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INDEX
INTERVIEWS
GUESTBOOK
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FRENCH DEATH METAL
1. Hello, are things cool and macerating in your area?
Hello, all is cool in there. We try to keep our heads free from infernal waters and pollution.
2. For those who wouldn't know your band, a few words of introduction could be useful to help them and plug their brain on the right circuits... So you can depose it there:
Purge is a
band that was created at the beginning of the years 2000, with the
simple goal to play Death metal, a kind of music that wasn't practiced
anymore in the other projects of the original members. After a few
weeks of cover songs and improvisations, a couple of compositions
saw the light of day. The thing was beginning to get seriously hot,
a demo was recorded in 2004… Then the usual line up problems came
in the way and the band's activity was very slowed down.
Since
2007, the line up has stabilized and started playing live. Motivated
and having an only old demo in hands (A recording that wasn't too
representative anymore), the recording of a new demo, or eventually
an album, was considered. The songs were ready but, you might notice,
it took a lot of time. Finally, the album is available on CD format
since end 2011 through Gospels of Death records.
3. Introduce your last recording entitled "Sordid Preludes to Purgatory", and tell us why it could please Death metal fans who like the style to be dark as an old cadaver smoked on wood fire and straight as a shovel in your head.
This album
is composed of eight tracks we can proudly qualify of old school
Death metal. After scientific analysis, it shows to contain less
than 1% of modern influences, the smell of cadaver is very developed.
All the more, the production voluntary tended to what was done in
the beginning 90s, the listener won't be crushed by a carefully
painted beautiful stiletto heel but by a very rusty shovel. Karl
Dallara (Como Muertos) who co-produced the album did a good work
at this level.
4. I felt a quite neat difference between the songs of this last CD, and the instrumental rehearsals you sent me a good one year and a half. It's straighter, much more blasting, and it sounds better, I think... Are these the same songs that were reworked, or you didn't change much and my feeling is mostly due to the production?
Our method of composition happens in a such a manner that our songs don’t evolve much through the years, it occurs to be frozen very fast. I don't precisely remember which songs you were sent, but necessarily the production helps a lot. It's obviously difficult to compare songs recorded in a rehearsal room with something more professional… And if there are no vocals in the rehearsal takes...
5. Tell us where the name of the band comes from... "Purge" is quite atypical for a Death metal band, I feel it has a more grind and alcoholic consonance... But then what do you want to purge? Madam's pussy?
This name was adopted only several months after the band's creation, we searched for a long time. We wanted something easy to remember, if possible something short, to the contrary of too long monikers (You can see if everywhere nowadays). One day someone proposed this word, and we all agreed. Very numerous interpretations are possible (Historical, religious, anatomical...), it's also what pleased us. You can choose what fits you the best.
6. PURGE was initially a parallel project of members from other French bands, is this the case in 2012? Could we see it as a full band, or rather as the manifestation of temporary vacations in other territories?
It was indeed
the case when the band was created. It's very hard not to be consanguineous
at this level: There exists a few musicians for a lot of bands.
On the long term, I think it doesn't prevent from being legitimous.
Speaking about Purge, it's a full time band since a few years, with
all the seriousness involved.
7. Your influences contain both fast, evil, obscure things to be closer to the polish genre or old Morbid angel for example, and others to be closer to original Death metal (Or even thrashier stuffs)... If you had to choose between both, which would be your favorite? Aren't you too torn between your teenage musical loves and what the harder adult life leads you to compose? (Hopefully you don't try to include ultra modern influences, and jazz, and hip hop, it would become a quite hard to deal with internal marasm, something like a more than schizophrenic integration of multiple personalities ahah)
Each band member has his own influences, but hopefully we are only two to compose music, it makes things much easier. The fact the band was created with a precise goal also helps quite a lot. It's hard to say what each prefers, first because it would be too long and then because some of us listen to really shameful stuffs. Hopefully we agree on what we are playing, and it's the most important. We have no will to evolve towards something specific, even if it occurred that one song was dropped because it sounded too much like a given band.
8. You have also released two demos before the CD: One the year 2000, and another one the year 2004. For those who wouldn't be familiar, could you describe the musical content and explain the differences with the PURGE of 2012?
We have only
released a demo in 2004, entitled "Symbols of Disgrace",
it's still available as a pro-tape from the band. It contains 4
tracks that sounded even more old school than the album, mainly
because of the demo-like production. The line up was different and
we were less good technically speaking. It was slower, but maybe
more focused on atmospheres to compensate, I don't really know what
more to say...
