INNER
WISH
INNER WISH is a power
metal band from Greece that really surprised me with the quality of their
second album "Silent Faces". With a crystal clear production and high performance
from all of it's members is not very surprising how they managed to attract
the interest of LMP label. But the band lso has a long history in the scene
here that goes back in 1998 when they have released their first album.
So, if you have some spare time just check out this interview and I believe
that you will learn few things more about this band that I think that soon
will make the whole world talk about them...
1.HELLO! FIRST OF ALL I'D LIKE
YOU TO TELL ME HOW YOU
FEEL AFTER RELEASING ONE OF THE
BEST POWER METAL ALBUMS OF THE GREEK METAL SCENE. IS THERE ANYTHING YOU'D
LIKE TO CHANGE?
-
Hi..it’s an honour to talk with you…Before
I start the answers I want to thank for the interest in our work…. Look,after
all those years of hard work ,after many line-up changes and a lot of difficulties
that every band meets ,we finally managed to release an album that we are
really proud of..It is an album which contains 4 years efforts and it is
recorded with the best conditions that’s why it sounds so great in my opinion…I
believe that it has a variety of beautiful songs ,it is well performed,
it has a very good production so why should we change anything?I think
that SILENT FACES represent 100% what INNER WISH want to give to all of
you…..
2.SOMEWHERE I'VE READ THAT YOU ARE
DESCRIBED AS A WHITE POWER METAL BAND. DO YOU ACCEPT THIS DESCRIPTION OR
ARE INNERWISH MORE THAN THAT?
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We are a melodic heavy metal act with
power elements and positive philosofy in life..Our lyrics talk
about human problems and feelings…If a white power metal band is defined
by this term then yes we are a white band….But if you mean a band that
always contains songs that talk about christianic religion ,I can say you
that we don’t write on this purpose…There were some songs on our first
album WAITING FOR THE DAWN that talk about the relationship between god
and humans…And probably there will be some new songs with this subject
,but noone of us who writes the lyrics wants to pass special
religious messages to anyone ..The lyrics must be always interpreted with
the individual optical view…
3.ALMOST 7 YEARS HAVE PASSED AFTER
RELEASING YOUR> DEBUT ALBUM "WAITING FOR THE DAWN". WHY DID IT TAKE YOU
SO LONG? WHIHC ARE THE SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THESE
2 ALBUMS?
-
The first album was released in May
of 1998 by a small local company called NMC and in a small number of copies…After
the release there were many line-up changes,and only in the summer of 2002
we finally understood that the band was ready to enter the studio in order
to record a good album..So we entered the studio G in november 2002 with
sound engineer Nick Iosifidis(probably the best studio and sound engineer
in our homecountry) in order to make the album..The sessions ended in march
2003 and we sent all the audio files to R.D.Liapakis for mixing and mastering
in Prophecy Studios in Germany..When the cd was ready we sent our demos
to all the labels around the world..We had a lot of negative answers and
some offers ..The best was LMP’s offer so we signed a contract for 1+4
albums (each album on a optional base)and SILENT FACES was released in
Europe and Japan on 15th of march 2004..The USA date is 20th of july…The
differences between our 2 full length albums are the following:great production
on SILENT FACES, more power songs,more technical musical parts on the songs,
big label and worldwide distribution.The similarities are the songs themselves.I
think that if anyone knows WAITING FOR THE DAWN ,it is quite easy
to understand that SILENT FACES is an INNERWISH album…
4.ONE THING THAT SURPRISED ME IS THE
CRYSTAL CLEAR
PRODUCTION OF YOUR ALBUM. IT WAS
RECORDED HERE IN
GREECE! HOW LONG DID IT TAKE YOU?
WHAT KIND OF PERSON IS R.D. LIAPAKIS? DID HE CONTRIBUTE OR HELP YOU IN
ANY SONG?
-
As I told you the album was fully recorded
here in greece between november 2002 and march 2003..We are completely
responsible for the production of SILENT FACES although we listened many
times our sound engineer’s opinion about the songs ..R.d.Liapakis mixed
and mastered our songs in the best way and his advices will be trully
useful on our next album that will be recorded this time under his guidance..He
is a great guy that he wants to lift our scene to a big level and I think
that all the greek bands must think very seriously that he makes great
job in his studio and wants to help us in any way he can…He is greek ,he
is well known and respect worldwide either as a singer or as a producer,
so I think that we must trust him….
5.SO, DO WE HAVE HERE IN GREECE STUDIOS
THAT HAVE
NOTHING TO BE JEALOUS OF THOSE
ABROAD? IF YES, WHY ARE THERE SO MANY BANDS GOING ABROAD IN ORDER TO CREATE
A GOOD SOUND?
-
Here in our homecountry two are
the big problems for heavy metal music..The lack of many studios and the
absolute deficiency of metal producers..There are some studios with great
equipment but there are a few,and the major problem is that noone
knows how he can make a local metal band sounds comparable to the foreign
ones..We have many good sound engineers but they don’t have the experience
on this music style….
6.THREE MEMBERS FROM THE FIRST LINE
UP LEFT THE BAND, BECAUSE THEY WEREN'T HAPPY WITH THE BAND'S MUSICAL DIRECTION.
CAN YOU BE A BIT MORE SPECIFIC? HAVE YOU EVER THOUGHT OF QUITTING AFTER
THAT?
