Inside Sematary’s chainsaw-wielding, horrorcore universe

Sematary and his hip-hop collective Haunted Mound live in a 20th-century abattoir situated somewhere in rural Northern California. Built in 1905, the Butcher House is as spooky as it sounds, a two-floor derelict house tucked deep into the wilderness, and serves as the group’s official HQ. If you’re at all familiar with Sematary’s online presence, it’s where he shoots many of his music videos, a montage of lo-fi and ultra-grainy sequences that feel like something out of a B-movie horror flick. “Some old lady lived in it before me,” he tells me over Zoom. “There’s still old flower curtains on the walls from when she was there. I know she died, I’m not sure if it was inside the house, but one can assume.” 

At just 23 years old, the rapper whose real name is Zane Steckler, began performing under his alias Sematary in 2019, quickly blowing up online after a succession of Rainbow Bridge mixtapes, EPs and singles catapulted him and his collective to internet fame. Dressed in head-to-toe True Religion and usually depicted wielding a chainsaw, the artist also nicknamed Grave Man is best known in underground music circles for his deep-fried aesthetic and a hardcore fanbase to rival fellow internet collectives like Drain Gang, though his seem even younger and scarily obsessive – if you don’t believe me, take a look at the Haunted Mound subreddit. His sound is equally cooked, a murderous combo of bone-crushing basslines and horrorcore rap that’s been compressed to shit. Some might call this an acquired taste, but for Steckler, it’s a winning formula. 

Where are you calling in from, the butcher house?

Sematary: Right now, I’m in LA for work, but I do live there [the butcher house]. I don’t really like living in the city, or being around lots of people.

OK so Bloody Angel, sonically there’s a lot of similarities to past releases, the same blown-out sound but with the addition of some guitars in there. How do you see this album situated in the Haunted Mound universe?

Sematary: Yeah, it’s a lot of the same stuff that I’ve been inspired by and all my tastes combining it in new ways. It’s kind of old Gucci Mane, Salem, those kinds of sounds. I don’t know what you call the genre, like Joy Division, new wave, I think. All those things mashing into one and heavy riffs, the usual trap influences. 

What about the album name, how do you come up with those more generally?

Sematary: There’s no idea. I don’t really tell stories with overarching themes in my stuff. It just sounded cool. It’s good imagery. 

Speaking of imagery, you’ve been fronting the deep-fried aesthetic for some time now. It’s something that I’ve observed returning to the mainstream lately too, with Kanye’s latest release, witch house making a comeback and so on. Have you felt this too? 

Sematary: I don’t think the stuff I consider witch house is in the mainstream. The stuff Salem did, there’s still nothing like that. Besides, me trying to follow that sound, I don’t feel like there’s anything like that going on right now. It’s a lot more cloud rap, which is cool too, I like that stuff. Getting all nitpicky about genres is dumb, but that stuff is getting popular again. It’s still not as hardcore as it could be, that’s what I’m trying to do. 

Why do you think that is?

Sematary: I don’t know, I never thought about it that deeply. Probably putting those influences in with other genres that have to be mainstream, you can’t go as hardcore. Just to make it accessible. 

 “Everyone is welcome except fucking Nazis” – Sematary

How do you get started working on tracks, do you have a go-to method?

Sematary: Usually we’ll make the beat first and then we’ll write on our phones whatever lyrics. I have a big ol’ Notes page. I haven’t been writing as much as I used to. Like sitting down and writing the song. A lot of times I’ll just start playing the beat and just go stream of consciousness with the phrases I have. A song will take shape from there.

What would you say attracts you to these extreme, heavily-processed sounds? 

Sematary: I like a lot of heavy metal, black metal. A lot of the older witch house was mixed pretty loud, heavy, crunchy and unforgiving. So all those influences put together, it’s just how it ends up, because I want to make songs that sound like that. Crunchy is fun. For me, it’s therapeutic. Like how a punching bag and hitting stuff is therapeutic, it’s like that but for my ears. 

I actually mentioned you in an article I wrote back in 2022 about deep-fried memes. At least in the memescape, deep frying is a technique that allows you to bypass censorship, like you can post a meme about dark or explicit things, and deep-frying allows you to explore subjects on the edge of what the algorithm deems acceptable. Is this something you’ve ever thought about? 

Sematary: The way I make my mixtape covers and edit my pictures, I’m just trying to be like my influences. I like a lot of the old pen and pixel works with the iced-out text and shit, so I was trying to follow that look but make it more cursed and less gangster rap. Back in the day, Chief Keef would put crazy filters on their pictures and I follow that. I just like editing the fuck out of my pictures, it’s just fun to me. No deeper thinking. 

When you started performing as Sematary in 2019, you blew up online super fast. Was this something you ever saw coming? How did it all begin?

Sematary: This is always something I wanted to do since I was 11 and I saw Yung Lean and it really gave me a feeling like, I can do what I’ve been wanting to do, and follow his model. Making music is the only thing that I’ve ever been excited about doing, it’s all I ever thought about. I got out of high school in 2019 and started dropping mixtapes.

I first caught onto your stuff in 2020, which is also a time when everyone was chained to their computers, and internet-native music began reaching bigger audiences than just strictly underground circles – I’m thinking like Drain Gang and PC Music. Were you aware of that happening?

Sematary: I don’t really concern myself with the stuff that’s going on. Drain was definitely an influence, but I kind of stopped paying attention to other music once I started. I don’t feel like there’s a lot of similar stuff to what we do, I kind of wish there was competition.

How do you situate yourself in Haunted Mound?

Sematary: A bunch of friends that all work together. We all have the same goal in mind, so it’s easy. Just keeping everything going, keep dropping projects, keep doing shirts, going on tour. 

Do you enjoy touring?

Sematary: It’s cool to not be stuck on the internet, talking to fans, just online, where they don’t really treat you like a person. In real life, it’s much more fun and we can actually see how the songs work and affect people in real life, which means a lot to me.

“I just like editing the fuck out of my pictures, it’s just fun to me” – Sematary

You have some real diehard fans. It’s something I’ve only ever seen with artists whose music started out online – I’m thinking of the obsessive sub Reddits, the conspiracies surrounding Haunted Mound, it must be a lot. 

Sematary: I just have to not look at any of it ever now. For my mental health.  I have to not. I see stuff when people tag me on Twitter or mention me on Instagram, but I actively don’t look at any of the other stuff, because it’s all negative for me. Nothing positive has ever come out of looking at that stuff.

Why do you think that is?

Sematary: I don’t know. Kids are weird. 

You’re one of the only internet-native artists I’ve seen who’s used their platform to speak out against the alt right and all the radicalisation we’re seeing online.

Sematary: I want all people to be included in our fan base. Everyone is welcome except fucking Nazis and alt-right people. I don’t understand why that’s a thing in the underground, it shouldn’t be a thing in the underground. 

I want to return to some of the collaborators on the album, like Wicca Phase, who’s one of your original influences. How does it feel now that you’re coming full circle?

Sematary: It feels really freaky. I’ve worked very hard to get here and I’m going to keep going and see how far I can take it. 

Bloody Angel is out now