For their 11th album, extreme metal troupe Aborted worked backwards to find their inspiration. Instead of creating physical merchandise to fit the concept of the release, the international band—which includes musicians from Belgium, Italy, and the US—came up with the product first and wrote their record around it. “We wanted to make an action figure to go with the album,” vocalist and founder Sven de Caluwé tells Apple Music. “Of course, it had to fit with the ’80s and ’90s horror universe of the band, so we decided to create a slasher to rule them all. His name is Waylon, who’s a cult leader summoning demons to bring about the end of the world. He’s a metaphor for everything that’s been going on in this wonderful little playground we call a planet the last couple of years—the crazy conspiracy theories and all the insane division we’re having on a societal level.” Below, de Caluwé details each track on ManiaCult. “Verderf” “All our previous albums either started with an audio sample or some not-metal sounding intro. This time, we wanted to have something heavy and depressing to set the atmosphere for the ride that’s about to ensue. It’s pretty short, and there’s a couple of Dutch words in there—which is the first time I’ve ever done that. The title is Dutch for ‘decay,’ by the way.” “ManiaCult” “At first, we couldn’t put more than two or three riffs together for this song, so we gave it the working title ‘Small Lunch.’ I think we had maybe 10 versions of it until we got the track that came out. It became one of our favorites, so we decided to name it the title track. It’s more midtempo than the other stuff on the record, but there’s a lot of headbanging stuff going on there and a big-ass breakdown in the middle with Joe [Badolato] from Fit for an Autopsy.” “Impetus Odi” “This was the first single, and it was also the very first song written for the album. It’s probably one of the fastest songs we’ve ever done. There’s some exploration of vocal styles, with a lot more weird goblin or black metal vocals going on, so it’s definitely something new. I think it’s a very well-rounded Aborted song. It’s got the crazy-fast stuff, it’s got some technical stuff, it has the leads. There’s the black metal-tinted vibes in there and a big breakdown.” “Portal to Vacuity” “The last song was fast, but this is definitely the fastest song on the record. It doesn’t sound like it, maybe because there’s a lot of midtempo and even slower doom parts going on, but the last fast parts are 328 BPM or something like that. Starting with the Retrogore album in 2016, we infused a lot more black metal into the music, but every time we did that, we didn’t have the perfect mix of high-energy grind and death metal. So, this time we really wanted to get the balance right. I think it’s one of the most diverse songs on the record.” “Dementophobia” “This is probably the most simple and catchy song on the record. We brought a bunch of things back that we haven’t done in a long time, probably since The Necrotic Manifesto. We actually did a pretty funny animated video for this one. We’re all characters in a Scooby-Doo episode and a lot of silly stuff happens.” “A Vulgar Quagmire” “More black metal in this one, but with a mixture of grind and the tech-y side of Aborted—and dare I say, Cradle of Filth influences here and there. The song is simply about poop. Usually, we have one song per album about poop, but I was very dumb last time, and I actually forgot to put one on TerrorVision, so we made up for it by having two songs about shit on this one. But it’s also about Family Guy, because quagmire is quite vulgar.” “Verbolgen” “The title is Dutch for ‘disgusted.’ It was written by [drummer] Ken [Bedene] as something to break up the record, so there’s no metal in it. It’s strictly a piano interlude. We felt that TerrorVision was a long record that was very intense from start to finish, so sometimes the aggression didn’t hit that hard because there were no breaks. This time around, we really wanted to have something to cool things off and not pummel you relentlessly—so, when the next song hits, it’s like taking a sledgehammer to your teeth again.” “Ceremonial Ineptitude” “This is one of the first tracks we wrote, and I think it has a lot of very different things that we’ve been doing for the last couple of years. There’s a lot of vocal experimentation on this one, and some guest vocals from Ryo [Kinoshita] from Crystal Lake. I think it’s definitely one of the more catchy tunes on the record, so hopefully people enjoy it.” “Drag Me to Hell” “We always like to have a little homage to movies, since the horror universe is basically what we’re all about. I didn’t want to do a very mainstream movie, so we took the Sam Raimi movie Drag Me to Hell because it’s just like we are—incredibly silly and over the top. We’ve also got Filip Danielsson from Humanity’s Last Breath on this one, but the song is literally about the movie. I can’t remember how many times I laughed at the scene when that blond girl kept getting her hair pulled out.” “Grotesque” “That’s song number two about poop, so I invite you to read the incredibly silly lyrics. It’s also one of the last things we completed for the record, and it’s a little bit of an atypical song for us. It’s quite technical but also ventures more into the direction of a band like The Black Dahlia Murder. So, it’s a bit more foreign than the other stuff we’re doing, but it fits perfectly in the record.” “I Prediletti: The Folly of the Gods” “We’ve got Ben Duerr from Shadow of Intent on this song, and I think it’s quite a mixture of brutal death metal and black metal. You might even think Behemoth here and there. There’s a lot of different atmospheres going on, but it’s quite punishing from start to finish. The beginning is very surprising for us because it starts with a quite melodic guitar intro, which is very unlike Aborted, but I think it’s a perfect closer for the record.”