Hi! Nephasto began when Luana asked if I'd like to start a side project with her in 2023. We'd talked online mostly and then met in person when she was on tour opening for Morbid Angel that spring. We sent some riffs and ideas back and forth and once we saw that we were aligning creatively I sent a couple of unused completed (sans vocals) demos of songs to her that I had initially written for Chthonic Deity. One of those was what ended up being "Deformed Deviation". I really liked her instinct on what beats to play throughout the song. It became clear where vocal placements should be so I started working on that after receiving her drum track. I knew she was going be touring the US in 2024 and we decided to try to get together to record. We initially thought we'd have a week or so in the studio, but it ended up being only a couple of days of availability for her. Rather than have the pressure of capturing 2 or more original songs in a small window without ever playing in the same room together, we decided to do a cover along with "Deformed Deviation". She got dropped off the night after her tour ended, we rehearsed for a couple of hours the next day and then she tracked drums the following day. I recorded the guitars, bass and vocals the day after that. Arthur mixed and mastered it remotely and that was it.

I've known Arthur for a while and had wanted to work with him. He's worked with Luana previously in a remote setting as well. It was a very immediate and obvious decision for us to choose him to produce the record and luckily, he was willing and available to do so. I ran into him a couple of times after booking the dates with him and sent over our pre-production demos for both songs so he would have a good idea of what we were going for and he quite clearly nailed it.

Arthur is extremely focused and efficient in the studio all while having a casual temperament. I had a lot on my plate to finish and he never made me feel rushed. We're really happy with how it sounds. He did an amazing job.

Although we're currently a studio band, we do intend to play live and will add a couple of live guitarists since I prefer to play bass (especially when I also have vocal duties).

Luana was the one that initiated the start of the band. I think she possibly wanted another outlet for her style to evolve and expand? Maybe she was just curious to see what would result in collaborating with me? I'm not sure exactly... Ha! Neither one of us expect this to become a main band that tours a lot, but we still want to write more and play when we can.

I actually wrote that intro riff at the Autopsy practice space in Oakland in 2017. I spent a lot of time at the O.M.C. (Oakland Music Complex) when I lived in the Bay Area, sometimes having up to 3 different rooms to rehearse in for different groups at a time, so it's a place I definitely feel comfortable and creative in. I had already moved to L.A. a year prior, but was in town to rehearse with Chris Reifert for Painted Doll and spent some extra time in the room noodling around on guitar. I captured it on my phone and built off of it for a few more years. I try to let a song idea lead me where it needs to go rather than force something that doesn't sound like it fits. Sometimes it happens easily and sometimes it takes years of fine tuning for me.

As for the Demigod cover, we had a few songs from other bands on the table, but we both agreed that this one would be a good fit for us. "Slumber of Sullen Eyes" is an impeccable album. It's one I never get tired of and it continues to inspire me. They actually tune a full step lower than we do so we had to pitch a digital recording a step up so I could learn the parts. It's an absolutely deadly song and we wanted to pay homage to some of the best to ever do it.

I saw the cover art posted online and inquired about purchasing it maybe a half a year or so before Nephasto started to really take shape. When it came time for me to write lyrics I used the art as inspiration. I had an immediate idea for it. The perspective for this song is from someone being stalked and ultimately killed by this deformed, jagged, stench ridden, rotting deviation of a creature. Their senses describe the way it looks, smells and feels like during a sort of out of body experience during their mortal confrontation.

Oh, definitely. I have some rough demos of songs as well as segments that need to be completed for the full-length. Now that the single is out and tour season is mostly over, we should have a little more time to give it some attention in 2026. Luana's touring schedule has been so extensive that there hasn't been much progress with rest of the material, but we are both determined and motivated to complete the next step and have an LP released so we can play live eventually. This band requires some patience though. It's ultimately a side project with 2 busy people in different parts of the world. We don't want to rush to put anything out before we are satisfied with its end result. It has to feel cohesive and represent us properly.

