Embalmed
Embalmed is a very interesting
death metal band coming from a beautiful Greek island. The difficulties
they have to face are many, however this strengthens their will and makes
them even stronger to strive for something better. Lyric-wise now they
deal with every sort of conflict and war, especially the ones that occur
in our minds... Here's what Archon told us...
1.HELLO GUYS. THE FIRST QUESTION IS A TYPICAL
ONE... YOU ARE NEW BAND AND SO TELL US IN A FEW WORDS THE BAND HISTORY
AND PRESENT THE CURRENT LUNE -UP.
Embalmed was formed in the spring of 1999
By Panos (guitars),Kostas S.(guitars),Kostas T.(vocals) and Thanos (drums),just
to have fun performing favourite songs. Recruiting Petros as the new drummer
we started to write our own stuff, simple death metal riffs. After two
years of not taking seriously anything i found Lazaros from Crystallized
to help us with drum sections and I took over the whole guitar stuff. We
entered the studio and although we lacked of experience we recorded 45
min of material in 1 month, which is called "Scattering the Ashes of War".
Two years passed for Embalmed to reach the line-up it had to from the beginning.
Keeping the same brutal voice of Kostas, Embalmed joined forces with Makis
behind the drum-kit,John L. on lead guitar and John H. on bass.
2.YOU DESCRIBE "SHATTERING THE ASHES OF WAR" AS
A DEMO, HOWEVER IT HAS THE DURATION OF A FULL-LENGTH ALBUM. WHEN
HAVE YOU RELEASED IT AND HOW LONG DID IT TAKE YOU TO COMPOSE ALL THE SONGS
INCLUDED HERE? IS THERE ANYTHING THAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO CHANGE?
We describe it as a demo because of its form.
It has an awful artwork,sample of our inexperience and many production
mistakes although it sounds good as an underground stuff. It was released
in the second half of 2002 and the songs we composed in two weeks time,
but the ideas were dwelling in my mind for 4 years. Of course we are proud
of it, taking into consideration that we are from a small island of Greece,
that we haven't got money and experience but i believe that the most important
is that we lacked of contacts,who would promote our job through the underground
"inner circle". A musician always wants to change things otherwise every
artist would write only one album and that's it. People change, world is
changing, music changes too...
3.ALMOST TWO YEARS HAVE PASSED OR EVEN MORE SINCE
YOU HAVE RELEASED YOUR FIRST DEMO. DO YOU HAVE ANY NEW SONGS READY? WILL
YOUR NEW DEMO ALSO HAVE THE DURATION OF A FULL - LENGTH ALBUM? WILL YOU
ADD ANY NEW ELEMENTS IN COMPARISON TO YOUR PREVIOUS ALBUM?
We have already made a relearsal CD with the
half of the material and we keep writing stuff till we believe we have
something to say out there.I don't know the duration of the second CD but
it is going to be a concept idea,it will be a full length effort and definitely
it won't be a demo. New musicians means new elements in the sound of a
band,and this does not mean that Embalmed will change as a whole. It is
many steps futher from whatever we have done in the past, that's for sure.
4.YOU DESCRIBE YOUR MUSIC AS DEATH METAL. HOWEVER
I NOTICED MANY EPIC ELEMENTS ESPECIALLY IN YOUR MID-TEMPO/DOOMY MOMENTS.
DON'T YOU AGREE THAT THE DESCRIPTION OF EPIC DEATH/BLACK METAL SUITS BETTER
TO YOUR SOUND?
Death metal has been married with a lot of
sounds into the last years, but always remains extreme and brutal. We are
a death metal band but we use some other influences as well to express
different emotions. The base of our music is always death metal and that's
it. It is not necessary to try to put more labels on it.
5.WHICH BANDS HAVE INFLUENCED YOUR SOUND? WHAT
DO YOU THINK OF DOOMSWORD, BECAUSE I BELIEVE THAT IS A BAND THAT YOU HAVE
SOME COMMON ELEMENTS WITH.
When we started we loved bands like Hypocrisy,
Bolt Thrower, Amon Amarth, Unleashed, God Dethroned, Dissection and Behemoth.
I believe that our influences come mainly from these bands but we don't
have to keep trying looking like them or sound like them. We are different
people and have other things to say. It is the sound that we built according
to the bands we loved from our early age. As times passes by we slowly
find our personality and hopefully our originality. About Doomsword,what
to say...i have never listened to them.I just know the name..
6.YOU COME FROM A GREEK ISLAND, CHIOS. HOW DIFFICULT
IS IT FOR A METAL BAND TO "SURVIVE" OVER THERE? WHICH ARE THE DIFFICULTIES
THAT YOU HAVE TO SURPASS? DOES CHIOS HAVE A STUDIO WHERE YOU RECORD YOUR
MUSIC OR DO YOU HAVE TO COME TO SOME BIG CITIES OF GREECE?
The difficulties are many. Not just as a band
but also as people who live here. It is a situation you have to deal with
and any difficulty can be overcomed if the band members work together as
a whole. Surely there are matters which make us to travel to big cities
of Greece,specially when it comes to our gear or recording. I think only
rehearsal and promotion can be carried out from here.
