Somewhere between the mountainous landscapes of Pennsylvania and the forest combed valleys of New Jersey, Duskmourn was formed in 2012. Comprised of Walter Deyo (Guitars, Bass, and vocals) and Bill Sharpe (Guitars, Drums, Keyboards). Duskmourn’s vision has always been to create music that will transcend its listeners to another world…a simpler world…of ancient tales & nature bound journeys. It all started in early 2012, with a couple of awesome demo songs, pizza, and a lot of beer. After the demo songs were refined and rehearsed, Duskmourn entered the studio to record their first self titled EP. With help from former members David Heer and Jenny Sharpe the demo was finished and completed by mid 2012. Writing on 2014’s “Legends”commenced immediately after finishing the Duskmourn EP. With a vision to create a larger, more vast atmosphere, Duskmourn turned to it’s folk/natural roots to tell their story. With the recordings now complete for its first full length album “Legends”, the album was released December 8th, 2014.
Moving forward to present day we get to ask members Bill Sharpe and Walter Deyo what makes Duskmourn such a special unique band with such a Universal sound yet a sound all their own. Such an accomplishment considering there are only two members. This is quite amazing and certainly the sound is as large as life and a feel of a 20 member band. I’m looking forward to this interview and getting to know what is Duskmourn and what else makes this
band so amazing and so unique. Without further adieu let’s get into the nuts and bolts of what is Duskmourn, thanks so much for taking the time to sit and talk with us, Myself and all your fans in all corners of the globe are looking forward to your thoughts and ideas and to get to know you as band member’s, music lovers and fellow human beings. Thanks for taking the time to sit and chat with us. We know you guys are extremely busy. With that being said, let’s begin!
Firstly, I must confess that I truly love the name “Duskmourn” and see many literal and figurative meanings behind the name, but can you tell us what it means for you and how you decided on it?
Thanks! The name actually comes from the character, Kiril Duskmourn, from a book called Stardeep by Bruce R. Cordell. We thought it represented our music perfectly and stood out among the other options we were considering at the time. Besides that, there wasn’t any kind of deep meaning behind it.
From what I understand there are two members of “Duskmourn” How did this come about? Who does what creatively speaking and is responsible for writing new material?
Believe it or not, we met through YouTube after discovering we had basically the same influences and interests in music. We met up in person shortly after and started working on material for a demo. Creatively speaking, Bill writes most of the music and Walter writes most of the lyrics, but we are always sharing ideas and opinions on each other’s work through email and phone. It is important to us that everyone is happy with all of the material before we finalize anything.
Can you please tell the reader a little bit about yourselves?
Let’s see, we think we are pretty normal guys just with a huge appreciation for music. Outside of Duskmourn, we have our day jobs and all that fun stuff. We also love to play video games (mainly World of Warcraft and other Blizzard games).
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n your most current release, “Legends”, one of the strengths about the album—as with your EP—is the consistent feel of the songs and the picture it paints in your head. How does your creative process look? How do you achieve such a consistent feel throughout the whole album?
That is an interesting question. The creative process for both music and lyrics starts with a mix of inspiration from music, nature and/or life in general. Once the inspiration is there, the music is typically written using guitar and keyboard and entered into guitar pro so we can communicate about our ideas.
Another thing I always love is the right balance between clean vocals and the grunting. When these songs develop, do you set out to specifically create melodic parts for instance? Or do you go where the flow takes you?
We definitely go with the flow. It helps to listen to the song as a whole and get a feel of where certain things like this can and cannot work to fit into the big picture.
What was the mindset when you you wrote “Legends”?
At the time, our goal with Legends was to make the most powerful and epic album possible that would let the listener escape to another world of adventure, heroism, darkness, wonder etc. We are both inspired a lot by fantasy RPGs, so we wanted to have that kind of medieval sound worked into the music as well.
When you are writing a new album, do you use everything you write, or do you write more than eventually lands on the album? If you have material left after completing an album, what happens to it?
For Legends, we used almost everything that was written. For our next album we are currently working on, there was a good amount of music scrapped because we set the bar much higher for ourselves this time around. As for what will become of those unused songs? At the moment it is really hard to say.
The cover art on this album is second to none. Who was responsible for it? And would you guys work with them again in the future?
Thanks! Walter is 100% responsible for the album art and also created and manages our website.
How do you find the studio side of creating an album? How well does it translate to a live show and a live audience?
We tend to enjoy the creating and recording part of our music the most. We have only played one show to date but being able to translate our music into a live performance was pretty seamless with the use of a backing track. If it were our choice, we would have had a live keyboard player, but we weren’t able to find one in time.
Do you have any routine rituals or superstitions to help prepare for a show?
We have only played one show so far and the pre-show consisted of eating a lot of pizza and watching some awesome bands!
What is in the future for Duskmourn? Is there a new album we can look forward to? Touring? Festivals?
The future for Duskmourn is looking awesome and we are extremely excited for it. We have finished writing material for a new album and are currently in the early stages of recording. This is our main priority at the moment. As far as touring, we don’t see extensive touring happening for us in the foreseeable future unfortunately. We just have too much going on at the moment, but who knows what the future holds? We consider any offers we get for shows and we would absolutely love to play at one of the European metal festivals.
I must ask you about your musical influences, you have a unique sound all to your own but there is a very diverse sound and a mix of many different genres. What bands influenced the musical style and direction of Duskmourn?
When we first started Duskmourn, Melodic Death Metal was the foundation of our music. Bands like Kalmah, Wintersun, Amon Amarth, Skyfire, Norther and In Flames (old) were all major influences. After our demo, we changed the direction a little bit to include elements from Black Metal, Folk Metal, and other types of music as well, such as video game soundtracks. Now we have some kind of combination of these and we think that is important to keep our music unique. We try not to go too far into the direction of one specific genre.
Thanks again guys for taking the time to talk with us, I wanted to ask another hundred questions but realize how time constraints limit our discussion. Any last words for the readers?
Thanks for the interview! Also a huge thanks to our fans and friends out there supporting us! We are excited to continue delivering the best material that we can to you guys . Cheers!
Thanks so much and all the best in your future endeavors. Once again thanks for being a part of our publication and we look forward to talking with you in the very near future.
David Maloney
Official Duskmourn Facebook Page
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