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Bands: Arallu
Review Date: June 23, 2018

Arallu

Arallu are stalwarts of the Israeli metal scene releasing 6 albums in the past 2 decades. Earlier this month, the band reissued their 4th album ‘Desert Battles’ ahead of its tenth anniversary. The black/death metal sound is boosted by re recorded vocals, remastering and a new cover art. I spoke to front man Butchered about the Desert Battles reissue, keeping the band going for over 2 decades and more. (Peter ‘Trendcrusher’ K.)

It’s been 10 years since the release of “Desert Battles”. Why did you decide to release a remastered version of the album with re recorded vocals and new cover art?
Hello from Jerusalem and thank you very much for this interview. Im Butchered the main member of Arallu. “DESERT BATTLES” album finally coming again after long time of waiting. The original album released March 2009 but we never was Satisfied with the results of the final mix and mastering , and that’s why we didn’t release it again after the 2000 copies as finished in 2013. Lately people who have all Arallu discography except this album asks us about this album and we think it’s time to release it again but not as the original version. Dory Bar or who responsible for “GENIEWAR” and “SIX” albums re mixed it and mastered the album after we recording the full vocals again to get the best from this record.

Your sound is described as Oriental metal. How did you come up with your unique sound?
When I started listen to the European black metal bands of the 90’s ,I really liked the idea of the local folk music inside the raw sound of the black metal. I thought to myself “I can’t play like that . I can’t write music like that. I can feel the cold and the mountains coming out from the speakers! if I will try to sound like that no one will listen to my music. I can’t make it sound like that. BUT if I will bring a special sound and guitar riffs with special instruments combined with them”. middle eastern music is my childhood home music. My father was listening to this music since I was a child. the combination between the european sound and the middle eastern sound id not easy to do and we works hard to combine them but after many years u can see its works together.

The new version of ‘Desert Battles’ sounds great. How does it feel looking back at the album?
Thank you very much and i’m happy you like it like us. I think if the original version of this album was sound like that, more people were discovering our music. For my opinion this album is the best of Arallu, and we think a lot around the years to rec. this album again. But thanks to Dory Bar or the new version sounds like we really rec. it again.

You have recently released a video for the track “Possessed by the Sleep”. What are your thoughts on music videos in the age of Youtube?
“Possessed by sleep” is from our last album “SIX”. i think every song of every album should release as a video because Video can explain the lyrics of the song in the best way. But its all about money , and videos are to expensive and that’s why we don’t have every song a video clip…

What are your thoughts on the current state of black metal?
Mmmmmm… I think there are some good bands and albums and some not good albums. I can tell you I really like to listen for some new music from EMPEROR. The last album of MAYHEM is really great, same of SATYRICON and ROTTING CHRIST, but i’m really disappointed from DIMMU BORGIR and CRADLE OF FILTH for example.

You are the original member of the band. What has kept you going for the past 20 years despite the changes in lineup?
I really like to create music, the feedback from album to album get better and it gives me the force to move on. The band members are changed because i’m not stopping to push the band forward and some people are get tired from that. I can tell you this line up of the band have a great force. like the devil himself and i’m sure they will go with me for many years!

What’s currently on your playlist?
We working now for our upcoming album. Its will be album number 7. We finished already 8 full songs and we hope to start rec. soon. Beside that I hope to perform soon in asia. It’s a dream for me to come and play India,Japan, Singapore. I hope someone will take it forward someday…

Do you have any more shows/tours planned for the rest of the year?
Unfortunately nothing for now….

Thanks for answering all our questions. Do you have any final words?
Thank you very much for this great interview and i’m really hoping to come play for our fans in your great country soon.

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Bands: Grim Fate
Review Date: April 10, 2018

Grim Fate

If you are a fairly new band and play in the Incantation / old Finnish scene way, you bet your ass I’m intrigued. GRIM FATE delivers the goods on this one and it is a job well done. Let see what these decomposing individuals are up too… (Ricardo)

Although you (Wim) aren’t a new one in the scene, the other one (Pier) you started Grim Fate with, is. How did you guys met and more importantly, why did you start Grim Fate together and did you had some goals to achieve in mind?
We know each other for quite some time and are into the same kind of bands. We recommend new bands to each other and stuff and are both really passionate about death metal. I had the idea to do a band in the vein of the Finnish scene and stuff like Incantation for years and I thought last year it’s just time to do it instead of talking about it. And since I know Pier is really into this kind of stuff it was an obvious choice to ask him and join me. We didn’t have any idea where to go with it, other then make some music that we like and see where it goes.

Incantation…Demigod…old Amorphis. Just a couple of obvious influences you can hear while listening to the “Emerging from the Crypt” EP. Which albums inspired you both to start Grim Fate? The ones which made you think “Hey…how great would it be to create something as that?”.
Incantation is an obvious influence of course, and I am really into the Amorphis mcd and the early work of bands like Convulse, Purtenance, Demigod, Rippikoulu, Demilich, Sentenced, Abhorrence, etc. But it’s not that we try to recreate their sound. We just do our own thing and it’s slow and brutal and has a nice melody here and there. It’s our interpretation of the sound that we like so much. And funny enough I read some reviews that links us to bands that I don’t even listen to or like. But it’s not important to us, we like what we do and we hope other people like it as well.

Let’s talk about the sound of your EP, as I mentioned “good old Tico Tico Studios guitar sound” in my review to enhance the Finnish scene. Do you agree with the comparison? Was it on purpose or did you just experiment and on one point you said both “Yeah, this is the putrid sound we are looking for!”?
I don’t know man, that’s way too much honour. Tico Tico is a legendary studio when it comes to the Finnish scene and we just started recording ourselves. But we take it as a compliment for sure. I just started making songs for Grim Fate and dialled in my amp for a great sound for this music and that is what we recorded and with some slight EQ and reverb while mixing that is all it is. The sound when I play my guitar at home and practise our write new songs is pretty much the same as on the CD and to me that is how it has to be. It is what it is.

At first you have released digital one track demo (“Decomposition”), and not long after that you got in contact with Chaos Records and Dawnbreed Records to release your new material. Can you tell us more about how everything went? Is releasing your material on cassette important for you guys? There is a little bit of nostalgia within you, ha!
We made this track to see if any label would like it and we sent it to a couple of labels. And quite a few were interested, but either wanted a full length or didn’t have room in their release schedule and Chaos was one of the labels that was really into it from the start and offered us a great deal to do a cd version. Both Pier and I know Jeff for a long time and when we met him at a festival last year we talked about our band and he said he was interested in a tape version. And we really like every way to release our stuff and we agreed right away and I have to say he did a great job and it is sold out already. Would be great if some label wants to do a vinyl version as well, because in the end that is the ultimate version.

In the meantime, Philippus Yntema entered the ranks of Grim Fate. Can you tell us more about him and how things went?
Philippus more or less helped us out on the MCD already and we mixed and mastered it together. We played in Boal together and we are also in Burial Remains together and we understand each other really well, so with him helping us out already it was an obvious choice for the future.

“Dying World”…Anthrax…I know what you’ve told me, that you haven’t heard “Be All, End All” of the Anthrax’ “State of Euphoria” album before, but I can imagine I’m not the only one who has pointed it out. And in the mean time you’ve probably you heard the track already…What was your first reaction when you heard about the Anthrax connection? What a coincidence, heh?
I am not an Anthrax fan at all and I have listened to a few records in the past, but didn’t know “Be All End All”. It was pointed out to me a few times now that the beginning of both songs do sound a bit like each other. Well I checked that and I was like yeah this is funny, but at the same time it’s a really basic riff, so there is quite a big chance that some stuff sounds like other stuff. It’s no issue for us and to be honest, I like our version way better hahahaha

What can we expect in the near future of Grim Fate? Working on a debut full-length, the urge to do a tour, splits…other activities…?
As we speak we just recorded a new song. Maybe it’s a good idea to do a split or something, but no options on that. We have quite some songs written and we might do a full length, or another EP, or a bunch of splits. We don’t have anything planned out and are open for anything. We just want to make music and have a good time and releasing stuff is something we really like. As for live shows we don’t have any plans to hit the stage, but when the right opportunity rises we’ll see what happens.

You’ve got some other bands activities as well, like the brutal Death Metal outfit Boal. Also I’m very curious about Miasma Of Guilt. Can you tell us more about the status and nowadays activities of your other bands/projects?
Yeah I’m quite busy with stuff. Boal is not done, but more or less inactive for the moment as we have other things going on. We recorded an MCD two years ago, but never released it, as we weren’t too happy with where that was going. New stuff will sound different from the debut CD since that turned out way more in the brutal direction than we had in mind when we started. Miasma Of Guilt isn’t happening in the end, which is really unfortunate, but some of the members started a new band called Burial Remains. It sounds more or less like any other band with a HM-2 pedal I guess hahaha.But we have an MCD ready real soon, but in the meantime we have enough songs for at least one full length written. I think it’s pretty rad shit, so keep an eye out for that. I also did quite some layouts in the past, but that is a bit on the back burner for some reason right now, but like doing that a lot also.