7.THE MAIN THEME OF YOUR LYRICS, IF I AM NOT MISTAKEN,
DEALS WITH WAR. HOW DO YOU APPROACH THE WAR AS A METAPHORE OR ARE YOU WARLIKE
PERSONS?
No we are not warlike persons. War is very
different from a live show of Marduk, from a video game and from a CNN
report. We live right on the borders of Greece near Turkey and we know
the dangers of a war crisis in the Aegean.We just can't talk about love
and flowers. We play death metal. And of course we don't believe in goats
and don't like guts and gore. Not as musicians.War is something we live
with every hour of the day. It hasn't to do only with cannons and napalms.
War has many forms. War within your mind I believe is the worst. And we
are fascinated with every form of conflict in our life. Every form of conflict
can work as an inspiration to us. Simple human nature!
8.IN TWO SONGS INCLUDED IN YOU DEMO I'VE LISTENED
TO SAMPLES TAKEN FROM THE FIRST CONAN MOVIE. SO WHAT EXACTLY DOES CONAN
SYMBOLISE TO YOU? WHICH IS YOUR FAVORITE CONAN ADVENTURE THAT ROBER E.
HOWARD HAS WRITTEN? WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE A NEW EPISODE OF CONAN ON THE
SCREEN?
In simple words: uncompromise, pride, honour,
passion and purity. Conan has been an exciting character to me just because
he is himself. And just because he defies every known form of oppression.
Both god and man. It has been a long since I watched the movies or read
one of his stories but if I had time I would like to watch again on of
the two movies or even a sequel but with the same actors...
9.THE COVER OF YOU ALBUM SHOWS VIKING ATTACKING
A VILLAGE. HOW IS THIS COVER CONNECTED WITH YOUR MUSIC AND LYRICS? WHO
IS THE ARTIST THAT DID THE COVER?
The idea was to find a picture of warriors
raiding and pillaging, first to emphasize the word "war" of our demo and
also to express our sound. But the picture was found randomly and I don't
even know the artist. As I have already told, the artwork was something
we didn't cope with a lot. It is something that we'll look into with more
professionalism in the future.
10.DO YOU HAVE ANY PLANS FOR LIVE SHOWS? HAVE
YOU PLAYED ANY LIVE SHOWS BEFORE? WHICH LIVE SHOW OF YOURS DO YOU REMEMBER
THE MOST AND WHY? HAVE YOU EVER PLAYED LIVE IN CHIOS?
We have already made some plans for this year
but none knows what will happen taking into consideration our jobs. The
fact is that we haven't played yet a real show, just a gig to gain experience
in dealing with equipment and trying to keep the original Embalmed sound
on stage. It was in Chios and it did really well for a death metal band.
It is very difficult, you know, to travel carrying all that gear for long
distances, paying lots of money and get nothing even to pay the tickets,
leaving your job for a long time. But we will work something out this summer.
11.WHAT KIND OF EMOTIONS AND THOUGHTS DO YOU WANT
TO CREATE TO YOUR LISTENERS WITH YOUR MUSIC?
Passion for life. Transforming all the negative
emotions into pure energy, is something that the youth has forgotten and
search in wrong directions to find themselves. We want to "dope" people
with our music if it is possible,to awaken them to fight for the right
to be themseves.
12.HOW DID THE PRESS RECEIVE YOUR FIRST EFFORT?
WHICH REVIEW THAT YOU READ PISSED YOU OFF AND WHY? DID YOU HAVE ANY PROPOSALS
FROM LABELS?
All the feedback we received from the press
was amazing and it was beyond any expectation. You see,we did the demo
for ourselves. We didn't believe that the people would like our stuff so
much. There are so many bands out there. Which one to listen to first?
I didn't want to send it to any label cause I believe we must mature first
and find our personality as a band. Then we must take care of anything
with responsibility, from rehearsing to promotion. And that means a lot
of time and money. This is the time and we are finally ready to make the
big step. Just wait and see...
13.IN YOUR OPINION WHO CAN UNDERSTAND THE WORLD
BETTER A PHILOSOPHER OR AN ARTIST AND WHY?
I think that an artist can understand the
world better. It is simple...the philosopher tries to understand and keeps
struggling his mind in vein. A musician in a way ignores the world and
tries to colorize his surroundings with music, like building another emotional
world which is of course more human than everything we know. That is why
we can't live without music...we don't feel there is a world. That
is my opinion.
14.WHICH ELEMENTS IN YOUR MUSIC DO YOU THINK YOU
HAVE TO IMPROVE AND WHY?
There aren't elements which need improvement
if we talk about the musical style. You like our music or you don't. Of
course we must improve our musical skills more, to explore and express
ourselves more. There are also other stuff too, like more expensive gear,good
producer and sound engineer if we want to make our music well known. Playing
more fast or more brutal is a matter of expression not necessarily of improvement,
although we play faster now and far more brutal.
15.THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR THE INTERVIEW. LEAVE
A MESSAGE TO THE READERS OF BEHIND THE VEIL WEBZINE AND SAY WHATEVER ELSE
YOU WANT...
Embalmed would like to thank you Niko and
every single person who supported the band either by purchasing our demo
or just telling a good word about us. We will try to blow up everything
with our second attempt and fullfill the expectations of all those who
believed in us from the start.The world is ours to define!!!
Panos"ARCHON"
Nick "William_Kidd"
Parastatidis
|