Email interview with Count Seth, Becoming the Archetype
December 24, 2005

Becoming The Archetype, formed in the summer of 1999, the group formerly known as The Remnant, caught Solid State’s attention in the summer of 2004 while playing a festival with Demon Hunter, a band whose members also work at the label. Members include Jon (Guitar), Wisdom (Bass, Vocals), Sean (Guitar), Duck (Drums/Vocals) and Seth (Guitar).
These guys are as real as they are talented! If you have not picked up their debut album then you should be embarrassed! You can check out our review here.

Dennis: The last time we spoke for an interview was back in March and you had just announced you were signing with SolidState. How has the transition been with the label and how has it been working with them?
Count Seth: We are positively thrilled to be working with Solid State and more specifically, Ryan Clark. The fact that they gave five young guys like us a chance to do this is very exciting for us. They put up plenty of money for us to make a quality album and have now worked out European distribution, which we are very happy with. Our experiences so far make us very proud and thankful to be on the label and ready to defend them from people who act like they know something and want to talk negatively about something they don't know about.

Dennis: Everything about your debut album, Terminate Damnation, is as intense as it can be. What inspired the concept of the album?
Count Seth: The main thing that inspired that concept was our getting sick and tired of the hardcore and metalcore that we've been hearing all over the place recently. The heavy Christian scene is saturated with pansy emo singing, tons of breakdowns and boring riffs and we thought, "Hey, there's better music to be made and even if it doesn't market well or sell well, we can do it for integrity's sake." We are all into many types of music, but if we're listening to heavy music, it's generally, Extol, Nile, Opeth, bands like that. We're not interested in making music that only involves playing chords and switching from verse to chorus back to verse and so on. We wanted to make an intense album, so we did and we're thankful to Solid State and for allowing us to do that and believing in us.

Dennis: The artwork is also something worth talking about. Tell us about the artist and the story behind that.
Count Seth: That is a quite interesting story. When we decided the album would be named "Terminate Damnation", we told Ryan we'd like a painting with angels and demons battling each other, so he suggested Dan Seagrave. We became very excited because Dan has done album covers for such great bands as Suffocation, Morbid Angel, and lots of other brutal bands. So Ryan contacted him and gave him our idea, and Dan replied that yeah, he could paint some demons impaling angels and putting angel heads on stakes. So we had a good laugh and wrote back that we were thinking more along the lines of an even battle that represented ongoing spiritual warfare. Dan is not a Christian and I don't think he had painted for a Christian band before so he assumed we would want something pretty evil looking, but he came through with something much better than we had expected.

Dennis: The last several months have been about tests and trials. After having so much problems with your vehicle and missing many shows, how has this impacted the bands focus and how do you look at the spiritual war as an aspect of what BTA is going through?
Count Seth:  Well, a couple months into touring, we realized we were pretty much the only American Christian metal band that toured and we thought that was pretty neat at the time. After awhile, we figured out why. It seems that bold Christian lyrics are not so popular and although we did it for integrity, we started judging other bands' lyrics less and less because it's nearly impossible to really do what you believe in and still be successful enough to do well. We did have many vehicle mishaps on this last tour (which was a great tour: Agony Scene and Nodes are great guys and we met awesome people every night), and that's always a bummer. The reality of the situation, though, is that there are spiritual forces at work behind everything, working for us and some working against us. Jesus said we would have trials and we are glad for the chance to learn patience and be prodded toward our mark which is His righteousness. We know these trials only last a certain amount of time and the Holy Spirit has taught us faith in a Saviour that never fails, not even when we do.

Dennis: Since the problems, you guys have even had to go back and do you regular jobs and take awhile off from touring. Will the band be working on new music during that time? If so, when do you hope to have another album released?
Count Seth: Well, for the next few months, it won't seem to fans like we're doing much because we won't be touring extensively and we won't be recording, but during January through April, the band will be very busy strengthening our foundation. Yes, we'll be writing for our second album which we are hoping to record in fall of '06 (hoping to be released either late '06 or early '07. Also, we'll be working to recoup personal money lost in the last few months and figuring out a permanent vehicle situation so that we can tour in the summer. We'll also be playing shows here in the southeast on several weekends, so you'll still be able to see us live if you're a southern boy (or girl). And on top of that, we're planning to shoot a video in coming months, so we'll be quite busy both personally and with the band.

