French tech-death band Exocrine just dropped a new album. France has been churning out some solid bands lately, and Exocrine can be counted among this trend of exceptional musicianship. Is it something in the water? The air? Or the accumulated hundreds of years of artistic history and knowledge that’s breeding bands that perform at the top-level like Exocrine? The genre preface or label “technical”, or “tech”, is an indicator that skills of an Olympian degree are required before a band can be considered for this title attribution. Guitarist Sylvain Octor-Perez showcases these skills wonderfully, with this playthrough of their song “Scorched Human Society”, which demonstrates that he meets the bar set by the collective tech-death genre with ease.
While Sylvain’s marvelous technical prowess itself would be enough to solidify Exocrine as a top contender in the tech-death genre, the song composition is on par with his technique, which therefore makes the album a solid piece of work not just within the tech-death genre, but within the musical field overall. The atmosphere created is classically spaced out, a sci-fi film score. Their most recent album Molten Giant is a nod to Kaiju movies and media (if you don’t know, Kaiju is a genre of media whose subject content is giant monsters). Often, the monsters are attacking the earth, and giant robots are needed to fight them. Think Pacific Rim, or Godzilla, or Neon Genesis Evangelion. The latter is probably more Mecha than Kaiju, but I digress.Â
Point is, I’m able to picture the enormous reptilian creature rising up from the ocean, the steam lifting off its concrete scaled back as sea water is evaporated by the creatures’ glowing molten core. The air raid sirens sound, children stare up as the sun is blacked out by the silhouette of teeth and spikes. You’re sitting in class when your phone starts vibrating. You look at the screen and it’s a contact you wished you’d never see. Your stomach goes cold and you leave class quickly, deaf to the professor asking you where you’re going. You know they’ll know soon enough. As your driver takes you up the tarmac of the airstrip, you catch your breath at how oddly quiet and insignificant all the running workers look under the shadow of your Mech…
Yeah, this album got my imagination going. I’m actually listening to it as I write this, which made it hard to stop the creative writing thing, the music kinda spurred every picture in my head perfectly. So check out “Scored Human Society” above, and check out the album Molten Giant out now on Bandcamp, Spotify, Google Play, and iTunes. We’re stoked to premiere this talent and skill here, on GearGods!
In addition to the playthrough, check out Octor-Perez’s gear used in the video below:
Guitar : Strandberg Boden OS 7
- Maple top/Chambered Swamp ash body
- Endurneck profile 26.25″-25.5″ scale
- Ebony fretboard
- Pickups: Bareknuckle Aftermath
Amp/Cab: Kemper Profiler
- 5150 + fortin33 / HESU cab profile (by PJ666)
“On our latest release Molten Giant, I played a Boden OS 7 model with Bareknuckle Aftermath pickups, a swamp ash chambered body with an awesome flammed top and ebony fretboard! It’s a jewel! The Aftermath pickups give me the best precision in the lower frequencies, and the Endurneck changed my vision of the instrument because it forces me to have the perfect “grip”. The multiscaling allows the perfect precision on low strings while keeping the treble very playable, something that is almost impossible on a baritone or a non-multiscale model.
I then plug this weapon in a Kemper Profiler. I think the Kemper really changed the world of sound for guitars, as the quality and authenticity of the profiles I use allowed me to have the feeling of playing on “real” amps while being able to record anywhere and at any time. The choice of the head amp was a bit hard and complicated, but with my friend HK at Vamcara Studio, we did a lot of testing while doing the reamping for the album. The 5150 was doing well, and a Bogner “Ubershall” and a Randall “Satan” were almost chosen, but the warmth and the tone of the ENGL”E650 Ritchie Blackmore” gave this album a really special color, so for the studio, I now use this profile with TS9 Tube Screamer. For live shows, I use a different head profile, a 5150 with a Fortin plugged into a Hesu cab.
The setup on these guitars is really cool for me, and with the comfort provided by playing the Boden, it allows me to have a good sound which is the most important thing. I also think the setup is very balanced and optimised for technical death metal, as tech death is a particular music between prog and brutal death, so you have to find the right balance between a heavy but precise sound. Keep in mind that, if you’re comfortable at playing guitar, you play better and sound better.”
