Grindcore powerhouse use lockdown to strengthen an already ridiculous lineup
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BY KEVIN STEWART-PANKO
ith members spread across the south and northeast U.S., England, Sweden, Chile and Spain’s Basque region, it’s only appropriate that the genesis for the latest lineup and album by grind supergroup Lock Up was kickstarted in Berlin, one of Europe’s most cosmopolitan and artist-friendly cities. ¶ “On the Campaign for Musical Destruction Tour in early 2020, Misery Index was touring with Napalm Death, Rotten Sound and Eyehategod,” begins drummer Adam Jarvis (of Baltimore). “At the Berlin show, we were backstage shooting the shit with [bassist] Shane [Embury, of Birmingham] who was telling us that [ex-drummer] Nick [Barker] wasn’t feeling it anymore and was out, and that he didn’t know what they were going to do… unless I wanted to play drums. I was like, ‘It’s that easy, huh?’ Plus, he was talking about getting [co-vocalist] Tomas [Lindberg, of Gothenburg] back in the band. So, in the course of a 15-minute conversation, I was in Lock Up.” 24 : J AAPN RU I LA 2R0Y2210:2D2 E: CDI B EC E ILB E L
With everyone locked down—or up—as COVID-19 worked its infectious black magic around the globe, the newly-minted lineup got to work on the band’s fifth album, The Dregs of Hades. This work involved guitarist Anton Reisenegger (of both Santiago and San Sebastian) and Embury sending various formations of riffs and songs to Jarvis, who would hash them out at his practice spot, devising rhythm patterns and beats, arranging and rearranging the raw material so it was smoothed out enough for the vocal duo to do their own back and forth about who was going to do what, how and when. “Once we got the songs, Tompa and I would work out what we wanted to do and what songs we wanted to work on,” explains co-vocalist
