Barren Path will release their first album, Grieving, on October 31 through Willowtip Records. There is one important catch, which is that the band is a veritable murderers’ row of genre veterans. Between its five members, you’ve got over a century of grindcore experience that has been conveniently distilled into 13-and-a-half minutes of blistering sonic mayhem.
Most grind fans will recognize guitarist Takafumi Matsubara and drummer Bryan Fajardo as two of Gridlink’s founding members. During the twilight years of that band, Mauro Cordoba joined on bass for the final studio album, and guitarist Rory Kobzina rounded out the lineup in time for a trio of live performances in 2023 (documented in full by the legendary Frank Huang). Together, these four form the instrumental foundation of Barren Path. Joining them on vocals is Mitchell Luna, who had previously played with Fajardo in Noisear, Mauro in Maruta and Shock Withdrawal, and Matsubara on Strange, Beautiful and Fast. Now that they’re all on one album, it almost feels like these five have been sparring with each other all their lives, training for this exact moment.
I reached out to Barren Path to chat about the group’s formation, the writing of their debut album, and influences (past and present) that set them on this…well, you can finish that sentence for yourself.
–Alex Chan
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It’s around the release of Coronet Juniper that our story officially begins. Matsubara and Fajardo had begun sketching out ideas for the next Gridlink album. “They wanted to write something more Amber Gray/Orphan style,” Luna explains. “Before that could come to fruition, they had some creative differences with Jon Chang (vocalist) and Gridlink disbanded. They reached out to me to work vocals for the material that they started to write, but we would make it an entirely new project. I, of course, couldn’t turn it down.”
The timing couldn’t have been more perfect for the remaining members of Gridlink. A remix compilation of Amber Gray and Orphan, aptly titled Perfect Amber, was already in the works, featuring new guitar and bass tracks from Matsubara, Kobzina, and Cordoba. Adding Luna to the mix completed the picture, though Luna reflects that his unique position as the “new guy” initially made it difficult to find his footing: “For the longest time, everyone else in the band was just calling this project ‘Mitchlink’, and it was getting to me.”
Nevertheless, the band had a full lineup now, so progress on the album could begin in earnest. Matsubara and Fajardo acted as primary songwriters–after all, the seeds of Grieving were planted with their desire to return to the devastating aggression of albums past–but it was when all of the other members’ parts started to click into place that the album came to life. Matsubara recalls how the tracks took shape: “Bryan and I recorded together, and then we sent the files to Rory and Mauro. Where their guitar and bass contributions were incorporated and mixed in, I thought it was my proudest moment…and I think my riffs made Mitch’s lyrics stronger. That was my proudest contribution.”
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Matsubara jokes that his greatest inspirations remain “cats, karate and Tony Iommi”, but this doesn’t sound so far-fetched when you’re on the receiving end of one of his trademark riff barrages. There is both violence and grace in Matsubara’s playing that, when supercharged by Cordoba’s and Kobzina’s agile harmonies and framed by Fajardo’s atomically precise blasting, accomplishes what your humble narrator can only describe as time dilation. Grieving is under 14 minutes long, but its tracks unfold like Kenshiro’s hundred-hand strikes from Fist of the North Star: by the time you’re capable of processing what just happened, you’re already dead.
This approach was perfect for Luna, who loves grindcore that sounds like “sharp, calculated, precise knife attacks”. His first favorite grind bands were Assück and Discordance Axis, and once he started to dig deeper, he found himself drawn further into this world. “I really found a lot of inspiration from the late 90’s/Early 2000’s Pittsburgh death/grind scene…Commit Suicide, Circle of Dead Children, stuff like that was very influential to my approach when I was first getting involved with this kind of music.”
Luna describes Barren Path as leaning more towards the metallic side of grindcore, asserting that “everyone in Barren Path is way more of a metal musician than a punk musician. Grind is usually either more punk, or more metal leaning, [and] we are all from the world of the metal discipline.” And discipline is certainly a key word there. “Everyone involved in Barren Path takes their role in the band very seriously,” he added. “We all take pride in being proficient players.”
You can hear this in the staccato whiplash of “Whimpering Echo” and “Subversion Record”, the sci-fi spoken word segment on “Isolation Wound” set against a backdrop of spiralling tech-thrash, and the melodic black metal riff on “Lunar Tear” that erupts from the suffocating murk like a cloud of bats taking flight. Luna loves being in bands like this, with musicians who “sprinkle in a bit of innovation or technicality, even if it’s taking tiny bits and pieces from other genres and incorporating it into the main ‘grindcore recipe’ […] I think it’s important to always try to make things sound a bit different or craft your own sound, even if it’s only 20% or so of the formula. The mission statement is always: a sound that attempts to be somewhat original while still keeping it rooted in grindcore.”
Ironically, this focus on the music meant that when recording was finished, the band still didn’t have a name. The “Mitchlink” inside joke had run its course–no band ever wants to be overshadowed by its members’ past exploits. Thankfully, inspiration struck when Luna took a step back. “In the end, I just looked at all of the lyrics from the songs I wrote, and pulled ‘Barren Path’ from a line. It was right there in front of me the entire time, I just never realized it.”
Thank you so much to Mitchell Luna and Takafumi Matsubara for their time!
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Grieving is out October 31st on Willowtip Records.
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For you lovely readers who made it all the way to the end, here’s some bonus interview content that didn’t quite fit into the main body of the piece. Enjoy!
Who or what are some artists that people should be paying more attention to right now?
Mitchell: Triage is a sick grindcore band from Texas (Bryan Fajardo also plays with them, so maybe a slightly biased answer). It’s 3/4 of the members of Kill The Client and they play a very similar style
Teeth from Long Beach, CA plays dissonant Gorguts-style death metal. I saw them live a few times recently, and they were quite mind-blowing
Fake Dust from Portland, absolutely crushing grindcore. Their vocalist has insane range and puts me to shame.
I am still listening to Dearth from Whoresnation regularly, even though it was released in 2022. Honestly, one of the best bands in the genre right now.
And I guess since I already plugged one of Bryan’s other bands, I will say check out the Shock Withdrawal album that came out last year. This is shameless of me to self-promote, but I am proud of it and I want it to be heard, haha.
Is there any other interesting information about the band or album that you want to put out there?
Takafumi: Please look forward to the second album!
