INTERVIEW APOKALYPTIC RAIDS

APOKALYPTIC RAIDS from Brazil is a band that gained cult status in some parts of the scene. Now they released their new album called „The Pentagram“. Reason enough to do an interview with vocalist and guitarrist Leon Manssur.

This year APOKALYPTIC RAIDS celebrate the 20th birthday of the band‘s existence. When you look back, what has been the best experiences that happened during this this time, an what has been the worst ? Do you prefer todays scene or the earlier days ? And please introduce the current band members and their side-projects.

Man, 20 years are really transforming. Best experiences were certainly travelling around the world and meeting and playing to new people. Worst experiences might be about a shit part of the „music business“. Hopefully I can stay away more and more from that shit.

I have no nostalgia of the old days. It was great then, it is great now. I make it. Great is where I am now, I will make it great whenever. Of course it is different with regards to technology. Things are much faster now. But the things that are human, like greed, passion, so on, these never change.

Current line-up is stable with me, Leon Manssur on the guitar and vocals, Vinicius Canabarro on the bass, since 2003, and Pedro Rocha in the drums from 2001-2007 and 2013-now. Vinicius is also singer in Atomic Roar, a band already on their third album now. Pedro is from Farscape and Whipstriker. He is a professional drummer/teacher and has a lot of bands and projects aside of metal.  

INTERVIEW JASON NETHERTON / "SEND BACK MY STAMPS"-FANZINE ARCHIVE / MISERY INDEX

Hey Jason, first of all, how are you doing ? Some months ago I found your fanzine archive (look here), which is really great ! So I think you are a very busy man, playing with Misery Index and running this fanzine archive, furthermore you published this book about death metal history called „Extremity retained-notes from the death metal underground“-so are you somekind of workaholic ?

Haha, no its just a labor of love; I’ve been dedicated to metal since I was a kid, and extreme metal since I was a teenager, so although it takes up most of my spare time, its never a burden. In fact all of my projects (band related and fanzine archive) are kind of like part-time projects now. Aside from real work, I do what I can when I can. Lately the fanzine archive has slowed down a bit, but I have not forgotten it. Once things settle down I will get back into it more actively. Right now I try to add one zine a month, and I already have a few hundred in there, so its growing slow and steady (but probably not as fast as some people would like, I know).  

REVIEW ELÄNDE "DÖDENS RIKE"

ELÄNDE is a Swedish three-piece black metal band from Gothenburg which exists since 2010. Before the release of their current album named "Dödens rike" they released a demo and an EP.
Most prominent member of this band is for sure Trish, who plays drums in ELÄNDE, I think some people know her through a lot of bands and projects such as DödsÄngel, Djevelkult or Skitliv. Besides ELÄNDE, she actually plays for example in Urarv, an avantgarde black metal band in which Aldrahn, well known through Dodheimsgard /DHG, does vocals and guitars. But enough of that namedropping, I only mentioned this to point out that ELÄNDE consists of well-experienced scenesters and musicians.

ROMANIAN SCENE REPORT

To be honest, I don't know much about the (extreme) metal scene of Romania. Like most people involved in extreme metal I have listened to Negura Bunget and Dordeduh and of course I know (very metal related) the story of Dracula (Vlad III Draculea), that lyrically inspired countless metal bands. But after that I have reached the end of my knowledge concerning Romanian metal. Mihai ”Coro” Caraveţeanu of Axa Valahă Productions wrote a really interesting scene report and I can't express how grateful I am for these deep insights !

ROMANIAN SCENE REPORT

A dark letter from the land of Dracula

Hi! First of all I’d like to say I’m honored that someone invited me over to write about the Romanian metal scene, I did that several times before in this life, but my last attempt happened more than a decade ago, when I thought there was still hope that something will change here for good. As most of you most probably know already, Romania is a country in the Eastern Europe, with a tragic past, including more than fifty years of different totalitarian regimes, the longest being the harshest communist regime behind the Iron Curtain, a dictatorship built on fear and a spiral of silence that affected and still affects the nation as a whole even three decades after it was supposedly finished. It happened in the final days of 1989 when the dictatorship was over, the dictator executed, with his execution broadcasted on the national television and with more than 1000 collateral victims of the single bloody revolution from all the social and political movements which happened in the East around the same time.  

REVIEW EKPYROSIS "DEATHTRIPS"

At the Magoth-gig last saturday I met the guy behind The Crawling Chaos Records who sold some stuff on his distro table. We talked about black metal in general and Ildjarn in particular and he advised me a band named EKPYROSIS, whose latest release is published by his label. To be honest, until then only knew the Italian death metal band of the same Name ( I found out that there are some other bands called EKPYROSIS). On their newest release named "Deathtrips", that is only available on tape (limited to 150 handnumbered copies and as digital download here), you can hear six tracks with a duration of 18 minutes. EKPYROSIS are labeled as avant-garde black metal, and I don't totally disagree, but hearing the term avant-garde within a black metal context I think to bands such as newer Dodheimsgard / DHG, Arcturus, Fleurety or Ved Buens Ende, and all these examples sound totally different, much more progressive, more complex and technical.

REVIEW ATROCITY "OKKULT II"

Since "Okkult" and the following EP "Masters of Darkness" Germany's ATROCITY are back on the path of creating more extreme sounds. In my review for the EP (here-review written in German) I looked back at the entire discography, and believe me, I am far away from being an uncritical listener, and yes, there has been some releases by ATROCITY I really didn't like.

INTERVIEW RUNEMAGICK

Fans had to wait eleven years for the new Album (release date July 20, 2018) of Swedens death /doom underground cult act RUNEMAGICK. But let me say first, the new album was worth the wait. Guitarrist and vocalist Nicklas Rudolfsson answered my questions.

First of all I have to say that the new album is really great, but I didn’t expect anything else.What can you tell us about the process of creating  this album and writing the songs ? When did you start with writing new songs and why did it take 11 years for the new album ? How would you describe the new album in your own words , maybe in relation to the prior Runemagick releases as well ?

Always nice to hear that there are people who like our music. Especially now that it was many years ago we released something new. Most of the material, both riff arrangements and lyrics, are written in 2017 and early 2018. Possibly there is some older riff here and there too.

If I describe the material from my point of view, I can probably say that it is quite straightforward arrangements and songs. As for tempo, it is often heavy mid-tempo riffing and drumming the “Runemagick style” mixed with some heavier doom parts and some more up-tempo stuff.

I do not know for sure, but I imagine that if you like any of our previous albums, you should recognize the new material as well. It may not be so obscure material as on "Envenom" rather more about "Enter The Realm Of Death" and "Darkness Death Doom" I suppose.

11 years… time flies. Yes we decided to start up again in 2017. Before that we can say we had a long break. However, no quiet break, it has been full of other bands, projects and other activities in life. Then it has probably also been that inspiration from our side during that period has been partly gone so to speak. Then you can say that there was some lack of inspiration too.