Dennis: I saw your album was picked up by Abacus Recordings and released in Europe just a few weeks ago. Have you heard much feedback and how did that come about?
Count Seth: Solid State Records worked out a licensing deal with Abacus so that our album and a few others could be distributed in Europe, which is very exciting for us. When we toured with Extol, they told us that Europe would likely be very appreciative of our style and we're hoping that's true. We don't know how we've sold for the first two weeks, but just the fact that it's over there opens opportunities for touring Europe, which would be sweet. We want as many people as possible to hear our music and our prayer is that God would use the music and lyrics to speak to souls and help them. We love people and that is what really drives us to make music, so that fact that our album can now be heard by European ears really blesses us.

Dennis: If you could collaborate with any musician ever (regardless as to whether this musician is alive or not), who would it be?
Count Seth: For me personally, it'd be either Ben Folds because of his ability to be creative with so many different instruments or it'd be Christopher Parkening because I know he has collaborated with many other musicians before and his Classical guitar skills and understanding of music are beyond description. I think if the band were to pick, we'd choose the Undeceived lineup with Extol or the old Embodyment lineup to work with.

Dennis: So much controversy still lies with the concept of Christian metal or death metal. I have gotten numerous emails from non-Christians saying death metal and other extreme styles such as yourself can not be Christian due to the brutality and aggression behind it. I have tried to explain music can not be Christian or non. How has your music crossed boundaries by bridging a gap between both sets of fans?
Count Seth: Well, I guess there's a lot of ways to look at this, so I'll explain how I personally look at it. God is the author of everything and when He made man in His image, I think that means, among other things, that He gave man His creative spark, so that man has the ability to create. So when I listen to even satanic bands, I know that the good art being made is ultimately because of God and reflects His creative nature. We hope that Christians will view our music that way. In that way, the music we make does not sound all that different from secular music even though it is made with completely different intentions, just like Christian pop doesn't sound that different from secular pop or Christian rap from secular rap, etc. Now you can definitely make a division between the lyrics and the music if you want, and in that case, our lyrics are definitely written with the intention of helping people. Jason (bass, vocals) writes lyrics about the struggles of life and the death that exists in the world. The only way to change or be helped is to see the truth and we want to speak about reality and show the world as it really is. We want people to see that they are sinful and live in a sinful world and see that the only victory to be had is in the Man, Christ Jesus. We know this because of personal experience and want to help others because we love them. The only help we can offer is the truth of love: the love of God. So, in that sense, while our music itself cannot be called Christian or otherwise, our intention and lyrics seek to encourage and strengthen Christians in their convictions and show non Christians love and truth.
As far as brutality, it has never made sense to me the thought that Christians aren't supposed to be brutal. If Christ had not been brutal, He wouldn't have brought a sword and fire. He wouldn't have descended into the depths of hell and battled victoriously over the forces of evil. Michael wouldn't have waged war and hurled Lucifer from heaven. When are Christians not supposed to be brutal? I guess when they've been castrated by the church, they shouldn't be brutal and that is when wickedness prevails and death reigns.

Dennis: What has been the most spiritually motivating event since the release of Terminate Damnation?
Count Seth: We always share our faith at our shows and invite anyone who so desires to come back and talk to us afterward at our merch table. Sometimes people take us up on the offer and ask us to pray with them about struggles in their lives or explain to them our faith and those moments remind us that there is so much more to what we do than selling CD's or making money. Now of course, if we don't make some kind of money, we can't continue to do what we do, but if God truly wants us to do this, there will always be provision from somewhere and our energy can be focused on loving people and do things like praying with them and sharing the love of Christ with them. Any of those moments at shows could be the most spiritually motivating and as long as that continues to happen, we'll do whatever we can to continue this band and continue making music that we believes glorifies Jehovah.

Dennis: We haven't announced at this time that our clothing line, SIAN Clothing, will officially be sponsoring you guys this next year. I just wanted to say thank you so much and I can not wait to be working with you guys more. 
Count Seth: Yes, we also are excited about it. I remember at Cornerstone this year, you guys gave Jon (guitar) a shirt and I think he wore it every day there in Illinois. When we get those rad shirts, I'll be wearing them often and showin off them SIAN designs. We've met lots of great people because of the band and we thank God for people like you who use their artistic ability to create things worth viewing. God bless ya'll and we'll see all ya'll in '06!