Hello everybody, we’re here with James from Cage Fight.
How are you doing?
I’m very well, thank you. How are you?


Doing great.
So, we’re here to talk about your upcoming album, coming out on May 1st, called Exuvia.
“Exuvia” refers to the outer skin shed by certain animals, symbolizing a new stage of life. How do you feel that concept connects with the image you’re giving of Cage Fight through this second album?
Well, there are a lot of metaphors tied to the name, but I think the main one, in relation to what you’re talking about, is the idea of shedding skin as a kind of rebirth. The band went through quite a lot of changes over the past few years, and this album basically represents the next phase of the band. It’s our rebirth, a completely fresh new beginning for us.


That’s nice. And what do you feel is the biggest evolution from the first album to this one?
For the first album, we basically went into the studio and recorded it within six months of knowing each other. So we didn’t really know each other very well yet, either musically or personally. We just followed the vibe, and it was fun.

We put the whole album together in a very short amount of time and just went with it. It was a really exciting period. But the biggest difference now is that we know each other much better. We know what interests us creatively. We’re much more willing to experiment, take risks, and write things that complement each other far more than they did on the first record. And I think this album was also a lot more collaborative overall.

Will, our new bass player, brought a lot of musical ideas to the table. Nick, our drummer, actually started one of the songs from a drum part he wrote. And finally, Rachelle, our vocalist, wrote the majority of the lyrics on this record, whereas she didn’t on the first one. She also brought a lot more melodic vocal ideas into the process. And all of us were really involved in the songwriting and structure of the album from beginning to end, as a proper team.

So yeah, that’s a long answer. (laughs)
But I think, ultimately, we’re a much more solid band now, whereas at the beginning we were still finding our feet.


That’s really good to hear.
And I saw that you also had a new bass player for this album, Will Horsman. How did he end up joining the band? What was the process like?
Well, Will had kind of been part of the band from quite early on. He was basically my fill-in guitar player because, quite often, I couldn’t make Cage Fight shows due to commitments with my other band, TesseracT. Obviously, I couldn’t be in two places at once. So Will stepped in as my replacement guitarist, and he actually played quite a lot with Cage Fight. He played our first major festival, which was Bloodstock Open Air in 2022. He also did tours with Nekrogoblikon and some shows with Soulfly, I think.

So he ended up playing a lot of important shows that I couldn’t do. And when John, our previous bass player, left the band, Will was the obvious choice to join. He really wanted to do it, he was full of ideas and enthusiasm, and we all got along really well. So it just made perfect sense.


Yeah. And I saw that he even wrote two songs on the album.
Yeah, well, he wrote lyrics for two songs : The Hammer Crush and Deathstalker. But he was also heavily involved in the title track, Exuvia.

That song actually started from an idea he and Nick came up with together. The two of them wrote a lot of the music during a jam session, and I remember they basically brought me a recording of themselves playing in a room. Then I took that idea and developed it further, and we built the song from there.

So he really brought a lot to the table. He also came up with some very interesting bass lines that were a bit more outside the box. In particular, on the chorus of Un Bon Souvenir, he created some really unique ideas that are subtle, but they genuinely elevate the song and bring it to life. So yeah, he’s been a very valuable addition to the band.


That’s great. We talked about the band and about how the album came together, but what about the album itself? What story does it tell?
Well, there are actually quite a lot of stories within the record. And I think one of the key elements is that Rachelle really stepped into the role of lyric writer on this album and took control of most of the lyrics. She ended up telling a lot of personal stories, but many of them are also very relatable to other people.

She didn’t write the lyrics on the first record because our bassist at the time had already pre-written a lot of them. So this album was an opportunity for her to really step into that role. She also wasn’t very confident writing in English at first, because, as you probably know, she’s French.

So she lacked confidence initially. However, she went through something quite traumatic that basically pushed her to start writing. It became a form of therapy for her. And once she started, she just couldn’t stop. She ended up writing most of the album very quickly.

So the core concept behind Exuvia, as I mentioned earlier, is rebirth through shedding skin. But the mask also carries several meanings. The most literal and visual meaning is that the mask is actually her grandmother’s radiotherapy mask, which she used during cancer treatment. And Rachelle is wearing her grandmother’s mask on the front cover of the album.

So the song Exuvia itself is really about battling cancer ; the struggle, the resilience, the strength needed to keep fighting and stay alive. It’s a very emotional song. Her grandmother actually appears in the track as well. Rachelle recorded her talking about some of her experiences, and those voice samples are woven throughout the song.