Thanks for your time, Wim, Pier and Phillipus. I’m sure our paths will cross in the future when you will release more material with Grim Fate!
Thank you for the interview and the nice words in your review Ricardo.We will just keep going so our paths will most likely cross in some way or another. Good luck with your zine!

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Bands: Sammath
Review Date: March 19, 2018

Sammath – “If some hipster idiot doesn’t like it the smile on my face is just as big as getting album of the year”

There are still a lot of bands out there, who keep on releasing decent albums but don’t get the recognition they deserve due many different reasons. And maybe it is a subjective factor as well…recognition. If I name 5 bands and pass this one to 100 different people, guaranteed I will receive many different answers. So let me rephrase it…bands of which I think deserve more recognition and one of them is Black Metal act from The Netherlands: SAMMATH. It’s have been a couple of years since their fine album “Godless Arrogance” was released, so it is time to ask Jan Kruitwagen how things are going….(Ricardo)

“Godless Arrogance” was released in 2014 and is received very well by press and fans. Looking back; still satisfied with the album, the songs and how things worked out in general? Were there reviews you remember which made you very proud? And were there reviews which are absolutely bollocks in your opinion (maybe someone compared you with Gorefest, Moonspell and Samael…believe me, I’ve read some crazy comparisons throughout the years) .
Time goes by fast… Yes , im still satisfied with it. Usually the black hole I fall into after releasing a album is just because its done and then you hear stuff you should have done better, or left out. But with Godless Arrogance its all good. I think with our type of music, which even most black metal people think is to dirty we should be damn satisfied where we are at now. Since we signed to Hammerheart the amount of sales and reviews interviews are pretty nuts. We spend a great 18 years with Folter Records, which was also great. The scene is still alive and kicking hard, its simply gotten so big that there are more idiots. So as you stated, some reviewers make crazy comparisons, but everybody writes review these days, so it’s not going to get better. We have been called a grindcore band, a death metal band. Its also hard to put one name on it as every albums has a different feel to it. But fuck me, if this isn’t black metal what is. Many people who bought the latest album cant stand the first album, and other way around. I just cant write the same type of black metal every time. The 6^th album seems to be turning into a mix between the first and last. Reviews that make me proud, many, even negative ones. If some hipster idiot doesn’t like it the smile on my face is just as big as getting album of the year.

Besides the CD and 12” vinyl release “Godless Arrogance” was also released by Zwaertgevegt on cassette. I know musicians who are excited about the fact their music is being released on cassette as well…maybe it is nostalgia or the physical part of the cassette as well as the artwork (which is different compared with CD and vinyl) and cassette case…Did you have the same idea when you received the offer to released it on tape?
I’ve known Alex for years and he is one dedicated dude. We got shitloads of offers to release it on tape, but he deserves it. Just this winter he was at almost all our shows, upfront, banging his bloody head of the entire set. Its different because the format is different, only reason. I still like playing tapes from the 80s. Its more nostalgia indeed though. As I prefer vinyl and still buy cds.

In the mean time you have parted ways with long time drummer Koos Bos and replaced him with Wim van der Valk, known for his great work within Inquisitor and Centurian. Why did you decide to let Koos go (who is known for his insane drumming on the Sammath releases, Koos’ boots will be tough to fill) and how did you get in contact with Wim (who has definitely has the feet to fill those boots)? And how is the collaboration going so far?
With Koos it was simply time, the bloke didn’t have any. He has a big family, is self employed and just could not rehearse. So I had a very difficult phone call to make, because he was and still is one of my best mates. Wim called me and after we chatted I decided to build my own soundproof rehearsal room. When that was done we started to play. And when Wim walked in, Ruud and I both had the feeling we had known the dude for years, in the short time he has been part of Sammath 1 1/2 year now, he’s become a damn good mate. It wasn’t easy for Koos, wasn’t easy for Wim to learn our music. But after just three evenings of rehearsals shit just worked out, you need that in a band, comradery.

The unavoidable question…What have you been up to with Sammath recently? Are you working on new material? Will it be a continuation of “Godless Arrogance” or does the addition of Wim van der Valk open new doors for you when it comes to song writing?
Writing new songs is going fast now. Having my own place to be able to play loud makes it all so much better. We had three live shows and were rehearsing like idiots all winter, not so much getting the songs right, but just endurance, playing this live, especially the songs from Godless Arrogance were killing me. It took me 6 months of daily practise of at least 1 hour to get this sounding like I wanted it to. I’d never done vocals and guitar on stage, so it was just a matter of rehearsing, till my fingers bled and my voice was gone. The addition of Wim, who breathes metal helps out a lot in many ways. He has a very violent way of playing, this inspires me to write riffs and also his timing is bloody perfect. Listen to his band Inquisitor as you stated, for the best extreme thrash you’ll hear since the 80s.

Your other band, Kaeck released a great debut called “Stormkult”. Any news on them as well?
That entire Kaeck project was strange in a good way, Maarten from Kjeld send me some drums and six weeks later I wrote a entire cd. I bought a guitar of Michiel from TMDC the day I received those drum tracks, it was tuned in B, never played that before, and it fitted perfectly. The lyrics, cover, all done in 6 weeks. Mr Oovenmeester who did the vocals on cd is damn good at writing lyrics, also done in those 6 weeks. Insane, and the result killer. We got to perform the cd live at Under the black sun, with some guys from Kjeld, Winter of Sin and Standvast in the line-up, we all wish we had more time, but a new album will come for sure. The vinyl is out 11^th march, damn good looking silver vinyl, Heathen Tribes from Greece is releasing it.

You’ve been around since 1994, saw the rise, fall and resurrections of many acts, many local scenes, formats of music, labels and the genre in general. If you look back it, could you point out some highlights and disappointments?

I thought the internet would be great for metal, and in some ways it was. You can order stuff you otherwise would have missed. I speak to people from all over the world every day. On the other hand you have so much utter shit being released that you mis the good stuff. And worst of all, if you have some news its drowned out my 666 other news items that day. So most new bands don’t get a chance at all. Strange really. I used to love tape trading, writing letters, selling my demo tapes. Id spend hours writing to maniacs worldwide, great times. But now you can write to thousand at the same time, but who really takes the time to read it?

What most disappointing to me is the influence political morons are getting on black metal, fuck of with you shit politics. Especially the far left, shutting down concerts, (the venues should also be ashamed of themselves, no backbone whatsoever) forcing their stupid dreamy worldview upon everyone. Mostly pathetic losers without a job or a working shower, living with mum and dad thinking they have a voice, fuck off. Political correctness is destroying everything. How the hell can anyone be offended if anyone has a different opinion, fucking pussies. I love it when people don’t like me, or can’t stand my music. If by chance you get to talking, which usually happens. Maybe we can have a beer, mostly you end up having some great insights about someone else’s worldview/opinions, and you end up shitfaced 20 beers later together. Or you just differ in some things, who cares. When I was young you didn’t even think about politics in metal, id have a beer with anyone of any colour. That’s wasn’t even a thing. People seem to be stuck in their own little shitty groups, only strengthening each other, thus not even trying to understand the others opinion. I try to keep as central as possible, political wise. But for fucks sake, keep that shit out of our scene. And the worst thing of all is that most of them don’t even listen to real black metal… it’s like me having a opinion on rap lyrics, it’s not my field of expertise, haha, and I don’t give a flying fuck. I get many great reactions, but also many negative ones, that bloke cant sing, it sounds like Immortal on crack, its generic, its boring, to fast, monotonous bla bla bla, who gives a fuck, grow some balls you goddamn pussies! !

But to end on a positive note, metal is very much alive and kicking, so many different genres popping up, drone, shoegaze, suicidal, noise black metal. Hell I can’t stand that crap, but stagnation means death, so good on m.

Thanks for your time, Jan. We will certainly knock on your door again when Sammath has released some new material…
Speak to you end this year then! Thanks for the interview and your support for underground metal! METAL TILL DEATH

Sammath

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country: Netherlands
style: Black Metal
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Bands: Druid Lord
Review Date: January 7, 2018
Authors: DPF

Druid Lord – “That was the whole idea. Keep the album dark and heavy.”

