Oskar (MONACHUS) interviewed by Christian Montagna of SON OF FLIES webzine. Italian blog. ___________________________________________ 1. Hi, I want first to thank you for your time, for allowing me to interview you and for giving your italian fans a chance to read a little more about Monachus.... You´re welcome! We hope to play some shows in Italy next time we tour Europe. 2. Can you give us a quick history of Monachus? Monachus was born from the ashes of Icos. Icos came to an end in early 2009 after almost 10 years. ¾ of the band (Oskar, Erik and Martin) wanted to continue the journey and Monachus was formed with the addition of drummer David Flood. 2010 saw the first sign of life through our contribution on Falling Down Compilation vol 2. Our debut album, Out of the blue, was recorded and released early 2011. Shows and tours during the rest of 2011 lead to the departure of bass player Martin. The band was now a three-piece. Our latest album, Below, was released earlier this year. 3. Describe the new album "Below"... Explain the major differences between the last album and the past release "Out of the Blue".... I think we finally found the sounds, expressions and emotions that we´ve been searching for more than 10 years. The current line up seems to be the perfect envelope for what we want to present for the listener. Right away when we started to write for Below we realized that everything came out in a more direct and honest form. The distance between our ideas and the musical outlet felt much closer and less forced. And I think the final result pretty much speaks for it self in these terms… 4. "Below" seems to shift between pummeling sludge/doom and more psychedelic passages. Can you tell me more about your songs? We try to give the listener a piece of our self with every song. The musical outlet, and dynamics within each song, is our way to communicate and connect to the listener. We take on whatever sound or emotion needed to get our message, dreams and ideas across. We never think about “styles”, what you hear is a direct result of what we want to communicate. 5. This new album, was it a natural evolution? I think so. When we began to jam as a three-piece we all felt a deeper sense of relief and a stronger connection through the sounds we created. Things just fell into place in a very comfortable way. This said, I think we felt more challenged and inspired by each other than ever and we shared a common felling of wanting more than we had before. Doing what we do as a three-piece can be hard since there´s less voices to fill the soundfield but it also lends itself to give each one more space and freedom. I think this is what your hear on Below. Three poeple coming together, creating something massive. 6. How do you keep going with this mix of sound? We always try to evolve our sound. Be it different ways to approach our instruments (or new ones) or new forms of putting our different sounds and voices together. All of us are constantly seeking new ways to express what we feel and this band will always be an important outlet for that. 7. Why the name "Below" What is the meaning behind it? We had this idea when we wrote the album that we wanted to deal with the underlying meaning of things. Both musically and lyrically. Exploring the depths of what we felt and really just dig in to the core of what we do. What lies behind the words and what moves beneath the soundwaves… 8. About your lyrics: There are different themes? We never write our lyrics out of certain theme. We come up with different ideas for each song and then try to mold them into something that will work as a whole piece. On Below we tried to go beyond the obvious meanings with some of the lyrics. The outcome of this is really up to you as a listener. 9. You live in Gothenburg... This big town is a good influence for you? It sure is! There´s a lot of great bands and a few good places to play shows. We got the ocean on one side and the forest on the other, these contrasts inspire us. There are a lot of great bands that I guess most of you know of. I can´t list all of them but a few bands deserve to get mentioned since they inspire us and you might not have heard of them yet: Walk through fire, Bitter sick and die alones, We live in trenches. 10. Any words about the last mini tour with Light Bearer and Orhorho. It was a great experience for you? The 6-day tour we did with Light Bearer and Orhorho was amazing! We had great shows and meet a lot of nice people along the road. We also got to play some nice places that we haven´t visited for a while. The shows in Hamburg, Leipzig, Linz and Berlin was just mind blowing. We played the new album as a whole, as well as some older songs, and got the best response imaginable. Can´t wait to go on tour again! 11. What are your plans in the next months? We came to a decision on the short tour we did last month that we will focus on writing new material and hopefully have a new album ready within the near future. This new three-piece constellation is just so inspiring for us so we can´t wait to get new stuff written. 12. Thanks for the interview! Thank you for your interest and support of our band and what we do! ____________________________________ CONTACTS: https://facebook/pages/MONACHUS/245683167266 monachus.bandcamp/album/below
Posted on: Tue, 08 Oct 2013 13:50:51 +0000
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