| Darkness – Chaos –
Revenge
Words that ascertain the extreme dark metal that Jeff
Longo, Shane LeBlanc, Trevor Brook-Allred and Stefano
Manera create together like archaic weapons in brutal
warfare. As unique innovators Blood of Christ continue
to step outside the boundaries of extreme music while
retaining theirfundamental element of brutal and dark
excellence.
The world was first introduced to the young London
natives in December 1995 with the release of their much-admired
demonstration cassette, “The Lonely Flowers of
Autumn”. Fans of extreme music could not help
but take notice of the cassette's four numbers, which
featured a dark blend of several genres of music to
create something new and important. Hyper blast beats,
melodic vocals, acoustic guitars, driving double bass,
catchy hooks, grinding black-death metal riffs, intelligently
developed and poetic lyrics, dark grooves – “The
Lonely Flowers of Autumn” has it all! This was
the year that Blood of Christ definitely defined themselves
as something special in an already stagnant scene and
undoubtedly set main songwriters Jeff Longo and Jason
Deaville apart from the pack of traditional death metal
guitarists and lyricists; not necessarily in skill level
but in eclectic creativity and composition powers.
Sadly, 1996 saw the end of the amazing writing duo
of Jeff Longo and Jason Deaville. Differences that just
could not be settled, a ruined friendship and a widening
river between them led to the entrance of barbaric vocal
crackerjack Conan Bulani. This would also be the year
of Blood of Christ's first recording contract and the
recording of their underground legendary effort “…a
Dream to Remember”. Once again entering Mole Studio
in London , Ontario with Rainer Wiechmann during December
1996, Blood of Christ captured nine numbers over the
course of a fortnight for their Pulverizer Records (
Chicago , Illinois ) debut. Released in February 1997
on both Pulverizer Records and Diehard Music ( Denmark
), “…a Dream to Remember” took the
underground extreme music aficionados by storm with
its nine movements of guttural, brutal, majestic and
unique epic dark metal. Once again Blood of Christ created
a collection of music that blended several styles of
extreme music to keep them outside the confines of death
metal banality.
A new recording contract, a licensing deal with a European
Label, a well respected almost legend-like name in the
underground and a debut full length album just released
meant that these kids from London had to take their
show on the road. 1997 saw the beginning of Blood of
Christ making some amazing concert appearances outside
of their own city and receiving great opportunities
ever since; such as opening for the likes of Incantation,
Morbid Angel, Opeth, Kreator, Cradle of Filth and many
others as well as a full Canadian tour in 2002 with
Kataklysm and Necronomicon!
The next departure. Sometime around mid 1997, when
Blood of Christ got themselves kicked off of the Milwaukee
Metal Fest, Marek Kopala's (the bass player) dismissal
came to be. A tough decision for the guys sighting the
fact that Kopala was a founding member alongside the
Longo brothers, nevertheless it had to be. Marek's interest
and input into the band as well as his skill or practice
level was waning. It was time to make a choice and so
Greg Idasz, a school chum of Conan's, came into the
picture.
It was also around this time that Blood of Christ were
planning their 2 nd album for Pulverizer Records and
had over 12 songs written and ready to record. It was
tentatively planned that they would record the album
in the summer of 1998 and have it released in the autumn
of that year. Songs like “Midnight Serenade”,
“Covered in Mud”, “Pagan Circle”,
“Forgotten Divinity” and “Blood Passion”
would sadly not be recorded or surface until much later
as that the now defunct Pulverizer Records' downward
spiral had, unbeknownst to most bands on that label,
begun. Having royally destroyed relations between himself
and Diehard Music, Pulverizer Records owner Randy Williams
began to slowly disappear from the scene all together,
leaving behind a string of debt with bands and fans
all around the globe. Letters poured in from fans asking
why they hadn't received the album they purchased from
Pulverizer Records and where their money was! All the
guys in Blood of Christ could do was to shrug their
shoulders and send the fans a complimentary album with
the promise of something better next time around.
As if the disappointment of a self dissolving record
label wasn't enough, Blood of Christ received another
crushing blow when they were forced to break their working
relationship with Conan Bulani, not once but several
times. Eventually, it was decided it would be for the
best if Greg Idasz handled the vocal and main lyrical
duties so that they would not face any major setbacks
in the blitzkrieg style of musical growth and work habits
that Blood of Christ had been accustomed to since early
1994.
It was with this three piece lineup that Blood of Christ
impressed Skyscraper Music owners Stephane Mellul and
Maurizio Iacono during a performance in support of Kataklysm
at the Kathedral Night club in Toronto , Ontario enough
that they wanted Blood of Christ on their label. Jeff,
Jason and Greg had already been hard at work recording
their second album (with the absence of Conan) at Mole
Studio with Rainer Wiechmann. After a few primary listens
to the album (tentatively entitled “Adrift the
River of Contemplation”), Maurizio felt that the
mix was sub par and that the guys should consider remixing
the album with Jean-François Dagenais (also of
Kataklysm fame). So taking Maurizio's good advice as
significant, Jeff decided to do just that and got things
into action. By this time it was already early 2000;
and another major lineup change was about to happen.
Having several major changes in his life, Greg Idasz
simply packed up and moved on from many things; including
the Blood of Christ. As if almost full circle, the Longo
brothers were left as the sole members of Blood of Christ
in the year 2000. Having a full album recorded and a
recording contract for two albums with Skyscraper Music,
Jeff and Jason had their work cut out for them. Fortunately,
an old friend came to the rescue. Quandaries were solved,
bridges rebuilt and the working partnership between
Blood of Christ and Conan Bulani was once again in full
swing. Almost as if no time passed, Blood of Christ
re-entered Mole Studio stronger than ever and Conan
recorded vocal tracks in one night for the entire album
which was then mixed in no more than 40 hours by sound
engineering wizard Jean-François at Victor Studio,
Montreal during November 2001! Seeing it as an honor
to work with the Kataklysm boys (Maurizio also made
a guest vocal appearance on the album in the song “Beneath
the Beauty of Darkness”,) a band that heavily
influenced Jeff in the early days of Blood of Christ's
writing style; it seems that the move was well made.
The album (“As the Rain Gently Falls”),
almost 5 years in the making was finally released on
Skyscraper Music (with distribution through PHD in Canada/United
Kingdom and Crash in the USA ) in the summer of 2002.
Blood of Christ had overcome downright loathsome situations;
the Longo brothers prevailed alongside barbaric vocal
overlord Bulani and still stood atop the heap of a mundane
death metal scene – proving themselves unique,
important and extreme!
Now the Canadian extreme music veterans have entered
a new era – 2005 is a new year and Blood of Christ
will bring you a new legend of extreme dark metal that
will raise them to the destined stature and recognition
that they deserve. Step outside the boundaries with
us, revenge is at hand.
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