Great name, cool logo, fantastic sound. Druid Lord. That could be enough to describe the doom/death lunatics from Orlando. But after 8 years since the debut „Hymns for he Wicked“ came out, I think we probably should ask’em why did it take 10 years since the debut, or better 5 years since the „Baron Blood“ EP to release the fantastic second album „Grotesque Offerings“?

Hell yeah man. We appreciate it. We did a lot of 7″eps, a split CD with Kaiju, so that kept us busy until 2013 but then we had some lineup issues. Our drummer Stephen quit the band after already helping arrange three new songs. We found our current drummer Elden Santos here in the Orlando Scene playing in Orlando bands. He was into our doom style and we asked him to join. We then finished writing the album but then had to record the bloody thing. Some other things happened as our guitar player Ben was involved in an accident. Overall these things made us a much stronger band and we are now ready to tear it up.

The album is also about 20 minutes longer than the previous. Did you expect to have that much more material?
No not really. The songs just progressed in a way that they became much longer. We wanted to let the music breath and let the listener really get into the riffs and music. It was just the way the songs happened to come out. Even in the end we were like “damn these are longer songs” but overall our friends and fans have been really into. We’ve already played a lot of these tracks live and they went over great. I feel this album has just a dark overtone to it. Much more that our debut album.

How went the recording session? Could you tell us some details about it? The production fits the songs perfectly by the way.
We knew it just had to be HEAVY. We recorded all the instruments…guitars, drums, bass, vocals at Tony Blakk’s (our vocalist/bassist) home studio (Blackk Magik). My bud Lasse from Hooded Menace told me about this guy who mixed and mastered all the Hooded Menace stuff in Finland. So we sent Mikko all the tracks and he worked on them for a few months. I wanted the guitars dirty sounding and not all clean and polished. Overall it worked out well. We had some difficulties since we are in FL and Mikko in Finland and it took longer than expected but we got it done.

Are you satisfied with the works of Hell’s Headbangers so far?
For sure, Hells Headbangers are one of the leading underground labels. I wanted to sign with them back when Druid Lord first started, but they had a busy schedule with their releases. We finally got in touch with HHR again and they said yes. I’m very pleased with our working relationship…not to mention they put out damn great bands!!!

This time the coverart was done by Daniel Corcuera. Can you tell us something about the concept? Why did you decide to work with him?
Daniel has always been one of my favourite artists. In fact I wanted to work with him years ago in my prior band Equinox but he’s been very busy doing artwork, playing in his bands, and tatooing. I mentioned a few years back about doing a DL album and he was into it. Finally his schedule opened up and we made the deal. I had the album title “Grotesque Offering” already planned but didn’t have a concept originally. We both threw around some different ideas then i finally saw the concept in my head. The idea of the artwork comes from a ceremony where dark occult like hooded figures are involved in bringing back their dead King. The skeletal knight is kneeling in front of the throne with an offering (gobet) that will restore the dead king to his former evil self. Daniel also did the inside and back cover artwork. Those came from his ideas. We were stoked to work with him. He did an amazing job.

I think the atmosphere is even darker, without losing the catchiness I like about Druid Lord. Great leads are incorporated as well. How are your opinions about it?
That was the whole idea. Keep the album dark and heavy. The guitar solos had to be haunting and work with the riffs. Everything just twists and turns to take the listener on a musical journey into our world of horror. That’s our thing. I knew it was a bit of a departure style wise from our 1st album but we still have some fast parts. I want people to feel the music in every note. I hope that people will read the lyrics when listening and hear the voice inflection that Tony uses. of course we still have the DL hooks and people like about the band.

What are the plans for the upcoming months? Any shows in Europe maybe?
We have our CD release gig this Jan 26th here in Orlando FL. Working on booking shows and possible tour. I really want to get over to Europe as well. Big goals for 2018.

Thank you for participating to the interview. Is there something you want to tell our readers? Your last words:
Thanks Damiano for the interview. We appreciate the support. The album will be released on the Hells Headbangers label internationally this month on CD/Tape/LP. Check out www.druidlord.com for merch. See you on the road get ready for our doom drenching foul ways.

Druid Lord

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Bands: Terror [USA]
Review Date: December 19, 2017

Terror [USA]

Formed in 1986 in Cleveland – Ohio and having released about a dozen demo’s in the 80’s and 90’s, the story of Terror abrupt stopped. Without any full-length release they said goodbye to the scene and could write shows with Coroner, Kreator, Incantation, Massacre and many others into their book. But metal still was running through their veins so there was nothing that could stop the reunion of this American thrash band…so now, about 20 years (!) later a new 7” vinyl has been released titled ‘Legion of Gore’. VM Underground had the honor to talk with vocalist/guitarist Brian Sekula…and we found out his addiction: Belgian Duvel beer! (Fredde)

Greetings from Belgium! Hello guys, what’s up? Welcome back after such long absence!
Greetings to Belgium! Nothing but fond memories from Belgium, I was the sound engineer on the Incantation-Sinister Deadhead tour back in the 90s. I believe it was 1994 we played a place called Pavlov’s Dog across the street from a sheep farm, a great underground show where I was introduced to Duvel beer by a older man with a Cannibal Corpse shirt and he bought us a few to welcome us to his town! I overindulged and woke up on the bus hours later with a large cut on my eye, and we were on our way to France…I was told by the guys it was a wild night .

I’ve got to ask…what’s the reason you’ve been away for so long, and off course why did you reunite?
We formed early in the 80s and released our first rehearsal/ demo in 1986. Around the time metal was starting to break down barriers. We were managed by Steve O’Bannon of Seraphic Decay records, he was in charge of all our local and international correspondence, which at the time he was releasing some of the great underground bands — Incantation / Mortician /goraphobia and many others. We were slated to release a record with him but he was trying to shop our demo to labels for a full length and didn’t want to put it out himself . So we continued to play many shows with many bands such as Kreator/Sacrifice/Candlemass Corner/Death/ Massacre/Grave / Nasty Savage /DRI/ The Accused/ and many others but around that time, like many other bands, we started to experience line up changes – some for the better, some not so, rather then beat the band into the ground. I put it to rest and joined other bands and remained active in the music scene . But over the years I have always been asked if we would put another release out or play a show, so the idea has always been around but the reason for the recording was a tribute to the death of my brother, our original guitar player John Sekula, who also went on after leaving TERROR to form MUSHROOMHEAD, a Nu-Metal band that has reached some commercial success releasing close to 10 albums on a major label and now currently reside on Mega force Records. That’s the connection between the 2 bands and why the singer from Mushroomhead Jason (J-Man) Popson helps with the vocals on our 7′. He has been a fan of the band long before he was singing in any project. We have remained friends over the years.

A new single has been released titled ‘Legion of Gore’ and off course we all know that the two tracks on this disc are taken back from the old days…what’s the difference between the older versions and this one? And off course, why have you chosen those tracks out of all the others you’ve created in the past?
The difference between the tracks, beside the 20 plus years in recording them, is the songs always resonated well with the fans that supported us and one of our big supporters and close friend Jim Konya, from many bands best known from Nun-Slaughter /Schnauzer /Minch, would always request those as potentials for re-release. The 7″ was completed while Jim was still with us and I was looking forward to presenting him with mutable copy’s for his collection. But sadly he passed before its release so this is also a tribute to him as well, even though we could not make the cut off for the dedication on the release, but he was able to give us his blessing and approval after listening to it in the studio. Some of the tracks were finished in their guitar players studio where he was able to hear it / and the other difference is the players… the great Jim Roe is a monster on drums and it is always a pleasure to work write and record anything in his personal studio Neanderthal studios in New Jersey. My Son, now 24 and a great player, has filled his Uncle Johns shoes on lead guitar and plays the old songs like a pro! You can substitute old classic songs with young blood in the mix, it’s made for a great recording.

I must say, with this new release you’ve tickled my balls, so the next question won’t be a surprise hehe…how about new material in the near future? Or was it a brief reunion?
Thank you! It’s good to hear that the old material translates well today, and yes we have some new material as well as some more choice older songs that will be released as soon as possible in a full length.

Already twelve demo’s are in your discography…and this in a period of more than eight years. Was it that difficult to create a full-length studio album or were there other factors that made it impossible back in the days? Perhaps you guys are addicted to demo’s, that’s also a possibility haha
Well there were never that many official demos release, many were rehearsals that were fan released and live shows. A full-length was always the idea, but over time we kept releasing more new material as demos because, back when record labels were still relevant, we were always holding out for a deal. Meanwhile self releasing limited copy’s at shows for fans and tape traders. Addicted to demos ? Well maybe collecting and trading!! But that was never our intention to end up with that many in the catalog… makes good for a lot of still unheard material ….

