Steve Ruff: With all the bands/projects you’ve been involved in, how was it being the sole member of CTD?
Joshua Lory: I had a great time working on the 10 demo songs by myself, playing everything, I got to spend time figuring out my singing voice and what I wanted to do forever. I’ve always been a fan of crooners, that’s how I always sing when I’m alone. The style I was doing in Western Grace is pretty harsh on the vocal chords when you’re not singing like that all the time, and that is tough to do without a band. I never had a group of songs come together so fast. But there was about a year’s worth of study time put into the lyrics. I never prayed so much over an album in my life.
You’ve put out numerous albums of superb quality that run the gamut of styles and genres…what drew you to the horror punk style for this album?
I’ve always loved the musical vibe of Horror Punk, so many great vocalist out there and that’s what I love most about it, guys that care about being singers with recognizable voices. And there’s a huge lack of that in all punk these days. I always love it when punk gets artsy like the Damned, Misfits, Scaterd Few, Bad Brains, and so on. I don’t have to look at who I am listening to, I know because of the singer’s voice. So good singing, not just yelling and being hardcore over that raw punk energy, that’s what I wanted to do.
Did you get your new studio built?
Yes! I love it too! I turned an 8X10 TuffShed into a down to business work place. Sound proof, wood floors, all my gear is crammed in there. There’s enough space to record drums and they actually sound great! I’m also running a new recording program called Presonus Studio 1, I enjoy it far more than ProTools.
I think I can guess, but there are definite influences on here, care to elaborate?
So musically… old Misfits, Ramones, and Iggy Pop also Michale Graves era Misfits, Blitzkid, Grave Robber. Lyrically… Daniel Amos, Crucified, Scaterd Few, Saviour Machine, Ninja Scroll, and Destiny Lab.
How long did it take you to write these songs and get them recorded? What was the writing process like and who did you listen to and read to draw inspiration?
The writing and recording of the first 10 ones took about 3 weeks total, it just flowed, I felt very focused. When the album is released there will be 7 more songs, the old ones are being touched up with better musicians on drums and guitar.
Inspiration came from watching seminars or listening to Internet radio, documentaries, and podcasts by Kent Hovind, Doug Hamp, Rob Skiba, Steve Quayle, Tom Horn, Trey Smith, and a few others. The documentaries Age of Deceit 1 and 2 are really great, a lot of good stuff from the Christian Truth movement. There’s a real coming out of the Matrix feel going on, it’s refreshing. Rob Skiba’s books Babylon Rising and Archon Invasion are great reads. I really delved into the Bible, I have a grasp on the Old Testament like I never had before. Also, the Book of Enoch and Jasher really clear up a lot of things concerning the supernatural world surrounding us. The rap group Destiny Lab and Ninja Scroll were also inspirational.
What is it about the ‘horror’ punk genre that really catches you?
When I first got into it was because I was a horror movie fan and that was about it. I’ve come to realize the genre can be used to talk about real life horror, that’s why I think the Christian Horror Punk scene works so well. We’re coming at you with the brutal reality of this world and giving hope in our savior Christ Jesus.
What do you say to detractors who seem to always believe that this type of music and the visual aspects of this music are less than ‘wholesome’? You know the ones, imagery is evil, etc…
Evil is what you make it. Lucifer was an angel, he will come to you as beauty and light, that’s how he deceives. These same people find the suit and tie respectable dress, but we know the evil that can dwell there. I feel if someone believes evil will come as something ugly and vile, they will be the first deceived by the Antichrist. We as Christians are to fear no evil, so what are they really afraid of? It’s all about being culturally relevant if we want to reach the unsaved. I’m trying to reach people that have let a lot of darkness in their lives, dabbled in witchcraft and the occult and let the demons in. I want to let them know the true freedom they can find in our Father. People those detractors wouldn’t give the time of day.
Having said that, Christian bands really need to study up on symbolism, there’s some straight up creepy occult stuff on so many album covers with no explanation other than the thought it looked cool. We need to make what we have appealing to the world without becoming worldly ourselves. Stop trying to “Christianize” ungodly things, my God will reject it like the golden calf in Exodus. That’s how we get out of the mental aspect of Babylon.
