L'Enfant Sauvage - An Interview with Gojira

Joe Duplantier of Gojira 

Gojira are a band that perhaps had one of the worst chances in European Metal history, and still made the most of it. How? First, they came from a country with a very small Metal scene (with a few cult bands like Trust, Sorteliege and the whole Black scene, I know) not to speak of a Death Metal scene in the time of its inception. Second, they went into one of the most overcrowded genres in Metal, and tried to make something unique without it being pretentious. . Third but not least, they have managed to maintain a band that has been growing naturally for over 17 years. From the small town of Bayonne, which has around half the residents of Tel Aviv, the band has grown to become an international phenomenon opening for giants like Metallica and selling out venues all across the world. Now, they bring their sophisticated brand of Groove infused Death Metal to Israel, and I took great joy in interviewing non other than singer and mastermind of Gojira- Joe Duplantier



Benek- Hey Joe! What’s up man?


Joe- Um, not much! I’m good man, I’m at a good place in my mind, really comfortable. I’m in France, we just played a show here in France in Hellfest, and this year was really good for us because we were in a really nice slot on the bill. We played with Jason Newsted and Stone Sour and Volbeat, and it was really good.

Benek- Did you catch any other bands? anyone you were looking out for?

Joe- I wanted to see Swans, very, very experimental with this one guy who’s been doing this for thirty years and he’s a crazy mother fucker kind of alcoholic strange poet with a guitar and it’s all based on feedbacks and weird sounds and chords, it’s very hard and it’s very loud but it’s very interesting, it was a really experience and I was glad to see them onstage for the first time. Other than that we were doing some interviews and signing sessions so I didn’t really have time to see other bands. I saw Napalm Death really quick onstage and they were amazing but that’s it. Last time we play Hellfest almost every 3 years, because if we go to often it’ll spoil the French fans so it’s important to be rare.

Benek- So, it’s been almost exactly a year since L’Enfant Sauvage, how do you feel about it, and about the reception it got?


Joe- I feel very good, the way people received it was really good, everyone was very enthusiastic about it and it’s been great man. From day one, people seemed to be happy and the hardcore fans even were a little scared before the release of the album because we signed on Roadrunner and stuff but they understood we kept what makes Gojira intact you know? we didn’t put water in our wine, like we say in France.


Benek- What was the idea behind the album, are there any underlying themes? I know there was the whole thing about the impact of death in The Way of All Flesh, is there some consistency?


Joe- The Way of All Flesh was mostly about death in general, there’s a lot to say about it and nothing to say because we know nothing about it. But at least we know our fears, you know, about the unknown when there is something we don’t know we become petrified and useless so it’s a big challenge for humans in general, or at least for me. I’ll speak for myself; it’s a big challenge to overcome the fears in general. That’s the most important thing in the lyrics, the main theme I want to say, before the environmental concepts, is mostly dealing with the fears and the difficulty of being at peace in general. For me, when we did L’Enfant Sauvage, there was not a real idea behind it but more of a state, a state of mind and a feeling, an intuition, I would say these words instead of an idea. There’s never an idea, a precise idea, sometimes at the end of the recording or the pre production I realize there’s a theme to give a title or a direction to the artwork but usually it’s being spontaneous and being in a present moment.

Benek-How is L’Enfant Sauvage different from the rest of your records, except for the phenomenal amount of response it has gotten, what do you think sets it apart?

The exposure is a big thing, the perception you have on an album is also based on how the promotion is made. For the first time we had a real international release, that was a huge difference, and everyone is influenced by this. Even when they listen to the records, exposure is becoming a part of the landscape on the Metal scene internationally and The Way of All Flesh, for example, was released in Europe , and then we found a deal in the US and was released it there later, then we found a deal in Asia so we were more independent at the time working with small labels, small record companies struggling to find deals and negotiating as we go. For L’Enfant Sauvage there was a big preparation for the release and that makes the perception different, the press was writing about it and they tried to be original in their critiques and stuff so the surrounding was very different, a different context. The music is pretty similar to what we’ve always done, we started 17 years ago and it’s been just growing very naturally, organically and there’s no real big difference in composition or the state of mind, the intention is pretty much the same. It’s another page that we turn but it’s the same book, it’s like we’re telling the story of our lives as we go. It’s good to have your own sound, but it’s hard to reinvent yourself, sometimes we decide, like consciously lets make a song that is super different, like this or like that but we fail because we always come back to the same energy that is guiding us. There’s an energy guiding us, we make ourselves available for this music, we get together in the practice room and we start to play and then the music is coming, we don’t really decide from where it’s coming.




Benek- What was the working process like for L’Enfant Sauvage? Who writes most of the riffs?

Joe- We work together you know, it’s like Mario and me find most of the ideas but we need to be the four of us somewhere to form this entity that is Gojira. We form a certain entity together and I’ll be the eyes, Mario will be the mouth, Jean Michel (Labadie) will be the legs, and Christian (Andreu) will be the arms and without the legs we can’t go very far. People from the outside will say “oh Joe and Mario are doing everything” but in fact we’re like a body together. Mario and me are very active when we compose, we talk and we play a lot we throw ideas all the time, and the two other guys are more quiet and patient but their listening and participating in a way. It’s very important for them as well.

Benek-In their own way, such as sleeping (we both laugh)

Joe- yeah, obviously, taking a nap, sometimes I think about it, about how would it be if it was two different guys? Staying quiet, in the same room instead of them ,the music would be different so somehow they influence but Mario and I do most of the writing . That’s the short answer (laughs)

So by now…do you have a favorite track off of it?
Pfft, yeah I like the song Pain is a Master for the lyrics and the music, I would love to play this track live. This song is special to me, and a little more personal than the other songs. I talk about pain, and how you can learn from experience, pain is a very very intense experience when you suffer, and you’re alone for example , the notion of time seems to change and everything becomes harder and longer, you don’t knokw if you’re going to survive when you have very difficult moments in your life. I think when you have to go through these moments in your life it’s because there’s something you don’t understand about yourself and life will make you understand, painw ill make you understand and teach you something if you stay awake and listen, and feel then you will learn something and get stronger. I’m not inventing anything you know, “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”

How do you feel the artwork conveys the theme of the music?
It’s the same thing, you know? the same effort, the same movement, it’s one creation. The visual, the music, the sound and even the production and mixing its all in one and done in the same time. Usually when I write lyrics I do drawings at the same time and sometimes I’m inspired by the drawings I make and sometimes I don’t know what to say, I have an idea I want to express but it just doesn’t come out and it feeds the lyrics you know, it’s really you know it comes together as one. We do it ourselves, I do the covers and Mario helps me with some of the stuff, he does some of the stuff. He sent me the sketch of a head with a tree inside of it I thought it was cliché but I thought it was simple and strong so I repainted it somehow but it comes with the music, sometimes I don’t understand what we’re doing but I know it’s one energy expressing itself and one same effort.