On the back cover of ‘Legion of Gore’ I’ve noticed you were support bands with different kind of great bands (at least in my opinion) called Kreator, Incantation, Massacre, Grave and the Swiss band Coroner. Any great stories to tell about those shows, anecdotes about members of these bands, and do you still have close contact with one of those band members?
Yes we were fortunate to play with many great bands and as far as the Incantation connection… that’s a hole story in itself. I have been friends and have worked with them since there beginning with the seraphic decay connection and also being a sound engineer as well as a musician. I’ve helped record their albums in the early days, their 2nd album and third ep that were released on Repluse Records, as well as helping with live sound production over the years, so that’s how I’ve been able to remain friends with Jim Roe over the years as well as all the current and past members. As far as other bands I do still have relationships with the guys from Death/Massacre/Obituary, because in my time away from playing, I’ve met them all again along the way on the road touring the World with mutable bands. As well as being the 2nd touring guitar player in Mortician NY. for many years, there are stories that stretch the length of this planet. I could write a book about… maybe, down the road that will be my next adventure, I’ve worked as a journalist for a few magazines… interviewing and reviewing albums, shows, and have interviewed Morbid Angel , SOD and Agnostic Front at the Ritz in New York City for their famous reunion show. That was a blast!

Okay, I’ve mentioned Coroner before, and I must admit that I somehow hear influences from this band in your sound, more precisely the vocals have got some kind of comparison with them sometimes…do you approve the thoughts I’ve got about that or am I mistaken? Perhaps I’m the only one that makes that link and I’ve got to flush out my ears?
Not as much an influence, I’m a fan of the band and Ron’s vocals. That was a style in itself in those days… the fans liked to connect with the bands not only through music, but with the vocals and the pronunciation of the lyrics. Something that was lost over the years with extreme death metal. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of all vocal styles, but I’ve noticed that fans connecting with lyrics seems to help the bands form a bond with there fans, so we try to keep things audible. And flushing your ears is always a good thing haha, it’s like cleaning your pallet for new metal..

Do you follow the scene nowadays? What’s your vision about metal music these days? Any bands you think our readers definitely should check out…or bands you want to see burn in hell?
Yes I’ve been active and following the scene for many years, and it’s hard to say here in Cleveland Ohio the scene has falling to pieces as far as supporting local music. We are a tight nit group of people and those are the faces you see all the time at shows, although we have many killer bands… to many to mention. But for the sake of shameless plugs, I also play guitar and sing in a band called Funeral Pyre – not the California band – we were around long before they released there LP same as the other TERROR, but over time people acquire the names. We have releases available and a Facebook/Band camp page if people want to check out our stuff. Jim Roe is a mastermind behind a new project called “The Primitive”… check his Facebook/Soundcloud out where he not only writes and plays every instrument but the music is fucking bombastic. And I also like Disma from New Jersey! As far as bands that shall burn many of those I will not mention but I’m sure we all have a few ..

I haven’t talked about the current line-up yet…any changes in comparison with the old days? If yes, enlighten us with extra information about these dudes…Like for example what they like to do in their free times, other activities, past bands…you know, their history…or in the other case, please feel free to introduce the different band members.
Well I have already covered the deal with the current line up… the band is as follows: myself Brian Sekula on guitar and vocals, Jim Roe on drums, Alex Sekula on lead guitar and Craig Martini on bass. We all come from other bands around the country. Craig our bass player, originally from Cleveland Ohio, moved to Las Vegas to play with Paul Gilbert, and ended up on a few of his records and toured the world with him plus many others. Joe Satriani (and Colin Hey) from men at work – the dude is just a monster on bass guitar and get the big gigs because of his talent, that’s why for years we were out of touch, but now moved back to Cleveland so we hope to collaborate on new material together ..And Jim still lives in New Jersey, so we collaborate through internet and phone, we both have studios so it makes the distance smaller when you can share ideas and wave files through the computer. And Alex has been a fan of our music since he started to appreciate metal and has always asked to be a part of any reunion or release to honor his late uncle. And he has pure raw talent so it’s a no brainer.

If I hear the name Ohio – Cleveland, I must think about that very great museum called ‘The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’. I’m from Belgium, so visiting it won’t be for immediately (never say never)…but I’m sure you’ve been there many times. Worth checking out or just waste of time in your opinion? What would be the main reason to check this museum out?
Mostly a waste! It does have changing exhibits and once in a while something will come through that is worth checking out. nut the board that runs it is a fucking joke pff too many bands overlooked time and time again and the ones that get in, they never give them there true props in any of the exhibits. And the ceremonies are always in New York City, very few in Cleveland, so not many opportunities to see your heroes up close and most of the corporate sponsors give all the tickets away and leave the scraps for the public to buy at a ridiculous price .

The lyrics you’ve used are mostly in the line of death and religion. You also think the world would be a better place if there wasn’t any God involved at all? Or do you give shit about religion and take life as it comes? Cause honestly I don’t believe virgins are waiting after I would kill myself, or sickness and poverty will disappear when rubbing my hands in ‘holy’ water and beg on bended knee for a man who died at a cross. Are you still going to search the same theme’s for future songs or will you take another course?
Religion has never been a strong suit for this band although everyone has different beliefs. It’s mostly a financial scam to me… live your life how you want to, many people dying these days would have told you the same! I don’t think it would have made a bit of difference what religion you followed to how or where we end up. I think when we die, our dead vessels are disposed of, and we live on in memories just like great music. Can it end up in lyrical content ? who knows

Any places on the world you definitely would visit to promote your band or make people aware that the band Terror is back on track? Have you planned shows in the near future yet?
Yes, any opportunity that presents itself that is capable for us to do, we surly will. As far as shows we have one on the plate, but we will wait till it is announced by the label. I’ve traveled around the world and would surely like to do it again, but its has to make sense financially. Opportunity’s these days are just tailored toward promotion and that usually means losing money, that’s why most bands don’t play much .

Thrash metal is the style you’ve chosen to create music for…are there other genres that are an influence for the bands style? Any old school albums that opened you eyes to become a metal artist?
I was always a fan of the Florida metal bands such as Mantas/Death/ Nasty Savage and the Bay area bands such as Slayer and Dark Angel, but hearing and seeing Venom and Merciful Fate play with Exciter back in the day pretty much floored me! I was hooked and wanted to play the same music and style. As the years went by, the music just got heavier, faster and more aggressive, and we were always looking for changes in our music as well. Still I love all music…I’m still a fan of the classics but understand where a lot of new bands are coming from. I see the influences in their writing because I lived through the era that they are trying to capture, but the pure raw intensity is lacking in most of the stuff I hear. There are many great new bands that capture the sound and make it into something original out there… just not many in my opinion…

Are you fan of the revival of tapes? Or do you prefer vinyl? This single only has been released as a 7” vinyl, what’s the reason for that? Or is it also available in cd-format? And I’d like to know if there’s a limited press of that 7”?
Both the other band I play in Funeral Pyre just released a split cassette with a band called Sloth. I still have hundreds of cassettes, that’s why we’re all tape traders at heart! Just now doing it on different formats I’m still a fan of physical copy’s tangible things I like to see hold, and read records tapes whatever downloads? I get it, you have to make your music available for all to hear, but also support what you like. Buy something if you can, that’s what keeps the scene alive . Go to shows, buy merch, support the bands that are still willing to travel hundreds of miles to play for us, it’s the right thing to do if you call yourself a supporter of the underground ! As far as a cd version, it’s coming… I also get that not everyone has vinyl players so that’s also why there’s digital formats in the mean while. The release is limited to 500 Marbled vinyl with limited Artwork only through Hells Head bangers Records. If you follow our Facebook TERROR (cle) you will have all the latest updates as far as releases or shows and Merchandise.

Sometimes I do a ‘fast round’. I give you a word or sentence, and you answer with what comes to mind immediately…
Lemmy Kilmister: dead legend
Reign in Blood: under a half hour of pure metal
Iphones during shows: whatever, capture what y ou want but fucking stay connected to the show, why the fuck did you go? I’m a fan of audio bootleg – old school!
David Bowie: dead legend
2016: we’ll see, good health, good metal
Underground metal: lives on
Favorite band: to many to narrow
Favorite food: Mexican
Favorite one night stand: let to our new guitar player – just kidding, his mom rocked
Summer festivals: to corporate, keep it under 10 bands, quality over quantity!

Any chance you visit Belgium very soon? And can you put me on the guest list, then to drink some beer together hehe
We sure hope and yes sir, some Duvel will be in order in the future!

