Local headbangers can rejoice as Athens metal icons, Skeletonwitch, come home for a show at The Union Saturday night after releasing their new album, Forever Abomination.
The heavy metal genre has been broken into vast numbers of sub-genres since it came into popularity in the 1970s. Nearly all of these labels have been attached to Skeletonwitch since the group formed in early 2003.
For guitarist Scott Hedrick, there’s no need to pigeonhole the band’s sound. Hedrick joked that the band’s favorite band is Skeletonwitch, not out of arrogance, but because it plays the music its members want to hear.
“We just prefer to call it heavy metal,” Hedrick said. “We pull from many different styles of the genre.”
Hedrick and the rest of the group members have shared the stage with some of their biggest influences and contemporaries over the past couple of years.
The band spent the summer of 2010 on tour with Ozzfest, supporting heavy metal legends Rob Halford, Ozzy Osbourne, and Black Label Society.
Skeletonwitch was also handpicked to support punk and metal godfather Glenn Danzig on his “Blackest of the Black Tour” in 2008. The band is also gearing up for its fifth trek to Europe and will eventually end up in Japan.
Along with promoting themselves on large world tours, the members of Skeletonwitch have been able to reach audiences through other outlets. The band’s music has been featured on widely-played video games, such as Rock Band and Brutal Legend, and the band recently graced the cover of Decibel magazine.The group’s song “Bringers of Death” was also featured on a video for Adult Swim.
“We were contacted out of the blue for these projects,” Hedrick said. “It wasn’t even something that was involved with the record company.”
No matter their level of success, the members of Skeletonwitch have not lost sight of the city where it all began. Both guitarists of the band, Hedrick and Nate Garnette, were once students at Ohio University. Hedrick graduated in 2006 with a degree in journalism. Hedrick and the guys also hold a high level of sentimental value to Athens’ own, The Union.
“I actually still work at The Union sometimes when we’re not on tour,” Hedrick said.
The band has played countless gigs at the venue and finds it a more than fitting spot to host a homecoming show.
Skeletonwitch will not be coming back home empty-handed. With the release of the band’s new album, its members hope that fans will appreciate their attempt to take their music to the next level.
“We upped the ante all across the board on this new record,” Hedrick said. “We had a really good producer who did a great job of getting us the sound we wanted.”
ap338210@ohiou.edu
What: Skeletonwitch
When: 9 p.m. Saturday
Where: The Union, 18 W. Union St.
Admission: $7
