Post Death Soundtrack, the musical project of Stephen Moore, recently unveiled his fifth album, IN ALL MY NIGHTMARES I AM ALONE, a 30-track collection of songs ranging across the stylistic spectrum, including rock, Gothic rock, industrial, industrial metal, alternative, post-punk, acoustic, darkwave, metal, doom, avant-garde, and electronic.
Prior albums from Post Death Soundtrack include Music As Weaponry, The Unlearning Curve, It Will Come out of Nowhere, and last year’s Veil Lifter. The latter album, a blend of brutal doom and grunge, is ferociously compelling.
Talking about IN MY NIGHTMARES I AM ALL ALONE, Moore says, “This album is in some ways a complete breakdown in audio format. I find it beautiful and powerful to express what often is not acknowledged or communicated. I learned that from Kurt Cobain and I’m very proud of this work.”
At the present juncture, Moore is putting the finishing touches on his upcoming album, HEL’S MOUTH, a collaboration with Portland artist Casey Braunger. The project is called HE IS ME.
XS Noize caught up with Stephen Moore to discuss the inspiration for IN ALL MY NIGHTMARES I AM ALONE, his creative process, and the significance of the name Post Death Soundtrack.
Can you share the inspiration behind IN ALL MY NIGHTMARES I AM ALONE and the creative process involved in bringing it to life?
‘IN ALL MY NIGHTMARES I AM ALONE’ came from sudden inspiration and trauma. I began producing my own work and learning more about how that would look for me. Life challenges and stressors, from illness, death, addiction, and stigma all played a role in the album’s creation. After discovering the bones of a forgotten album, I initially decided to work on those 13 or so tracks at hand, build on them where necessary. Some were left pure as they were, and others became industrial or avant-garde beasts. Then, after one of my animals passed under less-than-ideal circumstances, I largely stopped sleeping or eating well, stayed up for days at a time, and wrote another full new album over the bones of the old one. Interestingly enough, I also experienced a multi-day waking nightmare during the course of this album that goes by the term Delirium Tremens. So, there are 30 songs going to streaming for this album, and 31, as there is a bonus song on the Bandcamp version. The last song deserves more than being a bonus song, but I needed to stop delaying distribution and let the beast out.
Did your sound evolve naturally, or did you push it in a certain direction?
I have a range of what I know I enjoy and where I can thrive, what I’m personally good at. This collection runs through some of that gamut. Since the ‘found songs’ were largely acoustic and I didn’t want a purely acoustic project, I wrote a bunch of new, more dangerous material that reflected what I was going through at the time. So I pushed the project to get heavier and more so what it had to become.
You’re currently involved in another project, HE IS ME, with Casey Braunger. Together, you’re putting the final touches on a new album. What can you share about the album?
The album is coming out really well and will likely be 15 tracks. It’s going to be called ‘HEL’S MOUTH,’ based somewhat on Norse mythology, so it is an underworld of sorts but not to be confused with Hell. I see it as a final battle or a moment/experience where stakes could not be higher. Casey has meticulously prepared a bunch of brand-new material equally sliced between industrial metal, doom, and ambient. This will be coupled with remastered versions of our prior songs and two covers. It can be expected within 4 months.
How did you get started in music? What’s the back story there?
I started writing music at 15 and recording demos/albums at 16. Artists like Nirvana, Public Enemy, Cypress Hill, Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, Stone Temple Pilots, Nine Inch Nails, Skinny Puppy, and Tool initially inspired me a great deal.
Let’s talk gear for a moment. What kind of guitar do you play?
I play a Gibson SG and a Fender Strat. I use VOX amplifiers and largely pedals from Earthquaker.
Do you use any special recording techniques in the studio?
I try to catch rawness in a bottle, or the pure emotion in a bottle, so I’ll think of something pertaining to the lyrics or themes, or sound that draws on something vast and powerful for me personally. That energy is what tends to project most of all. Everything turns out well if you capture that.
What’s the story behind the name Post Death Soundtrack?
There are two meanings behind it that I like. One is that, after you physically pass, your Post Death Soundtrack is the ripples and energetic footprint you leave with the wider world. Also, I see this as music for those who have died to the false world and are now living in but not of this world.
What can you share about your writing process?
It has become highly intuitive, so I can write a song, come up with lines, fresh writing, any time. Out for a walk, in conversation, from a sign or funny thing I see. Often ideas will come from a new lyric, a guitar riff, a melody that comes to mind and builds spontaneously from there.
What inspires your writing? Pop culture, movies, books, poems, or something else?
Usually real-life situations, relationships, and observations on the nature of the world, but I will cloak this in heavy metaphor, so it reads more like a surrealist painting or something I find interesting.
Which do you enjoy the most: writing, recording, practicing, or playing live?
Writing and recording. Playing live is also very intense and special, but that only comes when you connect with others who are as serious as you are. Those are hard to come by.
What’s your definition of success?
Not buckling. Doing exactly what you feel is your mission and not swaying an inch.
What’s next for Post Death Soundtrack?
Next will likely be another album in this cut-and-paste, eclectic industrial, post-punk, and beyond style that I see as similar to a Molotov cocktail, or a magazine threat tied to a rock and tossed through a window. Then will come the sonic follow-up to the heavy rock/metal approach of ‘Veil Lifter.’
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