Getting a grilling from the interrogators of ‘Hammer, Skeletonwitch face the Spanish Inquisition!

What is your favourite skeleton/witch combo? How about the bony fellas from Jason And The Argonauts and The Weird Sisters from Macbeth?

Alex, Windsor

Derrick Nau (drums): “He’s a fucking dumb ass. I don’t even understand his question. NEXT!”

Nate Garnette (guitar): “Huh?”

Eric Harris (bass): “What is he talking about?”

Scott Hedrick (guitar): “Well, Alex from Windsor, that’s a pretty good one. You guys know Jason And The Argonauts has claymation fighting skeletons and the Weird Sisters are witches from Macbeth, you know with the ‘bubble, bubble, toil and trouble’?”

Derrick: “So he wants to know our favourite skeleton/witch combo?”

Eric: “Ah, so we give Alex an example of our favourite skeleton and favourite witch?”

Nate Garnette: “As a combination?”

Metal Hammer: We can see this is going to be a long interview.

Derrick: “Well, I say Clive, the skeleton that Conan takes the sword from in Conan The Barbarian.”

Nate: “Now I understand the question.”

Derrick: “Nate’s favourite witch is one that will suck him.”

Nate: “I don’t care if she’s got a big nose.”

Eric: “I understand the question now and I just want to say Leprechaun 3: Leprechaun In The City.”

Hey brothers Garnett, did you parents call you Nate and Chance for a bet?

Joel, London

Nate: “I don’t even know why our names are supposed to be weird. It’s not like we’re named after Superman’s dad.”

Hammer: I don’t remember seeing anyone called Chance in the bible.

Derrick: “Well, he’s a unique dude.”

Scott: “In our very first review, which was good by the way, but right at the end it said: ‘Chance – clever stage name.’ I mean, what the fuck is that?!”

This thrash Viking metal stuff that you play, it’s a bit 2007 isn’t it?

Jason, Streatham

Derrick: “WHAT THE FUCK DOES THAT FUCKING MEAN!? I’m sure he’s a great guy Jason, but if you want to get stuck in one year I wouldn’t fucking recommend two thousand and fucking seven. We recorded the album in 2007 – that may have something to do with it.”

Scott: “Well, it’s just good to have new metal behind us and metalcore behind us and to get back to some proper metal.”

Nate: “I just wish the first part of that sentence was true. Especially in the States.”

Name three dead people you’d still fuck?

Sonny, Myspace

Scott: “I’d fuck Anna Nicole Smith.”

Derrick: “GG Allin.”

Nate: “Dorothy from The Wizard Of Oz.”

Given that you are one of the only bands around today, watering down thrash metal with unnecessary metalcore flourishes, don’t you feel ashamed, like someone who has turned up to a fancy address party wearing a Borat-style mankini.

John, London

All: [screaming incomprehensibly and throwing beer around their tour bus]

Scott: “Do you know what, to this gentleman John from London – or maybe he is John London like the famous maritime novelist Jack London – considering we’re one of the few bands watering thrash down then that makes us extreme and individual. Especially if there are very few other bands doing it.”

Eric: “I wonder if Trivium is his favourite band?”

What do you know about your band mates that you wished you didn’t know?

Steve, Hull

Eric: “That our drummer Mike (err, Derrick…) will jerk off anywhere.”

Hammer: Anyone? I’ll be talking to him later.

Nate: “They say it helps stop you developing prostate cancer.”

Eric: “What? Having Mike (Derrick) beat you off?”

Scott: “He’s got the golden touch!”

Chance Garnette (vocals): “I’m glad I know everything I do about these dudes – I need it for ammunition in the future. This is one big fucked up family and I know everything about them. A bit like Texas Chainsaw Massacre.”

Scott: “Chance waters down his thrash riffs with so many metalcore flourishes that they call him the Texas Chainsaw Master!”

Eric: “Nate has a Silence Of The Lambs tattoo. It’s the same one that Buffalo Bill has. We often see him tucking his cock between his legs as well. And if you just look at him from the waist down, it looks good. If you ignore his grandma hair and just concentrate on his pubes… and it helps if he’s wearing blue stockings.”

There have been a lot of reports in the press that Metallica are going to return to their roots with their next album. It’s going to suck isn’t it?

Henry, Rhyll

All: “Yes.”

Derrick: “I’ve heard it. It sounds like The Offspring but even shittier than that sounds. Most of it sounds like they’re trying to rewrite a Diamond Head song. I think they’re really trying and it is better than St Anger but, you know, it has to be. My ass is better than St Anger.”

Nate: “It’s Metallica, dude. They just need to get rid of Lars’ dad.”

Derrick: “No, they need to keep Lars’ dad. Have you not seen Some Kind Of Monster where he goes (puts on Danish accent): ‘If I were you, I’d delete it.’ His dad rules.”

What skeletons do you have in your closet?

Bernard, Solihull

Derrick: “We don’t have any skeletons. We tell each other everything.”

Chance: “I’ve got a really big dick.”

Nate: “It’s just wearing a small dick’s coat.”

I’ve heard that you’re such drunkards that you employ someone to follow you round with beer all the time. How do I get a training job like that and how much does it pay?

Simon, Middlesbrough

Scott: “We really don’t need to answer this. It pays in…nothing? Oh, hang on… it pays in comedy. It pays in having the best time of your life but it pays zero dollars.”

Nate: “I love Pabst Blue Ribbon. I know everyone likes High Life but PBR is better. It’s cheap. It gets you loaded. I drink the shit out of it.”

Would you beat Zakk Wylde in a drinking competition?

Holly, Chichester

Derrick: “No, probably not. I’d like to try though. He has money so he drinks Becks or Lowenbrau all the time. We drink water with pee in it.”

Scott: “I’d like to just set it up and see. I’m not saying we’d win but I’d like to lay down the gauntlet.”

In the Middle Ages, the sight of a skeleton must have been very disturbing – see references in Geoffrey Chaucer’s The General Prologue and the macabre tale of the three living and the three dead mentioned in Simon Schama’s The History Of Britain when an idyllic walk in the woods is interrupted by three cadaverous princes, rotten strips of flesh hanging from their torsos, porcelain white, skeletal ribs open to the air. But these tales speak of their times, because in previous times it had been of the utmost importance because of the poor hygiene to bury the dead immediately and because the science of anatomy wasn’t even yet a twinkle in Da Vinci’s eye, there was no incentive to dig the dead up gain but plenty of disincentives, namely disease, death and eternal damnation. But of course, the great leveller, the plague, outstripped society’s ability to bury its dead and corpses lay rotting on the village greens. We were forced for the first time to consider the very minerals we were made from. The skeleton had become a new talisman of fear. In light of this have you ever tried to suck yourself off and if so what did it taste like?

Nancy, Stoke

Scott: “AH! That’s a GREAT question!”

Nate: “That’s a fucking awesome question. Yes I have, Nancy. While reading Chaucer.”

Scott: “There’s no way you can reach that far.”

Derrick: Yes I have and it tastes way better than your mother, Nancy. I got my ribs removed before Marilyn Manson. I taught him everything he knows about sucking himself off.”