Well, I’m all out of question right now…anything you want to tell our readers, some last words?
Thanks for the opportunity to speak and promote the release! We plan on releasing a cd version soon, possible split cd. For any information regarding the band like mentioned, we have a Facebook Page its TERROR (cle) at facebook.com. We also have a bandcamp through hellsheadbangers for anyone to hear and order the record. There are 2 sided t-shirts to support the release as well. Stay heavy, stay metal!!!….
Thanks for the interview, and keep the metal spirit alive!

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Bands: Nox Vorago
Review Date: December 19, 2017

Nox Vorago

It’s been quite some years since I did my last interview for Vampire Magazine. A lack of time but also a bit of a disappointment in nowadays’ scene was the cause for this. I felt, and still feel today that the underground scene is just a mere shadow of itself. Only a handful of new and interesting bands pop up among a vast majority of copycats, trendfollowers and talentless pseudo-evil kids trying to be the next big hit. One of those newer, really interesting and innovative bands without losing touch to underground extreme black/death metal is Nox Vorago from Sweden. I first saw them when they performed live as support for Norwegian band Vredehammer some years ago and their live performance left a very big impression, something that rarely happens to me when I am not familiar with a bands album. After the show I met the guys and I was given the band’s debut album “Obsidion stonemirrors” which confirmed my opinion on the bands music after their gig. “Obsidion stonemirrors” is a highly interesting extreme death/black metal album which captures your attention untill the very last note. Since that gig I’ve stayed in touch with Johannes, vocalist in Nox Vorago, and after seeing so many talentless bands being interviewed in so many magazines I’ve decided to give the word to a band that truly deserves some attention: Nox Vorago! (Marcel)

Hails Johannes. Finally managed to get the interview done haha. How are you doing mate? And how are things in the NoxVorago camp?
Greetings Marcel! All good here, enjoying the summer with a lot of physical workout and music. Things could seem very silent from us nowadays. Yet much is going on in the background. We got a hold of a new better rehearsal place and our second album is finished, mastered and all. Betwixt all this we are writing much new material and planning the proper release of the second album.

The idea is to support bands which are not too known yet and which I feel deserve more attention. So since you’re still a rather obscure band tell the band’s history for our readers…and we’re interested in the full history and not just a little sum-up hehe. Please also introduce all members to our readers.
Certainly. It started out as a music experiment with Magnus Andersson (Keyboards), me on vocals and two other people which are not in the band today. It was a very rough start with a lot of different wishes and band members. Tommy Mattsson (Guitars) and Robin Kullberg (Bass) joined in 2008 and our music started to take shape. We released two demos during that time; Facing the Void (2007) and Blood Essence (2010). Anders Lundvall (Guitar) joined shortly thereafter. We got a support slot for Wolves in the Throne room at this time which was a very good experience. At this time the material for Obsidian Stonemirrors was making progress but it wasn’t until Robert Isojärvi (Drums) joined in 2011 that it felt complete in all possible ways. So yes, for some of us the journey started around 2006. However most of us feel that NoxVorago was born when the first album came out. I think all bands and projects go through hard decisions and obstacles, even over long periods of time. For me it is in that time the real deal is being shaped. Art takes time and we measure our music as valuable art.

I got to know you through the tour you did as support for Vredehammer. How was that tour for you because if I am correct that was your very first tour through Europe, right? Can also tell if you prefer to be a touring band or a studio band? What are the pro’s and cons for both studio and tour?
The first tour for us was as support act for Six Feet Under in 2013, along with our brothers in Vredehammer and Hate Storm Annihilation. The year after that we went on tour with Vredehammer again. It was fun to see more of Europe and hit the stage with them again. We really enjoy playing live; I would like to say tha tNoxVorago is a live band, with the intention to deliver the real thing. So therefore we strive after giving the audience an experience to remember. Much is being planned on that front. I can’t go into more details here but let me say this; our upcoming second full length will be the next phase ofNoxVorago, both visually and audibly. We certainly like to record also.

A bit back to the start of the band. You guys come from Gothenburg, a city well known for the many quality acts within extreme metal. Do you consider the fact that you come from Gothenburg a burden or a blessing? With that I mean that lots of people could have certain expectations music-wise. Can you also tell a bit more about nowadays scene in Gothenburg from your point of view?
Neither actually. We just do our thing and don’t mind about that much. On the other hand we have always strived for high quality music wise. The expectations are surely there though. I think many know this when hitting the stage here also. You really have to deliver today. There are many bands performing all the time.

As of now you guys released two singles and one full-length album entitled “Obsidian Stonemirrors”. Can you first of all tell a bit more about the album title? Knowing you guys a bit I do have this gutfeeling that there’s a lot more behind the title than meets the eye, am I right?
At first glance the name could mislead or seem strange. In short is it a metaphor. When the song was being made I was journaling some dreaming as I like to do. As strange as it may sound, the name comes from the dream realm. So are much of my lyrics overall I think. The lyrics and album title touch the topic of black mirrors. Those mirrors in short feels like its absorbing light. Therefore the album also touch the negative perspective of Omega. In the same time I could hint that large, black and reflecting eyes may not be far-fetched from a point of view.

Can you also tell a bit more about the album. Where is it recorded and how do you guys write your music? Is it a band process or is it individual ideas put together and who contributes what within the band?
Obsidian Stonemirrors was recorded in Grand Recordings Studio in Gothenburg year 2012. We usually jam and put our songs together in the rehearsal room. Many chunks of ideas and riffs have been worked through.

How is the album received by international press and music fans out there? And do you feel you got enough attention from both press and fans for this album? With that I mean it is obvious you put a lot of hard work in this album, which to my humble opinion sounds so refreshing in this overpopulated scene yet still the majority of extreme metal fans have never heard of you before.
Thank you very much. We received a lot of good reviews on Obsidian Stonemirrors from both international press and music fans out there. Especially on the two tours we did through Europe (with Six Feet Under 2013 and Vredehammer 2014.). Yes we did put a lot work into the record, though very well spent time and effort. It will be very interesting to see the effect of our upcoming full length, since we still float under the radar so to say. We strive for giving our listeners an interesting experience through the music.

That said, how do you look upon the music underground scene in general nowadays? Do you also feel that the majority has become a mass-consuming brainless mass without identity which just follows the stream and never takes time anymore to really dive into an album and allow it grow on you? I say this because I feel that your album is such an album. You can’t just say you like it or not after a first quick spin. It takes time to absorb all the details and see the grander picture within the music.
I think the majority of people today are in a rush. Also when it comes consume music. Most people take the easy way. Maybe the way people listen to music has changed also. That said, I think the quality of the music has taken a major wrong turn. As you say, it takes time and I listen to music the same way, giving an interesting record more than just one spin.

Can you go a bit more in depth in the lyrical side of NoxVorago and how important are lyrics for you guys?
The lyrical topic has always been ancient phenomenons, alien abductions, hauntings, occultism and dark philosophy. To name a few. I weave this into other personal experiences. For me it is very important to speak in metaphors and sometimes mystery. The viewer should not be held back by facts though. Just as paintings, everyone sees something different.

Since last time we met you’ve released a single entitled “Nuremberg 1561” and perhaps some of the readers out there know that in april 1561 above Nuremberg a large amount of unidentified flying objects and celestial anomalies like spheres were sighted. What more can you tell about this and what is it that influenced you to use this theme as the main theme for a single?
I am very interested in ancient civilizations and phenomenons. The UFO encounters are much older than most may think. Therefore I think the Nuremberg anomalies are a good highlight on that point. It was published in their newspaper also. Witnessed by many. It is a printed UFO/Phenomenon made year 1561. The world’s first successful airplane was year 1903. So, say if the encounter was not airplanes or saucers. Maybe we are dealing with something else?

I guess you’re probably referring to possible extraterrestrial life. Lifeforms that perhaps have visited earth during the early civilisations? Lots of signs can be found within archeology that some human-like beings have landed on earth and were seen as god-like forms. It’s a highly interesting matter which keeps me busy quite a bit. What’s your view on this?
I am quite open minded to this topic and possibilities overall. Ancient civilizations and many religions have been inspired by something clearly. Our planet is very old, questions rise and maybe we will see much more findings of old. It is very interesting I agree.

Apart from the music you’re also a talented artist Johannes. It’s very dark and sinister and many paintings do make one think a bit deeper than just staring at the surface. What inspires you and in what ways does your painting and photography fit within the concept of NoxVorago?
Thank you Marcel! The main inspiration comes from dreaming, and some other things mentioned above. As one may expect, the recalling and recording of dreams, lucid dreaming and out of body experiences. Aside from ancient phenomenons the occult literature has been a major keystone in my life through the years. On the torrents of inspiration the result is paintings, sketches and writings. It seems as if it comes in waves so to say. Some of my lyrics have its painting. Therefore they fit quite well.

