Those Who Lie Beneath

Jamie Hanks is in the back of a van somewhere in America's mid-section, and he's repeating what must his band's mantra. In summation, it's that Those Who Lie Beneath, the Portland, Ore.-based death metal band he fronts, want to be as brutal and evil as possible. And one listen to the band's debut, 'An Awakening,' and it's obvious they're very serious about the whole evil and brutal thing.

"We're just f---ing brutal and evil, man," says Hanks. 'An Awakening' is in stores now, and will be right up your alley if you're into At the Gates and the Black Dahlia Murder. "I try to rip people's heads off each night, we spit all over the place ... we just f---king don't give a f---. We want people to leave our shows and be like, 'Wow. I wanna see them again. I wanna buy their s---. I love that band. I love that band, because I am terrified of that band.'"

Hanks obviously didn't feel as though he got his point across enough. Later, he tells Noisecreep that the Taco Bell-loving dudes in Those Who Lie Beneath are "not trying to say anything in particular, other than we just want to be evil. We want to be brutal. It's that simple. We're not a Christian band, we're not a straight-edge band, but we're all hear for the same thing: to say f--- you to the mainstream, and do what we want, do what we love -- which is death metal, being evil and having a good time doing it."

After talking to Hanks a while, it was obvious he was the kind of dude who'd have an interesting response to that age-old question music journalists love to ask, because, well, beefs gets readers: Are there any bands out there you don't dig? Hanks delivered, basically telling us that crunkcore cash cows Brokencyde are the Tila Tequila of metal.

"If there's a band we had to hate, I'd say Millionaires. But I can't even say I hate Millionaires because they're hot. Brokencyde ... that band pisses me the f--- off," Hanks says. "We also hate bands that are over the hill and should have thrown it in a long time ago, like f---ing Nickelback."

Wait, so, you were saying ... about Brokencyde.

"They f---ing network online," he says. "Its really unfortunate that, as much as the music scene has gone to where it is, basically, you make your living online. Its not through zines or touring your ass off. We grew up DIY. We grew up believing, if you tour your ass off, you will make it. The Internet helps us a lot, but Brokencyde ... f---ing blasting like f---ing 250,000 friends a day, and they get the stupid 14-year-old kids who don't know any better. We're trying to show these 14-years-olds what we can do live. And present ourselves to them, and not be like, 'OK, you can hear us online, but when you see us live, you're gonna be like, these guys blow.'"

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