See our other photos from the show: Day 1
Killswitch Engage are, from left to right, Justin Foley on drums, guitarist Adam Dutkiewicz, vocalist Jesse Leach, bassist Mike DāAntonio, and guitarist Joel Stroetzel.
As a result, Killswitch Engageās ninth full-length LP, This Consequence, has all the hallmarks of a band meeting its moment. Itās been nearly a quarter-century since they released their eponymous debut, and theyāve subsequently achieved a career-sustaining amount of success as one of the main architects of the metalcore genre, but This Consequence is likely their first album to highlight such a clearly articulated, socially conscious through line.
Lyrically, cause-and-effect is a driving theme on This Consequence, and Killswitch Engage (KSE) captures the zeitgeist of the 2020s with incisive, often cautionary, commentary regarding topics like war, hatred, division, and falling in line. Musically, the band has channeled those same sources of inspiration into performances that feel more urgent, and thus more sincere, creating a viscerally brutal yet brilliantly melodic slab of postmodern metalcore. KSE has long held a reputation for having a good time and riling up crowds with uncontainable energy and unpredictable performances, but itās been hard to ignore the degradation of discourse in this country over the last decade, even for these renowned ringmasters.
KSE was formed in 1999 in Westfield, Massachusetts, from the remnants of Overcast and Aftershock, two prominent local metal bands. KSEās early lineup featured founding members Dutkiewicz on drums and Mike DāAntonio on bass, along with vocalist Jesse Leach and guitarist Joel Stroetzel. The fledgling band quickly gained attention for its mix of melodic and death-metal influences: a musical amalgamation that would become the template for metalcore. The bandās second album, 2002ās Alive or Just Breathing, was pivotal, marking a major shift in their sound and identity, with a dual-guitar attack leading the charge. In order to accurately render that album in concert, Dutkiewicz switched to guitar, and they brought in Tom Gomes on drums. The record includes some of the bandās most iconic songs to date, including, āMy Last Serenade,ā āFixation on the Darkness,ā and āThe Element of One.ā Adopting a two-guitar approach was a masterstroke and Alive or Just Breathing has since become one of metalcoreās most definitive albums, blending deft, tightly synchronized guitar riffs with battering rhythms, guttural verses, melodic choruses, and a hardcore punk attitude. It was a winning formula that enabled KSE to build a huge fan base.
āEverything I bring to the table, I tell them, āWe can throw it away.āāāAdam Dutkiewicz
In 2004, they released The End of Heartache, their first to feature Howard Jones on lead vocals and Justin Foley on drums. The album reached No. 21 on the Billboard200 and earned a Best Metal Performance Grammy nomination for the title track. Songs like āWhen Darkness Fallsā and āRose of Sharynā continued to elevate KSEās status within the metalcore hierarchy. In 2009, Jones left and Leach returned. Disarm the Descent was released in 2013 and debuted at No. 7 on the Billboard200, marking the bandās highest charting debut to that point. Incarnate followed in 2016, and then Atonement, their first release on Metal Blade, in 2019. KSE was on a roll with Leach firmly back in the fold, and ready to tour when the pandemic struck. During the downtime, inspiration hit, so they regrouped, wrote, rehearsed, and eventually recorded This Consequence. Songs like āAftermath,ā āAbandon Us,ā and āBroken Glassā exemplify the kind of relatable cultural commentary that can be cathartic for todayās disenfranchisedāespecially when paired with the bandās other equally memorable musical attributes.
In riffs they trust: Killswitch Engageās Adam Dutkiewicz (left) and Mike Stroetzel prefer strong, arranged guitar parts that create scenes within arrangements, rather than flash shredding.
