Sanctuary guitarist Lenny Rutledge is featured in a new interview with Dead Rhetoric discussing the band's classic 1988 album, Into The Mirror Black. He also talks about the band's new album, which is currently in the works, and original vocalist Warrel Dane, who passed away in 2017. Following is an excerpt from the chat.

Dead Rhetoric: Work has begun on the fourth Sanctuary album – which will be the first to feature current vocalist Joseph Michael. Do you have a sense of what direction you want to go in with the songwriting, tones, and style- as I’m sure there is pressure to align well with the three previous albums?

Rutledge: "I can tell you that the music, there is some music that is pretty aggressive at times, and it does sound a little like The Year The Sun Died music-wise, but there are more upbeat aspects. With Joseph’s vocals, he does have a little bit more of a range – I love Warrel’s work on the last album, some people expected to probably hear more of a throwback to Refuge Denied and Into The Mirror Black. I like what he did, it sounded like we had grown up a little bit, I don’t know if that’s a bad word for people. As a musician you want to grow and you want to change and make things more interesting for yourself as well, not just your fans.

This time, we’ll probably explore some of the old vibes of the first couple of records. It probably will be a blend of all three records. It’s turning out pretty good so far, we are realizing we have a lot to live up to. I feel that Warrel is somebody that is very underrated, and he’s always on my mind. I want him to be proud of this, or at least okay with (it). For me, that’s always in the back of my mind."

Dead Rhetoric: Losing Warrel Dane in 2017 was quite a blow to the band and the metal community. What are some of your fondest memories of the man through Sanctuary, and your relationship that you had with him personally?

Rutledge: "Oh God. I think one thing that always surprised me about Warrel, he comes across as a very intense guy and maybe dark, but he was a really funny, goofy guy. Which seemed very unlikely based on a lot of the intense stuff he wrote. I got to see sides of him that were very caring. He could be a dick sometimes, but that was very rare. For the most part, he was not his persona that you would see. He was a really fun guy to hang out with – I don’t consider myself a super dynamic guy. There was something about him, he was quiet and shy but he had this way of turning things on and being the life of the party. Jim (Sheppard) and Warrel, when they were together he was a lot of fun. When Sanctuary first got back together the second time around in 2010, Jim, Warrel and I would get together and would just hang out. Sometimes we weren’t even writing, we would just play acoustic covers and hang out in the studio here. We didn’t start writing songs for a couple of years, we were getting reacquainted. Those are really fond memories for me."

Read the complete interview here.

In December 2017, BraveWords posted what would be our final interview with Warrel Dane, conducted in July of that year. Dane passed away on December 13th, 2017 due to a heart attack at the age of 56. The story was our last feature story of 2017. Check it out here.