How did Gojira start?When we started we didn’t have big plans we just wanted to play music. That’s the old school approach, of things, now with bands that find the logo and the haircut then they think “maybe we should compose songs.” Where I come from is more, “lets play!” lets do music, so one day we wanted to record so we took a shitty ghetto blaster and we pressed record, we did a bunch of demoes on cassettes and then we did a proper demo in a studio, then a second one and three and four demoes before even thinking “Maybe we should release an album?” so we started very naturally. Like a plant growing, the plant doesn’t think , “I’m going to become a tree” it’s just growing. So it was very organic, I like how we started. My brother and I were jamming in our family house, he was like 10 and I was 15 basically, and we started with a shitty acoustic guitar and he was drumming on pans and pots, and that’s how it started. A brotherhood thing, then we started to hang out with these two other guys and we formed a band. Just like that, so it just happened, it was never a decision, never “lets be a band! Lets get some chicks!!! And go on tour and make money, lets be famous!” was never in our mind.


Benek- Silly Joe, Death Metal bands don’t get chicks, they get fat sweaty guys running at the stage

Joe- I know! ugh! (laughs)

Benek- How do you feel you’ve grown as a musician since the early days of Terra Incognita?


Joe- I would say, there’s so much to say each time you ask a question I’d have like a thousand answers but we have a limited time so I’m gonna say one thing. From a kid in high school trying to be Metallica or Sepultura I became a producer more than a great musician or a great singer or a rock star, I see myself as a producer. I have ideas, intuitions and inspirations and I like to produce albums, I see them like objects almost we create this objects so for this I need to play guitar, I need to put these ideas together or damn now I need to scream into this microphone but I’m always driven by this intuition and this inspiration but I’m not really into guitar, I don’t care really. For me to play guitar is more of a way to go a certain place , I’m not a guitar player or a guitarist, I have friends that are so into guitar all the time and they love playing guitar, for me it’s just a way to get somewhere. I would like to make a movie, to create something with dance, Ballet or anything, something that will be bigger than me and more powerful than me. I like this , you know? with a lot of work and a lot of time you can create something that is so powerful that it can take care of you somehow.

Are there any plans to make a movie or anything in motion?

Nothing at all, there’s something in my mind I feel attracted by , I Feel attracted to creative things. Even building a house, creating something bigger than me is how I’d describe it. We give life to an album just like you give life to a child. But you didn’t do anything, you just had sex and then your stomach grows and someone grows out and it’s perfect. But you didn’t do anything you just dedicated energy, time and patience . Then something happens, beautiful.

Benek- What was the French scene like when you started, how has it changed?

Joe- I don’t know man, shitty? It was pretty shitty. We had some good bands in the 80s but then no one was able to cross the borders and it died for ten years, when we started there was no one around. There were a very few doing a good job like Loudblast and now it’s starting again, there’s a scene, some very very good bands, respected Black Metal bands here in France but they’re so underground that even I don’t know these bands personally. All sorts of bands emerging . We were one of the first French Metal bands to travel abroad and start to play in the U.S and I think it inspired other bands like “damn it’s possible!” If those guys can do it, we can do it too. We’re part of the moment it started to change.

Benek- Speaking of the U.S, you recorded L’Enfant Sauvage in the U.S, in New York, how did that come about, and why?

Joe-We wanted to be in a different environment, something exciting with a lot of people and producers, engineers our record company is in NY so its’ very exciting to do it this way. Usually we record our albums here in France, in the countryside in our family house in kind of a small studio there with you know, it’s an old house, a lot of spiders and bees everywhere. It’s where we grew up and stuff, but for this album we wanted something different, we still composed the songs here in this house and that’s where I am right now , um but for the recording process we need gear, engineers , knowledge and when we do it here it’s a big challenge we need to rent gear , fly people here and it’s very difficult. So doing it in NY, at this time when we’re signing a contract with Roadrunner was it just made sense because they were around.

Benek -what is it like working with a brother in the band?
Joe- I had a very short experience before that of being in a band with different guys, so I can compare just with that but for me it became so natural, for me it’s normal to be in a band with my brother. But I can say it’s very powerful, it’s very intense and sometimes it’s hard, but sometimes it’s awesome but it’s always intense.

Benek- Do you feel a musical connection?

Joe- Yes, we don’t need to use words, I don’t even know how to start talking about it it’s so big man. What started this band you know? my relationship with my brother, we would disagree on a lot of stuff and he was much younger than me , at the itme it was important because I was 17 and he was 12, when we were recording our first demoes, and I was hanging out with my friends drinking wine and smoking pot , but he was just a kid so he was always around and annoying and stuff , he wanted to hang out with bigger guys. But when we start to play there’s nothing else, just a pure powerful connection between us, we could play for an hour and a half straight, not jamming really because in Metal the patterns are always different and a lot of tempo changes. We would follow each other in a heart beat, I’ll be like “ok he’s going there” , damn that’s interesting and when something started being solid and great we’d be like “yep! This is good.” Instant connection all the time, and we stopped together. Like (makes sound of palm muted guitar coming to a halt) and we just stop.
Benek- Gojira is one of those bands that can’t go wrong you know, like Mayhem or Meshuggah, that don’t h have a single bad release. How do you stay so creative and full of ideas? What inspires you?


Joe- Like I told you, really this is important to me, they’re not ideas. It’s energy and this energy is always there, it’ll never end because on a certain dimension, time and space don’t exist. If you’re connected to this dimension, I know it sounds a little pretentious and I’m not pretending to be a higher spirit or a master or anything, but through music I can pass to this dimension when there is no time and space. If you stay healthy, and don’t do drugs basically , because a lot of people do drugs to open doors and compose , and it’s amazing oh my god, but if you avoid that then the connection stays good. The connection can be forever, you don’t lose connection if you stay centered, healthy, grounded, and focused. Happiness is also very important to me, it’s not just like we’re going on tours all the time, doing drugs and being lost when we go back home, a lot of bands fail after a couple of albums because they get lost. For us having a healthy happy lives with our own families with projects that are not related to music are very important so when we get back together we feel like kids happy to play together. We keep this port open to certain energy. I feel confident, I don’t think we’re going to lose this it’ll change, it’ll be slower and faster or darker and lighter but this energy we have accessed .


Benek- What does Gojira mean to you in your life ? How would you define your music and message? How central is it?

Joe- It’s very important, I could say it’s saving me from despair and chaos, misery I’m a very sensitive person. When I was in school, I suffered a lot, I thought the world was shit. People were so cruel and I had a hard time to have a real friend, one day this guy would be my friends and the next day he’d go with a bigger guy, a cooler guy and spit on me. So at a very early age, I had this hate for people, I really thought the world was not a good place, and music was a very important thing to me. I didn’t have a difficult childhoods, I didn’t grow up in a poor country and my parents were very cool and loving people so I cannot really complain but I’m telling you it was really hard for me to confront the world. For me the music was almost a reason to be alive. At some points it was my best friend and a platform for me to stand on, my home, my country and my planet.

Benek- Planet Joe heheehe… Anyway, you’re very outspoken in your lyrics about environmental damages, why is that?
Joe- You’re asking me? Well I’m sure you have the answer…

Benek- ….What do you mean?

