You can find out more with this great interview.Hi Blake. Thanks for doing the interview. How are things with you today?
Hey Steve! Thanks so much for taking the time to talk to me. Things are great - too many moving pieces in life, but that’s how it goes! Just got back from playing a gig in Dallas with Temple of the Fuzz Witch so riding a bit of a high. Excited to chat.
I know you’ve answered this question before in our last interview. Can you tell folks not in the know, can you give a brief history of how the band AIWASS came together and where it is today?
Around 2019 or 2020, I was going through a lot of things - loss, grief, anger…boredom even. I had taken years away from music. I had a band here and there but nothing ever really came of it. Then I started making some songs that felt like they were about to burst out of me - my attempt at making the music I in particular wanted to hear. Things honestly started snowballing and eventually I had some singles, an EP, and the first album, “Wayward Gods.”
I moved from Flagstaff, AZ to Phoenix, AZ and started a live band. We played some great shows with some great bands - Monolord, Hippie Death Cult, etc. That lineup didn’t work out for a variety of reasons, most of those reasons I’m happy to let rot in their graves. I went through a lot of things, moved to Texas, released “The Falling.”
That album did well, but I found something lacking. I tried several go-arounds at forming a new lineup. Eventually, I declared a “hiatus.” To be completely honest, I wasn’t planning on coming back. But there was a demand to do so - not just external, but internal. I had to make Aiwass music. It’s what is inside of me. A few months back I put together a new lineup and here we are, playing live again - fresh sound, fresh songs.
How would you describe your own sound?
That’s a complicated question, Steve. Early on, songs like “The Sun Devil,” were very stoner-adjacent/stoner-influenced. As time went on, they became more of a psychedelic doom sound like you hear on “Wayward Gods.” Eventually, that reached its climax with “The Falling.” Aiwass is constantly evolving and I don’t plan for that to stop.
The layers of clean vocals have been replaced by a pretty intensive scream. The drums are real now (I programmed them for years). Overall, the “psych-doom” has been replaced with a more “blackened” doom or sludge sound. The main throughline, however, has been battles with my mental health and spirituality.
I became aware of your great music through your amazing 2021 debut album Wayward Gods which we’ll be discussing for the majority of this interview. Looking back, were you pleased how the album was received by the underground scene overall. As it was released during the time the world was still adjusting to getting back to normal after COVID.
Thanks for the great question, Steve. I was definitely pleased by how “Wayward Gods” was received. I’ll be brutally honest - I was surprised anyone even listened to it! You have to remember, I was a young, grieving, tortured man in his 20s with no clear direction, no clear choices. My mother had just passed away, a lot of things were frankly going horribly for me and continued to do so for several years.
That album was my drug, my release. It felt like a way to talk about what was going on in my head without paying a therapist. I just definitely didn’t expect the reaction - the reviews were great, the Doom Charts placement was above anything I could have expected, sales were good. I was very much stunned. But it also - and I don’t think this is uncommon - made me much hungrier for more. Much more critical of my own work. That’s probably why I’m still making music 5 years later.
Why did you call the album “Wayward Gods" as it's anything but that.
It was a hard album to name, to be quite honest. The original title was something like “The Equinox of the Gods,” which is a Crowley reference just as the name of the band is a Crowley reference. That just felt a little clumsy on the tongue for a first album. I started brainstorming, asking myself questions, like, “what does this album mean?” and “what do I want people to understand?”
Well, wayward means essentially difficult to predict - generally because of unusual behaviour. Not only did that describe my lifelong battles with health and mental health - it also described to me the nature of the universe. I thought about how the gods in the Thelemic system are impossible to predict, how they keep you on your toes. That reminded me of some of my battles with mental health. The gods aspect of the title? Well, Crowley said every man and woman is a star and I like to think a star is just the visual manifestation of a god, or whatever you want to call nature or power. The short answer is…it just made sense to me in my head.
Was that a hard album to write and record for.
Unbearably so. I had no idea what I was doing. I doubted myself. I hated myself. I was going through horrible turmoil. My mom had just died, my longtime partner had left me. It was about as bad of a time as you can go through. But the album was…my salvation. My way to talk about what was going on and feel my way through the darkness. When it comes to songwriting, the songs just kind of fell out of me. But the process was dark. Painful. Something I both don’t want to forget, as it has made me who I am, but would definitely like to forget more often.
What inspired you when making the album during that time.