Now I think music is a different thing. Music controls our emotions. Some people think punk and metal is evil because of the feeling it gives them, but I feel relaxed while listening to that style. It’s all about the message of the bands I listen to and it’s getting less and less secular. I’ve got enough Christian music to listen to that, and only that. Now, music that angers me to a violent state is Dave Matthews Band; no joke, my blood boils to that jam band stuff, and it’s supposed to be all about peace and love, so what is it that makes me react that way to that music? Maybe I’ve got a warrior soul and the heavy fast stuff is my beat, maybe someone has a comforting soul and likes something else, I don’t know….
Now, music that angers me to a violent state is Dave Matthews Band; no joke, my blood boils to that jam band stuff, and it’s supposed to be all about peace and love, so what is it that makes me react that way to that music? Maybe I’ve got a warrior soul and the heavy fast stuff is my beat, maybe someone has a comforting soul and likes something else, I don’t know….
Talk to me about the lyrics and what compelled you to write about the subject matter…what are the different themes you take on, and why are those so important in your view? (…I know when we were talking at one point you referenced the lyrics and their meanings, do you think it has come to a point in ‘Christendom’ (or culture as a whole) where people need to be awakened out of their apathy, and ‘blunt’ lyrics are a vehicle to do that?)
First and foremost in my life I started over in a spiritual sense. The Gnosticism and various other philosophies I tried meshing with Christianity were not working. The focus of these things were all on self, me being my own god, not submitting to the one true God of Abraham, Moses, and Joshua. I really got biblical on this, I got supernatural and I try to expose the occult and witchcraft going on behind the scenes of our daily lives. The Great Deception is all encompassing especially in all forms of media. I talk about Nephilim and Fallen Angels, trans-humanism, secret societies, as well as some straight praise and worship songs. There’s a lot going on in a short amount of time.
As far as waking people up, I’m here to plant seeds. I hope something in the lyrics catches the listener’s attention and they start to research and crawl down every rabbit hole. Don’t take my word on anything, look into it for yourself! I’ve come to realize that people come to these things on their own for different reasons and wind up seeing the synchronicity in everything in our lives.
It’s a fact people worship Lucifer, people worship Moloch, and other false gods. They perform all types of heinous acts on children and the innocent. And just as Alister Crowly and Anton LeVay predicted, it’s all coming out in the open. These subjects are important to me because there are people that worship an evil master, the Father of Lies, and these are not just the average metal head or goth kid… these are the famous, the billionaires, and political leaders, people in power and that power came from Satan. People sell their souls and sacrifice their loved ones to gain this power, and the Christian voice is silenced by 501c3 government run churches.
I know I may lose friends over this, but I want to be a biblical Christian, not a worldly one. I do not want to impress the world with joining into whatever PC crap is being pushed by a bunch of Luciferians running the media. You can be a fruitful Christian and still be biblical.
The attitude in this country is sick to me, the attitude of the majority of those claiming Christ sickens me. People are dying because they don’t have food, water, and shelter, every creature on the planet deserves these things. These people aren’t in their situation because they don’t practice “the Secret”, they are there because of tyrannical people running their lives. Now go back and think of all the “progressive” arguments the ‘merican Christian is going on and on about, who gets the cake they want!?!? I’ll tell you who didn’t get cake or anything to eat for that matter, the hungry, the poor, the oppressed! These people are heroes to me surviving day after day under true oppression! It’s 2016, we know how to get clean water, where it needs to go, we know how to grow food naturally in any climate using greenhouses, etc.
I get why God laughs at the enemy, because it’s so much time and work against Him and it’s just going to fail so miserably. I think of all the broken electronics I’ve owned and had to replace, or all the crappy cars I’ve had to constantly maintain, and that’s all Trans-humanism is going to be; you’ll want to die, but be forced to maintain a new type of addiction, Satan loves to create addictions for us. In my opinion we are knee deep in mystery Babylon and people need to know! Worship the Creator, not the creations.
One more thing I want to address is the rise of the occult happening in America, and by the way, this was never, ever a true Christian nation. Again, Christian’s should study symbolism, that’s how the enemy communicates right out in the open. They know the average Joe or Jane are not going to take the time to know what symbols mean. Christians also need to study symbolism to stop using pagan symbols daily in their lives. Can we just stop glorifying and making excuses for evil?!?! These symbols have power, even if you’re not believing in them, they still affect your life and those around you. This is the mystery religions and secrets passed on by the fallen angels. All over our states, especially the east coast, are temples, monuments, statues, etc all glorifying the “gods” and the Pagan deities of old, and so few Christians know about it or even care.