Joe- I understand the question but it’s obvious, we have one planet. Not planet Joe, planet earth is our spaceship and there’s nothing else than that right now unless someone has a great idea to go live on the moon or something we need to take care of this place, it just makes sense. For me it’s the number one thing in politics. I always thought we weren’t doing politics, just music and poetry, but if you have one idea it can become politically involved. Expressing this was just natural, I grew up in the countryside in the old house I’ve described earlier, I grew up with a proper education, my parents taught me how to put my trash in a trash can rather than throwing it in the ground, Very simple education, the big polluters didn’t receive education it seemed. I have a lot of anger and fire in me and I need to express it, when I start to scream in the microphone that’s what comes sometimes this subjects.

Benek- On the other hand , it’s probably something that will not effect our planet for as long as we live, is this important for you because of your children? Or the love of the planet?

Joe- It’s important because everything is important. Every single word, every single movement and day or action has a repercussions. You do something and everything has an impact on a deep level, and it’s spiritual what I say now. If you throw your chewing gum in the grass it’s not going to effect a lot of people but when you throw your chewing gum in the grass there’s something that is happening in a spiritual and energetic level. There’s a lot of this happening on the planet and it sucks.

Benek- Do you believe the world still has a potential for saving? Is it not too late to change the force of habit?


Joe-Yes, I have hope in people, even if I hate them, I still think there’s good in people you know?

Benek- Why do you work with the sea shepherds in particular?
JoeBecause they’re cool man, they have a great logo laughs (laughs) but I like how their pretty unique, they’re great inspiration for me and for us in the band , the way they do things they don’t ask for permission or anything. They just do what they have to do according to what they think and feel, a lot of people are going “ ahhh the world is going down and it’s bad” you know but they do something about it. They’re not scared.

Benek- Is Paul Watson a fan?

Joe- He doesn’t have time to think about this, he’s very busy and dedicated , his dedication is very interesting. I see myself in him in some ways, he’s not available to people because he’s giving himself to his ideals and to his ideas and dreams. He’s completely dedicated, it’s a sacrifice, but these kind of people don’t have a choice, they to do this.

Benek- What happened with the Sea Shepherds EP?


Joe- I feel very uncomfortable when someone asks me about it because it’s so pathetic, I feel almost ashamed to talk about it because we we’re on fire with this EP. We did all the hard work, we composed four songs, we called a bunch of well known singers, we went to LA , my brother and me to record this and to mix it, just a few things missing to release it. But then something happened with the computer, we had a computer crash and we lost a lot of files, and it was really hard on us because we we’re signing a deal with Roadrunner, taking care of the new album, so it was a lot of work especially while on tour. So the EP was on the side because I had to recover all these files, and re record all those files but it would just be one week here, two weeks there, few days in a hotel, and on tour, I’m like I should work on this EP but I didn’t find the time and the energy to work on this. It’s there, it’s gonna come out some day.

Benek- Many many years in the future hehehe

Joe- Yeah maybe in 25 years , the plan was to put the spotlights on sea shepherds more than making money, the point was to sell it and make money for Sea Shepherds and give them all the money. We released one song called Blood and Salt on Roadrunner Magazine with Devin Townsend and Fredrik Thordendal , that’s already something. The name comes from the blood of the whales and dolphins in the salty water. It’s really inspired by why Sea Shepherds are doing what they’re doing, and Devn Townsend is singing and Fredrik is playing guitar, these people coming together is already a statement so of course we didn’t raise any money so far but a lot of Metalheads know Sea Shepherds through us so some of the goal has been achieved.

Benek- Do you also support Veganism?

Joe- ummm, I’m not a Vegan, but I’m Vegan friendly, some Vegans are so annoying though…but myself I was vegetarian for a few years but I gave up because I was on tour and I’m a mess, also I love meat that’s another thing, meat is so good you know what I mean? But it’s a little crazy when I start to think about it that we’re eating animals when we could just eat plants and seeds and beans you know? We could live healthier and happier without doing this traffic animals, the treatment of them is completely insane I would like to go back to this and I have Vegan friends who try to convince me and I’m like, “yeah I’m convinced already but I’m just too lazy…”

Benek- how do you feel about coming to Israel??
Joe- I feel so happy man! It’s a little impressive because of the history, and the conflicts and all that you know, when you’ve never been to a country you have this fantasy about it, each time I hear about Israel or Tel Aviv you hear about a bomb that exploded or of war, so our vision as Europeans is of a warzone. But I heard a lot of great things about it too, so I’m always very happy and excited to discover a new country and place . How is it now?

Benek- It’s just very hot…but no bombs hehehe. Do you feel your live show has changed over the years?

Joe- It changed a lot, now we’re more confident on stage, more mature and we accept what we are more. I feel like we got rid of a lot of layers we used to have, we thought we needed to look or sound like these guys , or I’m too fat or thin, you get onstage and full of complex as a teenager. As you grow older you accept , that’s how I am, and that makes you a better performer when you accept yourself.

Benek- What’s in the near future except for the Israeli gig ?

Joe- We have other shows in August, we’re going to tour all over Europe and then more touring. We’re basically in the middle of the album cycle, we have another year of touring easily on this album. We have a lot of new territories to go to, there’s life for this album still, people want to see and hear us. So touring and touring, and worrying about this damn EP!


Benek- Any sort of signing session planned?

Joe-There is something planned but not finalized yet, also, I think even the date of the show will probably change a day forward or after because of Anthrax
Benek- Any last words to the Israeli fans?

Joe- We cannot wait to be there, we cannot wait to meet you guys , we’re very, very excited and feel blessed to be able to travel like that and to discover Israel. I’m sure it’s a very beautiful place and I’m looking forward to visiting.

Maveth- Coils of the Black Earth Review

Maveth - Coils of the Black Earth

Band- Maveth
Album- Coils of the Black Earth
Origin- Helsinki, Finland
Mark- 4/5
Label- Dark Descent Records









I sure hope this gets posted after my Sorcery “Arrival At 6” review because this can be the ying to it’s yang. The good to it’s bad. The old Metallica to it’s new. Well, but where are my manners? First let me speak of what we’re dealing with here. Remember the time Finland was crucial to Death Metal? Me neither, but Finland was one of those countries that when Death Metal came out of it, it kicked your ass back to second grade, wherein your priest molested your ass back into your mom’s womb. From Demigod, to Demilich to Abhorrence, while not as popular as their Swedish counterpart , they always offered a unique and innovative listening experience. But now fast forward 20 years, and what’s new and brewing within Finland? Well, much, but it certainly has not become the Death Metal mainstay that is Sweden. While a Metal capital for all things such as Folk Metal (ala Korpiklaani, Turisas, Finntroll, Moonsorrow, Ensiferum, and every other band that can hold a myriad of acoustic instruments) , Black Metal (ala Behexen, Impaled Nazarene, Horna, Sargeist, Archgoat and any other band who can’t afford proper amps/guitars/heating system) and of course, probably their biggest export, Melodic Death/Power Metal ( Children of Bodom, Norther, Wintersun and any other bands who’s guitarist can shred and wail at the same time.)

