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Trinacria – “Aleister Crowley had a mansion on Sicily – what else could you ask for?”

trinacria – “aleister crowley had a mansion on sicily – what else could you ask for?”

Info

Trinacria from Norway is a new band that was founded by Enslaved mastermind Ivar Bjørnson and Fe-Mail members Hild Sofie Tafjord and Maja S. K. Ratkje seemingly with the aim of creating some unsettling, unorthodox and wildy frantic Black Metal. Last month they have released their first ablum, ‘Travel Now Journey Infinitely’, through Indie Recordings and it turned out to be quite a challenging listen. Reason enough to ask the band some questions, both Ivar and Hild were so kind to answer them.

 

Trinacria is a new band, but with musicians who were already busy in several other bands. Yet, sounding very much different from this new project. How did you guys meet each other?
HILD: the project was initiated by the norwegian consert institute, and they wanted ivar ,maja and me to compose a piece for metal band and fe-mail. we connected very fast and felt immediately that this could be good music.

Most of our readers will know bands like Enslaved, Borknagar, Taake, etc. But some of the other members are active in bands like Fe-Mail and Slutmachine. What kind of bands are these?
HILD: fe..mail was formed as a duo with maja and me in 2000 and is based on a noise expression. Frenchorn and vokal being the main source of all prosessed sound. Now we have merged into trinacria and a performancegroup called AGRARE with sweedish dancer and coreographer Lotta Melin.
IVAR: Slutmachine is a now-defunct band that Espen (bass) used to play in. One of the best and heaviest Norwegian trash-bands ever. They did one demo-album and quit.

Was the musical direction a deliberate decision or was this something that grew along the way of composing? Was it a created during a free jam or was it composed from some kind of plan?
HILD: Ivar, Maja and I met several times to compose and play and form the expression.we played together and talked a lot.and the music grew from theese meetings. We also sendt suggestions to eachoter as we live in 2 different citys. The songs are composed in relation to eachother in a big form. They belong together. Ivar has made the great lyrics

Trinacria played on the Inferno festival last year, so, in Norway the band might not be as new as for us Europeans. To me you guys came out of the blue, was there any reason to do so? No big promo campaigns, tours or demos…
HILD: the prosess started about 2 yers before we performed on Inferno. We focused on getting the music and the band together. We toured in Norway for 2 weeks before we recorded, and we will definitely play concerts in the future

A band like Neurosis or Swans is never far away in your sound, are these bands that you all like and wanted to do something likewise? What are the main influences for the album?
IVAR: It is a bit more personal and heartfelt than that, man. We’ve all been writing our own stuff, quite successfully I might add, for 20 years or something – it is not like we want to do a copy of our favourite; we don’t need that. But of course the bands you mention, and many more from the post-core, the contemporary, experimental, noise and alternative metal scene has been influencing us – we love that kind of stuff too, and listen to it; of course it is going to be an influence. However, the main influence is always our own existential perspectives, our inner lives and subconscious activities.

The band is called Trinacria, what exactly is that? And what exactly do you guys mean with the album title?
HILD: Amongst other meanings it is the name of the Sicilian flag… A weird way to start the answer, but why not! It is a part of the occult symbolic tradition, which fits perfectly with Trinacrias scope, if there is any. And Aleister Crowley had a mansion on Sicily – what else could you ask for?

Since the lyrics are a bit hard to follow at moments, what are they about? Is there something of a concept that you follow, music and lyric-wise?
IVAR: The topics are very vague, to say the least. The lyrics are more like psychedelic fragmentary moments, dream fragments, or scripts to absurd/ surreal short movies. They have a touch of conspiracy, occult history and darkness to them – they seem to deal a lot with issues concerning individual freedom and development in opposition to existential loneliness and contemporary paranoia.

The album is released on a brand new label, Indie Recordings. How did you get in contact with them? And what are your expectations?
Ivar: My “main” band Enslaved signed with Tabu for the album “Isa” back in 2004. That release was a highly successful release for both the band and the label. In 2005 however some internal problems occurred at Tabu – with all key personnel except one left Tabu to start Indie. When Trinacria was ready to an album – the only and perfect choice was Indie. So in a way I guess you could say we already knew Indie as a label better than most even before the label started. It is an absolute pleasure to work with them again..

Do you consider yourself a part of the Norwegian (extreme) metal scene, as you seem to be a bit of a misfit amongst the others…
IVAR: Yes, both me and Grutle was part of building the scene back in the early 90s, so that will always a part of everything we do, both as people and music-workers/ artists. We’ve always been misfits – that should fit the Extreme Metal concept perfectly. That is; if you’re not a 14 year old web-forum hater with nutrition problems hehe.

Will Trinacria be seen on the European stages any time soon? With what band would you really like to tour?
IVAR: If the right touring possibility comes along where we can do our full production, we will of course make the time. Personally I’d love to tour with Neurosis with either of my bands, especially Trinacria.

Any other future plans? Any goals to achieve within the next year?
IVAR: We all work like hell with our projects – hopefully next year the first few notes of a future Trinacria album number two will be written. Who knows. Hard work is the goal – achievements will follow.

I’d like to thank you for the interview, the last words are yours…
IVAR: Thanks so much for the interview and lending us your time and ears, Felix. Hope you get the chance to see Trinacria live some day! Thanks to everybody out there for the amazing reception we have received!

Trinacria

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