Despite its contemporary production style, ‘The Devil’s Masquerade’ is a back-to-basics album of sorts for Texas metal institute Helstar. Singer James Rivera explains what changes in his vocals and the songwriting approach lead to this, and talks about the benefits of his long-lasting partnership with guitarist Larry Barragan.

“This time, we really took our time to write things out together”, Rivera says. “Without just me going: okay, this is the verse melody, this is the chorus melody, let me come over and record it, and we’ll call it a day. This time around, Larry and I got together at the studio, with a tablet and a pen, and when we were happy with a verse melody, we would knock it out, then record it, and it’s done.

Then you go: okay, what about the pre-chorus, what might we do here? Let’s move that note this way, move that note that way, and then I think it’s going to be more dramatic that way. And what about the chorus? Dude, let’s not touch what you already have. Beautiful.

That’s how we wrote. It was the Barragan-Rivera preen again. We took the bull by the horns, is what we call it here in Texas. We’re going to do this all by ourselves, and when then new guitar player comes in, all he’s got to worry about are his solos.”

From Another Planet

Those solos this time were recorded by Alan DeLeon Jr., Helstar’s 24-year-old newcomer. “Alan did as many solos on the record as Larry did”, Rivera points out. “You can tell the difference between them too. Alan is just from another planet, that’s all I can say, haha! To play that good and be so young, wow! Crazy! But when we’re around him, you don’t even notice it. He’s just a fun guy to be around. He’s very mature for his age.”

DeLeon’s father Alan DeLeon Sr. also is also part of the greater Helstar universe. “His dad’s band used to open for us back in the ‘Nosferatu’ days”, Rivera nods. “And Alan DeLeon Sr. also came out of retirement, and guess what he did? He joined Larry’s Spanish-language metal band Santa Oscuridad! So now, he’s the guitar player for that.

So the whole family is coming out of the woodwork. Santa Oscuridad will be opening for Helstar and Crimson Glory in San Antonio. So yeah, he’s excited! It’s been years since he played.”

One of the Sickest Vampire Creations

Lyrically, ‘The Devil’s Masquerade’ does go back to the familiar vampire and horror themes that Rivera likes to explore. “There are three songs on the record related to vampirism”, he explains. “‘Stygian Miracles’ is based on a Netflix series called ‘Midnight Mass’, which is one of the sickest vampire creations I have ever seen in my life. Which is what made it so different and so fascinating. Because it’s the main priest of the village that’s the main vampire, but yet, he still does sermons and stuff on Sundays, which is really weird.

‘Carcass for a King’ is a collaboration of vampirism and the fall of Lucifer, and then there is ‘I Am the Way’, about a legion of vampires where mortals are the enemy: your wars shed the blood, we just drink it. Everybody bring the jug, we must fill, another battle haha!”

‘I Am the Way’ being about a legion of vampires also justifies the legion of high-profile guest singers appearing on the song. “And I am the head vampire”, Rivera laughs. “I wrote all the parts out. All I did was just give them two lines per verse to sing, but they kept it pretty much the same as I gave it to them. But I still told them: please, be yourself.

And I think out of all the singers, Jason (McMaster) and Robert Lowe really blew me off the stage. Jason actually took it to a whole other level. I didn’t expect to hear that. But then I thought: come on, it’s Jason! And Mike Soliz… Everybody did a great job, man! I don’t want to pick any favorites, because that’s not right.”

Room for Some Nice Angelic Stuff

“I went back to singing a lot more melodic stuff. I experimented a bit with vocal approaches. I’m a big goth fan, and I never actually sang like the bridge on ‘Carcass for a King’. Actually, the first take was higher. And then when I did the next take, this is just the way I started to sing, and I did it lower, Larry said: dude, that is creepy-sounding! Forget the high part! Messiah from Candlemass would be proud of you, haha!

So we did that, and then I did a lot more bigger church choirs on several songs that I had never done before either. So I just started wanting to become a little bit more melodic and operatic again. The music is already very heavy, so it doesn’t need me to be heavy along with it, and be all aggressive constantly. There’s room for some nice angelic stuff on top of the heaviness. It works together. They complement each other.”

Those who want to hear Rivera go full goth and sing the likes of ‘Bela Lugosi’s Dead’ should look elsewhere though. “Dude, I did that on my Metal Wave project”, he exclaims. “I’m a big Peter Murphy fan. And Dave Gahan on the old Depeche Mode: ‘Black Celebration’, ‘Music for the Masses’ and ‘Violator’, when they were still dark and good. After that, I lost interest in them. Too bubblegum for me.”

Dedicated and Disciplined Enough

With Rivera’s voice being such a recognizable part of any band he works with keeping it in shape is important. “I should be taking care of it even more than I do”, he admits. “But I also think that sometimes when you overthink things too much, it takes away the naturalness of your personality. And my voice is part of my personality.

When I’m on tour, I sleep a lot. And then I have a gargle that I do with the hottest cup of water you can stand, and then you throw two aspirin, a teaspoon of baking soda and a teaspoon of salt in. Stir that up and gargle with it. Our vocal cords are tiny muscles, so after an hour of being on stage, they swell up a little bit. But then when you do that gargle, the aspirin immediately just shrinks the vocal cords back down.