Photo by Mike White
The writing and rehearsal process for This Consequence was the first time since Alive or Just Breathing that all five members convened in a studio to work out the material before recording. Like many artists nowadays, KSE had been writing and recording remotely for at least the last decade. Stroetzel says it was great to be able to work on the tunes together, in the same room, and that, musically, it allowed the arrangements to come together a little bit faster. āEspecially the songs that were only partially finished,ā chimes in Dutkiewicz. In addition to his role on guitar, Dutkiewicz has been the bandās producerāhis major at Berkleeāalmost since inception. Perhaps having a skill set with that kind of overview is why heās also the only member of the group to craft fully fleshed-out songs on his own. And yet, even he recognizes how his material benefitted from their rehearsal process this time. āIt was really good for everybody in the band to get their hands on their instruments, learn the riffs, and then tweak them to their level of comfort,ā he says. āTheyāre more invested in the song that way because their voice and their sound is on it. And when we play the song live, itās more their song, instead of that song that Adam wrote.ā
āA tight staccato section needs a wide, harmonically rich section to complement it. We try our best to have scenes in a song like that.āāAdam Dutkiewicz
The cultural continuity of the lyrics on This Consequence didnāt just come about by happenstance, either. Itās not a concept album per se, but the band encouraged Leach to continually refine his lyrics and elevate his ideas and topics. āWhen youāre writing lyrics for that many songs at once, itās easy to fall into the tendency of writing about the same topics, with the same vibe,ā says Dutkiewicz. āHe just needed to try something completely different.ā As a result, Leach tapped into his own angst about the current state of world affairs, bestowing upon This Consequence the kind of social relevance that previous KSE albums never quite captured so succinctly. āJesse gets the gold star for trying the hardest,ā commends Dutkiewicz.
Per usual, Adam Dutkiewicz served as producer for the new album, but engineer Mark Lewis at MRL Studios in Nashville, Tennessee, played a significant role in determining its final sonic character.
Dutkiewicz isnāt particularly attached to his own musical ideas or songs and admits heās willing to deconstruct just about anything for the good of the group, even after heās submitted a complete demo to the rest of the guys. āEverything I bring to the table, I tell them, āWe can throw it away.ā I think a big part of being an artist is just the creation of things and sometimes the destruction of things.ā Dutkiewiczās willingness to analyze material from that perspective is part of what makes him such a good de facto producer for the band. āItās just not having an ego about anything,ā he says. āYou always have to remember you have to do whatās best for the song and not for my riff.ā Another theme that runs through KSE songs on This Consequence, and in general, is how their arrangements work. They employ a visual, almost cinematic approach to production and songcraft. āItās almost like you want scenes in a song,ā explains Dutkiewicz. āA tight staccato section needs a wide, harmonically rich section to complement it. We try our best to have scenes in a song like that.ā
āWe play together a little behind the beat now. Before, we were fighting each other a little bit.āāJoel Stroetzel
Dutkiewicz and Stroetzel have been playing guitar together since long before the release of Alive or Just Breathing, mostly because the former has always worn multiple hats within the band, and share many of the same influences, including Megadeth, Slayer, Testament, Sepultura, and especially Metallica. They both credit James Hetfield for setting the bar when it comes to their own obsession with fast, articulate rhythm-guitar playing. As Stroetzel got older he gravitated towards classic rock, especially Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin. āNow I can play things other than metal,ā he jokes. Dutkiewicz, on the other hand, got into the classic stuff at a younger age, citing his early infatuation with Eddie Van Halen and Angus Young. āItās more so Angus Youngās spirit and onstage attitude,ā he clarifies. Dutkiewiczās high-energy stage presence validates that sentiment.
Adam Dutkiewiczās Gear
Adam Dutkiewicz, telegraphing his love of suds, onstage at Los Angelesā Wiltern Theatre in February 2022, playing his Caparison TAT Special FX āMetal Machineā with Fishman Fluence Signature Series Killswitch Engage Pickups.