With everything going on in my life, I needed some kind of…perhaps the word is salvation or direction maybe, but I don’t think either is actually adequate. I guess I needed a reason to hope. Music was that to some extent, but so were the ideas of various thinkers I was reading at the time. Crowley, as you can tell from the name of the band, was number 1 for me, but so were Nietzsche, Schoppenhauer, Jung, Freud, and others. Musically, my inspiration has largely come from my favorite bands (Mizmor, Hell, Thou, Yob, Neurosis, the list goes on) but also from very different genres like classical music (especially Beethoven). I yearn for epic heaviness at all times.
I’m touching upon Wayward Gods as you’re planning to release a new “REDUX” version. Can you give us more details of that? - As I love that album.
To be frank, the genesis started with my producer and mixing engineer, Grant Husselman. I was starting to work on album #3 and Grant said that he was probably done with mixing and producing for the foreseeable future. I was pretty devastated, as the only person I trust to do what he does is Grant. However, there was one trump card in my back pocket with Grant, which is the fact that he didn’t get to work on “Wayward Gods.” In fact, how we met was him reaching out about saying he loved the album. I mentioned to him after a few months of poking and prodding that I wanted to do a redux where we redid everything but the guitars. And I mean everything. It took a few weeks, but suddenly I had a producer again and I also had a redux to work on.
What can people expect from the “REDUX” version?
The shortest answer is that it’s the best of the old meets the best of the new. It has everything that made the original version so special and so loved, but it has a better sound. It’s more thought out. I re-recorded new bass lines, Grant played drums, I recorded new clean vocal lines as well as the screams that I’ve been moving towards. We even started brainstorming new sounds, new ways of getting the message across. It’s very much “Wayward Gods,” but more geared towards the sounds I’ve always enjoyed but may not have had the knowledge or creativity yet to actually do myself.
When did you decide to do the “REDUX” version and are you not happy with the original version?
It must have been about a year ago? Maybe even less. Grant and I move fast. The lack of happiness isn’t necessarily the issue with the original recording. A lot of people love that album and I’m glad it brings joy to some people. But it wasn’t the album that was in my head. It was the album I knew how to make in 2019 or 2020. The albums that I can make now are more advanced, more primal (which says something considering how that album sounded), more…brutality. I want the joy of beauty and the sadness of destruction in these songs. I think this particular version encapsulates not just what Aiwass has been and will be, but also what it should have been from the beginning.
Is the REDUX version closer to the original version you had outlined for the album.
Very much so! I heard Mizmor and Hell when I was a graduate student - that would’ve been 2016 or 2017. I wanted to make one man blackened doom. I got about halfway there. I didn’t know how to scream. I never would’ve sang if I’d known how to do the vocals I wanted! At the same time, I always heard angelic choirs - fallen angels. In some ways, “The Falling” was the utmost limit of those choirs. This redux says, “here’s a choir, but here’s also the demon that they’ve fallen towards.” It’s way closer to what I would have done then if I’d known how to, while simultaneously being informed by my taste in 2026.
When is the “redux” version being released and in what formats?
We shall see. The plan is later this year or perhaps at the beginning of next year. We aren’t working with a label at this moment - we’re not against it per se, but we only want to work with someone who believes in what we’re doing. Moreover, we want it to make sense for both sides creatively and, to a lesser extent but still importantly, financially. If this redux ends up on vinyl, amazing - I would love that. If we end up just releasing it on Bandcamp and ten people spend a few bucks on it and enjoy it, that’s fine - mission accomplished either way. All I really want is for people to hear the album I wanted to make years ago.
I’ve seen the artwork for the new REDUX version and DAMN. Brilliant artwork. Who designed the artwork. And did you give the artist some rules to go by or did you let them go on their own creative tangent.
I am a man who has seen curses and blessings, but the biggest blessing is my fiance, Caitlyn (@caitlynjk_art on IG). She designed the cover in conjunction with our friend, Shelby (@dickyvallencourt on IG), who is on the cover. I mostly just let them go wild and think of what would work best after listening to some loose mixes of the redux. Shelby has been a friend for years and was game to honor the original cover while also doing something fresh and exciting.
I think she really did an incredible job capturing the Thelemic nature of this album, about what I was trying to say. Caitlyn took that material and designed a beautiful, multifaceted cover. I did my best to stay out of her way and the result was rewarding, as it was better than anything I could have thought of.
Does the new artwork fully align to the new version of Wayward Gods.
That’s a good question. I’m sure if you told someone it was a “blackened doom” album, they might say it was a little pretty. But I also think these songs are a little pretty if you listen closely. My goals of empowerment, of freedom, my love of the natural, the profane, and the sacred - I think this cover says a lot more about what I wanted to convey than the original did. Ultimately, the original album was my way of coping with what was in my head through the teachings of Aleister Crowley - this new cover shows someone who isn’t yet sure of the future but is aware of the power of the present, and I think that’s a message I’d love to cling to and that Crowley might have as well.