Right now they (NWO) are doing all they can to make true Bible believing followers of Christ Jesus to look like we are slowing their “progress”, and in a sense we are by saying ‘no thanks’ to what they offer. But we’re not stopping them. Our un-involvement should not effect their lives aside from being a little salty and tossing a warning at someone. You’ll never see a Bill Nye or Neil Degrass Tyson saying these monuments to Baal are silly ancient religions that are slowing their “progress”, nope not a word spoken. Why? Because Baal is their worshipful master! Them not doing that or going at any other religion aside from Christianity as a threat, is honestly helping prove the Truth we believe!
Can we get a bit personal? I’ve known you for a long time brother, been with you through many phases of our ever evolving search for truth and knowledge, and I am curious as to where you are in your spiritual beliefs as it relates to the world inside of you, and ultimately, outside of you as well?
Since you know me better and things of my past I won’t talk about in an interview, you’ll be able to understand the huge impact this has had on me. My more liberal friends may like me less and think I’m crazy, and that’s fine, and though I don’t totally align with right wing politics, I find my conservative friends to be more accepting of where my faith lies. My anarchist friends are cool with whatever!
A little over a year ago I went through what I call ‘spiritual rock bottom’. I felt myself being pulled in all directions from my universal beliefs and trying to soak in all the insanity I knew of in the world. I didn’t understand who Adonai is, or who Yeshua is, and I was on a journey of trying to justify every excuse of my worldly ways as I could. My mentality of the Bible being written by flawed men, that there was a God of the Old Testament different from the new, just all this BS coming at me and I went agnostic for a while, maybe Atheist for a week or two, but God wasn’t through with me.
During one of my late night YouTube rabbit hole crawls I came across a video that had some stuff by Kent Hovind. At first, my seasoned programmed mind thought the dude was lame and in the dark ages with his thinking, I didn’t venture far enough into his seminar, but it got me thinking about God in a heavy way. I couldn’t sleep that night and kept thinking about the things he was talking about pertaining to Creation, so I got out of bed and finished the snippet the guy had in his video. I researched more of Hovind’s full videos and that really got me digging into the Bible and reading it in a whole new way. Then I stumbled on Trey Smith’s Nephilim video and was blown away by that. These guys and others make me so proud to be a creationist and someone that is not afraid to talk about a different history of the earth, which has just as much, and I’d say more, actual scientific evidence to back us up. Go watch some of Hovind’s debates against evolution at major schools, he tears them apart, sometimes taking on 3 guys at once.
I gave myself as a vessel to be used by God for his purpose and that has led me down the most incredible journey of spiritual and self-discovery I have ever been on. I just turned 40 and I’m revitalized with the Holy Spirit, I have discernment, wisdom and knowledge. I work on being fruitful a lot even though that is very hard for me. You combine that with the 10 commandments, and to me it’s we should not murder instead of kill, because I feel if I kill someone defending my family, it’s justified and not a sin, those 9 fruits, those 10 commandments, and receiving Christ Jesus as your messiah.
Things are good. I’ve never prayed more, I’ve never studied more, I’ve never tried living it more than I am now and I say why not?!?! What’s holding us back! You want punk rock, want the system to hate you? Follow Christ, follow the Bible that you read and understood on your own… this is it! So the Gnostic thing, doing mushrooms in my 20’s, and The Secret; all that stuff for me was about ego, trying to bring Adonai down to my level. It’s taught the opposite, it’s taught that you ascend to be a god, part of the great deception right there in Genesis.
What I don’t see people asking is, why or where, is Christianity and God failing them? Well, people need to ask what they want from God. Also, are you worshiping the God of the Bible? Lucifer has his claws in the Church, all types of evil spirits running wild in “christian” churches around the world. The trend I see with a lot of musicians who walk away from their faith, if they truly had it at all, and I don’t find a lot of them being honest about why they got into the Christian music industry. They wanted to make it, they wanted to be rock stars and they wanted to make a career out of it. That didn’t happen so they based their faith on the ways of man and walked away. On the flip side of that, a lot of bands that did make it gave up the gospel and hid it. They don’t want to upset anyone, don’t rock the boat, just blend in and deny it. Then Jesus becomes “The Light” and God is “the Universe”.
When I asked myself that, the next thing in my mind was, “What are you really doing for God?” There I have it… I’m a horrible witness, I’ve never led anyone to Christ Jesus, and at the least I’ve maybe helped a brother or sister in their walk. I haven’t had that in my life until recently, but that’s all online relationships, so that in itself can be a downer. I’ve taken in all the unnatural world has to offer me, it left me with a hardened heart. I went through my walk of faith very alone until recently. I’m getting my priorities straight. I want to represent the Kingdom of Heaven. Yeshua still loves all those that fell away and waits for their return!
