Kyle Schaefer talks Xenotaph, SHRED FEST 2026 and the beautiful violence of modern tech death
Watch the full interview with Kyle Schaefer of FALLUJAH at end of article.
There’s a certain kind of madness that only technical death metal can summon. The sort that feels less like music and more like being dragged through a collapsing wormhole by creatures made of riffs and existential dread. And somehow, through all the chaos, Fallujah have become one of the few bands capable of making that experience feel strangely human.
Now they’re returning to Australia for SHRED FEST 2026 alongside Obscura, armed with their latest sonic monolith, Xenotaph — an album that feels like it was written inside a dying star somewhere beyond the edge of reality.
Speaking with Crank, vocalist Kyle Schaefer reflected on bringing the new material to Australian crowds after the band’s last trip down under in 2023 with Cattle Decapitation. But this time feels bigger. Stranger. More ambitious.
“We can’t wait to head back down under with a heavy selection of songs from our new album Xenotaph. These shows will be crazy.”
And honestly? He’s probably underselling it.
Fallujah have evolved far beyond the cold mechanical stereotype often attached to tech death. Xenotaph breathes. It expands. It levitates somewhere between transcendence and total annihilation, wrapping impossible musicianship around atmosphere thick enough to drown in.
This isn’t just another extreme metal tour. SHRED FEST 2026 feels like a summit meeting for the future of progressive heaviness — where precision, emotion and outright sonic warfare collide under strobe lights and sweat-soaked ceilings.
Australia is about to get very loud.
This is the Gospel.
I bite crowd surfers.
Killer.
