INTERVIEW: Lee Harrison – Monstrosity

To many, MONSTROSITY are a footnote in the history of death metal, having been the band legendary CANNIBAL CORPSE vocalist George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher got his start with. However, this is a criminal oversight, MONSTROSITY have a solid discography of often overlooked death metal classics. After an eleven year recording break, the band are back with a completely crushing addition to their back-catalogue; The Passage Of Existence (read our review here). We spoke with founding drummer Lee Harrison to chat about the new record, the reason for the 11 year gap in albums, and MONSTROSITY‘s touring plans.

Hey Lee, thanks for taking the time to chat today. With The Passage Of Existence having just dropped, how are things in the MONSTROSITY camp at the moment?

Lee: Things are good. Glad the album has finally been released. The responses seem to be good so were happy about that. I’m just glad it all came together in the end.

It’s been over a decade since the last MONSTROSITY album, Spiritual Apocalypse. What’s been going on with MONSTROSITY in the gap between releases?

Lee: Its hard to believe its been that long but the time flies by. We have been writing the record since 2011 and recording since 2015. So we have been working on the record for a long time.

Do you feel that such a long time between releases has led to The Passage Of Existence being a stronger record?

Lee: Well we took our time to make it right, so I would say yes. We usually take four years between recordings but this one just seemed to drag out. With the artwork and working out the label situation it all added time to the process.

Can you walk us through some of the stories you wanted to tell and concepts you wanted to explore within the lyrics of the new album?

Lee: The lyrics for the new album were handled by Mike Hrubovcak [vocals] and myself. The lyrics came together pretty fast once we got it rolling. Mike worked on some songs for several months and then I took what he had and just went through everything. Added some stuff here and there and just polished everything up. The subjects vary from something like Cosmic Pandemia, which is about a virus floating through space heading towards Earth, The Proselygeist is about a ghostly preacher, and Eyes Upon The Abyss which is more or less foreseeing the end of times.

Reviews are starting to pour in for The Passage Of Existence. How has the critical response been, and how has the fan response been to the record so far?

Lee: Everyone seems to be positive on the new album so it proves our instincts were correct in the fact of taking our time. The end result justifies taking all of the extra time. We could have done it quicker with a bigger budget but the way the studio situation was it made sense for us to do it the way we did. The reviews have been good and the fans seems happy with it so we feel justified.

I believe 2006 was the last time MONSTROSITY toured here in the UK – can we hope to see some UK dates during this album cycle?

Lee: I would imagine so. I was just there in February with TERRORIZER at The Dome, London. So I would imagine we would play there or somewhere similar. I purposely took the band off of the road back in 2011 so we could focus on the record we just didn’t think it would take so long. So the plan was to time a tour with the release of the record. Unfortunately our singer Mike had some other things going on and so we’ve pushed back touring until after the New Year.

Are there any tours in the works in support of the new record?

Lee: We are discussing and working on arranging things. We want to do a tour first. We have been turning down one off shows because we seem to have bad luck with one offs.

What tracks from The Passage Of Existence are you particularly excited to debut live?

Lee: The obvious songs that we released are the main priority I would say. Beyond that its hard to say. We played Radiated on the 70,000 Tons Of Metal cruise so we’ve actually done that one already.

MONSTROSITY has been there since the early days of death metal. How do you feel the death metal scene has changed and evolved since the early ‘90s?

Lee: The business has evolved with the internet and all of that. Its amazing that the bands from back then are still putting out records and still have popularity so its cool to see that there is still interest in the type of bands that came out in Florida.

Are there any bands, either up-and-coming or underground legends, that you feel deserve more attention?

Lee: There’s a lot of upcoming bands that are deserving of more attention but no one in particular that I can name. Its hard enough promoting our own band so we will focus on that haha!

What does the rest of 2018 and 2019 have in store for MONSTROSITY?

Lee: We hope to do some touring and I plan to get back to work on the next album and get a head start on that so it wont take another 11 years to finish the next one.

It’s perhaps a bit early to be thinking of album seven, but now you are signed to Metal Blade can we expect MONSTROSITY to be releasing albums at a steadier pace, or are we going to be faced with another 11 year wait for the next record?

Lee: Well actually Conquest Music licensed to Metal Blade Records worldwide. Metal Blade wanted worldwide this time so Conquest made the deal with them. In the past, Conquest had released Rise To Power and Spiritual Apocalypse through Metal Blade for Europe/UK only. In fact, Metal Blade will reissue Rise To Power and Spiritual Apocalypse next month. As for the next album I do have four songs written for the next release so I did get a little ahead in the time we had “off”.

Thanks so much for taking the time to talk with us today. Before I let you go, do you have any parting messages for our readers?

Lee: Big thanks to the fans for sticking with us and hope everyone picks up the long awaited album now that it is here and we just hope it lives up to the our past records. See you all on the road somewhere! Take care!

The Passage Of Existence is out now via Metal Blade Records. 

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