Photo by Debi Del Grande
Guitars
- Caparison TAT Special FX āMetal Machineā with Fishman Fluence Signature Series Killswitch Engage Pickups
Amps
- Kemper Profiler
- Kemper Stage
- Mesa/Boogie 4x12 cabs with Celestion speakers
Effects
- Electro-Harmonix Magnum 44 Power Amp
- Maxon OD808 Overdrive
Strings, Picks, Microphones, &
Accessories
- DāAddario EXL115 XL Nickel Wound (.011ā .049)
- In-Tune XJ Jazz 1.14 mm
- Shure ULXD and GLXD wireless systems
- sE V7 Dynamic Microphones
- DāAddario Planet Waves cables
Stroetzel confesses that it took some time to develop into the symbiotic guitar tandem thatās become a signature musical element of the KSE sound. āWe play together a little behind the beat now,ā he explains. āBefore, we were fighting each other a little bit. I always thought Adam had a very forward style with his picking, but heās mellowed over the years. I had to pick up the pace a little, Adam relaxed a little bit, and I think we found a happy midpoint. It only took 25 years [laughter].ā Part of the challenge has been adapting to how the other person writes. āI struggle with some of Joelās articulate phrasing sections,ā explains Dutkiewicz. āIām just a big mangler and heās got these well-phrased sections. And Iām just like, āGod, ah.ā He plays a lot more guitar than me, so his string skipping and pick phrasing is way beyond what Iām capable of doing.ā Stroetzel says he struggles with some of Dutkiewiczās chord voicings because he has such big hands. āSome of these chords he can reach, Iām like, āMan, how do you even do that?āā
āJust hearing the Kemper for the first time, and what it could actually do, was pretty impressive, especially for high-gain tone.āāJoel Stroetzel
Surprisingly, however, they donāt actually even take guitar solos in the traditional sense. āWeāre not necessarily looking to throw leads on everything,ā admits Dutkiewicz. āTo us, itās just a musical interlude. You canāt have vocals [constantly] for three minutes and 30 seconds, so itās just a quick little side journey in the song.ā One of the closest things to an actual guitar solo is probably on the opening track āAbandon Us,ā right after the first chorus, which features the nimble-fingered fretwork of Dutkiewicz, but even thatās more like a short detour than a bona fide lead break. Instead, they tend to incorporate a lot of Thin Lizzy/Iron Maiden-style harmony parts and deploy single-note phrases, counter melodies, and sub-hooks to the vocals in bridges and choruses, weaving a layered tapestry of melodic ear candy. Songwriting is ultimately their primary focus, and the songs are relatively short and to the point for a metal band, so there doesnāt seem to be a need to clutter things up with unnecessary solos. When it comes to crafting such parts, the general rule of thumb for assigning these melodious forays is whoever writes the song, or initiates the song idea, does the honors. And so, songs like āDiscordant Nation,ā āI Believe,ā and āRequiemā highlight Stroetzelās nuanced lyrical phrases, while āAbandon Usā and āWhere It Diesā feature Dutkiewiczās more shred-like soloing style.
When it comes to tone, Stroetzel in particular remains a big fan of tube amps, and the band has a long history of utilizing heads from boutique manufacturers like Diezel, Framus, and Friedman. In recent years, however, software sounds have gotten much better, and theyāve gravitated towards profiling amps and plugins, especially live. āJust hearing the Kemper for the first time, and what it could actually do, was pretty impressive, especially for high-gain tone,ā explains Stroetzel. āIf you want an aggressive metal tone, I think the Kemper does a nice job capturing that, and it works great liveāweāre consistent from night to night.ā And besides, they both openly admit itās not like KSE requires a lot of nuanced technique. āWe donāt have very delicate parts in our songs,ā jokes Dutkiewicz. āEven our clean tones arenāt very touch sensitive.ā
Joel Stroetzel's Gear
Joel Stroetzel, here, and Adam Dutkiewicz both play signature-model Caparison guitars. Stroetzelās is a Dellinger-JSM V2.
