NAPALM DEATH Bassist Talks New LOCK UP Material

Grindcore supergroup LOCK UP — featuring AT THE GATES frontman Tomas Lindberg, Anton Reisenegger of PENTAGRAM and CRIMINAL on guitar, NAPALM DEATH bassist Shane Embury and ex-DIMMU BORGIR and TESTAMENT drummer Nick Barker — is preparing to enter the studio to record new material to be included on a split seven-inch single with U.S. grind merchants BRUTAL TRUTH. The band is also busy writing material for an as-yet-untitled new full-length album, due for release later this year.

Terrorizer.com recently spoke to Shane about LOCK UP's first material since 2002's "Hate Breeds Suffering".

Terrorizer.com: How are these songs all written when you're spread across the globe? Is it difficult keeping everyone's input equal?

Shane: "The first new track Anton had actually written a while back when we had first thought about getting the band together and so had been roughly worked out by him and Nick. When we started rehearsing for the Damnation Festival 2009 we went through the track again and tweaked it a little here and there to finish it. For the other two songs we will record they will be worked out as a three-piece and recorded that way and then the songs will be sent over to Tomas in Gothenberg to lay vocals on. Lyrically, me and Tomas usually split that down the middle but spontaneity is always important. It is difficult getting equal input but thats always been the case really, for the split the emphasis is on energy and vibe."

Terrorizer.com: What details do you have so far? Anything you can tell us about the titles and artwork?

Shane: "Well, two songtitles out of the three so far are 'Life Of Devastation' and 'Thus The Beast Decapitated'. Lyrically about experiences I have had with really close friends that have left their mark in both positive and negative ways. As for artwork, I will leave that up to Kevin [Sharp] from BRUTAL TRUTH to see what his take is on it all as he will have a general vision for the whole split, I would imagine."

Terrorizer.com: What spurred you on to actually get some songs down?

Shane: "I have had songs from older demos that we never got to record from back in the day and some newer ideas as well, and also with Anton coming into the band he was keen to bring some ideas to the table also. His style is a little different but its a good mixture and will move the music forward, but will still retain the roots of what the bands have always and will always be about — there has always been distant humming in the background all these years even when the band wasn't doing anything."

Read more from Terrorizer.com.

LOCK UP headlined the Terrorizer Stage at the U.K.'s Damnation Festival on October 24, 2009 at Leeds University Union.

Fan-filmed video footage of the band's performance can be viewed below (clip uploaded by Dave Ingham a.k.a. YouTube user "triptykon").

Reisenegger replaced the late Pintado, who sadly passed away in August 2006.