For your information, we still play these songs
and one of it was re-recorded for the album, it enables to compare
the quite obvious evolution.
9. Some peoples rave so much about Swedish metal, but finally there are very few current Swedish bands that I listen so much... So, in your opinion what are the advantages of French bands? What could be much better in France? (We could say that in there, we generally have an absence of starification (Or a ways less immediate access to "success"), that it's much harder for bands to be noticed, and so that they would in theory have a more underground state of mind (Even if I'm not really convinced with this last idea)... And on a musical point of view, what are our advantages? And to conclude, are you a Swedish metal fan, or is this just one style of music in the middle of various others you enjoy?
For a long
time, there has only been Massacra and Loudblast to get recognition
in other countries, it's few. Since a couple of years, the French
metal scene became very interesting with an enormous amount of great
band (Speaking about Death metal, I think about Bloody Sign, Ritualization,
Necros, Affliction Gate, …). I think we have a problem at the level
of promotion, and especially tours: French bands rarely play in
foreign countries and so they remain enclosed in a french-french
underground bubble that's not necessarily supported by medias, it
doesn't help too much to develop. But I have the feeling it's beginning
to change.
One should also say we have a very bad reputation
in foreign countries (Is it true or not, I'm not the one to judge),
France is not a rock'n roll country, it's a fact. When you think
about the mentality of many peoples who prefer to shit on each others
rather than to be constructive, it's also quite sickening.
When
you organize a gig with strictly French band, it would only attract
the friends and few die-hards, all the more in a small room with
quite average conditions. It's even more the case when your kind
of music isn't very popular. Hopefully there is passion.
Speaking
about Sweden, it's a big pool of very good bands, but when you dig
as you should there's also quite an amount of shit. Their advantage
lies in their culture: They have a real metal culture, they're very
professional and the bands invest enough of themselves to succeed.
I listen to a lot of Swedish bands, from various kinds of music,
and some of them really have (Or had) the class. But this doesn't
mean I worship this country or anything coming from there.
10. The members of Purge all play, or used to play in other bands... But unfortunately I see no electronic music project... Daddy Trey Azagtoth might not be very flattered, aren't you afraid to see him shed a little tear?
Personally
I'm not a fan of electronic music at all. This said, we compose
with the help of a drum machine, it might be the only link, I don't
see anything else.
Concerning the tears of Mister Azagtoth,
he made us shed some big tears of crazy laughter, his last album
is a real joke! Hopefully they compensate with their gigs.
11. Your last recording was recently released on a very black metal focused label, aren't you a little afraid to get unnoticed by Death-metallers as it occurred several times? (For bands released on Drakkar or Agonia for example).
Our label Gospels of death is on the contrary totally into Death metal, even if I agree, it's a subdivision of Necrocosm that's more focused on black metal. We will see how it occurs, but to be honest I'm not too worried.
12. What's
your opinion about:
-French Death metal:
As said before,
some very good bands including some with a real identity that might
grow bigger (Including Ritualization, we share the same drummer)
-Net labels.
Speaking
for myself, I'm not too much a fan. It's a very good vector to discover
bands, but I remain old school and I prefer physical releases.
-Musical
consanguinity.
Unfortunately it's hard to avoid it. Well,
it also remains a pleasure to meet a circle of known friends, it
avoids bad surprises.
-The tactile
tablets (The fanzine emulators in 2012?)
Hmmm... Some might
surely find it interesting, one more thing for wankers!
-Fretless
7 strings guitars.
Hmmm... Some might surely find it interesting,
one more thing for wankers!?
13. The kinds of music called "Death rock" and "Death industrial" are also meant to have things in common with death... Do you know it a bit and do you feel quite close to some bands evolving in these genres? After all a music with a dark, quite morbid feeling, could cross musical tastes, cross some mental barriers, even if it's less extreme and doesn't contain the same brutality...
I don't know these stickers that well but I find my share of darkness in many other genres than metal, sometimes even more. It's very hard to express a dark feeling with a fast and aggressive music.
14. What will PURGE do in the future? Unveil your astral projections and megalomaniac dreams.
We will work
as much as we can to promote our album a maximum, and if possible
to record something else soon (A split would be cool).
We have
a few songs in the bag, now it's opened, we will be fast.
Web
page: http://www.myspace.com/purgedeathmetal