Now the debut album and a single have been out for a while and tours has been completed, what next can we expect from NoxVorago?
Our second album is the next phase of NoxVorago and our priority today, along with completing more songs. We are looking forward to presenting it properly, especially live. So expect more shows and releases. And maybe some surprises.

Thanks for the interview. Hopefully some of readers got more interested in you guys after reading your words here. Looking forward ‘till our next meeting, either in Sweden again or here in the Netherlands. Last words are yours. Cheers!
Thank you! We are looking forward to that also. Cheers!

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Bands: Nil Miserans
Review Date: December 19, 2017

Nil Miserans

A new and promising band from Belgium called Nil Miserans gave sign of life with their debut album. A mixture between black and death metal with lots of technical skills is what they provide the listeners… but I wondered what the story about this band was and asked drummer Nicolas Christiaens for some background info. Read and shudder adepts of the dark side of metal! (Fredde)

Everything fine in Belgium with the lads?
Hey, we’re fine thanks!

First, and probably the most asked question I suppose…what’s the meaning of the bands’ name, why have you chosen this name?
Nil Miserans is a synonym for Hades. As we were working according to the Greek theme we were inspired by it during the search of our band name. Though it may sound as just the name of the God of the underworld it also means ‘no compromise’ / ‘no compassion’. This was another reason why we picked the name because for this album we all crossed boundaries of both our capacities and our vision in music.

Most members have been in several bands before they’ve joined this new band I heard…can you tell us something about the different members, their specific skills and eventual other bands they worked in?
As I told we all have our specialties, but for this album we all went a lot further and pushed those limits. For instance Pieter (vocals) and myself (drums) sat down and wrote the whole concept and lyrics together. Which is in contradiction with their former band Omerta, where Pieter used to do this. The biggest difference in working-method was the fact that we pre-produced the whole album and then started to re-write the songs in a way that they perfectly fit the storyline. This is where Timothy (guitar and backings + ex-all above hate) and Lazar (guitar + ex-rafflesia) played their part. The two of them had some sort of obscure chemistry going on from which the atmosphere of the album sprouted. Using midi-keyboards and samples they created the perfect vibe for our dark tale. This part took about a whole year of hard work and no play! As any musician will be able to tell you, not being able to play for a whole year requires character and brings frustrations! But ‘no compromise’ And it was worth it! Also Bjorn (bass + ex-Omerta/Thurisaz) wasn’t spared As you might have seen during our live shows, he does the trick with only 9 fingers. So as we didn’t give in on the bass-lines we can say he IS the embodiment of no compromise! All hail this guy!

About your debut album…why the choice of making a concept album from the first time? Not that common that bands start off with a full story and make their music around it…or don’t you agree with my point of view haha
Indeed, starting off with a concept album is risky and requires a lot of work. But we didn’t want to do the same thing we had been doing for over 15 years. We wanted to push ourselves and saw it big! We wanted to go even further and make a short-film about the story, but… and this is the downside of starting off with a concept-album, we didn’t have a starting budget.

Perhaps some kind of funding or Kickstarter project is a possibility for making this short-film to come true? Doesn’t cost you a thing, only have to make sure that what you promise will be executed…or do you hate such concepts?
This might be a plan indeed, but asking people to invest at such an early stage of our project seems a bit too much. We will be glad if people are buying our cd to start with. Perhaps a next video clip (we already have 2) can be a shorter version of our idea and will help us postpone the bigger plans to our next album.

Musically seen this album is a mixture between symphonic death and melodic black metal, where some band influences such as Behemoth, SepticFlesh and hell yeah, even old school Dimmu Borgir is audible…in fact, I stated in my review that a Norwegian black metal feeling comes alive when listening to it. Can you find yourself in my opinion or do you want to add something about the musical choices in your debut album to our readers?
Haha, let’s say those bands MIIIIIGHT have had a little influence on our vision upon songwriting yes But our intentions are not monotonous, we don’t like to limit ourselves by putting a label on our music. Of course we DO still have our favorite bands and love to flirt with the darker sides of symphonic music and we can’t deny often ending up with the mentioned above. This just doesn’t mean a next album will have the same vibe, because the songs are written in a way to reflect the story-line.

Stories about Ancient Greek and the different mythologies have been around in probably tons of metal albums, but yours handles about half-brothers and the God of the underworld Hades. Can you give some little summary about the story, off course without spoiling it for people who wants to discover it on their own. Short said: what’s the main aspect without revealing the end.
Our music deals with a lot of emotions and it can be sensed that way when listened to. These feelings are coming directly from the story in which Aaron is murdered over an impossible love-triangle. His situation is drained in feelings of desperation, deceit, betrayal, hopelessness and seeking a last resort. This kind of sums op his journey through the mythology of the Greek afterlife. It is indeed an often narrated subject in metal music, but the Greek mythology then again is amazingly interesting and large! We actually had great fun studying these tales. The only question now is: will we stick to this subject for our next album or not?! Pam pam paaaam!!!

So you guys had to read many books to tell this story or was a quick internet search enough to begin? You perhaps have any examples of books that are interesting to empathy the Greek mythology and then especially about Hades? In my personal live, I must admit that I only read comics when taking a shit, reading books isn’t one of my favorite things hehe
We must admit we aren’t spending most of our time in books either, but the subject really gained our interest and we just dove into it. Most of the info we found on the internet and old history books. And although it might sound boring to get back into the schoolbooks the subject of Greek mythology is really amazing and extremely profound. (… Or you can always just watch Clash of the titans… haha)

If people are interested in Nil Miserans after reading our fourth issue from VM Underground…where can you be reached? Any official page, clips, sounds, …where possible new listeners can give the album and band a try?
Of course we have a Facebook page and an Instagram where we post pics, gig-dates, clips,… And where you can get in touch with us to buy our album, shirts or book us. On youtube there are already 2 official clips to be found. Also our album is available on Itunes, deezer, Spotify,… But we recommend to listen to it in the right order as it is a concept album. If not you will most definitely miss the vibe of the story and therefore the whole concept.

A new album mostly comes with lots of promotion…what’s the status about the bands touring schedule? Any plans to play outside of Belgium in the near future?
We still have one last show for this year in Lokeren with our friends of powerstroke. After that we have a little break as our drummer leaves the country for 3 months. But the very same week he gets back we already hit the stages again in Ghent and the week after in Bruges. We recently were added to the list of bands represented by NCObookings and can tell you now that some nice shows will follow in 2017, but for now we are still filling the schedule. So people, contact us now when we’re still cheap! Haha.

NCObookings…enlighten us please?
I just started this agency. It’s still in a starting phase, but looking to grow. The concept is, as the name tells you, Nicolas functions as a ‘Non Commisioned Officer’. He helps out new bands to play the shows they deserve. He does this solely to support them and to help organizers by putting a kind of ‘label’ on bands as being a great band to put on their bill. It appears that mostly coverbands or the same bands keep on being booked. But this way organizations can be sure the band they are booking will provide an awesome show. The other band under NCO at the moment is The curse of millhaven. They are an awesome live band you should really check out as well!!

Webzines, metal magazines and off course the listeners are the best people or mediums to review an album…what are the reactions so far about the album? And also important, how do you look back right now at your own release?
We are very pleased with all reactions given so far. Overall the feeling seems mutual with the reviewers and everyone seems to get the bigger picture! We only had one disappointing review so far of a magazine that focused completely on the production of our album and not on the content, referring to a similar album called ‘the satanist’ of a band named ‘behemoth’. Well now, that’s a smack in the face. Where is the music industry going if new bands are expected to bring a debut album with a pricetag of several thousands of euros?!!
Well, that’s the reason you only have to believe VM-Underground cause we’re in for the support of unsigned, unknown bands. Ha!
But hey, we don’t complain, every other review was really positive on the music and each show we played so far we got nothing but praising feedback! Which in our opinion is still the main goal.

Sadly the last years weren’t that positive for rock and metal music with the dead of several important musicians. How do you think or feel the metal and rock future will be in the next ten years or do you think all hope is lost for new metal bands? Who is personally the most important musician that died the last years, and can you tell us why?
Is there any other answer to this last question than Lemmy?! And do we really need to tell people why?! If someone says yes to this, we’d say, try listening to Motörhead! Hahaha.
As for the rest, the future of metal, rock or any other kind of music in fact, is totally in the hands of the people listening to it. We’d say: discover new bands, go to shows of bands you don’t know, share new music, don’t stick to what you know, that makes you narrow sighted and stops musicians of trying to break boundaries and stops music from evolving. If any better example: the bills of every big festival over the last 5 years nearly didn’t change! Who will be the next headliners when Bruce, James, Dee, Angus, Ozzy, Alice and Rob aren’t rocking the casbah anymore?!

