On Sunday, October 26, 2025, I sat across the table from Skull Diga of Hell’s Redemption at Burdick’s Bar and Grill in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Void of his signature face paint, the man behind the mask opened up to me about, among other things, his influences, the formation of Hell’s Redemption, and how his band and their new album, Farewell to Benevolence, are poised to be embraced by the masses.
Upon the conclusion of the interview, he very kindly complimented me and said, “You’re a good interviewer.” While the nice words were greatly appreciated, he made the interview easy. And like his music, his words were thoughtful, entertaining, and memorable. Check out the interview below and Farewell to Benevolence, which is currently available on all DSPs!
Please discuss the band’s origins.
So Hell’s Redemption basically started as an idea that I had. I wanted to do something outside the norm. Like I used to battle rap; I used to be a battle rapper back in the day. I never really put songs together. I was just known as somebody who could rap. And I sat down and listened to a couple of rock-style songs. And one of them that inspired me was Run-DMC’s “King of Rock.” I was listening to it and was like, ‘Yo, what if I went back and started writing to rock beats and see how it worked and developed my style around it. It was like two years ago when I created Hell’s Redemption. And it all branched off from me listening to Run-D.M.C.’s “King of Rock.” And Rage Against the Machine. I had a little bit of Rage in me. Linkin Park – I listened to them, but I was never a big, big fan. But I listened to Rage a lot. Bad Brains. It all developed into what I wanted, so I just started from there. I also started listening to different producers.
Anyone in particular?
They were like online producers. There was a producer I listened to called Mad Tracker. He had a lot of dope beats, and I was like, ‘Yo, I want my band to have that kind of metal flavor.’ And so I started to look for people who could play instruments. And when I found the people who could actually play the instruments, everything began to fall into place from there. I discovered my guitarist and bass player on the bandmix.com website. They just listened to me, and they were like, “Yo, I’m down. Let’s go.” From there, we just started creating.
What was the goal you set out to achieve with Farewell to Benevolence? Thus far, do you feel it has been completed—why or why not?
The goal I set for it was to make music that would resonate with people. Something that they could relate to. I like to talk about a lot of the struggles, a little bit of social justice. One of the goals was getting the music out. So just being out. That was one goal. The main goal is for it to reach the masses. It has yet to do that, but that’s why we’re here.
You mentioned that Hell’s Redemption was created two years ago. Please talk to me about those two years leading up to this album.
It’s been crazy. When I started the band, it was just me and Stick Boovy [who’s not currently a member of Hell’s Redemption but remains a featured collaborator]. Stick Boovy is his own brand, but I said, “Stick, can you get on these tracks? Let’s mix the screaming with the rap, the metal, and the rock.” He has the gift of screaming, and the first song we recorded together was “Twisted Behavior,” which made it onto the album. That experience gave me a whole new respect for screamers. I didn’t understand the art behind it until Stick Boovy taught me.
After finding and creating the main base of the band with Stick Boovy, I connected with my guitarist, Cyr (real name Jordan Cyr). He provided us with a place to practice and brought the structure and knowledge of actually running a real band rehearsal. As time went on, I learned that Cyr could sing too and that changed everything. The rest is history with the song we created, “City Morgue,” which was inspired by my job at a morgue.
Our bass player, Jacob Horn, also known as HellBot, brought in his own layer of knowledge, especially when it came to music theory, just like Cyr. On top of that, he could scream with some development, and he added a strong business sense to the band that helped us move forward in a serious way.
We also started out with guitarist Cranston Mitchell, an amazing artist, rapper, and guitarist. He just wasn’t the right fit for this particular band, but we’ve all stayed connected because the sky’s the limit for other musical projects together.
The last missing piece was a drummer and we got blessed again. I’d been friends with known puppeteer and actor Chan Pratt, and when he heard I was looking for a drummer, he suggested his cousin, Zack White, aka Zack! He came in with incredible skills and crazy drumming abilities that took everything up a level.
Now, with Cyr, HellBot, and Zack, we’ve grown into a real force. We’re still evolving, still connecting, and I can honestly say this is the foundation, and I love this group of guys.
One of the things I like about the album is that it touches on all those subjects, but it still has a sense of optimism, rather than being all doom and gloom. Is that something you consciously decided to do?
I didn’t do it on purpose; it just happened organically. As I talked about those things, I didn’t want to stay in a bad place. I tried to find a bright side, to show that in the midst of darkness, you can overcome your demons. So yeah, it all happened organically, man.
What’s even crazier about this album is that I wrote most of the topics while working at the morgue. People would ask me, “Were the spirits speaking to you?” But really, it was more about what I was seeing and feeling every day.
