Video: How to GUTTURAL with Shadow of Intent’s Ben Duerr

We all know the guttural. The gurgly, hollow scream that puts goosebumps on the arms of every metalhead when it hits. It’s the kind of scream that makes you wonder how vocalists contort their throat to get those kind of acoustics without screaming straight into a toilet bowl.

If you’ve somehow avoided my ravings about Shadow of Intent, then allow me to enlighten you. Shadow of Intent write symphonic deathcore about the Halo video game series. This is the band that Winds of Plague wanted to be but without the cornier-than-the-state-of-Nebraska hardcore gimmicks. From the songwriting itself to the lyrical content and their ridiculous live performances, Shadow of Intent are going to be a headlining act very, very soon. On only their second full-length album, Reclaimer, Shadow of Intent have put out a record that bands that’ve been around for 20 years can’t even dream about writing. You on board yet? Good.

Gutturals ain’t for the weak, folks. So to discover their secrets, I went behind the scenes with vocalist Ben Duerr, who has the vocal power of Phil Bozeman and the range of Mitch Lucker. I figured there was absolutely no way he can really pull this stuff off live but let me tell ya, people, this dude can fucking scream. So if you’re an up-and-coming vocalist, we’ve got lots of tips and techniques for you to refine those beautiful gutturals. Ben makes it so easy that even I managed a decent guttural. That means there’s plenty of hope for the rest of you.

Shadow of Intent’s latest album, Reclaimer, is out now and you can listen to it here. Duerr’s other band, Hollow Prophet, just released a split EP with Scumfuck (ft. Dickie Allen of Infant Annihilator), which you can listen to and purchase here.