KILLSWITCH ENGAGE Guitarist Discusses Project Featuring CANNIBAL CORPSE Singer, Future Of TIMES OF GRACE

KILLSWITCH ENGAGE guitarist Adam Dutkiewicz was the special guest on the May 18 edition of the "Metal Injection Livecast" (web site). During the laid-back interview, Adam answered silly questions about working out, bus routines and video games. Adam also took some questions from listeners, which is when things got serious, especially when asked about his long-discussed side project with CANNIBAL CORPSE's George "Corpsegrinder" Fisher on vocals and former THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER drummer Shannon Lucas. Asked for a status update, Adam said: "Corpsey [George Fisher] is actually coming up the first week of June to hopefully finish the vocals on the project… We'll get the rest of the vocals down and hopefully I'll get it mixed by… I think we have some time off in July, so hopefully I'll mix it in July and get it done by then and mastered. As far as a release date, I don't know because there is a lot of red tape. I think you can't release a record until like six months after a member releases theirs, and I know that there's a new CANNIBAL record coming out soon so it might have to be stalled up for a little bit but at least it will be done, you know?"

Adam also spoke about the future of TIMES OF GRACE, the project he launched several years ago with current KILLSWITCH ENGAGE frontman Jesse Leach before the singer rejoined the group. Adam said: "That is kind of on the backburner right now, because we're so busy with this KILLSWITCH bullshit. So as soon as this stuff kind of slows down, I'm probably gonna try to write some more music [for TIMES OF GRACE]. And, yeah, it's just another outlet. [We'll] make it a little different than KILLSWITCH…"

Regarding how he can differentiate between which musical ideas to use for KILLSWITCH ENGAGE and which to set aside for TIMES OF GRACE, Adam said: "Yeah, it's a little different now [than it was when we released the TIMES OF GRACE debut album, 'The Hymn Of A Broken Man', in 2011]. I think we're gonna have to separate it a bit more [now that Jesse has rejoined KILLSWITCH]. The other record was more so, just like, whatever it was it was, and now I think we're gonna go on the less-metal-more-rock side for that project. Since it already had elements of the rock and roll in it, we're gonna kind of keep the faster, more aggressive stuff for the KILLSWITCH project and then maybe the more rock and roll stuff more for the TIMES OF GRACE thing."

Dutkiewicz last year told Decibel magazine about how his project with Lucas and Fisher came together. "When [KILLSWITCH] toured with CANNIBAL CORPSE and BLACK DAHLIA on the [Rockstar Energy Drink] Mayhem [Festival], I was just hanging out with George one night, and I was like, 'Dude, if I wrote you a bunch of songs to sing over, would you do it?' And he was like, 'Fuck yeah, man!'" he said.

Asked if this was material he had sitting around that he thought George would be good for, or if these were songs that were written specifically for George to sing, Adam said: "They were written specifically for him. He's one of my favorite singers of all time, and I thought there wouldn't be any harm in at least asking him. Once he said yes, it was like, 'Alright — let's go!'"

Regarding the musical direction of the new project, Adam said: "It's not straight death metal — there's some melodic elements in there — but it's much faster and more aggressive than KILLSWITCH is. And the drums are blazing, so Shannon is probably one of the only guys on the face of the earth who could pull this off."