Revocation's Dave says Great Is Our Sin

Go getters Revocation, have been hard at work, writing and recording for what will be their latest and newest release to date, "Great Is Our Sin".Frontman vocalist/guitarist David Davidson or "Dave" discusses this album and much, much, more!


1. First of all, who are you, and what do you do in the band?

Dave: I’m Dave, I play guitar and sing.

2. Let's talk a little about the history of your band. When did you originally form and is this the original line-up?

Dave: We formed back in 2006, currently I am the only original member.

3. Do you remember how the idea of forming the band first came up?

Dave: We were initially named “Cryptic Warning” and played a bunch of shows under that moniker for several years. Eventually our writing style started developing more and we felt that the material was advancing in a different direction so we decided to change our name to better suit the new material that we were writing.

4. How long after you formed was it until you played your first live show?

Dave: We were playing live pretty quickly because we had already established ourselves a bit in the local scene so we had some connections already in place.

5. What are your memories of the performance?

Dave: To be honest I have no recollection of our very first show haha. In general we were playing a lot of DIY basement shows and bars around that time so all the shows were really fun and rowdy.

6. How would you categorize the style of the band?

Dave: Progressive death/thrash.

7. Why the name Revocation?

Dave: It was one of the last good one word band names left in the death metal market.

8. Who are your influences and how have they shaped your bands sound?

Dave: We are influenced mainly by a combination of death and thrash. In terms of death metal I was really inspired by bands like Cannibal Corpse, Morbid Angel, Gorguts, Martyr and on the thrash metal side it was bands like Megadeth, Exhorder and Dark Angel. I was listening to both genres heavily and simultaneously when I was in high school and because I was experiencing both genres at the same time I think the lines between them got blurred which is maybe why our sound is such a synthesis of the two.

9. What lyrical theme do you guys use in your music? What message do you want to send?

Dave: We don’t have any one specific theme per-se, but I would say greed, corruption and religion have all been topics that we’ve touched on in different ways throughout our career.

10. Let's talk a little about your newest release, what are the listeners in store for with this release?

Dave: It’s a very dynamic and diverse album. It has both our slowest and fastest songs that we’ve ever done so purely from a tempo standpoint it’s quite unique for us. Most notably though, the new release is a concept record which is something that we’ve never done before.

11. What is the concept behind the album and how did the idea come about?

Dave: The new album is about the folly of man throughout history. We tackle certain subjects like public execution in the 16th century and the conflict between religion and science in the time of Copernicus and Galileo. Other songs on the record deal with issues effecting society in the present day such as corruption in politics or the pollution of our environment. The concept of the record was inspired by a Charles Darwin quote that I had read that states, “If the misery of the poor be caused not by the laws of nature, but by our institutions, great is our sin”.

12. What was the writing and recording process like for the album?

Dave: It was little different since our new drummer lives in Vancouver. He would fly out and we’d rehearse for a few days straight around when we were playing shows in the area or we’d get together over Skype and work out ideas. I feel that since we had to make the most of our time together it really focused us that much more on the task at hand. Ash is also an incredible drummer so I knew I could trust him to really work on his parts on his own time. Other than the drums, the writing process was basically the same as it always is for us on every record. The recording process was also the same as the last album because we worked with Zeuss again and recorded in the same studios. It’s nice when you can feel comfortable in your work environment and Zeuss definitely makes us feel at home, he’s also brilliant at what he does so we were very happy to have him behind the console again for this release.

13. Why do you think people should check out your new album?

Dave: We all collectively feel that it’s our best record yet so if you’re already a fan you won’t be disappointed and if you’re just checking us out for the first time this would be the record to get.

14. Do you have a favorite track off this album and why is that?

Dave: It’s honestly too hard for me too chose. I feel really passionately about all the songs on this record for different reasons, each song has something different to offer musically and lyrically.

15. How do you promote your band and shows?

Dave: A lot of promotion is definitely centered around the internet and social media. The best promotion we experience is right around when a new record comes out so I’m glad we’ve always had a lot of material to work with.