Photo by Debi Del Grande
Guitars
- Caparison Dellinger-JSM V2 with Fishman Fluence Signature Series Killswitch Engage Pickups
Amps
- Kemper Profiler
- Kemper Stage
- Mesa/Boogie 4x12 cabs with Celestion speakers
Effects
- Electro-Harmonix Magnum 44 Power Amp
- Maxon OD808 Overdrive
Strings, Picks, Microphones, &
Accessories
- DāAddario EXL115 XL Nickel Wound (.011ā.049)
- DāAddario Duralin Black Ice 1.10 mm
- Shure ULXD and GLXD wireless systems
- sE V7 Dynamic Microphones
- DāAddario Planet Waves cables
Dutkiewicz says that what listeners end up hearing, tone-wise, is ultimately up to whoever mixes the album, which, in the case of This Consequence, was Mark Lewis at MRL Studios in Nashville, Tennessee. Aside from that, everything else is very cut-and-dried. Stroetzel says thereās always a Maxon OD808 on everything they do thatās dirty. āThrow a little bit of that boost in there, and it just kind of compresses the tone a little bit and brings out the midrange a little more,ā he explains. āAnd then, all we really need is a noise gate. Thatās it.ā They both play Caparison signature model guitars, incorporating elements of other instruments theyāve played over the years. āIāve always liked Fender-style guitarsāStrats and Teles,ā says Stroetzel. āSo, my signature model is constructed with those in mind, but to sound a little bit thicker and have some thunder in the low end, like a hot-rod metal guitar.ā Dutkiewicz says his guitar was designed with simplicity in mind. āI was ruining guitars on tour,ā he admits. āI had a bolt-on once, and my sweat got into the bolt holes and it actually rotted out. I couldnāt believe it. Sweat was getting in the cavity of the guitar, and it was cutting out the pickups and causing corrosion on the electronics inside. So, I got rid of the neck pickup and made it a neck-through. Iām a mangler, so itās loud, bright, and obnoxious, just like me [laughter].ā
As for their revered place in the pantheon of metalcore, Stroetzel takes the humble approach, as many in his position often do, saying theyāre not really concerned with putting a label on KSE. āWe all just try to put in elements of what we like,ā he says. āEverybody in the band has listened to so many different types of music over the years. Itās like, āWho cares if this is a hardcore song or a thrash song?ā It doesnāt really matter. I donāt think weāve ever tried to stick to a specific style. Weāre just a rock band.ā
YouTube It
In this full-set performance from 2023ās Wacken Open Air festival in Itzehoe, Germany, Killswitch Engage dances the line between beauty and brutality.
The National New Yorker lived at the forefront of the emerging electric guitar industry, and in Memphis Minnieās hands, it came alive.
(Are you not totally intrigued by the story of this incredible woman? Why did she run away from home? Why did she fall in love with the guitar? We havenāt even touched on how remarkable her songwriting is. This is a singular pioneer of guitar history, and we beseech you to read Woman with Guitar: Memphis Minnieās Blues by Beth and Paul Garon.)
Following the end of World War I, Hawaiian music enjoyed a rapid rise in popularity. On their travels around the U.S., musicians like Sol Hoāopiāi became fans of Louis Armstrong and the New Orleans Rhythm Kings, leading to a great cross-pollination of Hawaiian music with jazz and blues. This potent combination proved popular and drew ever-larger audiences, which created a significant problem: How on earth would an audience of thousands hear the sound from a wimpy little acoustic guitar?
This art deco pickguard offers just a bit of pizzazz to an otherwise demure instrument.
In the late 1920s, George Beauchamp, John and Rudy Dopyera, Adolph Rickenbacker, and John Dopyeraās nephew Paul Barth endeavored to answer that question with a mechanically amplified guitar. Working together under Beauchamp and John Dopyeraās National String Instrument Corporation, they designed the first resonator guitar, which, like a Victrola, used a cone-shaped resonator built into the guitar to amplify the sound. It was definitely louder, but not quite loud enoughāespecially for the Hawaiian slide musicians. With the guitars laid on their laps, much of the sound projected straight up at the ceiling instead of toward the audience.
Barth and Beauchamp tackled this problem in the 1930s by designing a magnetic pickup, and Rickenbacker installed it in the first commercially successful electric instrument: a lap-steel guitar known affectionately as the āFrying Panā due to its distinctive shape. Suddenly, any stringed instrument could be as loud as your amplifier allowed, setting off a flurry of innovation. Electric guitars were born!
āAt the time it was positively futuristic, with its lack of f-holes and way-cool art deco design on the pickup.ā
By this time, Memphis Minnie was a bona fide star. She recorded for Columbia, Vocalion, and Decca Records. Her song āBumble Bee,ā featuring her driving guitar technique, became hugely popular and earned her a new nickname: the Queen of Country Blues. She was officially royalty, and her subjects needed to hear her game-changing playing. This is where she crossed paths with our old pals over at National.