-
When WAITING FOR THE DAWN was released
Thimios and I had already started composing new songs..The majority of
them are in the current album..The old members wanted to follow a more
hard rock path and not a melodic power form and that’s why they left
the band..Since many others passed from the band but I can reassure you
that not for a minute Thimios and I thought about quitting..Our band and
our music are basic elements of our lives and we will play untill we will
not be happy with ourselves…
7."WAITING FOR THE DAWN" HAS A CULT
STATUS IN THE
UNDERGROUNF, BUT IT IS HARD TO
FIND. DO YOU HAVE ANY
PLANS FOR RE-RELEASING IT?
-
Due to some legal problems ,is difficult
at this time to tell you that it will be re-released 100%..If we manage
to pass all these problems over we will try to remix and release it because
it has such a weak production..Otherwise maybe we will re-record some of
the songs on our forthcoming albums…
8.A BIG SUCCESS FOR THE BAND IS THE
FACT THAT YOU
SIGNED A DEAL WITH A VERY KNOWN
LABEL, LIMB MUSIC. HOW DID YOU MANAGE TO DO THAT? DID THE LABEL GIVE YOU
MONEY FOR THE PRODUCTION OF THE ALBUM? ARE YOU STILL SATISFIED WITH THEM?
-
When we finished the recordings we
sent demos with the full album mixed and mastered ,to all the labels..LMP
showed their interest from the beginning and earned us because their offer
was the best..Of course they paid our production and untill now we are
very satisfied with all their movements in order to promote our album..As
you know Limb is a very well known and respected person in the musical
industry and I believe that if we follow his advices we will maybe have
the opportunity to walk the paths of success…
9.IF I AM NOT MISTAKEN YOUR FORMER
SINGER BECAME A MONK AND SINGS IN A BAND CONSISTED OF MONKS. IS THIS> INFO
CORRECT? DO YOU KEEP IN TOUCH OR DOES HE WANT TO FORGET THE PAST?
-
Your informations are correct. John
is very proud about his past….We have seen each other sometimes and always
we talk about music….
10.RECENTLY YOU'VE PLAYED WITH U.D.O..
HOW WAS IT? DID HE LISTEN TO YOUR MUSIC AND DID HE TELL YOU HIS
OPINION?
-
We had the honour to support U.D.O
for second time and we really enjoyed our performance….Udo is living history
of our music but he is such a great person that he watched all our soundcheck
…We couldn’t discuss with him because he had to return to the hotel but
he seemed very pleased with what he heard…..
11.I KNOW THE BAND FROM ITS DEBUT ALBUM
AND I REALLY
LIKE YOUR MUSIC A LOT! SO, DO YOU
HAVE ANY PLANS FOR
LIVE SHOWS IN GREECE AND IN THESSALONIKI
IN PARTICULAR? WILL YOU DO ANY LIVE SHOWS ABROAD?
-
We will play in Chania on 27 of june
and we are talking for 2 festivals in the summer in Mytilini and Volos..Nothing
else has been schedulled for the summer..From september we will play all
around greece and of course in Thessaloniki..Because our company is not
a booking company we will travel to germany in july in order to talk with
many promoters and arrange our first gigs abroad….
12.WHAT KIND OF FEEDBACK DID YOU RECEIVE
THIS FAR? DID THE METALLERS FROM ABROAD ACCEPT YOUR ALBUM?
-
Untill now the majority of reviews
and the sale numbers are outstanding,far from what we expected….Of course
I believe that our next album will be the one that will establish us or
not in the world metal community..So far we are very excited from what
we receive from all the fans and magazines….
13.YOUR VOCALIST BABIS HAS AN EXCELLENT
VOICE. WHERE
DID YOU FIND HIM? DID HE SING IN
ANOTHER BAND BEFORE?
HAS HE TAKEN ANY VOCAL LESSONS?
-
Babis has never sung anywhere before…Our
bass player knew him and when he came to listen to him, you can imagine
how we felt….He is a great singer and I think that in the following release
he will be much better because he came to the band when all the songs were
finished and nothing has been written on his voice..Now he participates
in the composing of the songs so he will sing his parts and that’s a big
plus for him and for us…He is still taking vocal lessons and in a year
he will finish his education in Ethniko Odio…
14.IF YOUR MUSIC WERE AN EMOTION, WHAT
WOULD IT BE? IF IT WERE A PAINTING, WHAT WOULD IT SHOW?
-
If it was a painting I can’t imagine
anything else except a positive picture (not a specific one) with many
colours….We try to express our feelings and emotions via music and I think
that each colour would represent every feeling that we have….. If it was
an emotion I believe that it would be a positive one…..
15.WHICH IS, ACCORDING TO YOU, THE
BEST AND WHICH THE WORST PART IN YOUR MUSIC? WHICH IS YOUR TRADEMARK?
-
INNERWISH’s trade mark are the melodies….Our
best part I think is each song’s vocal melody and the refrains and
our worst part is the fact that many metal fans don’t like us due
to all that melodic staff….Many tell us to be more aggressive….
16.THANK YOU! HAVE I FORGOTTEN TO ASK
YOU ANYTHING AND YOU'D LIKE TO MENTION?
-
I must thank you for supporting us
and wish all the best to you and your readers…..
Nikos "William_Kidd" Parastatidis
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