Then there are other songs, like Oxygen. That song is about feeling crushed by anxiety and struggling with your own mind. In the music video we’re about to release, we use the mask as a symbol of something oppressive hanging over you.

And honestly, a lot of the songs connect back to the symbolism of the mask in different ways. But the central meaning is obviously tied to her grandmother. As you can probably tell, I could talk about this for another half hour, so I’ll stop there.
(laughs)


You’re opening the album with Confined. It has a very different vibe. It feels less chaotic than the rest of the album. Why did you choose to open the record with that track?
Yeah, I see what you mean. I guess Oxygen is the first real “metal” track on the album, whereas Confined works more as an introduction to Oxygen. It’s kind of this trip-hop, electronic reinterpretation of parts of Oxygen. The lyrics repeat “I can’t breathe,” so in a way it acts as a sort of immersive introduction that slowly pulls you into the album before leading directly into Oxygen.


And we kind of get the same feeling later on the album with Le Déni, which feels more like an interlude. Do you see it as something that separates the album, or more as an introduction to the next song as well?
Honestly, a bit of both. It sits right in the middle of the album, so it does work as a kind of break from the brutality. But at the same time, it’s also another introduction, this time into Exuvia, because it reuses musical motifs from that song. For example, one of the guitar lines is actually based on the bass line from the middle section of Exuvia. But because it’s played on acoustic guitar, it sounds completely different. It’s also much more melodic and vocally driven, with lots of vocal layers throughout.

And ultimately, the title Le Déni refers to the denial stage, that moment when you refuse to accept that something terrible is happening. Then it transitions directly into the song Exuvia. So yes, it functions both as an interlude and as an introduction to what comes next.


It feels like the whole album was built around the idea of Exuvia and the story behind it. So when it came to the title track, did you already know it would become the centrepiece of the album, or did the album gradually build itself around that song and eventually take its name from it?
Somewhere in between, really. I don’t think we knew from the beginning that Exuvia -both the song and the concept- would become such an important part of the record. But as the track evolved, it turned into this long, epic piece that really feels like a journey. It felt like the right song to carry such an emotional and complex story. So I think pretty quickly we realised that it was going to become that song on the album.

When we were sequencing the record, we debated a lot about where it should go. Some of us thought it should close the album, others felt it could even open it, especially with Le Déni before it, because that transition works really well.

In the end, we decided to place it right in the middle of the album, which makes sense to me because it really is the centrepiece of the record. Conceptually, it’s the most important track, and it’s also the longest one.


I saw that the first song you released was I Hate Your Guts. Why did you choose that track to introduce this new era? And how do you feel it prepares listeners for what’s coming next?
It naturally felt like the right choice because those were actually the first lyrics Rachelle wrote for the project and the first lyrics she had ever written in English. She went through a really awful experience, and she basically just wrote down how much she hated that person. So the concept behind the song is actually very direct and honest.

Musically, I had written most of that track while I was on tour with Tesseract in… 2023.
I almost said 2013, I’ve apparently lost an entire decade somewhere.
(laughs)

So both the music and the lyrical ideas came together around the same time. The track was already very aggressive musically, and then the lyrics fit perfectly with that energy. It was one of the earliest songs written for this new version of the band, so it felt natural to lead with it. I think it really showcases the direction the band is moving towards, while also introducing the emotional honesty that defines this era of Cage Fight. And honestly, it just felt like a really strong and heavy song to come back with.


That’s great. And you also have a collaboration with Julien Truchan from Benighted. How did that collaboration come together? How was it born?
Well, Rachelle and Julien Truchan had known each other for a long time through the French metal scene because, obviously, she used to be in a band called Eths. They toured a lot in France and crossed paths with Benighted many times, so they already knew each other well. We definitely wanted to have a guest collaboration on the album, but at first we didn’t really know what form it would take or who it would involve.

Then, when we wrote Pick Your Fighter. The idea actually came from a really fun and very French inspiration. The song was partly inspired by T’es En Moi by Nâdiya, which I had never even heard of before because, apparently, nobody outside of France knows it.
(laughs)

But then we discovered that it’s actually huge in France and in Québec too. So we took a few musical ideas inspired by that track and incorporated them into the song. And because the inspiration came from something so distinctly French, we thought it made sense to invite a French guest vocalist. Julien was our first choice, and thankfully, he said yes.


That’s really cool. He genuinely seems like such a nice guy.
Yeah, absolutely. I actually haven’t met him in person yet, but we’ve spoken online and he seems genuinely lovely. So hopefully I’ll finally get to meet him this summer.