But oddly enough, this gem of a Blackened Death Metal band comes from Finland. Who are our brave troubadours? None other than the Hebrew named Maveth! (because fuck yeah adding an H to Hebrew words makes perfect sense! Just ask Katatonia…Elohim Crystal Meth) While I disagree with the odd Scandinavian way of adding h’s to Hebrew words (ala Meshuggah, Elohim Meth, ETC ETC,) this band takes rough, ugly, dirty (no, I’m not listing adjectives regarding Devon Townsend’s visage) and uncompromising BDM and does it right. If Arrival At 6 brought nothing new to the table, Coils of the Black Earth does everything to both be oldschool and refreshing at the same time. Right off from the samples of rain on “The Devourer Within The Gulf” (Saddam Hussein-Ben) one can see the beginning of the V’s on his Metal checklist . Dark? Yes, moody? Fuck yes, Evil? To quote Nergal, “blacker than the devil’s ass” and we’re only on the first song. What I like about this band is that their versatile. The band manages to install their grim, vicious brand of DM both on the slower mammoth like tracks, or the fast blastbeaty ones such as the aforementioned opener.

Hymn To Azazel is a mix of both. Mostly sticking to the super fast core of this album, by this track you can somewhat feel the line the band draws between Black and Death Metal. How so? Secret, nananana, you can’t make me tell. No but, you can notice the DM styling via the distortion and drumming which is very reminiscent of oldschool Euro Death with some very Taake/Marduk esque riffs and screechy guitars , with the Slayer a-melodic solos throw in. Sounds familiar? Of course, but Maveth again, gives it there own twist. In the modern world of oldschool DM where pretty much everything has been tried (or declared poser ;) ) it’s refreshing to see band with a taste. This is why, at least I think, bands like Maveth and Necrowretch, who are on their first release, garner so much success.

Remember how I mentioned slower hulking tracks? The first of these is Hymn To The Black Matron (black matron…Oprah Winfrey?) it’s a slow track, with those churning blastbeats and guitars that smell of evil. It gets faster at times, but it really somewhat reminds me of a more evil, a bit more Swedish, lower tone Asphyx slow track. And hey ho we’re in the last 4 tracks!

Stating Eritcho is of the more melodic tracks on the album, while nothing to gawk at and yell Metalcore, the guitar line is memorable and the vocal patterns are reminiscent of Nile/Behemoth to me. It is also one of my favorite tracks on the album, so you know it’s quality (I am the say all and end all, the alpha and the omega.) Before the last two parter track of the album, there’s a quote that goes “dream, dream so the day may come” (major Barack Obama points to you there) that then kicks into the Blackened Death Doomy goodness of this track. Definitely the slowest track on this album, the power of the bands American vocalist “Christbutcher” (couldn’t find his real name anywhere.) While he supplies good vocals all along the album, his Ross Dolan (Immolation) esque vocals really shine on this one. The album ends on a two parter named Terminus( no, not Where Death is Most Alive.) So they basically took my “oh my fucking god burn it with fire” hatred for “throwing all our tricks at one song and making it super long” and took it to a wholeeee new level. But by doing this, it feels like two more normal tracks. Which are a fitting close to this album. Grim, uncompromising , and gritty as the rest of it.

Burn the cats and draw the pentagrams, it’s one of those kind of nights.  

Behemoth - The Satanist Review

Vinyl Cover of Behemoth's new opus, The Satanist 

Band- Behemoth
Album- The Satanist
Origin- Gdansk, Poland
Score 10/10



For the sake of full transparency, i'll get this off my chest right off the bat- Behemoth is my favorite band. I think that ever since my taste in music really reached the point where it became solidified, and I became invested in the world of Metal, Behemoth began speaking to me. The sense of real grandeur, the heaviness, and the fact that everything the guitar tone, to Inferno's monstrous blastbeats and Nergal's vocals sat perfectly with me through pretty much every release, gave these Polish monsters the status of crown jewel in my musical pantheon.

Yet, there was always a concern. You see, Behemoth are not the type of band which is comfortable with settling. Every release sounds different, at least slightly from its predecessor. From the Pagan/Black Metal style of Sventieth (Storming Near The Baltic) and Grom (which means Thunderclap in Polish,) to the unpolished Blackened Death style of Pandemonic Incantations and Satanica, to their steady upwards slope in Death Metal through Thelema 6 (my personal favorite) to Evangelion. This is not a band which is comfortable staying in one spot. Now, while this is one of the main reasons I love them, it is also always a risk. I have faith in the lads, and much security in their ability to keep evolving well, you never know. For every Enslaved, Amorphis and Watain, or bands who made transitions successfully, there are about 3 Morbid Angels gone trance, Satyricons gone Black N' Roll and Opeths gone Progressive Rock.

So of course, when it came to my attention that my nearest and dearest were having a new album, so soon after Nergal, thank Satan, won his battle with Leukemia, I was both incredibly happy, and incredibly afraid. Especially when Nergal kept throwing around words like “innovative” and “sincere.” Usually when artists start saying that i'm afraid they're going to go on to make a heart breaking and frankly uninteresting record that capitalizes on the “we're trying to be interesting” rather than actually being interesting through the music. Yet, being a believer, I kept my faith in Nergal. The man who brought me Demigod and Thelema 6 deserves some kind of trust, so trusted him I did. So the months went by, promotional images and materials were released , and come December 7^th, there it fucking was.

The first single and video which opens the album, Blow Your Trumpets, Gabriel. Of course, first came the video from them preforming it in Brutal Assault (a Metal festival in the Czech Republic,) there it already sounded good, but damn it, I needed to hear it properly! So, with trepidation, and a heart beat reaching the 200's pretty easily, feeling like my bullets were trying to shoot out of my chest, I clicked on the link to the video on YouTube. Thinking to myself “ this better be good.” Slowly, the songs starts into a mammoth of an opener. The stomping, burgeoning riffs sounded like the gates of a sinister temple opening, with Inferno's drum beat sounding like a beat to this mesmerizing trance. With Nergal supplying the text for this ritual, it became abundantly clear. Behemoth are back, baby.

Fast forward two months of me tapping my table and looking at the calendar like an anxious idiot, the day finally came. February 4^th was a cold, snowy day in New York City (where I was at the time,) and while I knew of the what was happening that day, I initially didn't plan to take place. My resolve was “yeah, I have this and that editions waiting for me at home, I'll just wait. I don't have to get it at launch.” Now that held pretty nicely, but a thought occurred to me “wellllll, I might as well pop into a Best Buy to take a look at it.” Popped in I have, and my resolve last around 4.5 second with the CD in my hand. 10$ are not worth the pain of being in NYC for two weeks and not knowing what this fucker sounds like until after everybody else has.

So, after two months of hearing Blow Your Trumpets, Gabriel (and Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer, but that doesn't fit the order of this review so we'll talk about it later,) I was finally treated to the track which follows that grand entrance into The Satanist's pandemonium. Furor Divinus does justice to its name (Divine Fury) as Nergal sounds enormously angry, as if he was enraged by his time away. The track breaks forward full speed, and begins to shed light on the differences between this album and the few before it. This album, to me, rather than being the per-ordained evolution from Evangelion, is actually closer to a more perfect vision of Satanica. An intelligent, Blackened Death release that is organically mastered and cooked to the point of perfection.