Time for some trivia question…
Deathcore or metalcore?
We’re fans of both genres since we played those style ourselves in previous bands so no preference.
Most technical metal band in your opinion?
Origin?
Worst metal act ever and off course why?
Haha! There are many bands that don’t answer to our taste, but are they therefore bad acts? No. But primo Victoria? No thanks!
Most underrated band in the world?
Small local bands such as we have plenty of here in Belgium: The curse of Millhaven, Resistance, Deconsecrate, Crimson falls, Fields of troy, Guilty as charged…
Entombed/Entombed A.D. -what does A.D. means?
After death? As the band Entombed split.
Baby Metal…shocked or thankful?
Let’s say, the music scene should always be open minded and you gotta love those Japanese people for all their freaky stuff!
Behemoth, SepticFlesh or Dimmu Borgir?
That’s a Hobson’s choice (look it up!) Hobson’s Choice is a British Comedy movie from the year 1954 from director David Lean. Or perhaps you meant: a Hobson’s choice is a free choice in which only one thing is offered. Because a person may refuse to accept what is offered, the two options are taking it or taking nothing. In other words, one may “take it or leave it.”
Preferred one-night stand?
Pamela Anderson, for nostalgic reasons.

Perhaps my question comes to soon, but already working on new stuff? Will this story get a sequel?
We recently started thinking about the possible subject for our next album, but we will take our time first to enjoy this one and the shows still to come. We’ve been off-stage for way too long.

I’m also from Belgium so as you know Holland isn’t that far away from us…Some years ago I had the chance to see Immolation play at Neurotic Deathfest Tilburg, I guess in the year 2010 but pity I had to miss it…and by the people comments they played their best gig ever…were your present at that festival and did you think this was a killer gig? Or weren’t you around that time? Or does Immolation doesn’t ring a bell…which would be a shame in my opinion…
No, unfortunately I was drinking Heineken in a bar and lost track of time, so I missed it! I could kick myself that moment when I realized I chose Heineken above Immolation…also I let some friends down that time, cause I was responsible for the time schedule that day…I suppose my friends still haven’t forgiven me for that hahaha… but one day I’ll pay for this error I’m sure!
WTF!!

Okay, I’m out of questions for the moment…any last words for our readers?
Thank you for reading this whole interview! You took the effort to look up a zine! To start with that’s already a sign of commitment and respect for music. Kudos! And then you even decided to read the whole of this long blabbering… Well, this makes you the person we make music for! A humble thank you. (Also to the magazine of course for having us!)
Hail to that!
Cheers and stay brutal!

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Bands: Nachtwraak
Review Date: December 19, 2017

Nachtwraak

Despite the fact that VM-Underground tries to blend the two worlds of nowadays technology (Have we not all become…The children of technology?) with old school attitude as much as possible, it’s still interesting to check out the world of vlogs. You never know what you stumble on upon. Thanks to the Youtube channel All Hail Hel I heard a sample of the new Nachtwraak album, which caught my attention immediately. Epic well composed Black Metal which has a raw and a bit of Russian-scene / old Nordic scene edge…Sywert en Plaag give you an introduction of Nachtwraak and the new album “Unheim” (Ricardo)

Once called Tempus Fugit you have changed the bandname into Nachtwraak, what was the reason behind it?
We both started together with two of our friends under the name “Tempus fugit” arround 2002/2003 (an exact date is uncertain). We were all fans of bands such as Mayhem, Burzum, Darkthrone, Dissection, Bathory, Marduk… and we wanted to make such extreme music as well. We were close friends and has a lot of discussions in the weekends (with lots of booze for sure!) about the real terror in our own lands and way of living. With the ways how our government and the cowards of the union totally destroying our roots and culture, just as the christians did centuries ago. In our opinion Christianity is still an enemy, but the Islam and every other belief or culture which are trampling our ways are the true enemies at the moment. So then we decided to change our name and lyrics to Dutch and that was when “Nachtwraak” was born.

Your new release “Unheim” is released…What is the reason to release it yourself? You would like to have total control of your music, or none of the labels offered the right deal for Nachtwraak? For you as musicians, what is the difference between “Unheim” and your previous albums?
One big difference is that we take care of all the instruments with only the two of us now. I understand that this needs an explanation, so here it is; Shortly after the recordings of the “Wolfstroon” promo back in 2006. The band splitted up because of the lack of interest by our second guitar player. This traitor just didn’t show up without letting us know and then seems to be vanished for a while. It still makes us mad, but he left us an amplifier which we still use for our rehearsals and recordings haha! We decided to totally produce it for our self because then we can put on the recorder as soon as we feel that it was the right moment, It gains us the opportunity to fully concentrate on the atmosphere without being distracted through the pressure of a studio recording. Maybe we draw some attention by labels through our new album. It will be nice to have some distributors around the world who know how to attract the right buyers with the same Idealogy as us. But as it seems so far we arehappy with the way we recorded our album and the next one will be recorded the same way (most likely). Maybe we buy some better mics and recording stuff but that’s all.

In my review of “Unheim” I mentioned “…I heard fierce melodies, variety and a good combination of 1990s Nordic riffs along with Blazebirth Hall and Ukrainian influences”, Do you agree musical wise? Do you think these influences are present in your songs?
No doubt, I can imagine we have influences of those acts as we like to listen to them. But it is unconsciously. I dare not to say if it contributed to the end result.

The lyrical content seems to be a combination of darkness, seclusion and history. Does certain books, historical events or movies influence you, or is it just a simple fiction that comes up when composing the music? What does “Unheim” means? Has it a connection with the German word “Unheimlich” (translated in English: eerie or sinister)?
Nice question! Unheim indeed has a connection to the German word “Unheimlich” and especially the dutch variant “Unheimisch”. In our mind Unheim is a synonym to the name of our land “Nederland” and the way we feel about it and what will become of it. Our lyrics are mostly reflections from historical events or legends to the trouble nowadays. “De nacht fluistert sagen” Is about a dream of reclaiming our soil and fortress through a bloody war and when you wake up you are still stuck in your shitty life, with your shitty job etc. “Ontheemd” Means uprooted and this should say enough.”Vlammen van vergelding” is a more traditional song in black metal about a priest who will be burned to death as a sentence for all his mistakes. “Een schreeuw uit het verleden” Is about the legend of Widukind and the desecration of Irminsul. “De Gloeiige” is about a dutch legend which tells the tale of surveyor who died before he planted his last Landmark, his spirit still Haunts the borders and you can hear his weeping through the Night. “Ratten van Unheim” Litterly means Rats of Holland and it is a fist to all scum that slipped through our borders without intention to integrate or at least honour our ways!

What does the band have available? Do you have merchandise to offer? Where can all this stuff be accessed and how can anyone who feels interested contact you?
At this moment We don’t have any merchandise to offer, it will be nice to print some shirts in the future, but focusing on our music is our main buisness of course. For contact or if you would like to buy a cd you can contact us through nachtwraak@hotmail.com or leave a message on the facebook profile.

And what will the future bring for Nachtwraak?
Playing live with session musicians is an option, although that we are both critical persons. If we contract session musicians they should be one with our idealogy otherwise it won,t work for sure. It will be great to record some tracks for a split-cd but we don,t have contact with bands to share a record yet. Whatever there is happening, we keep writing new songs and there will be new material in the future for sure!

Now a more general subject…Black Metal as a whole….
Black metal is definitely more then music to us, feeling and atmosphere are the true elements for a decent black metal release. It is the art to express hatred, depression or solitude within a musical form. Without a convincing spirit, black metal is not more then an empty shell. It is hard to explain this in words since it is all based by an undefined sense. Decent Black metal posseses the power to open gateways to darker times or dimensions which you will enter once you are stunned by it’s magic.

That’s all for now, thanks for introducing Nachtwraak to us… If I left something uncovered, feel free to add it here!
With all the terror going on in France an Belgium. Do you all think it will stay there??? Don’t be so foolish!! Blood must be paid with blood!! let them hear our call! …War!