National and other companies began adding pickups to so-called Spanish guitars, which they naturally called āElectric Spanish.ā (This term was famously abbreviated ES by the Gibson Guitar Corporation and used as a prefix on a wide variety of models.) In 1935, National made its first Electric Spanish guitar, renamed the New Yorker three years later. By todayās standards, itās modestly appointed. At the time it was positively futuristic, with its lack of f-holes and way-cool art deco design on the pickup.
Thereās buckle rash and the finish on the back of the neck is rubbed clean off in spots, but that just goes to show how well-loved this guitar has been.
Memphis Minnie had finally found an axe fit for a Queen. She was among the first blues guitarists to go electric, and the New Yorker fueled her already-upward trajectory. She recorded over 200 songs in her 25-year career, cementing her and the National New Yorkerās place in musical history.
Our National New Yorker was made in 1939 and shows perfect play wear as far as weāre concerned. Sure, thereās buckle rash and the finish on the back of the neck is rubbed clean off in spots, but structurally, this guitar is in great shape. Itās easy to imagine this guitar was lovingly wiped down each time it was put back in the case.
Thereās magic in this guitar, yāall. Every time we pick it up, we can feel Memphis Minnieās spirit enter the room. This guitar sounds fearless. Itās a survivor. This is a guitar that could inspire you to run away and join the circus, transcend genre and gender, and leave your own mark on music history. As a guitar store, watching guitars pass from musician to musician gives us a beautiful physical reminder of how history moves through generations. We canāt wait to see who joins this guitarās remarkable legacy.
SOURCES: blackpast.org, nps.gov, worldmusic.net, historylink.org, Memphis Music Hall of Fame, āMemphis Minnieās āScientific Soundā: Afro-Sonic Modernity and the Jukebox Era of the Bluesā from American Quarterly, āThe History of the Development of Electric Stringed Musical Instrumentsā by Stephen Errede, Department of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL.
We know Horsegirl as a band of musicians, but their friendships will always come before the music. From left to right: Nora Cheng, drummer Gigi Reece, and Penelope Lowenstein.
āIt was kind of life-changing, honestly. It changed how I thought about womanhood,ā Lowenstein says over the call, laughing a bit at the gravitas of the statement.
But the moment of levity illuminates the fact that big things are happening in their lives. When they released their debut album, 2022ās Versions of Modern Performance, the three members of Horsegirl were still teenagers in high school. Their new, sophomore record, Phonetics On and On, arrives right in the middle of numerous first experiencesātheir first time living away from home, first loves, first years of their 20s, in university. Horsegirl is going through changes. Lowenstein notes how, through moving to a new city, their friendship has grown, too, into something more familial. They rely on each other more.
āIf the friendship was ever taking a toll because of the band, the friendship would come before the band, without any doubt.āāPenelope Lowenstein
āEveryone's cooking together, you take each other to the doctor,ā Lowenstein says. āYou rely on each other for weird things. I think transitioning from being teenage friends to suddenly working together, touring together, writing together in this really intimate creative relationship, going through sort of an unusual experience together at a young age, and then also starting school togetherāI just feel like it brings this insane intimacy that we work really hard to maintain. And if the friendship was ever taking a toll because of the band, the friendship would come before the band without any doubt.ā
Horsegirl recorded their sophomore LP, Phonetics On and On, at Wilcoās The Loft studio in their hometown, Chicago.
These changes also include subtle and not-so-subtle shifts in their sophisticated and artful guitar-pop. Versions of Modern Performance created a notion of the band as ā90s college-rock torchbearers, with reverb-and-distortion-drenched numbers that recalled Yo La Tengo and the Breeders. Phonetics On and On doesnāt extinguish the flame, but itās markedly more contemporary, sacrificing none of the catchiness but opting for more space, hypnotic guitar lines, and meditative, repeated phrases. Cheng and Lowenstein credit Welsh art-pop wiz Cate Le Bonās presence as producer in the studio as essential to the sonic direction.