I wrote “Silent Cradle” while I was at the morgue, after witnessing numerous babies being brought in. It was heartbreaking. It’s always sad when anyone comes through those doors, but when it’s babies, it hits different. I remember one night vividly, a young mother and her newborn were brought in together after complications during childbirth. That moment changed me.
I’ve experienced miscarriages in my own life, so in a way, I was able to connect deeply with the emotion behind the lyrics. I understood that pain, the sense of loss that stays with you but also pushes you to find meaning and strength in it.
This was my first time working in that kind of environment, and it gave me a deep respect for the people who handle and transfer bodies. They treat every person with care and dignity. That’s why I wanted to write “Silent Cradle”, because nobody really talks about that side of life, that quiet tragedy.
After I wrote the lyrics and the concept, I emailed everything to our singer and guitarist, Cyr. He added the finishing touches, refining the words and shaping the emotion, and that collaboration became what is now the biggest single off our debut album, “Silent Cradle.” I have to give Cyr his flowers for that; he really helped bring the vision to life. The video for “Silent Cradle” was directed by Jessie Charles, and its cinematography was done by Reid Petro.
I think that’s very brave of you, and sadly, it’s probably something that more people than we would think have experienced. I want to applaud you for making the song.
Thank you. I appreciate it.
People might want to shed those tears, and the song can help you get through it. The way that I’m rapping. I’m rapping as if I’m right there, and you can see what I’m saying. It’s not like I’m trying to push my flow harder. The whole song was a slow buildup of pain all the way until the end.
How has your experience working behind the scenes in the music industry better prepared you for stepping into the spotlight as a member of Hell’s Redemption?
It prepared me a lot, and I’m still a little bit behind the scenes. But it prepared me a lot. The music industry. How road shows go. How to prepare. How to prepare an act for shows. A&R-type stuff, finding talent. I actually learned a lot from Ice-T just by being a shadow.
That’s cool because you and I met five years ago at an Art of Rap show where he performed songs from his hip-hop catalog. Have you ever seen him perform with his rock band, Body Count?
I have not. That is what I wish I could see because what I’m doing now is…
It’s right along the same lines.
Yeah. I wish we could open up for Body Count someday.
You were reciting some of your lyrics earlier. One of my favorite lyrics you have is in the song “Hypoxia,” where you say, “Nothing was handed, had to earn every step / Every failure was a lesson full of fuckin’ regret.” Can you please give me an example?
(Laughs). Man, for instance, when I was putting the band together, I didn’t put the right people in the right places. Then I found my other band members the hard way. Then I also had regrets about things in Hip-Hop that I wanted to do but didn’t. Now I feel like I have the opportunity to do it. It’s crazy that you recited “Hypoxia” because “Hypoxia” is about finally coming up to breathe. The word itself means being unable to breathe, but in the midst of not being able to breathe, I’m telling everybody in my lyrics that you gotta dig deep and find a way. “Standing at the top, looking down / King of the fall now wearing a bloody crown / Screaming so loud, you can see the damn sound / I ain’t gonna stop ’til I put your fuckin’ face in the ground.” That’s the determination.
Given your band’s song “Magat Face,” I gather it is a reaction to the current state of America’s presidential administration and its supporters. Is there a particular event that inspired you to write the song? Or was it just an overall response that you wanted to put out there to express your disdain in general?
There is an event that sparked that. That’s a good question, too. It was everything going on in Palestine, and I wanted to tell the people, “Scream out your fuckin’ lungs, we don’t give a fuck / Light a match, then burn this motherfucker up.” And I want the people to fight. Don’t stop fighting. And it wasn’t me talking to America; I was talking to everybody, and when I titled, “Magat Face,” though – it’s like we do have a lot of things we don’t like as far as what’s going on with the government. We don’t want a lot of that stuff.
Can you talk about the album’s sequencing?
When it came to that, I needed some help because we made so many songs. We put out 12, but I recorded 20-something. And a lot of people don’t do that. Even people I worked with — people not in the band — were like, “You should just put singles out.” I don’t want to do that. I want a body of work. I want to put out an album—a vinyl. And so I got with Cyr, and I sat down with him. And he is good at placement. We sat down and talked about each song. And when I did “Hypoxia,” I thought it was suitable for the beginning. And we placed “Silent Cradle” toward the end because we didn’t want to hit everybody with that topic early —it’s sad. And we put “Magat Face” towards the end because it had all that energy. We really took our time with the placement and sequencing, so that each song was like a constant flow of emotion, and they tied together somehow.
What do you have on the horizon? What do fans have to look forward to? Anything else we haven’t already discussed?
More music. We’re just gonna get more intense, more active. And we got shows coming up. There are a lot of things in the making. We’re going to get going full force.
So stay tuned!
