1. Hello and greetings from Perú. How are you guys doing over there?
Hey we are doing good. Just chipping away
2. Let´s start talking about your beginning and what has has been the greatest challenge the band has faced up until today? Do you feel that you have grown up as a band?
In the beginning I (Kaden drummer) joined Javier Garcia who had formed the band BYL. I found the style very appealing because it was the closest to my proffered style that I could find in Hamburg. I saw his local ad to join a "Death n Roll" band. The concept just grabbed me and when he listed Entombed as one of the main influences, my ears pricked up immediately. I guess our first challenge was finding the right members to join us. We went through a few before we found our guy (Jan on bass) and decided to keep it a trio.
I guess it takes a special type of person to put up with Javi and I lol!(joke but sort of true) These days we have definitely evolved as a band. Upon reflection I think the songs on the second album we all our combined influences on the table and maybe wanted to write a few faster thrashier kind of songs to challenge ourselves. We are now going back to some of our favorite tracks from the first album and I must say we are having a great time playing them because they seem super easy and fun and feels real natural.
3. You are basically a trio and as I know, your vocalist/guitarist comes from Spain. Would it be possible to tell us more about your personal musical background? Funnily enough if turns out that we all have similar backgrounds in regards to influence. I grew up in the 90s singing death metal covers off Chaos Ad(Seultura) Six feet Under (Haunted) and Napalm Death Fear Emptiness, despair) I was originally just a death metal vocalist but our drummer had other bands and no real time to take it where we wanted to so I took over on drums. So ever since then I have been busting the skins following my favorite drummers like Donald Tardy and Igor Cavelera. I can't give you such a big monolog for the other boys but I think Javier was doing something similar on the other side of the planet. He wasted no time in finding his way into a very successful band from Spain called Soziedad Alkoholika and got to tour and play on killer stages with killer bands we all know. Our bass player Jan played a lot of local shows for punk and hardcore metal bands he's probably more referred to as a bass playing guitarist. So it brings in a nice contrast!
4. Talking about your latest “Apocalypse” album, I can safely deduct that everybody was pleased by this release. What effect has this album’s reception on you? How do you fell about it?
Pretty proud of this one. Personally I had to learn a lot and gain more experience in order to perform well in the studio, the previous experiences I was very nervous and felt the pressure a because time was money. But on this occasion we didn't have to rush since we did the tracks in our own studio. So it was a big step forward which we will benefit from for future albums.
5. You’ve managed to incorporate various elements in your music structures, one can find death, thrash and HC elements, a bit of rock ‘n’ roll attitude. Is this something that came along the way naturally for you or was it carefully planned since day one?
Actually maybe a bit of both. Going back to the start the concept was Death"n"roll. We are very open to play whatever style comes out. If it holds a bit of magic we will just go with it. I guess it just goes back to all our influences combining. We all wanted to do cool stuff like gang shouts so we did. I forgot to mention earlier that Motörhead are a huge influence of Javier so I guess that's how we got our rock 'n' roll attitude. I was a little bit behind with some of the older rock/metal bands so Javier really helped me understand the concept of this playing style which is to be more laid back, slightly behind and make every every note solid! Make it Groove!
6. How do you work as a band? What’s the process you follow when composing an album? Do you work individually or as a team spending hours all together in a studio until a good idea pops up?
Nowadays we record the first part of our rehearsal just improvising. If a cool riff pops up after listening back then we store it for safe keeping. We also have done it several other ways so it creates something different. We have composed songs on our own and also worked on a project together too. The other way is to write beats for the guys to put riffs to. I myself like to write songs including lyrics vocals. So I'll usually obsess over the whole thing but I will need the guys to write the guitars. I can only imagine the guitar riff or hum it. The first album was already written so we basically followed it closely as one can but of course new ideas of how to play it came about so it changed a bit and it will continue evolve as time goes on but like a fine wine. In regard to "Apocalypse" it was a combination. A lot of the riffs were from our bass player Jan, like I mentioned he is a bass playing guitarist and then Javier came along with his magic and arranged it all adding the finishing touches to make it into a fucking masterpiece lol.
7. The album was recorded on band´s home studio and the result is great! How was the whole recording process? And how long it took?
It's a really awesome thing because Javier our frontman guitarist also has the mastermind knowledge and passion to really make this all possible without having to pay a professional studio thousands of euros. So when we had most of the new songs we where already rehearsing , after awhile we got to work. This time we didn't have to rush because it was during the pandemic and we had our first record out "Karma Bitch" I wanted to let the songs marinate as much as possible before I started tracking drums. I found the longer you wait the tastier stuff you come up with so I took my time and did it properly with a click track and scratch guitar. Then I would send the drum tracks to Javier and he would give me a little feedback here and there usually positive but maybe there was a few times he didn't hold back in telling me to do this or that part better which might have been a bitter pill to swallow at the time but I certainly wasn't backing down and more importantly it produced the results so it was for the best! After that the guys got to work and eventually after what felt like an eternity of suspense we got to hear the final mixes! Then we got to work on some of the backing vocal parts where we invited a few close mates to help us execute gang shouts and I got to sing my "Rotting vocal part then it was sent to Barcelona to Javier's very good friend Gorka who is a professional engineer to Master it for us. I I guess it took the best part of 4 years from starting the first new song Blackheart to he final track Rotting. A hell of a lot of work went into it but I am stoked you guys dig the result.