āOn the record, I think we were really interested in Young Marble Giantsāsuper minimal, the percussiveness of the guitar, and how you can do so much with so little.āāNora Cheng
āWe had never really let a fourth person into our writing process,ā Cheng says. āI feel like Cate really changed the way we think about how you can compose a song, and built off ideas we were already thinking about, and just created this very comfortable space for experimentation and pushed us. There are so many weird instruments and things that aren't even instruments at [Wilcoās Chicago studio] The Loft. I feel like, definitely on our first record, we were super hesitant to go into territory that wasn't just distorted guitar, bass, and drums.ā
Nora Cheng's Gear
Nora Cheng says that letting a fourth personāWelsh artist Cate Le Bonāinto the trioās songwriting changed how they thought about composition.
Photo by Braden Long
Effects
- EarthQuaker Devices Plumes
- Ibanez Tube Screamer
- TC Electronic Polytune
Picks
- Dunlop Tortex .73 mm
Phonetics On and On introduces warm synths (āJulieā), raw-sounding violin (āIn Twosā), and gamelan tilesācommon in traditional Indonesian musicāto Horsegirlās repertoire, and expands on their already deep quiver of guitar sounds as Cheng and Lowenstein branch into frenetic squonks, warped jangles, and jagged, bare-bones riffs. The result is a collection of songs simultaneously densely textured and spacious.
āI listen to these songs and I feel like it captures the raw, creative energy of being in the studio and being like, āFuck! We just exploded the song. What is about to happen?āā Lowenstein says. āThat feeling is something we didnāt have on the first record because we knew exactly what we wanted to capture and it was the songs we had written in my parentsā basement.ā
Cheng was first introduced to classical guitar as a kid by her dad, who tried to teach her, and then she was subsequently drawn back to rock by bands like Cage The Elephant and Arcade Fire. Lowenstein started playing at age 6, which covers most of her life memories and comprises a large part of her identity. āIt made me feel really powerful as a young girl to know that I was a very proficient guitarist,ā she says. The shreddy playing of Television, Pink Floydās spacey guitar solos, and Yo La Tengoās Ira Kaplan were all integral to her as Horsegirl began.
Penelope Lowenstein's Gear
Penelope Lowenstein likes looking back at the versions of herself that made older records.
Photo by Braden Long
Effects
- EarthQuaker Westwood
- EarthQuaker Bellows
- TC Electronic PolyTune
Picks
- Dunlop Tortex 1.0 mm
Recently, the two of them have found themselves influenced by guitarists both related and unrelated to the type of tunes theyāre trading in on their new album. Lowenstein got into Brazilian guitar during the pandemic and has recently been āin a Jim OāRourke, John Fahey zone.ā
āThereās something about listening to that music where you realize, about the guitar, that you can just compose an entire orchestra on one instrument,ā Lowenstein says. āAnd hearing what the bass in those guitar parts is doingāas in, the E stringāis kind of mind blowing.ā
āOn the record, I think we were really interested in Young Marble Giantsāsuper minimal, the percussiveness of the guitar, and how you can do so much with so little,ā Cheng adds. āAnd also Lizzy Mercier [Descloux], mostly on the Rosa Yemen records. That guitar playing I feel was very inspiring for the anti-solo,[a technique] which appears on [Phonetics On and On].āThis flurry of focused discovery gives the impression that Cheng and Lowensteinās sensibilities are shifting day-to-day, buoyed by the incredible expansion of creative possibilities that setting oneās life to revolve around music can afford. And, of course, the energy and exponential growth of youth. Horsegirl has already clocked major stylistic shifts in their brief lifespan, and itās exciting to have such a clear glimpse of evolution in artists who are, likely and hopefully, just beginning a long journey together.
āThereās something about listening to that music where you realize, about the guitar, that you can just compose an entire orchestra on one instrument.āāPenelope Lowenstein
āIn your 20s, life moves so fast,ā Lowenstein says. āSo much changes from the time of recording something to releasing something that even that process is so strange. You recognize yourself, and you also kind of sympathize with yourself. It's a really rewarding way of life, I think, for musicians, and it's cool that we have our teenage years captured like that, tooāon and on until we're old women.ā
YouTube It
Last summer, Horsegirl gathered at a Chicago studio space to record a sun-soaked set of new and old tunes.
