1. Hello my friend, pleasure to have you on Rotten Pages ´zine. How are you doing today? Let us set the scene first. Where do we find you right now? Please describe your surroundings.
Hello first of all thank you for having us on Rotten Pages’ zine.
We are doing very good and are on this moment at the house of our bass player in the living room right now drinking soda and beers and smoking cigarette’s.
2. Let us start out by learning a little bit more about the members of Frontline Despair, perhaps you can tell us about the meaning of your names?
Abaddon: I’ m Abaddon (Real name Levi) I am the guitarist of Frontline Despair. Before Frontline Despair, I didn’t actually listen to black metal, so I had no idea what to name myself. I basically looked up demon names and found Abaddon.
Balthazar: my name is Balthazar (real name Bjarne). I’m the bassist. I was looking up mythical names, that’s how I found the name ‘Balthazar’.
Grifust: hello folks, I am Grifust (real name Sam). I am the drummer of Frontline Despair, I based my name of one of my favorite movie characters, because I found that demon names were kind of cringe.
Mephisto: I’m Mephisto I am the vocalist. My name was based off one of the remaining a7v tanks from ww1.
3. Band was found in 2021, Overall what has has been the greatest challenge the band has faced up until today?
The band was originally founded by Vocalist Mephisto as a DSBM band called “Endless selfharm” at that time it was very difficult to find good musicians to join the band. Before the current line-up, we had 3 other members come and go. Eventually mephisto met up with Abaddon and Grifust at a black metal show in Tilburg. not long after that Mephisto and grifust met up with our current bassist to ask him to also join the band. It has been a stable line-up ever since. We did have some tryouts for a 2nd guitarist, but we never found the right fit, now we have decided to just keep it at the four of us. As for the greatest challenge, we had some criticism about our image and motive but we’re hoping it soon settles.
4. Are you and the rest of the band friends and how do you all get along with one another?
All of us are friends only Balthazar and Grifust knew each other but we have grown together and are all close friends. sometimes there are difficulties about songs or lyrics or other stuff, but every band has that.
5. Frontline Despair combines war with black metal. What is required to deliver strong war black metal record? How demanding are you in your music in order to squeeze the maximum?
we are very demanding about the records we make. For us a song is finished when everything is perfect. for us strong war black metal is about heavy guitar riffs with heavy drums and vocals that tell the story of a soldier, vehicle, or weapons that they would use.
6. Now that I am listening to your self-titled demo, I’d like to ask you on the process of composing your tracks. Describe us, if possible, your typical procedure when writing songs: What comes first, really? Music or lyrics?
We always begin a typical day of making music in a rehearsal room and just start playing. mostly our guitarist will come up with a cool riff and we all start playing with him till we have concept. we will record that and maybe change or make it better and longer and after that vocals will be made; we mostly discuss about key things that maybe have happened in history that will maybe be cool to make a song about so most of the times music comes first and lyrics later
7. Where is your favorite place to write your songs? And from what symbols, feelings, stories or environments do you get inspiration?
we mostly get inspiration from movies, museums, documentaries, books, and sometimes even by just walking in the woods while listening to some music.
8. How did Frontline Despair cross paths with Rat Covenant, how has the relationship been with the label?
We have crossed paths with rat covenant when we went to helvete in Oberhausen, Germany we were there for a weekend to maybe plan a gig at the venue. that’s when we met, and he has now made our first demo tapes and in the future with the release of our first album we are also going to make cassettes again with him.
9. Could you give us a little insight into the metal-scene in Tilburg? Are there many bands that play metal, and especially black metal? And how are gig-possibilities et cetera?
I must say that in Tilburg the metal scene is growing you have a lot of bands in Tilburg as Faal and Zwart which are pretty known bands not only in the Netherlands but all over Europe of course gigs are always difficult to plan sometime you have a good year sometimes nothing you never know but we try to find places to play at and we also have our local bar where our bass player works and we preformed there again on 20-01-2024
10. Do you think Frontline Despair is a good live band? What do your gigs consist of, and are some cover-songs played in front of the audience?
We think we are a good live band but it’s up to the audience if they like us or not, we try our best to put on a perfect show where people’s heads are banging but you never know. Back in the day we did play covers but right now only songs from our upcoming album and maybe in the future we will play one cover of a band but for now we won’t.
11. Does black metal need the aggressive imagery to get their points of view across? And is black metal of way of life or just a very energetic outlet for stress and such?
It’s not necessary but it creates the right atmosphere. Is it a way of life? We don’t really think so, in general, when we go on stage, we like the feeling of putting on another face so we can release our inner rage and really get into the music more and have no fears. But off stage we are ordinary guys with jobs and loving families. <3
12. What do you think is the major difference between first-wave Norwegian black metal and the current crop of worldwide “BM”?
The first wave of nwbm 20 years before we where born, so we don’t really know the actual difference, the only real difference we can make up is that black metal is getting more corporate and safer. We want to break that safety and really make black metal the aggressive music it once was.
13. What is your opinion about the Dutch black and death metal scene in general? Do you think the scene is more active than it was before?
The death metal scene is really active but black metal is like we said getting too safe and is losing its edge, when you cross that edge you’ll get lots of backlash and criticism but we don’t care and do our own thing the way we want to.
14. Is there such a thing as a Dutch black metal sound? What would characterize it?
Dutch black metal is more branding but there are bands like Wrang and Helleruin which have a distinct “Dutch” Sound. Most of the Dutch black metal bands also write a lot about dutch history, maybe that would characterize it.
15. What ways has been the best for you in order to promote the band? What do you do to reach as many interest as possible?
We haven’t really done anything promotion wise, but with an album coming out soon we kind of have to start soon, but we have some things in the works (like this interview).
16. Let’s finish this interview by looking into the future. What would you like your band to be known for?
Good music and great live performances and have a lot of fun doing it.