Spiral
Madness
Spiral Madness is a band
who is at the moment facing a big turn in their career... Their main composer
has left the band and now the rest of the guys try to continue and evolve
their musical identity and take it further on to the future. It's not an
easy task, but I strongly believe that if they have the will, they can
do it! This interview reflects on the band's past, present and future situation
and on the release of “Berserk Crowning”, which is something like the band's
best of moments till now. Let's see what Wielebny (Reverend), the band's
drummer told us.
1.PLEASE, POINT OUT THE MOST IMPORTANT MOMENTS
OF THE BAND’S HISTORY AND INTRODUCE YOURSELVES TO THE READERS.
Hi, we’re Spiral Madness, we’re from Poland.
We started in 1999, although you can find information that we have formed
in 1996. Well, there aren’t many important moments in our history, we believe
that things which are worth mentioning, will happen in future. We do our
thing: play concerts, we have recorded our promo cd some time ago and still
try to catch somebody’s attention.
2.IF I ASKED YOU TO PRESENT THE ALBUM YOURSELVES
TO THE READERS, WHAT WOULD YOU TELL THEM?
Well, it’s the compilation of songs composed
in 1999-2002 period recorded with new arrangements as new members joined
the band. The record is the best sounding one from all of the demos we
recorded before, however it lacks of many things, because we didn’t record
it in a professional studio. It was supposed to be old-school death metal,
but we spent a little bit and now many find it more thrash rather than
death. But that’s fine with us. We just do our thing.
3.THINKING OF YOUR WHOLE COURSE TILL NOW, IS THERE
ANYTHING YOU’D LIKE TO HAVE DONE IN A DIFFERENT WAY OR ARE YOU FULLY SATISFIED?
WHY DID THE BAND’S MAIN COMPOSER LEAVE?
There’s always something you want to change,
but you have to know when to stop. Nothing is perfect. We try to do everything
as well as we are able to, but shit happens. We do everything on our own,
nobody helps us, so it’s kinda hard and we surely made many mistakes in
the past. Many things should be done differently, it’s no use to name them
now. Speaking of a main man, he left because of private reasons. Even we
actually don’t know why. That’s his choice and we have to accept that.
4.WHICH ELEMENTS DO YOU THINK LACK FROM YOUR MUSIC
AND WHICH DO YOU THINK YOU SHOULDN’T USE AGAIN IN THE FUTURE?
There are many gaps, many flaws here. I believe
the most disturbing thing would be boredom. As we are evolving with time,
we try to enrich our music and especially give up playing the same tempos.
Also, we will stop recording so long albums, as many people consider them
to be much too long;-)
5.YOUR ALBUM’S TITLE IS “THE BERSERK CROWNING”.
WHY DID YOU NAME IT THIS WAY? WHAT DO YOU WANT TO SUGGEST?
Berserk crowing is the last perfect moment
of creation, when something is brought to life. And then it is being devastated,
to fulfil the process of creation. The unbreakable circle of life and death.
When a lifeform becomes ideal – it dies, and becomes sacred. That doesn’t
mean our music became perfect, though.
6.WHERE ARE YOUR LYRICS REFERRING TO? WHAT KIND
OF TOPICS ATTRACT AND INTRIGUE YOU TO TALK ABOUT? HOW IMPORTANT ARE LYRICS
FOR YOU?
We write about things which interest us as
human beings, most of them are simply emotions: fear, loss, loneliness
etc. There’s no ideology behind our music. Lyrics are additional, it’s
nothing special.
7.WHICH MUSICIANS MADE YOU REALIZE THAT YOU WANTED
TO INVOLVE WITH THIS KIND OF MUSIC? WHICH THINGS ATTRACT YOU IN DEATH/THRASH
METAL? WHAT’S THIS GENRE FOR YOU?
It’s hard to say, you know. The list would
be long and certainly including musicians from outside this genre. They
influence us rather as musicians than as a band as a whole. Each of us
do what he is supposed to, so it just meets somewhere. This genre is quite
attractive for us as it is aggressive, heavy, kicking here and there. This
is just about how we feel and how we consider music.
8.WHICH ARE YOUR PLANS FOR THE FUTURE? DO YOU
HAVE ANY NEW SONGS READY? IF YES, GIVE US SOME INFO ABOUT THEM. WHERE DO
THEY DWELL MUSICALY?
Plans? Nothing special – we will walk our
walk and maybe something will happen. New songs are being composed – it’s
typical Spiral Madness, but – as I said before – we will work on improving
them with a little more complex structures and try to escape form boredom.
9.NOW, THAT THE BAND’S MAIN COMPOSER LEFT, WHAT’S
THE DEAL FOR SPIRAL MADNESS? WILL YOU CONTINUE THE SAME WAY OR WILL YOU
TRY CHANGING YOUR MUSICAL DIRECTION?
Every replacement generally has its effect
on music played, yet there will be no revolution here. We especially wouldn’t
like to spoil the atmosphere of previous material. We’ll see what the result
will be.
10.WHICH REVIEW THAT YOU READ DO YOU THINK DESCRIBES
YOUR MUSIC THE BEST WAY AND IS THE MOST FLATTERING AND WHICH IS THE WORST
AND HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH YOUR SOUND ACCORDING TO YOU? IS THERE A COMMON
STATEMENT YOU READ IN ALMOST ALL THE REVIEWS YOU RECEIVE?
There were many reviews from all over the
world and it’s quite hard to remember all of them. We actually don’t get
reviews which are describing our music as masterpiece, but the ones which
name us crap aren’t too common either.
Mostly, they state we are (either death or
thrash old-school) metal band;-), with fine guitars and drums, nothing
innovative, yet fun to listen too.
11.DO YOU HAVE ANY PLANS FOR LIVE SHOWS? CAN YOU
EXPLAIN A TYPICAL SPIRAL MADNESS LIVE SHOW?
Well, the four of us get out on stage and
play, moshing and having fun. No fireworks are needed to attract attention.
Disappointed? We have some shows to play here and there in Poland, as usual.
Wanna come?
12.IF YOUR MUSIC WERE AN EMOTION, WHAT WOULD IT
BE? IF IT WERE A PAINTING, WHAT WOULD IT SHOW?
Joy – that would be the first one that crosses
mind. Regardless of lyrics which tell about darker sides of life, our music
has some happy tunes which make you bang your head. Visualising our music
is a task for our listeners and we would rather like to hear what people
see while listening to this stuff.
13.IF YOU COULD BE AN IMPROTANT PERSONALITY FOR
A DAY, WHO WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE AND WHICH PERIOD OF HIS/HER LIFE WOULD
YOU LIKE TO HAVE A TASTE OF?
I have no idea! I feel quite comfortable in
this body and I believe there’s no point in such imaginations. I certainly
would like to change many things in my life, but switching places with
someone else? Come on!
14.BY THE WAY, HOW’S THE UNDERGROUND SCENE IN
POLAND? ARE THERE ANY INTERESTING NEWCOMERS YOU CAN POINT OUT FOR US?
Scene in Poland is ok, many death metal bands
like Sphere, Gortal, Bloodwtitten, Deception, Obscure, Wolfrider, Phantasmagoria
- thrash metal, few very good black metal bbands like Luna Ad Noctum, Deamonicium
– it’s just a sample but we’ve got some strong underground bands.
15.THANK YOU! HAVE I FORGOTTEN TO ASK YOU ANYTHING
AND YOU’D LIKE TO MENTION?
Thanks for not asking about Pope and vodka;-)
Wielebny (Reverend) - drummer
Christine Parastatidou
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