INTERVIEW: CRYPTOPSY IN CONVERSATION WITH MATT MCGACHY
Interview by Cecilia Pattison-Levi
Montreal Canadian death metal band Cryptopsy is coming to Australia. It’s been nine years since they last visited Australia. The band is looking forward to celebrating the band’s history with the headline tour celebrating the 30th anniversary ‘None So Vile’ and the two new albums 2023, ‘As Gomarrah Burns’ and 2025, ‘An Insatiable Violence’.
“We are beyond excited to return to Australia,” exclaimed Matt McGachy. “We are going to be firing on all cylinders. The band are as tight as ever. We are full of energy and urgency. We want to finish on the top of our game. We can’t wait to share tracks off ‘None So Vile’ and our two new albums that fans here seem to really like. We want to keep the extreme up”.
Cryptopsy, as a band, is extreme in both content and delivery. They play a blistering, technical death metal musical style. It is hard and heavy. Their music combines with lyrics dealing with everything from insanity, serial murder to, ‘blasphemy made flesh’ and self-designed torture machines. While this may seem like your average death metal approach, Cryptopsy's music makes them that much more intense, that much more aggressive, and that much more listenable — a viewpoint held by the band members themselves.
“We like delivering aggressive death metal music,” stated Matt McGachy. “It's hard to write songs for Cryptopsy because it must be extreme! Cryptopsy songs and instrumentation has to be memorable. It has to be catchy with a melody. It must have groove. It must be heavy. There's a lot of boxes that need to be checked to fall underneath the Cryptopsy umbrella”.
Cryptopsy comprises of Matt McGachy (lead vocalist), Flo Mounier (drums/backing vocals), Christian Donaldson (guitars), Olivier "Ollie" Pinard (bass), and they have been together for a decade. They are also no strangers to exhausting tours. Much of the band's newly released ninth studio album, ‘An Insatiable Violence’, was written on tour. “It was really hard,” said Matt McGachy. “We tortured ourselves. While other bands were resting, we took on the daunting task of writing the album. It is a tight album – we wanted it aggressive, intense and limited because we want to stay relevant and give that legacy of the music to death metal fans”.
Cryptopsy’s urgency comes from the fact that time is moving on. The band formed in 1988, and it’s now 2025. “Flo is getting old,” laughed Matt McGachy. “We need to capture the music and that sense of humour in the lyrics. Cryptopsy’s work is darkly poetic and quirky. It has shock and awe, and we want to present as it was meant to be to fans”.
“Flo's amazing right now, he's at the best he has been in years,” said Matt McGachy. “I have hope that the band is going to continue for at least 10 to 15 more years. But I foresee an ending. And I want to release the most amount of music before that, because this line-up of musicians is the longest-standing line-up of Cryptopsy ever. We have a lot more to give, and it's exciting what we're doing, Chris and Ollie and Flo are just clicking so well together”.
The chance to see and hear Cryptopsy’s trademark rhythms and grooves that will get the circle pit moving will be here in December. “I believe that the band is at its strongest right now,” stated Matt McGachy. “The tour gives us more goals. We're basically all on the same page and very much enjoy playing Cryptopsy tracks. We are coming to Australia to destroy!"
Crytopsy Australian Tour Dates below and all tickets are available on Oztix:
Wednesday 17 December 2025: THE BASO, CANBERRA with ANOXIA, HEATHENSPAWN and ALPHA CULT
Thursday 18 December 2025: CROWBAR, BRISBANE with SNAKE MOUNTAIN and IDLE RUIN
Friday 19 December 2025: CROWBAR, SYDNEY with ANOXIA, HEATHENSPAWN and COMPLEXANT
Saturday 20 December 2025: CROXTON, MELBOURNE with WRITHING and MUNT
