Erik Rutan

Erik Rutan (born June 10, 1971) is an American heavy metal musician and producer from New Jersey. He is the guitarist and lead vocalist of death metal band Hate Eternal and lead guitarist for Cannibal Corpse, who he fully joined in 2021 after acting as a fill-in guitarist during their 2019 tour. Rutan has also spent time with Morbid Angel (three different stints) and Ripping Corpse. When not performing, Rutan operates his own recording studio in Florida called Mana Recording Studios.

Recording
Rutan started his metal career with Ripping Corpse, recording one album titled Dreaming with the Dead released in 1991. Around 1993, he left to join Morbid Angel, recording Domination (1995) before leaving in 1996 to found his own band, Hate Eternal, releasing their first album Conquering the Throne in 1999. Rutan then returned to Morbid Angel to record Gateways to Annihilation, released in 2000. Rutan left Morbid Angel again to concentrate on Hate Eternal, releasing King of All Kings in 2002 and I, Monarch in 2005. He rejoined Morbid Angel once more for the band's 2006 summer tour of Europe, a move about which the other band members said, "This will certainly be an exciting event with the Domination lineup together for the first time in 10 years!" The tour included a stop at the Wacken Open Air festival.

Rutan has had a number of side projects that highlight different aspects of his playing. For example, he formed the group Alas with former Therion vocalist Martina Astner, releasing the landmark progressive metal album Absolute Purity in 2001.

Rutan is a guest vocalist on the track "Bone Crown" on Annotations of an Autopsy's second full-length album, II: The Reign of Darkness.

On January 18, 2019, it was announced that Rutan would fill in for Pat O'Brien of Cannibal Corpse for the remainder of their winter and spring tour dates. Rutan was officially announced as a permanent member of the band on February 2, 2021 and appears on their fifteenth studio album Violence Unimagined.

Erik is a long time player of B.C. Rich guitars and has played various Ironbirds and V's with Dimarzio, EMG, Seymour Duncan, and (more recently) Fishman pickups. He has also played Ibanez guitars, mostly during his latter days with Morbid Angel and the early Hate Eternal days. During his time with Ripping Corpse, he played a Yamaha superstrat guitar (most likely an RGX model). For Morbid Angel, he used a Gibson Explorer outfitted with a Floyd Rose bridge and an Ibanez Universe guitar given to him by Trey Azagthoth. Recently, B.C. Rich created an Erik Rutan custom 7-string Ironbird with Fishman Fluence pickups and this is now his main guitar for Cannibal Corpse. Erik uses various amps from various companies including Marshall, ENGL, and Mesa Boogie.

In 2021 Rutan got an endorsement with B.C. Rich, he now has his own signature 7 String Ironbird.

Production
Rutan has produced the following albums:
 * Belphegor: Conjuring the Dead
 * Cannibal Corpse: Kill, Evisceration Plague, Torture, Red Before Black, Violence Unimagined, Chaos Horrific
 * Madball: Empire
 * Agnostic Front: My Life My Way
 * Six Feet Under: Commandment
 * Annotations of an Autopsy: II: The Reign of Darkness
 * Morbid Angel: Illud Divinum Insanus (drum production), Kingdoms Disdained
 * Soilent Green: Inevitable Collapse in the Presence of Conviction, Confrontation
 * Through the Eyes of the Dead: Malice
 * Goatwhore: A Haunting Curse, Carving Out The Eyes of God, Blood for the Master, Constricting Rage of the Merciless
 * Vital Remains: Icons of Evil
 * Malevolent Creation: Invidious Dominion (co-producer)
 * Nile: Those Whom the Gods Detest (drum production)
 * Krisiun: Conquerors of Armageddon, Forged in Fury
 * Pessimist: Slaughtering The Faithful
 * Internal Suffering: Internal Suffering, Awakening of the Rebel
 * Premonitions of War: Left In Kowloon
 * Aeon: Path of Fire (mixing)
 * In Battle: Welcome to the Battlefield
 * The Absence: From Your Grave
 * Pathology: Legacy of the Ancients
 * Avulsed: Gorespattered Suicide
 * Into the Moat: The Design, The Campaign (album)
 * Torture Killer: Swarm! (mixing)
 * Pain Principle: Waiting For The Flies
 * Covenance: Ravaging The Pristine
 * Ophiolatry: Anti-Evangelistic Process
 * Devourment: Conceived in Sewage
 * The Mountain Goats: All Eternals Deck (four songs)
 * Masacre: Total Death
 * Tombs: Savage Gold
 * Ephel Duath: Hemmed By Light, Shaped By Darkness, On Death and Cosmos
 * Rivers of Nihil: The Conscious Seed of Light