I've had a few releases on ERP and David is an old friend of mine whom I've worked with on different levels including touring with and hosting his band Undergang in the US as well as performing at multiple fests he's put on in Copenhagen. We've run into each other all over the world and his record shop in Denmark is a landmark as far as I'm concerned. He's a diehard death metal guy and the first person I asked if he would be interested in working with us. He's very fair to work with, and has integrity. ERP exists for the people that dedicate their lives to this rotten entity of extreme metal.

500 copies were pressed and we've had a pretty significant response from people so far. Its purpose is to gain some interest for when we release a full album and I think it's doing that.

Out the bands you've mentioned, I'd say Chthonic Deity is the only one with any shows on the horizon... and we haven't played in about 6 years. We're getting together in late January of 2026 to play in Denver and Colorado Springs. We don't have anything planned after that though. That's another band that's hard to schedule so I think we'll just stick to trying to find gaps in everyone's touring schedule to play a few times and have a good time together.

I've played a few tours with Mortuous, but nothing in over a year. I think they'll probably want to release another record before touring again. One of the guitarists was in a motorcycle accident recently and his recovery will take a while. He's been making a lot of progress though and just started playing guitar a little bit.

Acephalix hasn't played since 2022 when "Theothanatology" was released. They recorded a record in early 2025 but I wasn't able to be involved in writing or recording with my schedule.

Scolex is definitely in a long term hiatus. That was really the band where I began writing and able to reach some early milestones with. I self-released a MLP entitled "Torn from Beyond" for in what would have been 2012 if I didn't have to reject the first test pressing. It came out in January of 2013 instead, just in time for us to hit the road with Necrot and Undergang about a month later. We played for a couple more years and then slipped into a hiatus until 2018 when we did a west coast tour and performed at Kill Town Death Fest in Copenhagen as our final show. We have no current plans to hit the stage again, but you never know...

Chthonic Deity is a band that I formed with Charlie Koryn in 2013. We wrote 4 songs pretty quickly and then put it on pause when I recruited him to play drums in Necrosic (a band based in Oakland featuring Eric Cutler, Sean McGrath and Christian La Rocca). We released a MLP on Nuclear War Now! Productions in 2016 and performed twice with our final show being California Death Fest later that year before we fell into obscurity. That's when Charlie and I decided to revisit the songs we had worked on years before and pursue Chthonic Deity.

To be honest, it took me a while to get used to the scene here. I moved from California in 2018. I felt like the Bay Area was more of a music hot spot where everyone stops there on tour and the practice space is overflowing with people you know every single day. You could hang out with them when you run into each other in the hallways or have a random jam. At some point there was even a mini venue in there where we had free shows. Everything changes though, and I know I just have very fond memories of my time there.

A lot of routing skips Denver because it's sort of like a landlocked island. Long drives surround us and seasons definitely affect travel conditions making shows I'm interested in sparse at times. That being said, everyone was welcoming when I moved here. Denver has a lot of musicians and its own community within. Every city functions differently anyway. It's just a matter of getting used to it and finding a way you can contribute. It took me a couple of years to settle in and find my way here.

The last concert I went to was Death to All, Gorguts and Phobophilic. I actually saw them twice on their most recent tour. Once in Denver and then my husband and I drove to Albuquerque where we saw them play in a much more intimate venue. It was awesome and we're friends with people in each band so it was nice to see them more than once in a year. Gorguts was so tight with their new(ish) drummer and they even played new material which was very exciting. Death to All was also amazing. Max Phelps does such a great job filling Chuck Schuldiner's shoes. It's pretty unreal to see him channeling him. The whole line up is just crushing. I always like watching Steve DiGiorgio play, especially with the Trident! playing Death songs on a 3 string bass is just such a flex.

Thanks so much for contacting me for this interview. I'm so proud of how Nephasto sounds and am glad to know that it's being listened to all over the world. Thanks for listening!!!