Yet, I feel that the biggest achievement Behemoth have made with this album, disregarding the circumstances which were not easy, is that it is enormously varied. For example, passing onto the third track Messe Noire (French for Black Mass,) you can already see the dynamic of the album. A mid-paced to slow track, with the vocals sounding like a sermon on the street of a Black Plague infested Europe. The tracks open with the line “I believe in Satan!” and the slow guitars laid down behind the vocals somewhat support a “sick” or “plagued” atmosphere. Messe Noire and it's following track, Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer are a show of the exact beauty in the duality of this release. While Messe Noire is one of the least catchy and hardest to digest tracks on the album, Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer is the exact opposite. Easy to digest, beautifully quick and with a unique rhythm, it is absolutely no wonder that this song was picked as the second single from the album. Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer (or, in translation, Prey For Us Lucifer,) starts off sounding almost a bit like Chant of Ezkaton without the the melodic over-layering, but the sound and the drum beat make all the difference. Inferno keeps this really cool and irregular tempo throughout the whole song that actually gave this song the majority of it's personality. Then of course is the epic slow down. Around midway through the song, Orion does this groovy bass bend and Inferno sticks his drum just once as Nergal kicks into a crushing part near the end. Invoking nearly any demon you can think about, the lyrics end with another phrase that stuck with me from this album “the black sun will never set, because it never rose.”

Reaching now into the middle of the album (5^th track out of 9), is the track Amen. Amen is kind of a touch back with newer Behemoth and I actually thought that it purveyed a strong point of brutality that I really enjoyed. In all and all, it is one of the angriest, shortest and heaviest tracks on the album, with lyrics that would turn a nun into a prostitute and a prostitute into Cee Lo Greene. This track kind of takes the other newer Behemoths into the Satanist's era. The Satanist's title track closes what to me is the first part of the album. An epic if softer track, it shows one of the many new “shades of Behemoth” so to speak. For me, the Satanist, alongside with the closing track, O Father, O Satan, O Sun, shows Behemoth bringing a new instrument into making their pieces sound larger life. They do so by making big sounding yet gritty pieces. That are both at once cataclysmic yet relate-able. This is to me is the personification of what Nergal meant by a more personal album. It's not meandering, it's not full of coded messages or lyrics that you have to watch interviews to understand, but rather, it takes some of the earlier philosophy of Behemoth and applies them to a much more personal basis. It is a manifesto in that it applies to people and individuals rather than to specific topics like earlier topics taken up by the band. The album then continues to Ben Sahar (a track title that has my name in it? Supreme points!,) a mid paced romp that most closely is linked on the album with Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer. Fun, and like the track I paired it up with, beautifully headbangable to the point of breaking several joints in your neck. I also think the usage of choirs near the end was an enhancing touch, and unlike when many other bands use it, was done with a great sense of elegance that doesn't feel exaggerated. .



A moment before the end, a breath before the last track of the album I waited a whole 6 years for, comes my favorite track of the album, In The Absence Ov Light. A barrage of The Satanist era heaviness opens this mammoth of a track with a blast, and Nergal wastes no time growling his decayed and grim heart out within moments. This track, like most of the album, is a contradiction. While (alongside Amen,) it contains without a doubt some of the fastest and most brutal riffing and drumming of the album, it also contains a curious and almost Shining-esque acoustic part mid song that changes the whole atmosphere. From a furious attack , the song mellows out almost entirely into the acoustic guitars, with a saxophone accompanying Nergal reading a spoken word speech of sorts in Polish. When the speech reaches it's end, the song takes a split second of a breath before kicking right back into high gear to close off the strongest and for me, one of the most memorable Behemoth songs of recent memory. It absolutely cracked my top ten Behemoth song list of all time, and that list has only been cracked by two The Satanist tracks ( alongside Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer.) Here we are, at the last track. So far, not only Behemoth fulfilled my expectations for their comeback, but they have far exceeded expectations. But now come the last check on the list, the cherry on the icing on the cake, will the last track be great? Will it leave a taste for more? Will it suffer from a “longest track on the album, lets put everything together incoherently” syndrome?

Yes, yes, and obviously, no. O Father, O Satan, O Sun, the closing song, is Behemoth's equivalent of Led Zeppelin's Kashmir (or Immortal's Tyrants, take your pick.) A track that you'd imagine was played in a movie as the camera zooms out onto the sprawling wastelands while the army marches. The track sounds like what you'd imagine describes a conflict, yet the lyrics take that conflict into an internal spot rather than an external spot. On no track on the album, or matter of fact, in Behemoth's career, has the the representation of Satan's philosophical importance in their music been any clearer. An incomplete deity, a deity which is perfect in its imperfection, the Satan described in O Father, O Satan, O Sun represents human rebellion, represents humanities' conflict internal conflicts to develop and seek enlightenment. An allegorical champion for the duality of existence, to show that divine and complete perfection is but an invention used to limit the mind as to stop it from understanding it's own ability to grow in an imperfect state.


As you might've guessed at this point, I believe The Satanist was not only worth the nail-biting 6 years wait, but then some. For 6 years I didn't know what was going to happen, from the band facing the danger of losing it's leader, and to be honest its essence to disease, to the general doubts one has before his favorite band releases a new album, not to mention a comeback album. 6 years later, I realize that it's moments like these, when I can smile such victories rather than sigh a relief, when I got not only the joy of it scratching by and being decent, but the roaring thunder of it being an absolutely excellent release that marks a new chapter in the history of my favorite band, is why i'm so deeply attached to music in the first place. While there's the sadness of failure and the moments of disappointment, the happiness and emotional relevance of seeing the music that you love prevail, is legitimately a feeling which is hard to match.

Constructing Darkness- An Interview with Mikael Stanne of Dark Tranquility

Mikael Stanne of Dark Tranquility 

It seems almost so trivial right now that it's hard to imagine how new the Swedish Melodic Death Metal scene is. While the Death Metal scene is say, edging on its 30's. Meanwhile the Thrash and Heavy are hitting their 40's, the first albums of the wildly popular and wildly emulated Goteborg scene are only turning 20 now. In 20 years, these albums have had an impact which is almost unrivaled in other scenes. Bands like Dark Tranquility, At The Gates and In Flames began a revolution which sparked hundreds upon hundreds of bands worldwide who could come close, but never quite capture their spirit. Well, 20 or so years after Skydancer, I caught up with one of the most important figures of the Goteborg scene, leader and singer of Dark Tranquility, a true character of the international Metal scene, Mikael Stanne. Results ensue


B- Hallo Mikael! How are you?


M- I'm good , i'm good, i'm in Melbourne Australia right, heading to Adelaide. We're at the airport, it's very early morning here (I guess he means in the camp, as it's 2 pm over there...) and we had a fantastic show in Melbourne. Was super cool.

B- So, Dark Tranquillity is such a hard working band and something is always happening...I don't know where to start! How do you feel about your latest EP A Memory Construct?

M- I feel really strongly about it, it is a cool thing to do, something special for the second part of the tour. So we figured, we wanted to give something special to the fans who waited to see us, and it's only on vinyl, it's really cool. Totally a collectors item, and totally for the die hard fans and the collectors out there. It just seemed like something fun and special to do, and something I look forward to when I go to shows. To find something unique, something you can't get anywhere else. I actually met some guys last night who bought it on Ebay.

B- It seems almost parallel to Zero Distance, why do you feel the necessity to release it separately rather than with the whole package?

