Eternal Sphere” and “Rotting Swords Rise to Slaughter.” At the time, Storm Hunger and I had recently asked Taserof to join the band. We had these two black metal songs in the works that we thought would sound good with some kind of an atmospheric interlude between them.

Taserof, who we already knew was a talented ambient composer, came up with a track that we decided to use as an intro instead of an interlude. Both songs on Chalice of Eternal Flame are session recordings that we decided to release digitally on Bandcamp. We plan on re-releasing both of these tracks with studio recording on a future LP. Meanwhile, we have two splits coming out soon: One with Slege and one with Burning Moon from LA.

Taserof: I spent a bunch of time working on a multi-layered into that also included another zither type instrument but after all the time spent, the song didn’t cut it. The intro used for the Chalice Of Eternal Flame was originally created for an ancient Maori themed Black Metal project of mine called UTU that Storm Hunger has recorded bass in. The war horns and beckoning drums fit perfectly with the imagery I saw from Blood Omen. The demo was recorded live, including the intro sample, with an old reliable handheld microphone and only some minor EQing.

UTU definitely sounds like something to follow up on. Tell me about the Santa Cruz metal scene (if any) and how you envision Blood Omen standing out..

Vomit Christ: There is not much of a scene in Santa Cruz, and if there is, we are distantly involved in it at best. The prevailing ideology in this city is “peace, love, and unity”—a world view that we actively try to oppose. From what I’ve observed, the “metal scene” in this area is primarily interested in either doom metal or whatever forms of expression are trendy at any given moment. Our music is deliberately fast/aggressive, and is the antithesis of the dominant subgenres in the area. For these reasons and others, we do not have a huge following in Santa Cruz. Most of our support comes from outside communities that have witnessed our hedonism on stage. This being said, we strongly support Gloam and all of the projects that their members are associated with.

Storm Hunger:I can only speak for the time I have been around but there was a period where some good shows were being put on. Now it feels kind of dead and high-quality bills are rare. It’s something though, I live farther south and we don’t have shit here. To my knowledge, Gloam is the only other band that takes inspiration from similar sources within Santa Cruz

Taserof: In Santa Cruz there have been times when there were constantly great metal shows but in recent years it’s been rare. The venues are limited and it’s always been too hard or some obstacle for me personally to organize a forest show but they will happen eventually. There are more people into tech- death and processed, computer metal than anything else around here. Never was of interest to me. I got into Black Metal on my own and didn’t really know other people were interested around here until years later. I’ve taken inspiration from this area’s forest and coastline and the destruction of purity caused by the founders of this state namely the Spanish Catholics. There never was and probably won’t be a Black Metal scene in Santa Cruz, we don’t strive to create one. Our support comes from the fellow defiant bands that we play shows and release music with and the people who enjoy what we create. We play raw Black Metal and don’t give a fuck about fitting into some scene. Fuck the concrete.

Support Blood Omen by following their Bandcamp page.

Are you in a Bay Area extreme metal band? Would you like to be interviewed? Email kvltcatzine@gmail.com