There are a lot of BIG MOVEMENTS happening in Christianity right now. It’s good deep stuff and most of it has a lot to offer, from the Hebrew Roots folks, to the revival of the Orthodox, the Christian Truthers and the small church revival. However, for me, with the two I first mentioned, you have Zionist and Catholic ties. I have nothing against the Catholic brothers and sisters, but I’m against the Vatican and all it stands for, and I’m not falling in love with the new Pope at all. When you do your actual research and not listen to the nightly news, you’ll see the Antichrist words flow from his mouth. Research the Jesuits, but come to your own conclusions, those are mine. The Roots movement is really getting down with leaving Babylon and I back that 100%; however, the research I’ve done on Zionism and what’s happening in Israel and Palestine… I’m on the fence, both sides of that conflict are in the wrong if you ask me, and you can’t be out of Babylon with Zionist ties! A lot of the “New Age” has crept into the Church and the Truther movement, everything gets infiltrated so test everything with the Bible, if it doesn’t hold up you don’t need it.
The first album was amazing, a true throwback to music a-la the Misfits…with the second album in the works, tell me how far along you are to completion and who the guest musicians will be?
So the first album you heard I consider a demo now, those songs are being reworked and rerecorded a bit with better drums and guitar from some of my influences! Jim Chaffin will be bringing the old school fury on drums, and Wretched from Grave Robber is playing guitar and back ground vocals! I have a couple other people I want to ask but haven’t done so yet. Both are named Mike and play Rock-A-Billy really well. I’ve got 2 country/Billy songs and a Surf instrumental I’d love to get those dudes on! The other 4 new songs are some of the best hardcore I’ve ever written! I reworked a BF Thunder song and an old Outpour song to be played how I wanted them, in fact, I may reclaim a few more for future releases. This will be out by September I hope!
You got picked up by Sky Burns Black records, how did that come about?
When I started this project I did it in the hopes that either Thumper Punk or Sky Burns Black Records would pick me up. In the meantime I was going to release the songs 1 or 2 at a time as I finished them. I have a song titled “To Hell and Back,” and I was going to title the album that, so I did Google search to see if anyone had that title in recent years. Well, lo and behold, a one man Christian Horror band called Blast from Oblivion released an album the year before with the same title, and he was on one of the labels I was wanting to be on. In addition, we also share a birthday and that’s that synchronicity thing happening, God sometimes lays it out so smooth. So I checked out BFO and really dug what he was doing. It was totally different sounding than my stuff, and I thought that was rad for the Horror scene in general. After I posted a few songs on BandCamp I hit up BFO on their FaceBook page, let him know I was a fan, and sent him a link to my stuff and a little bit of what I was about. We got to talking, one thing led to another, then Joshua Sky from Sky Burns Black hit me up on FB and here we are today.
I’m on a legit punk/metal label, a legit Christian label, and I signed the same type of contract I would have written myself! Josh puts himself out there for his bands, label, and ministry. He’s really a great guy and I feel so blessed to be on the label with a bunch of awesome bands! I’ve even got back into metal more because of it! He’s got an amazing artist named Dave Besanson doing the cover, the album title is Scream out His Name, and there is a free download of the demo of the title track at the SkyBurnsBlack bandcamp site.
How did you manage to get Shawn ‘Wretched’ Browning from Grave Robber and Jim Chaffin on board?
I’ve dreamt of playing Punk Rock with Chaffin since I was 15! It was so awesome when I worked with him on PTSD, and I wanted to do that again. I saw a video Jim posted of himself tracking drums at home for the new XL album, and was like, “Oh snap! Chaffin can track at home now! I gotta get him on Cast the Dragon and go all out!” I prayed about it, asked him, he liked the stuff and that was that! Wretched had heard the 10 song demo and hit me up after listening to it so he could be on the next thing I did. I posted on FB I needed a guitarist and he volunteered! So the grace fell upon me and I am humbled to have these men on my album!
Are your guests also writing with you or did you write the material all yourself?
This was all me this time, again I feel so blessed how this all came together so easily!
Thanks for taking the time to do this interview my friend, any parting words?
I want to encourage everyone to try to put God first in their lives; give yourself completely to Him, trust Him, listen to Him, walk with Him… it is an amazing path once you’re truly on it.
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