8. What have been your primary inspirations (either music or non-music) as you’ve written material?
For me I live out in the countryside around 40kms from the city of Hamburg. I love getting out in the nature: forests, waterways, fields where no one is just me and my dog and I just dream how to make our songs reach their full potential. So having that serenity of nature helps. I like to think of cool lyrics which have a good pattern and flow but have a cool combination of words and a bit obscure. I think these days you almost have to invent new words to be original but I am good at that. I bug the the other guys quite often saying I have a cool chorus or verse whatever and lets build the song around it. So there is already a ton of new ideas for the next album. Occasionally a tiny bit of weed also helps;)
9. Unlike many other death metal bands, you make use of softer and calmer moments in the music such as those on “Rotting” and “No End”. How did these moments come about?
Love this question! Well I actually came up with the song "Rotting". I was walking with my dog through the forest on a winters day and felt a little bit sick. That's when I got this cool idea for a sing along. Starting with I and then the crowd repeats( I) then I sing "Am rotting" the crowd repeats Rotting! then We (crowd repeat We) are rotting away well you get the idea I hope. But I pictured it as one of those songs that have no other lyrics other than repeat the whole part throughout the whole song. By this stage we had already started recording the other songs and Javier was busy with the mixing. We had to come up with a few more songs to finish the album and this was the final track. On this track it was a little different because Jan and I bounced back and fourth with the arrangements and made it into and entire song. By the time Javier got it he came up with some new ideas obviously the clean vocal parts and awesome guitar leads but it it would have to be my favorite track off the album!
NO END was purely written by Javier himself. I think at the time he was fed up of being in lockdown so that's basically how that one came out lol
10. How important is live performance for BYL? Do you play often? If so how does your show looks like? Do you focus also on aesthetic side of gig?
BYL is something very special to us. We put every bit of heart and emotion into our live shows and every time we play. We can't get enough of playing live and give it all every single time. We are still growing as a band so our opportunities to play gigs at the moment are still limited. Our live show is quite raw maybe a bit punk like. We tend to just keep it rolling without too many breaks. These days I as the drummer wear a headset and have adopted more of a role as a co- vocalist along with our frontman Javier Garcia. It was tricky to do both at the start but over time it's just getting better and better so our vocal exchanges in our live show is becoming more of a new feature.
11. Internet brought an overpopulation of extreme metal bands and recordings. Did this affect the quality of the scene?
I noticed there are a ton of new bands out there and I am still open for new metal but at the same time I am really buried in the past when it comes to my favorite metal. I am still discovering cool shit from the 90s that I never found out about lol! I think the most important thing I will point out though is don't put out an album just for the sake of it. I've always found it takes quite awhile to bring out the taste in a song so it's quality not quantity. Bands shouldn't feel rushed to put out an album because a decent album needs time to marinate. I guess the overpopulation makes the ambition more difficult, but I believe a genuinely good band will still shine out!
12. Do you feel that you are a part of the local extreme scene or are you more related with bands from other countries?
I would say the latter! I think we are still pretty unknown in the local extreme scene. We haven't been around that long so we are still working our way in. Our first bunch of shows were with some bands who are friends of ours and we play different styles of metal. It was cool and it worked well. We where also invited to play with a black metal band from Poland which was an awesome experience. We are a band made up of international members being from Spain, Australia and Jan our bass player from Düsseldorf which some say is a country on it's own(laugh joke) so we have fans in different places. Which is a very nice thing! We really hope to get out and play to them soon!
13. If there is one thing you want to come across to the listener when listening to BREATHE YOUR LAST. what is it and why?
Just to sense the vibe we are bringing. That we put a lot of passion and thought into the songs to make it unique and interesting and to make people move!
14. What is the heavy music scene like in Hamburg? What are some other bands from your area that we should be paying attention to?
The scene is quite good. Some pretty well known bands come from here and a band that I have a lot of respect for and people really dig are a band called Detraktor. They are similarly an international band based in Hamburg like us but the members are from South America Chille so there you go! give them a listen they kick ass!
15. Many thanks for your valuable time and your effort! I wish you only the best! The last words to our readers are of course yours!
Thank you so much for taking the time to do this interview and we are really stoked you discovered us. Also I hope this reaches a lot more of metal people and they get a hold of our music. It would help us out huge if you stream our music on any music platforms or give us a like if your on facebook. Personally I'm not a fan of all these social media things but it seems such a necessary way for bands to get more popular these days. We are hungry to play shows and play for you guys wherever possible.
See ya on the circuit amigos!
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