Rebirth by Blasphemy

Jamie “Athenar” Walters started his Cleveland-based speed metal band, Midnight, back in 2003. Inspired by Venom, classic ’80s metal and obscure underground extremities, he unleashed a firestorm of singles, EPs and compilations—playing all the instruments himself on each recording—before dropping his first proper full-length, Satanic Royalty, in 2011. But touring wasn’t high on his list of priorities until recently. “I had my little thing of just doing 15 shows a year, and I was good with that,” he tells Apple Music. “But now I’m on the back nine of life, so we might as well accept some gigs. I’ll continue to do the same thing musically, but at least let’s get out there if there’s people who want to hear the stuff live in different countries, different cities. It beats sitting around the house.” Midnight's fourth LP in a sprawling discography, Rebirth by Blasphemy delivers some of Midnight’s most infectious and triumphant metal yet. Below, Athenar takes us track by track through its ten killer cuts. F*****g Speed and Darkness “At first the title was just going to be ‘Speed and Darkness’, but I just thought that was too generic. So I had to add a little offensive adjective in there. It’s about my transformation from being a 10-year-old listening to Twisted Sister and Mötley Crüe and then discovering that next step of Slayer, Metallica and those kind of extreme bands. It’s the next level of speed and darkness. You want it faster; you want it more evil, more aggressive. So it’s about remembering the first time you heard that type of music and keeping it with you.” Rebirth by Blasphemy “The title suggests that it may be something positive, like a rebirth or a refreshening, like something kind of joyous and New Agey. But in actuality, it was just written on one of those negative days that we all have, where not only do you not even want to get out of bed, but it’s like, ‘Why even leave the birth canal?’ And unbeknownst to me, there’s a James Bond kind of guitar riff in