“I saw this video of a 10-year-old Japanese girl shredding Paul Gilbert solos. I figured, ‘This can’t be about brute physicality. It’s about touching the guitar the right way’”: Karl Sanders on technical epiphanies – and why Nile needs three guitarists

Karl Sanders holds his signature Dean and wears a guitar strap that looks like medieval weaponry.

For more than 30 years, South Carolina-based tech-death metal band Nile have conjured swarms of zig-zagging riffs colored with Middle Eastern melodies and lyrics about Egyptian and Mesopotamian mythology, and the cosmic horror of H.P. Lovecraft.

In the process, they’ve gleefully left piles of detached jaws in their wake and compelled hordes of younger guitarists to boost the savagery and complexity of their playing. Now, as Nile prepare to release their 10th studio album, The Underworld Awaits Us All, the blood-red tide has turned. Instead of forging wildly original death spirals of sound, frontman and primary songwriter Karl Sanders has sought guidance from an unlikely new breed of guitar players.