You’ve been working with Grant Husselman for a while as he’s provided drums on some AIWASS releases. And he’s working on producing the new version of the album. How did that collaboration come together? Grant is known mostly for his amazing work with All Them Witches and King Buffalo.
You’re talking to a miserable bastard with incredible luck. Grant actually reached out after the first recording of “Wayward Gods.” Told me, essentially, that I could write great songs and play them well but I needed someone who knew how to mix (I mixed the first version - he was right). We started a friendship and a working relationship that’s gone on for years and part of the reason it works is the honesty we have with each other.
He’s willing to tell me when I’ve fucked up. He’s willing to tell me when I need to redo it all. He’s willing to tell me when a song needs to head to the junkyard. It’s not just that he takes the sound in my head and creates it without me telling him - it’s that he does it with love and incredible attention to detail. I’ll be the first to say Grant can be an asshole, but it’s that brutal honesty that brings out the best in a musician. I’m a very lucky musician that I get to work with him.
Will you be working with Grant in the future on new releases?
Easiest answer of the interview - yes. Grant is a part of the Aiwass family, the Aiwass sound. Not only is he essential to creating the sound in my head - he’s also a groomsman in my wedding. I’m sure I could have success working with someone else, but it doesn’t really interest me if Grant isn’t along for the ride.
What does Grant bring to the overall AIWASS sound?
I think Grant is the missing ingredient to the stew. We’ve spent so many years talking over things - be they musical, personal, political, whatever - that at this point there’s a silent communication. If I send him a demo and he says nothing, I know something is probably missing. If I send him some stems and he takes his time, I know i have some problems. He’s the gatekeeper.
He lets me know when my ideas are working and when they aren’t. At the same time, he never tells me how to do something or what direction to go. He just helps me to think of the right path to take. On a less macro level, Grant is responsible for the sound, the vibe, the atmosphere. He takes my raw insanity and polishes it into a rock you could sell in a crystal shop. He also does an incredible job of not going too “modern” - he’s aware of the sonic landscape and knows what fits.
What was working with Grant like on Wayward Gods. Did he provide any helpful hints and advice for you during these sessions?
Despite the fact that I didn’t work with Grant on the original, we’ve talked about this album so many times that the Redux only felt natural. His advice was everything once we got going though. I wasn’t even going to re-do the bass until Grant told me it sounded like I’d recorded through a potato. I knew a lot more what I was doing this time so it was a lot less of the technical aspect you might expect.
He was like a therapist–producer-engineer hybrid. He always asked, “What are you really going for here? Don’t tell me what you think, tell me what you feel.” Things like that. It was helpful. Sometimes you feel manipulated or guided when someone else comes in, but Grant helped me find the things I’d always wanted to do.
What are your high points and low points you've experienced within your musical career so far?
I don’t like to think of high and low points when it comes to this beautiful nightmare that is Aiwass. Highs? All of it, even the lows. Touring, writing, recording, playing live. Meeting people all over the country, the world. Hearing new sounds all the time and being able to be influenced by them and put them into action. Lows? All of it, even the highs. The collapse of the first lineup was definitely hard. But the whole thing is a cathartic exercise. None of it is pleasant per se. It’s just all necessary.
We all know that Austin, Texas has a vibrant and huge Rock/Metal scene. However, does this allow you to perform gigs on a regular basis and do you have a local scene that you're actively involved with?
Luckily, Aiwass has an incredible new lineup. They’re eager to show what they’ve got and I’m eager to keep hitting the stage with them. It’s a constantly evolving life form, Aiwass as a live entity that is. Luckily, the Austin scene is incredible. The venues are really accommodating, really supportive.
We’ve been able to enmesh ourselves in that relatively quickly and hopefully it will only keep growing. Texas and more specifically Austin are my home and have been about half my life. I plan to keep it that way. I want to of course play all over the state, the country, the fucking world for that matter. But it’s important to me to support the area I live in. We have some really great shows coming up and couldn’t be more excited. Fuck keeping Austin weird. Keep it heavy.
Will you be performing any gigs to promote the upcoming album locally or further afield.
Who knows about further afield. We’ll see what happens. But you can be pretty confident that, in the coming months, you’ll hear versions of the redux songs live. Our goal is to bring fresh takes to somewhat older “classics” in the catalog. We want to bring this to as many places as we can. You know where to find us.
Before you go, do you have any words of wisdom for your new and potential fans out there.
Listen closely, listen deeply, listen with an open heart. Love strongly, hate passionately but with a clear conscience. And do as thou wilt shall be the whole of law.
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