M- For sure, but it's just good to have something in between albums. Something that in itself promotes the tours. That's definitely what we did with Zero Distance, one year touring, then we released that song and continued for another. Maybe it's not something we plan on doing in advance, but it does the trick. If we have some extra songs, left over but good from the recording, that don't fit the album, then we think ah we should do something with it. So yeah, first it kind of makes sense, and it is a cool thing to do.


B- On a side note, how do you maintain such a grand amount of energy and enthusiasm 20 years into the band?

M- I donno, I think every night something gets you going. Something about the audience gets you inspired and you pull energy from it. The energy the crowd brings effects us, we're on tour, we play every night, pretty exhausting to be on the tour bus and not sleep enough. So we're traveling every day, but you spend 23 hours doing noting, waiting around, standing in line, and those 1-2 hours onstage, that's all the matters. Till that I have to make sure that we can provide the best experience for the audience that paid to see us. But I do tend to have a ton of fun on stage and I also think Melbourne last night was one of the highlights of this tour, without a doubt. Sometimes I feel the need to be a part of the crowd and just jump in (laughs.) Because it's fun, and I love, for my favorite bands, I always got front row, and feel the energy of being in the crowd. I love that feeling so. I choose to come and join them.

B- How do you feel the band life has effected your personal life?

M- It's tough but i'm used to it of course. Touring life is crazy, but at home it's sane and great. But I like it like that, my whole life together is nice, calm, and fantastic the way it is. I try to separate work and family, I mean I work from home occasionally for paperwork and stuff but try to just hang out with my family when i'm home. It's a big difference but I like the fact it keeps me balanced. You get pampered and get treated like a kid on tour sometimes, to make everything work. But at home you get to meet reality and be an adult again, do everything yourself. It's a good balance, sometimes we're all away from home for longer than we'd like. But at the same time that means that we can be home more once we finally arrive. Sometimes I hate it, being away, but at the same time I know that in 2 weeks from now i'll be home for 2 months and it'll be awesome.

B- Well! We touched on a big note, Construct, it's been out for a while now, how do you feel about it?

M- I'm really, really, really happy with it. We struggled with it for a long long time , and it took a long time for us to get into the right way and just do it. But once we finished it we were really happy with the outcome. We had a blast finishing it actually, and we play a lot of these new songs on this tour. The crowd also seems to only want more, and what better review can we possibly get?

B- You said in an interview for Terrorizer that unlike We Are The Void, that the ideas when you started writing for Construct just flowed through naturally. Why do you feel that happened? How did that effect the album?

M- I think we just, we focused on songs and melodies. It wasn't as much of a collaborative effort as We Are The Void was. We sat in the rehearsal room for a year and bounced ideas on and off, it came to the point of just being super frustrating, a lot of good things came from it. But 3 days out of 5 we did nothing. This time we though “screw it, we'll just go into the studio directly” and bounce ideas off each other there. So 3 of us started writing, splinters of songs, and we started building from there, all the sudden we had great songs and I started writing the lyrics, so we had finally new material! We've never done that before, and it made me want to write in a different way as well. As I wanted it to be very honest, very true, as the music called for it in a way. So, it's just the way of writing, and it inspired me to write lyrically differently. But the process itself for writing lyrics didn't really change, I either stay up late at night or until the morning with coffee and anxiety.

B- How is it different from previous Dark Tranquility albums?

M- The way we wrote it, made it change a lot. It wasn't just about the cool riffs or different leads. It was about the song, the power of chord progression and emotion.
What are some of the themes of the album? What would you say the lyrics and general idea are?
Basically, trust issues and skepticism i'd say. It's about personal relationships, how that effects you, about the people you trust and don't, and how you fail each other in many ways. Looking at it from a more “scientific” standpoint and less of an emotional one. It's kind of dissecting relationships, or friendships, or romance, in a cold, “scientific” viewpoint. That basically talks of issues, some of the stuff I was going through at the time, and it helped me get through the hardships I had. It's more focused, it's more honest, and because we chose * to mix it, it sounds better than everything we've ever done. You know sound is half the name of the game, as it will determine what people can hear of your work and how. I really like listening to it from a good stereo system really loud.


B- What's the idea behind the name “Construct”?

M- Construct is a construction you make up in your mind and that becomes reality. A bigger way of looking at it is also related to religion. Which is one of the things that frustrate me the most,when it comes to....everything. That people would rather believe than know, and I guess that's a part of the lyrics too. How when there are things we don't understand we like to substitute truth and substitute reality. Because we choose to believe in something imaginary, which is something you can make up in your mind, that is a construct.


B- Also, Construct has shown a major comeback in the way of the clean vocals, why do you think that they came in so strongly on here?


M- It just made sense, the songs called for it. The songs are more melodic, and focused onmelody, and it made me want to try some stuff. Because we wrote in the studio we got to experiment a lot and try out different things, so we we're like lets try more clean material. We saw how it worked, and usually , when we're in the cutting room, we're like “fuck it, it doesn't work” but with the new writing way, we had to be confident and more spontaneous. Experimental in a way. I really enjoyed it, loved it.



B- I also know Niklas (Sundin,guitars) all the artwork, how did that come about?

M- He was pretty damn hesitant at first as he was super busy with the writing of the album, and I start looking for other artists. I found a few I was drawn to colaborate with, but I didn't have a title yet. So I didn't really know what to tell the artists. Once I did, I told Niklas “what do you think about Construct?” and he was like “I love it.” Then the next morning he sent over the album cover. He was just up all night, painting it, completing it. I was really happy , as I always want Niklas to do the cover but he feels sometimes that he doesn't have the time or hes busy doing other stuff. We use it as a backdrop in our live show as well and everything.


B- In addition, for the 20 years anniversary of Skydancer, lets go a bit back. How would you describe the early days of DT? Those times were probably very different from what the band is like now?

M- Oh wow, we were just kids you know. 19 when we wrote Skydancer. We had all these grand ideas, we were like “holy shit, we gotta record an album, lets make the most out of it.” We wanted everything, you know, we wanted orchestra, keyboards, female vocals, and we wanted it to sound epic and majestic. We had all these grand ideas that now seem pretentious looking back. Recording it was kind of a reality check, and for me, it was an experience. We found early on, “oh yeah , it doesn't work” and not everything sounds great in the studio, it depends on how you play! So we took our time, practiced a lot. Hours, days, weeks to record album. We don't have much to show for it (laughs) but it was a ton of fun and I remember it fondly. I just remember being frustrated not being able to put in all the stuff we wanted.




B- Are there any plans of including more Skydancer materials in the set-list now?

M- Yeah, we used to do one Skydancer song with a guest vocalist, which we haven't done since. Which is really sad, we tried some songs out to see if it works, but it didn't work out. When we did preform A Bolt of Blazing Gold, it was with Mariangela Demurtas of Tristania, who joined us every night onstage for that song. But she probably won't do it again.

B- First and foremost, one of the few factual questions in this interview, how did you come in contact with the band?

M- It was Niklas and I sitting in our living rooms. We rented guitars and talked to friends from our same street, like “hey man, you wanna be in a band? You can play drums, you can play bass,s you can sing.” We formed the band out of boredom, at the time we just sat around and tried to figure out how to play music based on our favorite albums. Just try to sound as cool as them, we pretty much grew up together. Niklas and I are for example friends since we were 6 years old.

