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Hails Aries! Thank you
for taking the time to fill out this interview with me. Please introduce
yourself to the readers?
I’m Aries, one of the original founders and the
frontman of Austrian Black Metallers Hellsaw.
When did you and the
other members of Hellsaw first meet? Was it long until you formed the band?
What is the "current" line-up? For the readers who have never heard the band
how would you describe Hellsaw's music?
It feels like we’ve all known each other an
eternity in one way or another. The band itself was actually formed in the
summer of 2002 by myself and our then-drummer Svart, so we’re coming up to
our tenth anniversary. The majority of the current line up has been together
for several years. Apart from myself on vocals, there’s Isiul and Malthus on
guitars, Desderoth on bass, and our new drummer, Neuroticon, joined us in
time to start recording “Trist”. Our music is essentially black metal, but
we bring to it our own interpretation and emotions ,
so it could never be mistaken for anything but Hellsaw.
The bands newest cd "Trist"
was recently released through Napalm Records. How long did it take you all
to write and record the songs for this release? Does the whole band take
part in writing process or does 1-2 members handle everything?
I couldn’t actually say exactly how long it took,
because we don’t sit down and write an album in one go. I am the main
writer, but all the members take an active part, whether it’s writing a
track, or a riff, or interpreting what someone else has written. Our tracks
are quite varied because we write when we are inspired to write, so what we
are feeling when we write one track will be totally different to what we are
feeling when we write another, and this will be reflected in the piece. It
would be impossible for us to write just for the sake of writing - there has
to be emotion behind what we do. Obviously when we enter the studio we are
on a schedule, but the songs have been written by then. This time we
recorded the whole album “live”. It’s a much harder way of doing things
because you can’t make mistakes, but the end result is worth the effort.
Trist is the band's
fourth release, how do you feel the bands music has changed if at all?
Of course the music has changed. It would be a sad
state of affairs if it hadn’t after all these years. We’ve all grown as
individuals and musicians, and we have always brought our life experiences
and all that we have learned musically to each album. We have continued to
grow and develop Hellsaw’s sound and we will continue to do so. We are not a
band that is happy to sit back and release the same album again and again.
Does the band have any
upcoming shows, tours in support of Trist? If yes where are some countries
or places you will be playing?
We’ve just done a tour of Russia, and we will be
playing several festivals in Europe over the summer, then in the Autumn we
will be embarking on a tour which will take us to countries like Germany,
Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Netherlands.
who are some bands you
have toured with in the past? if you could set-up a "dream" show/tour who
are some bands you would love to tour with?
We’ve toured with lots of bands over the past ten
years, and we are often asked who we would like to tour with and what our
dream show would be, but to be honest, the important thing for us is not who
we tour with, but how good a show we ourselves give. Our whole focus is on
giving the best of ourselves to our audience, and we don’t let anything
distract us from that.
Everyone has their
own opinions, ideas on what black metal means, so I was wondering what does
"black metal" mean to you?
I’m not really into all this over-analysis of what
Black Metal is and isn’t. It’s the music that inspired me to become a
musician in the first place. It touches something inside me and it allows me
to give voice to my feelings, to express how I see the world and how I
interpret events, all of which are affected by the negativity within me.
The band comes out
of the Austrian metal underground. What is your opinion of Austria's metal
scene?
There are definitely some good bands coming out of
Austria at the moment, as there have always been. But I think it’s a mistake
to restrict bands to a particular scene. They are either good bands or bad
bands, regardless of which scene they originate from.
Coming back to the band
for a moment you handle the vocals for the band, when did you first start
singing? Do you do anything special to keep your throat/voice healthy?
I’ve been singing for over 10 years now, and I
don’t have a strict regime for my voice. I just need to make sure that I
practice fairly regularly so that I’m always stage-ready, and if we are due
to be on tour, then I’m careful not to strain my voice too much beforehand.
As I’m sure you realise, it’s a style of singing that puts a lot of strain
on your throat and vocal chords.
Well Aries we have
reached the end of the interview, do you have any final comments for the
readers?
Thanks for taking the time to interview us, and we
hope that we will have the opportunity to meet you and your readers on the
road sometime.
http://www.myspace.com/hellsawmusic
http://www.hellsaw.com/
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