The hard part is: you have to stay dedicated and disciplined enough to do it before you go to bed every night. But that doesn’t happen when you have a bunch of people drinking beer on your tour bus, haha! Usually when I’m on tour, and we have four or five shows in a row, I’m pretty disciplined. I still like to be sociable and meet my friends wherever we are at.

When you come into town, I wouldn’t be like: oh dude, I’ve got to get my rest, I’ll see you, bye. No, we would talk until three in the morning, haha! When we’re on tour, and we see these people we don’t get to see on a daily basis, and you feel like they’re family, and they’re the people you have a lot of love for, it’s hard to say goodnight. It really is.

I mean: I guess I’ll see you in two years? I don’t know? It’s not like I can go: hey dude, we’ll get together next weekend and go to a movie. It’s not like that. It is sad. There’s a lot of sadness and emotionalness when you’re on our, and you get together with your friends and your fans that you don’t do all the time. That’s the part I hate about touring. It’s the going back. But then, you know what, you’re in a hurry to come home and see your family too. It’s a double-edged sword.”

Wanting to Reach

Ever since reuniting in 2006, Helstar has been playing their old songs in lower tunings. That has changed, though. “All the old material, we’re playing back in standard tuning”, Rivera laughs. “Here’s what happened: we were recording ‘Black Wings of Solitude’, and when I started recording my vocals, Larry was in the producer’s chair, and he turned around, and he’s smiling at me. ‘What?’ ‘Nothing! That was good, man! Keep going, keep going!’

And I thought: what the fuck is so funny? Then, when we were done with the song, he swings around and says: you know, man, that’s all in standard tuning. Andrew (Atwood, former guitarist) and I talked about this, your tuning, what you’re used to is in standard. When we dropped to D, it made the music sound heavier, but you were always sharp, because you still wanted to reach.

Of course, when we do ‘Pandemonium’ live, it’s going to have to be in drop D. Otherwise, it would just sound weak. So what I have to do now is don’t think about it too much. Because if I think about it too much, my mind will go: uh oh, here’s where I have to raise up a bit. But I guess I’m singing in standard now. Jerry (Abarca, former bassist) asked me the other day if it felt good. I guess? I mean, it doesn’t hurt.

The only thing about singing in standard tuning is that the harmonies get a little harder. That’s the only part where I struggle a little bit. But again: if I don’t think about it too much, I’ll usually nail it right away. When I’m not sure, Larry always shows me that it’s right on the bar, because he has that thing that shows that you’re flat or high or whatever. It’s often a straight line. So I’ll just go: okay, I trust you.”

All About Kindness and Love

With both Barragan and Rivera having been in the Helstar since the early eighties, that trust is important. “Oh yeah, I trust him”, Rivera nods. “Larry is a perfectionist. So there’s no way in the world that he’s going to be in a band with a singer that completely sucks, or did something wrong on the record. He’s not going to let that fly. Hell no! We’re going to do this right. That’s how he is. So really, at the end of the day, that’s where I trust him the most, because I trust his judgement.

There are bands that are fighting on the road. I’ve been with one in particular that had a lot of that going on. I’m not going to mention names, but yeah, it’s just odd. If you’re not having fun, why do this at all? If all you’re going to do is fight through the whole damn tour, it’s going to be a long four weeks that you have left.

As long as Larry and I have been together, we haven’t had one dragged-out, horrible argument. I don’t think we’ve ever even raised our voices to each other. Ever. I’ve never really seen him get angry at any situation. Or if he does, he keeps it to himself. He’s not one to go: that son of a bitch, he cut me off at the road!

He’s a very, very dedicated family man. He loves his family. He’s all about kindness and love. Becoming a family man changed him a lot, but for the better. And don’t get me wrong: he’s still metal as hell.”

A Hundred Different People

“Right now, we’re just putting our foot down. Larry and me are Helstar. And we could continue on with a hundred different people, and it doesn’t matter. Although we don’t want to do that. We like a consistent line-up. And Mikey (drummer Michael Lewis) has been with us for what? Fifteen, almost twenty years now? We can’t find anybody better than him, that’s for damn sure.

We’re all getting old now. We would love to do another record, but you can’t predict anything anymore. You don’t know if anyone’s going to get sick or who knows what. Jerry’s actually back in the band for a while because Garrick is on paternity leave.”

That will leave 1995’s ‘Multiples of Black’ as the only Helstar album that doesn’t feature Barragan. “And that’s probably why it sucks”, Rivera laughs. “Although someone pointed out the other day that the songs are actually good on that record, the production was just really bad. There’s a couple of good songs on there.

‘Good Day to Die’ is always going to be a good song. ‘Black Silhouette Skies’ is another good one. So it wasn’t that horrible of a record. It just doesn’t compare to anything like ‘The Devil’s Masquerade.”

A Mixed Feeling

Having the resumé that he has, it’s difficult for Rivera to pick his favorite recorded vocal performance of himself. “I have to say it has to be between ‘Vampiro’ (2016) and this new one for sure”, he says. “But then, if you want to go back to the really classic stuff: on ‘A Distant Thunder’ (1988), I actually really developed that powerful singing in E standard voice back then.

Every song on that record, I don’t think I sang anything that was not up there. So it’s a mixed feeling about it. What I guess it is, is that I’m just blessed that I still can do it all. I kind of want to just be happy that I’m still recording, still playing. Every time you put out a record, you don’t know what everyone is going to think about it. But so far, which is a good sign, there hasn’t been one hater yet.”