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Bands: Gravebomb
Review Date: December 19, 2017

Gravebomb

Svensk Dödsmetall quartet Gravebomb released a full length on their own this year and started an online campaign to get their name heard. It seemed it a bit difficult to find the right partner, but with upcoming Dutch Old School Death Metal label Raw Skull Rekordz they have the right support to spread their chainsaw madness. In HM-2 they trust! (Ricardo)

How it all started…
We formed in the summer of 2014 in Gothenburg. It started out with Patrik leaving his former band to play death metal of the old school kind and without any likeminded friends signing up for it he turned to the internet and found Petter. Patrik also knew of Leon from Sonic Assault (a local thrash metal band) and the three decided to meet up and see what could be arranged. Said and done, and with Sven (Petters younger brother) joining shortly there after as a bass player we were quickly a complete band.
We take most of our inspiration from oldschool swedish death metal bands such as Dismember and Entombed as you mentioned. Apart from those obvious ones we feel inspired by other bands such as The Crown, Morbid Angel, Repugnant, Bloodbath, Autopsy and so on. After about a year of playing together and writing material we hit the studio to record Rot In Putrid Filth which we did in Trollhättan at Fvck Life Studios with Fred Forsberg. It got mastered where all the original masterpieces got crafted, in Sunlight Studio by Tomas Skogsberg! For lyric and themes anything goes really, but so far we have taken inspirations from movies like Alien, games like Amnesia and writers like Nietzsche. But for example Prime Directive is like an evil take on the Star Trek universe, and Animal Hunger is just a werewolf euphemism for fucking, really.

And your thoughts on Old School Swedish Death Metal?
Like any genre it is perhaps more about an attitude towards the artform that defines OSSDM, rather than only how it sounds. We use some blastbeats and d-beat that isn’t all that common in the older swedeath bands, but we still think we qualify in the genre. But of course, if we started to add metalcore breakdowns and pig squeels we would be crossing the line into poser territory. THAT’S A NO GO!

Let’s talk about your debut album, “Rot in Putrid Filth”…
We hope the listener will be assaulted by some really brutal riffs, massive drumming and evil vocals. But also some catchy songwriting and cool melodies that will hopefully mean the listener will remember the songs. We had the misfortune of signing a deal with a label that didn’t really do anything, so we were stuck for a while and couldn’t get the album out. But we released the album digitally, because we were so impatient. But now the album is finally coming out on CD, LP and tape in October, and we are very excited about that! At the end of October the album will be released on CD and tape, and hopefully LP as well. You can get them either through us or our labels: Raw Skull Recordz, Sound of Records and Metal Defiance. Shirts and merch will also be available soon enough. Easiest way to buy from us or just talk to us is through our Facebook page or mail us at gravebombdeathmetal@gmail.com. The feedback so far have exceeded all our expectations, it has been super positive and we feel like we really accomplished what we set out to do with this album. People seem to get it.

Let’s get back to the label thing, in a post on social media, you weren’t really happy with that part of the music business, right?
Well that was mostly me ranting about the old label we signed with really. It seems like a lot of our friends have had the same issues, signing with a label that suddenly drops all contact and any sign of progress and you sit there stuck with a contract saying only they can release your album. We were lucky enough to find a way out and I’m glad we can leave that whole mess behind and finally let Rot in Putrid Filth see a physical release!

Future plans?
We of course would like to play as many shows as we can, that is the most fun you can have as a band. We are already working on our next album actually, and have been talking about an EP/Split as well. It will all become clear in not too long!

Thanks for introducing Gravebomb!
Thank you so much for the interview! Cheers from Gothenburg, Sweden. In HM-2 we trust!

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Bands: Dementia 13
Review Date: December 19, 2017

Dementia 13

Dementia 13 is a Portuguese Death Metal band that pays tribute to Old School bands from that genre and also to classic cult Horror cinema. Each and every song and lyrics are inspired in a particular movie. Founded in December 2010, the band has two releases available: “Tales For the Carnivorous” (EP, 2013, Escaravelho Records) and “Ways of Enclosure (full length, 2015, Memento Mori). We contacted Álvaro F, founding member, and asked him a few questions about Dementia 13. (Antonio)

First of all, welcome to VM Underground zine and thanks for taking the time to answer these questions, Álvaro. Could you tell us a little bit more about the reason why you decided to start the Dementia 13 project? Why the horror movie theme?
Hey no problem! It’s a pleasure and we only have to thank you for this opportunity. I always had this idea of writing some Death Metal songs, getting my inspiration on all the stuff I listened to when I first discovered the genre, as well as throughout the years. I’m a big fan of plain old school Death Metal music and, since I’m also a huge Horror movie fan and collector, I wanted to have both worlds mixed. So I thought of making my own Death Metal Horror inspired band. Nothing new to that, lots of bands have been inspired by that cinema genre, but the truth is that I am not trying to create anything new, I just play what it feels right to me. And hope everyone enjoys it, of course.

How is the new album going in terms of acceptance in the metal world? Are you happy with the overall outcome?
Oh it’s going very well, actually. And it’s been better than we thought. Great reviews were given to “Ways of Enclosure” CD a bit all over the world! Many people understand the whole concept of the band’s music and lyrics, they talk to us about the movies which inspire all our songs, send us some suggestions and stuff like that. That makes us very happy and proud.

Tell us about your song writing process and how the classic horror movies guide you through it.
Well, before writing the songs, I immediately try to think of the perfect movie for that song’s feeling. Then I watch it (at least once) and take some notes. Write down dialogues, loose words, movie taglines, phrases and then I go to my computer and while listening to the song (already pre-produced in the studio with programmed basic drum lines), I start writing the vocal lines. And that’s basically it! It’s a hard work, to be honest, especially the part where I have to choose the perfect movie for each song. But that’s the way it is with any musician: very hard work!

We all know that we live in a very different musical world from the one we had back in late 80’s/early 90’s. What’s your opinion on the current digital age and its consequences for underground acts such as Dementia 13?
This digital era we are living nowadays has several pros and a couple of cons too. I could spend a whole week debating on this matter, analysing every detail but no one has time for that. However we have a pretty good example on Dementia 13: By the time we were discussing the details of the debut EP release with our label Escaravelho Recs, we suggested that besides the physical CD and tape copies, a full stream and high quality files download would be available for free. Of course we would respect the label’s decision, since this is not a normal thing to do. The band’s promotion plan needed the best boost possible so we wanted to try and reach a lot of people. The thing is that the band appeared in public with only a video teaser and two months later a video single and the whole EP would be made public. Since we almost appeared out of the nowhere, we thought the free download would be a good thing. We used the power of the internet on our benefit and neither the band nor the label lost any sales from that, as far as we know. The tape was sold out in just a few months, we still get sales from the CD version, which is now running out of stock and digital sales are still a good income, even with the free option available. Of course, in my opinion, tape trading days were the best by far hehe

Assuming you follow the current metal scene and how vast the amount of metal sub-genres is these days, what’s your opinion about it? Do you have a band (or bands) that came out as a (good) surprise for you?
Sub-genres aren’t really my thing. Specially the sub-sub-sub-sub-genres or casual hypes. Even though I listen to many different things in and out of the Metal world, I will always prefer the original and honest primal sound overall. But there are many great bands out there, coming out every day and of course I’m always discovering new ones now and then. It’s true that not everything amazes me nowadays. The most you get old, the most difficult it is to be musically impressed. But I try to listen to much stuff as I can.

On the same note, could you tell our international readers a bit more about the Portuguese underground scene. How is it these days and what bands would you recommended all of us to discover (besides Dementia 13, of course… eh eh)?
We have a great scene, actually. Not perfect, of course… we’re a small country, we have our share of hypes too but overall is good. Especially when it comes to bands! Generally speaking, we host great Underground extreme festivals like Butchery At Christmas Time, Moita Metal Fest, Steel Warriors Rebellion, Santa Maria Summer Fest, HardMetal Fest, XXXapada Na Tromba and many more! Just check them all out! We too have some honest and great labels, music stores, radio shows, etc.. All in a D.I.Y. work base. No funds, financial supports or whatever. No one here gives us anything! We help each other out. Regarding bands, I think we have too many to mention and on every possible sub-genre like Brutal Brain Damage, Switchtense, Festering, Holocausto Canibal, Destroyers Of All, Neoplasmah, Grog, For The Glory, Raw Decimating Brutality, Pitch Black, Ironsword, Decayed, Revolution Within, Corpus Christii, Terror Empire, Filii Nigrantium Infernalium, Theriomorphic and I could go on and on and on and on! hehe

What are the band’s plans for the immediate future? Will we see a new album soon? How about some live shows outside Portugal?
Right now we are planning to do some more shows in Portugal and continue to promote our latest release “Ways of Enclosure”. No plans so far for a next album but more releases are planed like a limited vinyl single (that had been postponed) and a couple of other surprises to announce soon.

Finally, any last words for our readers?
Thanks a lot for your support and opportunity and to everyone that read this interview. Stop by our Facebook page, official website or Twitter account for all the info you’ll need. You can also visit our Bandcamp page and check any merchandise available to purchase. Cheers from Portugal and remember that DEATH METAL REIGNS SUPREME!!

Thanks for the interview, Álvaro. Wish you the very best for you and Dementia 13!

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