That would be nice. And I really feel like this whole album comes straight from your guts and your soul. It feels like you truly put everything into it. So, for you, what would be the best way to experience the album for the very first time?
Honestly, if you drive, I’d say put it on during a long drive. It’s quite a forward-moving record, very energetic, but it also has a lot of dynamics throughout. Otherwise, listen to it at home. And if you’ve got a vinyl player, definitely listen to it on vinyl because it sounds amazing in that format.

I genuinely think it’s a fairly traditional album in the sense that it was designed to be experienced from beginning to end, rather than just as a random collection of songs. So if listeners have the time, I’d really encourage them to sit down and listen to the whole thing from start to finish.


You also play in two very different bands. Even though the sound isn’t the same, both have a strong identity. So, does the creative process change from one band to the other?
Yeah, definitely. Musically, one of the reasons I started doing stuff with Cage Fight was precisely because it allowed me to explore things that just wouldn’t really fit in Tesseract. Cage Fight is much more visceral. It’s more aggressive, more direct, and also a bit simpler. It’s not as intricate or detailed as Tesseract.

At first, it really started as a way for me to scratch an itch creatively, to make music that I couldn’t really make within Tesseract. That said, there can sometimes be a little crossover. For example, there was actually an idea I originally wrote for Tesseract that didn’t make the cut, so I reworked it and ended up using it on the first Cage Fight record.

But in Tesseract, the other guitarist is really the main songwriter and creative leader of the project. Whereas with Cage Fight, especially in the beginning, it was much more my own project creatively. I’ve been able to put a lot more of myself into the music in ways I couldn’t necessarily do elsewhere. I think that’s probably the biggest difference in the creative process.


I saw that the second album was recorded by Sam Bloor and mixed by Jim Pinder. How do you feel they influenced the final sound of the record?
They were both incredible to work with. Sam Bloor really managed to get amazing drum performances out of Nick. He also pushed Rachelle a lot vocally and helped guide her through some of the harmonies.

More than anything, he really brought the best performances out of her, and he was fantastic to work with overall. He also helped a lot with some of the guitar parts, refining and polishing certain elements. For example, he helped me record the guitar solos and pushed me to get them to the right level. I’m not really a “guitar solo guy,” but there were a couple of songs where we all agreed that a solo was necessary. So that definitely pushed me a bit outside of my comfort zone. Having someone there to help develop those guitar lines was incredibly valuable.

Then Jim Pinder brought a lot during the mixing process from a production standpoint. He achieved a fantastic drum sound, but he also added lots of subtle details. For example, in Un Bon Souvenir, there are these synth textures in the calmer sections that he actually created and added himself.

He brought in a lot of little textures, atmospheres and ideas like that. So between the two of them, they really helped bring the best out of the album while adding subtle elements that elevated the whole record.


Was there any song or idea you started working on that didn’t make it onto the final album?
Oh yeah, loads of ideas. There are always ideas that never quite make the final cut. But we usually keep them because sometimes something that doesn’t fit one record might fit perfectly into something else later on. So yeah, there are definitely a few things sitting around that we might revisit at some point.

Actually, we’ve already started working on new music now, so maybe I should go back and listen through that folder again to see if anything stands out.
So thank you for the inspiration.
(laughs)


And I saw that you’re going on tour this summer. You’ll be playing a lot of festivals, mostly in France from what I saw, and I noticed Motocultor Festival on the list once again!
Yes! So I guess we’ll see you again at the Motocultor Festival.


I hope so!
So, is the album already fully ready for the live setting, or are you still working on adapting some things to make it work even better on stage?
That’s actually a really good question. The album is ready for the live setting already. This Friday we’ve got our album release show, and then we’re also playing a festival in the north of the UK where we’ll perform the same release set. So yes, we can already play the songs and they’re all prepared.

However, for the summer festivals, I’d still like to refine a few things here and there, make some tweaks and improvements to get everything as strong as possible. So I guess the answer is yes, it’s ready, but there are still a few details I’d like to improve before we get to Motocultor Festival.


Well, I can’t wait to hear that. And for my final question: do you have a message for the people listening to you?
Yes, absolutely. First of all, thank you for listening to this interview all the way through. We’re incredibly excited to come and play in France this summer. I think we’re doing seven festivals across the country. Please check out the new record, and if you enjoy it, come and see us live.


Well, I can’t wait to see you this summer then. Have fun, and congratulations on the new album.
Thank you very much. And hopefully we’ll see you at Motocultor Festival.