It's never just another album, it's always the most evolved versions of ourselves that we can be at that moment. But we were trying to push stuff to as dark as they could possibly be, as heavy and as intense as it could be. Being young men in our mid-to-late twenties, there's a lot of shit going on, and life got complicated, and there was a lot of dark, bad shit going on. I mean, not only, but I think we pretty consciously focused that music on being as intense as we could. We didn't want to let up, we didn't want to let you up for air - or ourselves, for that matter. We were trying to crush it, and everything in our path: "If you want to hear some existential angst, have some of this." So a lot of stuff was embodied in that music, and it was difficult music to play. We didn't know it when we recorded it, but by the time we had toured that music for a few years... We've always made it our personal standard that we physically have to embody the music as we perform, and that album's a motherfucker.
Steve Von Till / Neurosis interview, Machine Music, 2020
NEUROSIS released their fifth album, Through Silver in Blood, on this day in 1996.
We basically knew what we were going for. I'd say this record is more of an epic undertaking than the last one. We know how to get a lot more out of one note these days and we are a lot more trance-oriented in our music as far as wanting it to be overwhelming and aggressive but at a constant flow. We were trying to develop a record that was like one song that actually means more from the beginning to the end than it does individually.
The process was a lot more natural and that was something that we had started to experience on the last record. We didn't have to be more cerebral, we could actually be more gut with the way it came out and trusting the engineer we were working with.
Dave Edwardson / Neurosis interview, Chronicles of Chaos, 1996
Through Silver in Blood is the first NEUROSIS album released through Relapse Records, after leaving Alternative Tentacles.
We originally encountered them when we were looking for a label for our Tribes of Neurot side-project and they were first to be interested, so we went with them. We were impressed with the enthusiasm they had for the Neurot stuff, and for them it must have been like a small release, but they did more advertising for us than our previous label had done with a Neurosis record and we needed to grow as a band. AT is a great label and they work hard, but they don't necessarily want to be a competitive label and they don't have to. That is where they are at. They helped us out, and we are pleased at that, but we need to grow to survive and it seemed kind of a nice way to grow while staying independent. When Relapse got Neurosis, their enthusiasm shot through the roof and all of a sudden we are top priority and that means a lot to us.
Dave Edwardson / Neurosis interview, Chronicles of Chaos, 1996
Metal was changing and people were becoming more open minded than punk rock in some ways and all of a sudden you had a label like Relapse, which was putting out Japanese noise as well as all of these kinds of heavy metal - I still don't know all of these terms. So we were able to peek our heads behind all these different curtains and put different tentacles out to different places and find those few freaks who like this band and the few freaks who never expected to see us, and some people over there. That whole era was touring with people from GWAR, Pantera to Black Sabbath, as well as our own theatre tours and club tours of the U.S. and Europe, and just finding the weirdos everywhere we could find them and building our own audience. Really crafting our own thing, stepping out of the box and putting ourselves into some uncomfortable situations, which proved fruitful in the long run...
I look back at every aspect of our journey so far, even the tough stuff, with gratitude and appreciation.
Steve Von Till / Neurosis interview, Machine Music, 2020