Enter The Grave - Recording

Recording

On 18 October 2006, Earache Records announced that it had signed a record contract with Evile. Looking for a producer for their debut album, the band decided to send a request by email to producer Flemming Rasmussen "for a laugh"; Rasmussen had previously produced three Metallica albums; 1984's Ride the Lightning, 1986's Master of Puppets, and 1988's ...And Justice for All. Lead vocalist / rhythm guitarist Matt Drake googled Rasmussen's name, and the first result returned was the producer's official website. Drake emailed Rasmussen asking if he would be interested. The producer replied a few days later, asking "Send me some of the tracks over". Drake emailed a number of mp3, but Rasmussen did not reply, leading Drake to worry that the producer "hated them, and thought they were shit." Earache Records subsequently emailed Rasmussen to formally ask if he would produce Evile's debut album, to which Rasmussen replied, "Yes". On 12 March 2007, his involvement was made public. Pre-production with Rasmussen began on 28–29 April at Evile's Huddersfield, West Yorkshire rehearsal space. Soon after the band performed a live set at Tottenham Court Road, London's Fopp store, which Rasmussen attended to observe Evile's live sound, and "further gain a feel" for the group's music. The album was recorded and mixed at Sweet Silence Studios, Copenhagen, Denmark. Enter the Grave was produced, engineered, mixed and mastered by Rasmussen, who also supplied additional backing vocals to title track "Enter the Grave". Anders H. Mortensen, meanwhile, acted as assistant engineer. Photographs taken during the album's recording sessions were posted at Evile's official MySpace blog, where fans were also invited to ask the band's members questions about the recording process for Enter the Grave.

In turn, Evile's guitarists went into a room where another person sat with a microphone, ready to capture the sound. From the control room, Rasmussen would say "Right, play something". The respective guitarist would play his instrument, to which Rasmussen would respond "Right, move it left". Moving the guitar left, the respective guitarist would play again, Rasmussen replying with "Move it right. Alright, leave it there. Don't touch it". The respective guitarist would leave his instrument in that position, and the "record" button would be pressed. From there, the musician in question would play his parts. A Mesa Boogie Dual Rectifier amplifier was tested alongside a Marshall amplifier, but according to Drake, "the Mesa (sound) was nowhere near as good". Evile chose to record Enter the Grave's guitar parts using a Marshall amplifier, and spent "roughly ten minutes" attempting to achieve "a decent sound". "A bit longer" was spent testing the drums so that a "nice" sound could be achieved, and so that the drums could be tuned. By 5 June, recording for Enter the Grave had been completed, and Rasmussen had begun mixing the album. Video footage shot during recording sessions was uploaded to Earache Records' official YouTube account on 4 July, providing an exclusive glimpse behind the scenes. In reviewing Enter the Grave, some journalists commented on Rasmussen's role as producer. Chris Kee of Zero Tolerance Magazine said that "getting Flemming Rasmussen to produce is a major coup and as you'd expect he's done a sterling job, these fine songs all being blessed with a clean, crisp, uncluttered sound", whereas Ian Webster of Terrorizer felt that "booking a band into Sweet Silence Studios in Copenhagen to record their debut with legendary Metallica producer Flemming Rasmussen is one hell of a statement of intent from Earache." Eduardo Rivadavia of Allmusic also commented on Rasmussen's involvement, declaring that his production "is surely one large reason why the album is characterized by a distinctively crunchy, rhythmically airtight attack."