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. Thanks for having us. Everyone is fine today. Right now we are in our rehearsal room and ready for your questions.
2. You guys have been going for a couple of years now. How would you like to say that the progress of the band has matched your intentions from the beginning?
At first Marco and I (Mattl) started jaming together around September 2019. After we finished 3 instrumentals it didn't take long for Rafal to join us. Unfortunately we had to pause after that for around one and a half year because we had a hard time finding a new rehearsal room. Once we finally got our current rehearsal room at the beginning of 2021, my brother Mani joined us on the Bass Guitar and we finally started to work on our music.
We are 100% statisfied how everything has turned out for us so far.
3. How much time do you spend on the band both physically but also mentally each day? Is it worth all the time and effort in the end?
For Rafal it's the whole day, every day mentaly. Physically he is at least every 2 days at the rehearsal room practicing his drumming. Marco, Mani and I try to practice at least 1 hour a day and on Saturday and Sunday we all meet to rehearse together. It is definitely worth the time and effort. Otherwise we wouldn' be doing it.
4. Being a new band – even though some of the guys have spent time in other bands – is it difficult these days to write songs that are unique?
If you want to say with this that we sound unique, thank you!
We never tried to sound like someone else. Sometimes we just start jaming together and we come up with something. We have no fixed schedule for songwriting, we just use what comes in our minds. If everyone likes it we start working on it.
5. Had it not been for Facebook I had not heard of you. How important are the social media in helping spread a band’s name?
We are still surprised how you came across our site. Gladly you did. Only thing I can say, Social Media is probably the most important thing nowadays for bands.
6. What would you say has been your greatest influences both in sound and aesthetics?
This is a hard question for us. We have a lot of influences. Like Rafal is a big fan of Death Metal but also sometimes Hip Hop & Electronic. Mani listens a lot to Thrash and Groove Metal but thanks to us he starts to enjoy Death Metal as well. Marco mostly listens to a bright range of metal music but also electronic like deep house or indie. The influence for playing the guitar and writing new music he definitely gets from death metal - heavy riffs, fast solos and great breakdowns. I mostly listen to Deathcore and Progressive Metal. So probably a mixture out of all that and songs that we can listen to together would be our influence.
7. Your self entitled EP was released several months ago. All the songs are damn solid- how was the process when writing and recording?
Thank you for your kind words. For the writing process its like I said before, sometimes we come up with something while jaming together. Also Marco and I finish guitars at first and send it to Rafal so he can add drums to it. Once we have a finished instrumental we start to figure out the Lyrics and Vocals for it.
Obviously it was our first recording session in a studio for our first EP. The recording process was super relaxed. No stress from the side of the Audio Engineer and we had all the time we needed for the perfect take. Right now we are trying to set up our own recording setup to become fully independent for everything.
8. When you work in the studio. Do you come in all prepared or do you improvise?
I would say we came overprepared. Because we recorded our EP in Poland. This was a 8 hour drive for us and there was no option to mess something up.
9. Mattl, your vocals are very well done, both intelligible and sinister as hell. How much work did you put into the vocals on this EP or does it just come naturally at this point in your career?
At first thank you. It never was planed that I should do the vocals for the band. We tried to find an extra frontman for us but without success. Our first option was that Rafal start training his vocals again and record the songs in the studio. But it was clear that Vocals and Drums are not an option for gigs.
I always screamed along to my favourite songs and at one point it just came naturally like you said. So around 6 months before the recording I startet practicing my vocals as much as possible for the studio.
10. Once you have released a record how do you deal with the fact that from now on things are out of your control? You can’t control if people will like it. You can’t control how people experience the music etc.
First of all we make the music because we like it and if someone else likes it too it's awesome. Tastes in music are different, so it's obvious not everyone will like it.
11. Do you often play gigs in your area, and how does it occur? Is it in small bars, or is there some bigger "official" concert places for metal bands? Is the crowd numerous during your live appearances?
For now we only had one Live show in Salzburg City. It was in an official concert hall called 'Rockhouse'. The crowd was definitely above our expectations. Right now we have no more shows planed. We try to get some new material done to be prepared to play longer sets.
12. Over the years death metal has evolved to be not just one specific sound. Is there any specific death metal sound that means more to you than the other?
Let's make it short. No. There are a lot of bands out there and it's good that they have different sounds.
13. Can we speak of a specific Austrian death metal sound, and what would that be?
Austria is not really known for its big Death Metal community. Maybe we can set the specific 'Austrian Death Metal' sound. Hahaha
14. Are there some parts of the world that really impress you due to the quality of the bands coming from the same area? I mean are you involved with what happens in South America, Asia, etc???
I believe that every area of the world has something interesting to offer... often from the first sounds you can hear where a band comes from... although on the other hand it can be misleading ha ha. For example, there may be a band from Peru whose members are strongly influenced by Swedish melodeath and they create this kind of music, this is what they sound like... you hear it for the first time and say "fuck, Stockholm"... and here's a surprise, ha ha. I myself like to listen to different things... the more variety, the better. Therefore, it would be difficult for me to point to a specific area. Simple but, if I like a band's music, it really doesn't matter where it comes from.
15. Could you tell us more about the metal scene in Salzburg? Is this a quite good state on a metal point of view, and were there good Death metal bands to check out in the past?
In Salzburg is a bigger community for metal music and not like the country side where we live. There are some goods places like bars and concert halls for that. Belphegor is from this city.
16. It might be too early, seeing as you’re working on it right now, but what can we expect from the forthcoming album?
At this point we have nearly 3 finished new songs. We just go our way and create music which sounds good to us. It's still not sure what the final product will sound like but we definitelly will deliver the best we can.
17. You are a independent band with no record label. How much of a DIY scene is there still left around the world that can support you if you want to tour or release an album on your own?
Nowadays releasing an album on your own isn't this hard thanks to some online Distributor services and Digital streaming services. And for the physical EP and T - Shirts, etc. there are also enough of services on the internet.
18. And now we have finally come to the end of this interview, do you have some important words for our readers?
Stay healthy, stay brutal and if you like our music feel free to share it with your friends and the world. We hope to see all of you at future live shows. PROST!
Thank you for the interview and for showing us to the other side of the world.
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