INTERVIEW RÄUM

"In fact, we are part of something bigger than ourselves. We constantly experience an eternal movement of rise and fall, as a person, as a species and as a civilization."

At the Dark Dungeon Festival in the medieval castle in idyllic Anthisnes, the first band to play on the black metal evening was Räum from Liège, which left the hungry crowd satisfied and certainly found more than a few new fans. One more reason to ask the ambitious band (review of their debut album see here ) a few questions.

REVIEW RÄUM "CURSED BY THE CROWN"

At the Dark Dungeon Festival, which took place in a medieval castle in the small town of Anthisnes, the first band I saw were the Belgians from Räum, before Mightiest, one of the best, and unfortunately also most underrated black metal bands in Germany, and finally Enthroned, the Belgian black metal kings, took over. The band name alone struck me as unusual as a German, "Raum", without the umlaut, means room in German. And also purely visually the four musicians didn't look much like black metal. In this respect I guessed a post-black metal act, most of which I honestly find quite boring and stale. Fortunately, however, it behaves differently, Räum play rather very partly very fast, hard, often traditionally designed black metal, which in some moments even reminds of Marduk.

INTERVIEW ENTHRONED

Enthroned are one of the big continuities in the world wide black metal scene. Since 1993 this belgian horde delivers great pieces of more or less agressive and traditional black metal. Their newest output "Cold black suns", also the debut for their new label Season of Mist, shows dome deviations from this path, which means that Enthroned added some new elements to their sound and yet, or perhaps exactly for this reason, it's still 100% black metal. Reason enough to talk with Nornagest, longest running band member, part of Enthroned almost since the beginning.

Hey, first of all, how are you ? Did you remained spared from COVID-19 ? How ist the situation in Belgium concerning this virus and how does it affect the band’s situation in general and concerning cancelled and/ or postponed gigs ?

The Plague did not only sneaked into the health of thousands but also and mostly within the music scene and public events, so everyone within the scene is basically affected in one way or another. We did loose a huge amount of opportunities, shows and even rehearsing as a whole is basically impossible as Menthor lives on the other side of the North Sea, as you know, some trips are simply not allowed. We are mostly doing what is possible regarding the situation… On my side, I took this as an opportunity to write the whole of the lyrics of the next Enthroned release and we are working each one on our sides on the musical support. Now, on a personal note, everyone in the band is healthy and none of us has been affected by the virus in that manner. In Belgium, some areas are considered “code red” like the town and province of Antwerp, but the rest of the country is safe in a manner of speaking. We hope the situation will slowly come back to normal as soon as possible, I cannot wait to go back on the road to be honest.