B- Why did you transition from guitars to vocals?

M- Oh I don't know. I wanted to be a singer I guess, I didn't feel comfortable playing guitar. Every rehearsal I was singing when Anders wasn't around, and it was just what I wanted to do. So when, after we recorded Skydancer, I told Anders that I wanted to be the singer, and he said fine, but he can't play the guitar parts. So he took over my old position in In Flames and I did the opposite. It just fit me better, as DT was my main band, and I just love screaming, I love making noise, expressing myself in a way. Of course it had its ups and downs, sometimes you feel really shitty about what you do, and sometimes you feel really great about what you do. But now, 25 years later I can see I made the right choice.

B- How do you feel you've developed as a musician/artist since the early days of Dark Tranquility?



M- I mean in the beginning it was all about trying to sound as good as my favorite vocalists. Like Mille Petrozza, David Vincent and stuff like that, now a days I am looking for emotions rather than a pure sound. I want to convey the lyrics in a way, I want people to really get what the song is about and how I feel about that. It's something you learn along the way, it's a different form of expression than just screaming your lungs out. But this is how it becomes nuanced and interesting. That's the biggest challenge,but it's the one I enjoy the most.

B- And perhaps most importantly, how do you feel the Metal scene around you has changed since those days? How do you feel the Swedish Metal scene has changed since the days DT ATG and IF were neighbors

M- There's a lot more bands now, of course when we started it was super tiny. A couple of bands popped up in the early 90's, but it was still like a “secret society” type thing. There were a couple of bands in Stockholm and a couple of bands in Gothenburg, and the number was increasing. But now, it's a fantastic music scene. I meet people all the time who show me there stuff and I listen to new bands, I still go to shows pretty much every week. It's really exciting, especially now as people have stopped comparing themselves to us, or At The Gates, or for the matter, Entombed. A lot of bands find their own identity, and the weekly shows have helped bands get nicer venues to preform in.

B- How do you feel about the explosion in popularity of Melodic Death Metal or Gothenburg Death Metal since the early days?

M- I remember being frustrated around 96' or 97' , that all the sudden we were lumped together as one sound, or one style of music. Because we were definitely trying to sound original, but now I just don't care. As long as people appreciate what we do, and what our friends do, I don't mind. It even became like a seal of quality, the “Gothenburg sound.” Ofcourse I remember when we did Skydancer, and people didn't get what we did at all. We were too melodic to be Death Metal and too angry to be Power Metal or whatever, nobody really understood. We thought “you'll get it eventually.” We just kept doing what we were doing, and sure enough, people got it. Powerful, emotional, and inventive music. We never had to compromise outside of the band. We're still doing it, and it's a great accomplishment.

B- Speaking of which, ATG working on a new album, any comments about that?

M- Really really excited, I spoke to Anders yesterday a little bit, and he's just been writing and writing and writing. It'ss really cool, I know it's an enormous amount of pressure on them, but i'm glad they've finally decided to do it. There's been talk for years and years, and years but they've always been like ahhhhh we don't know, we'll see, but now it's finally here. I'm super excited, and i've heard a few demos, couldn't be happier.


B- So Israel for the second time in what, two years! How do you feel?

M- I feel really good, we had such a fantastic time last time. We've been talking to Yishai, the promoter, who's a really cool guy, and he told us “we want you guys to come back.” So we said fuck yeah we'll come! So, really really nice.

B- Any special plans for your trip here?

M- Not that I know of, unfortunately. We're only gonna be there for the day as afterwards we're headed straight to Greece. Last time we went sight seeing and to Jerusalem, but this time it's get in, play, scream, get drunk, and leave!

B- What's after? What's in Dark Tranquility's nearby future after the excursion here?

M- We do two more shows, and then we get a month off. Which is nice, as we've been touring pretty constantly since November. Then we have a week in Russia in May I think, then we take the summer off. Only festivals. For the fall there'll be some more touring, probably one more in Europe and one more in the USA.

B- And last but not least, a word to the crowd?
M- We're just super happy to get the chance to come back. We'll have a cool night, a cool show, and we're looking forward to it.

Masacre- Requiem (Classic Feature)

Masacre- Reqviem (Requiem) 

Band- Masacre
Album – Requiem (written Reqviem, like in Latin)
Release Date- October 1, 1991
Stars- /classic review
Origin- Medellin, Colombia
Label- Osmose Productions originally/ Raven Metal for the rerelease

Ladies and gents, Metalheads of all demeanor and standing, take a seat. We are here today to discuss a musical plague many of you might've not heard of (yet you should've, isn't it always a bigger pity to know you're missing something than actually missing it?) But to begin, lets go into a bit of context and history. Many people think of the early Norwegian and Finnish Black Metal acts as troubled. Hell, many would go as far as to even call Norway's Mayhem as the most troubled and infamous band in Extreme Metal's short history. Yet, oddly enough, Mayhem's luck seems to carry over into who their amicable with it seems. Enter Masacre (pronounced Ma-sa-kre, Spanish for massacre.) Masacre are one of the earliest grandaddies of the Colombian Black/Death scene. You know all that “Bestial Death Metal” stuff that goes around now a days? That Blackened Death Metal which is dirtier than the cats Dabush kill for their schwarma? Heavy as all hell, furious and gives about as much dues as you see unicorns walking around? Stuff like Bestial Mockery and Teitanblood? Well Masacre wrote the playbook for it. Without money, without means, and at the time, a country with a small Metal scene, Masacre made do with what they had. And now a days, you have guys all over the globe, from Singapore to Poland to Sweden trying to recapture that brutish o' natural ugliness.

But where were we? Oh yes, their history. Well, Masacre came through around the time where the tape trade was strong. When bands like Salem (fun fact, vocalist Alex “Trapeator” Oquendo still remember being in contact with the Israeli scene's very own, Ze'ev Tenenbaum,while drummer at the time, Mauricio “Bull Metal” Montoya was in contact with both him and Yishai Sweartz) Sodom, Mayhem, Sepultura and others were sending their tapes, the Colombians were just starting to make a name for themselves. One fateful day, Masacre came into contact with none other than the infamous Oystien “Euronymous” Aarseth of the aforementioned legendary Mayhem. Such a meeting must have thrilled the Masacre guys quite a bit, as they themselves are big fans of the band (even going as far as dedicating the album we talk about today, Requiem, to Dead.) Considering the blaspheme and lo-fi nature of their music, the guys from Mayhem were pretty thrilled as well, and that resulted in quite a back and forth . Eventually, Oystien seized the opportunity and offered the band a spot in his up and coming label, Deathlike Silence. Excited the band wanted to release their follow up album, Sacro through Euronymous' label, feeling that their dream of worldwide recognition was neigh. Yet such was not the case, as due to Euronymou's murder at the hands of one, nice, lovely dude named Varg Vikernes, nothing came to fruition. But alas when things seemed grim for our Colombian travelers, they got into a slot which was as interesting as the first release (EVER) by giant French Black Metal label, Osmose productions (who housed everyone from Immortal and Enslaved to Absu and Vital Remains to James Hetfield's twice removed three times added cousin's grandmother for a while.)

