Introducing Kill Division. The grindcore unit features Gruesome drummer Gus Rios on guitar, Venom Inc. drummer Jeramie Kling on bass, current Megadeth and ex-Soilwork drummer Dirk Verbueren on drums and ex-Malevolent Creation vocalist Kyle Symons for the first time in over a decade. Despite half of the band taking on a less-typical role, Kill Division come out of the gate energized with their first song, “Cultists.”
Kill Division save the listener any fanciness or progressive tendencies, instead jumping into 90 seconds of blast beats, tremolo picking and brutally-honest lyrics. Rios explains the band’s origin to Decibel.
“I would say that Kill Division sounds like what if [late Terrorizer and Napalm Death guitarist] Jesse Pintado was from Florida!” he says. “This is most aggressive and extreme stuff I’ve ever written, and having two massive grindcore dudes like Dirk and Kyle as quality controllers was key to the songs coming alive! I’ve never written ‘grindcore’ per say, but after what we have all been going through, I had quite a bit of rage inside of me and grindcore was the perfect vessel for that release!
“I had been doing an online show on the Sick Drummer Magazine Facebook page last summer called the Gus and Seth Metal Show. Every week we would choose a band to talk about, then play some of their songs live. It was a lot of fun and Kyle had watched a few episodes. He eventually contacted me to do an episode, which I was super stoked about! Kyle and I were in our first band together back in the early ’90s called Sickness, so we go back to the beginning together! We also did our first tour together with Malevolent Creation back in 2002. So Kyle does the Massacre episode with Jeramie Kling on drums and we had a blast! Fast forward, Kyle’s down for another album and I wanted to write an assault of grind, punk and death metal. I knew my brother Dirk would be down too and when I told Jeramie about it, he goes ‘I’m on bass, yo!’
“Cultists is good indicator of what Kill Division is about: speed and aggression! The lyrics are my views on current and not so current mindlessness. If people were empowered to think for themselves, they would then soon realize that we’re much more alike then they want us to believe.”
Listen to “Cultists” below and purchase the single via Bandcamp here. Follow Kill Division on Facebook for further updates and more music.
