And so onto the band’s final chapter- 2005s second swansong, Rise to Ruin. Released on Candlelight Records, Rise to Ruin had the daunting tasks of following up one of the strongest return to form death metal albums the last few years, and for the most part succeeded. Culling the same energy and rage that the band had in their False years, but with a modern socio/political veneer and polish and even more solos, tracks like raging opener “Revolt”, “Question of Terror”, “Dehumanziation” and the aptly titled “The End of it All”, showed the bands successful return was no fluke, again capturing all the elements and that made the band a vital cog in the scene of the 90s. “Probably our heaviest, certainly our most cohesive, and by far our fastest” Frank recalls “Speaking in terms of metal, I’d call this the ultimate Gorefest album. The whole thing was written by Ed and Boudewijn, with JC responsible for all the lyrics of course. Boudewijn & Ed had quite a few problems between them, but that apparently fueled the fire, since this is some of the most aggressive stuff we’ve done. Boudewijn came up with much of the faster songs, while Ed was just on a roll. I still think every song here is a winner, so I’m not picking any favorites. Excellent performances all round, and JC’s on top form here. We finally realized we should turn his voice down in the mix just a notch, which made so much sense it still annoys me we never thought of this on earlier recordings. I think we’re all really, really happy with this album, and I for one am really glad we got to perform some of this material live before we split up again; stuff as heavy as this is such a pleasure to play and to really get your teeth into. That’s the great thing about performing your songs live: you get to hear them played at the volume you intended for them to be heard, that’s awesome”. Ultimately though, with the bands legacy once again intact, Gorefest again decided to call it a day earlier in 2009. After two triumphant albums in the new decade and a handful of arguably classic albums in the 90s, Gorefest are certainly a band that deserves classic status. And while they don’t have the 7-10 classic album legacy of say, a Morbid Angel or Cannibal Corpse, you can’t argue that their albums certainly made people pay attention and discuss the band. I asked Frank to wrap up this band spotlight with his thoughts on the legacy and impact of Gorefest and he responds is surprisingly humble fashion: “I don’t really see us having any influence of significance on anyone or anything, whatsoever. From what I’ve picked up over the years, we’re more thought of as, if ANYTHING, something of an anomaly. Fact of the matter is we’ve always done what we wanted, with only Erase being sub-par in my own eyes. Our legacy? I don’t think we’ll be anything more than a footnote in the history of Metal. Which is fine, as I’ve always thought of Gorefest as more of a cult-band anyway. We DID have an exceptionally good time, most of the time, and wrote some music that we really enjoyed ourselves, and that’s really all that matters to me.