The album itself, Requiem, starts off pretty nonchalantly. The small intro in the beginning has a sound of fires in the background while an acoustic guitar plays a tune which could be mistaken as Guitar Pro's newest intro. I guess this was done to fuck with the listener to the point of him knocking his head into the wall while the next track kicked in. Cortejo Funebre ( Funeral Procession) is a fitting opener to the chaos. Starting in slowly, while paving the way for the deathly feast itself. Needless to say, around midway the celebrations kick into full swing and the foot which was dancing around the pedal, now has it, fully to the metal. Yet oddly enough, instead of keeping it full speed, it goes back down to this dark and ominous Death Metal part that represents a bit of more refined version of South American Death Metal than one would be used to. The stigma that South American Death Metal is just visceral, mindless blasting is all but gone. While it is lo fi, and obviously was not made with a million dollar sound like is available today, or even the more produced record of back then, the riffs are clever , well written and beautifully integrated.

Of course, one of the most obvious points about the band is that it is in Spanish. Now, don't let that be a deal breaker for you, as it actually sounds pretty damn awesome with the music. Even for me, as a person who speaks the language, it was hard to get used to with Thrash, but in Death Metal where the pronunciations are anywhere between fully understandable and fucking gibberish (looking right at you John Tardy,) it's much easier to get used to. Also, an added bonus is that it's much easier to translate to English, and actually, considering that while, the band's name might mislead you to think otherwise, their lyrics are not very gore based. The lyrics are just as politically motivated , at least on Requiem, as Sepultura's were around their Beneath The Remains time. Well, “reality goes far beyond any dream” I guess.

Also, right off from the two openers , Cortejo Funebre and Justicia Ramera (pronounced חוסטיסיה רמרה and means, colloquially Prostituted Justice,) you can notice the Black Metal influence on the music. Some of the dark passages between riffs really sound like something taken out of the 90's Norwegian scene. Wellll, you sleep with dogs you wake up with fleas, you know? But it actually fits the music very well, as it does really fall into the middle line between those two genres, somewhere between Deicide and old Marduk. Also, the band's history is a bit more of a sadder one than the usual Death Metal fare. Their first drummer, the one you will be listening to on this record, Mauricio “Bull Metal” Montoya who by the way, was also the guy who release Mayhem's controversial bootleg “Dawn of the Black Hearts” on his label Warmaster Records, ended up committing suicide in the December 2002 (R.I.P.) Following such a heavy misfortune, although not for the band's music as he moved on by then. was the loss of esteemed and long time member of the band Victor Gallego in October 2005 to cancer (R.I.P.) But before and after these difficulties, the band members have kept the band going strong, both in the memory and hopefully posthumous pride of their departed members. w

Yet, this album is one for them to be proud of, and take fond memories of their time together with Mauricio, as is exemplified with the next song, Brutales Masacres (Brutal Massacres). My favorite track on the album, it actually manages to break through with this super catchy riff, which follows Trapeator's hollowed screams in the beginning. That's one of the things I find most beautiful about the early Colombian scene, they had absolutely no means, no support and yet, they still managed to do things that people now all across the world with all the means in the universe can't. Also, the music is very inclusive, the riffs on the verses are very Thrashy, while you have Black parts here and there, and Death all over the plate. This is what “Extreme” Metal should be, not a definition thrown around by musicians who don't want to say what type of elements they might have used to concoct with. Not that I have an issue with more far removed elements, but when it really takes from all version of extreme Metal in it's many colors, its at that point where it needs a broader rather than more specific definition.

As we jump from Brutales Masacres to Sepulcros En Ruinas (Sepulchers In Ruins,) we see that while musically the tracks kind of sit together on line that can be defined as Extreme Metal, the band isn't afraid to go into many different lyrical topics. Brutales Masacres and Escoria discuss openly about the dismal situation of Colombia at the time, and the...well “Brutales Masacres” happening in the streets. You see, Colombia has had an on and off problem with internal conflicts, led by Guerillas over around 50 years now. Violence, much like an Israel, was a taste of the ordinary for them. While now it is much safer than it was, say, 20/10 years ago, since around the album's release (the album was released in 1991, the statistic is from 1990) Colombia has experienced around 1,300 casualties from mines alone every year (http://www.the-monitor.org/index.php/cp/display/region_profiles/theme/2523.)

But the album also moves onto other lyrical topics with songs like Sepulcros En Ruinas. Also a socially conscience song, is about the situation of the Church in their home state. Much like in other countries in South America (with Brazil probably being the most extreme,) Catholicism is embraced much more deeply than say, in Western and Northern Europe and there's a strong hostility to nonbelievers (such as, in Brazil, it's very common to see Atheists or Atheist organization members being openly attacked and the police refusing to do much about it.) So the album, while deeply connected in sound and style to many other Death Metal album, is a bit more rooted in reality than many other popular works.

Following Escoria, the album goes into a track which was first premiered on Masacre's debut EP, the eponymous Ola De Violencia (Smell of Violence.) A bit of a Morbid Angel sounding track, at least in its first parts, this was a part of Masacre's first formidable outing into the global Metal scene. The track itself showed a lot of things to come, representing a mix of many of the elements. It is also one of the last three tracks which all together are, much like Brutales Masacres related to politics. But they all show a different side to the conflict. While Ola De Violencia is solely about violent occurances, and is a very graphic song in it's nature, kind of a Cannibal Corpse view on real warfare, the last two tracks take a step back.

The first of which, Tiempos De Guerra (Times of War) is kind of a predicted escalation of the situation. If I may harken back to Megadeth and the quote, “the end is near, it's crystal clear, part of the master plan?” so imagine that on a much more personal scale. The tracks rage, and a show of obvious discontent towards their situation,, is actually touching on an emotional level. A scream of people who were in a situation they had no control over, yelling over such troubled times that the future seemed wholly uncertain. While many bands sing about war, from every view point imaginable, Masacre give it a realistic edge that, if you go into the lyrics, does make for an interesting read. Especially if you compare it with the situation of Colombia at the time (i'll include some wikipedia articles on the bottom. They might not be perfect, data wise, , but they're a start rather than thinking “Mhmm! Colombia cartels and violence right?!)



But here we are, 42 minutes later, and we're at the end into this peep hole into the troubled Colombia of 20 years ago. While it is obviously pessimistic (well, yeah, Death Metal in the end of the day) it is refreshing and harrowing to hear a view into a war and a reality that we don't hear much about in the news and aren't very knowledgeable about, yet on the other hand, can compare with our own to some degree. The album closes with Conflicto De Paz (Conflict of Peace) which is to me at least, a great closing track title for the album, and lyrically the perfect seal. It goes into the problem of the country in kind of an over view, a general walk through all the many topics discussed on the album, and brings to an end. Those are the conflicts with peace. As a person who lives in Israel for 9 years now, I believe every one in Israel knows some version the “Conflicto De Paz” too well.

Links to delve a bit deeper into the Situation in Colombia, perhaps before hearing the album to get in the mood - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colombian_conflict_(1964%E2%80%93present)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paramilitarism_in_Colombia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutionary_Armed_Forces_of_Colombia (the largest faction involved excep the Colombian government itself, still 7-10 thousand members to this day!)