Fiendish
Gloom
Fiendish Gloom is a band
that has over a decade of experience on their backs and yet it wasn't until
a couple of years ago that they've started taking some serious and more
focused steps on the discography. Musically they "serve" and support the
classic death metal sound as Niko, their guitarist, informed us, and I
think the interview that follows will give you the chance to find out more
things about them!
1. HELLO THERE! NOW SINCE THIS IS OUR FIRST
INTERVIEW I’D LIKE YOU TO TELL ME A FEW THINGS ABOUT FIENDISH GLOOM. GIVE
US A SHORT BAND BIO AND INTRODUCE THE CURRENT LINE UP TO THE READERS…
We started the band in summer 1993, that was
the time we started making music. No one of us did know how to play an
instrument but we were bandmembers now. The first songs sounded more punk
than metal. Our first small, local gig was in June 1994. We wrote more
material which sounded better and more into metal, we did more gigs and
had several lineup-changes. In 1995 we recorded “Madman” as part of the
“Eifelsampler III”, a local sampler. From 1997 to 2001 we took a break,
because Markus Beitz, our ´97 singer left the band to study and no
worthy replacement was found. In 2001 we started with a new singer and
a new bassplayer. We wrote new songs and recorded our first 10 track demo
in 2003. We did a lot of gigs and had few more line-up-changes until our
current lineup which is:
Marcel Kitz – vocals, Niko Schmitz – guitar,
Mirko Jahns – guitar, Michael Rust – bass and Erich Manstein – drums.
2. WHICH ARE YOUR MOST IMPORTANT ACHIEVEMENTS
TILL NOW? HAVE YOU GOT DREAMS YOU WANT TO REALIZE THROUGH YOUR MUSIC? IF
YES, PLEASE MENTION SOME OF THEM…
We don’t have many achievements till now.
It´s cool that we recorded our first demo-CD and I´m happy
about the gigs we did together with great German underground bands like
Guerrilla, World Downfall, Torment of Souls or By Brute Force to list a
few. I hope that there will come some bigger gigs in the future. A dream
would be having a gig each night, having big tours, travel all around the
world and to be able to live the life of a musician and stop the boring
job I have to do right now.
3. SINCE I HAVEN’T LISTENED TO YOUR MUSIC, WOULD
YOU BE KIND ENOUGH TO DESCRIBE IT FOR US? WHICH WORDS DO YOU THINK ARE
IDEAL TO PRESENT YOUR SOUND IN PUBLIC?
I think we sound very oldschool death metal
like. Distorted guitars, double bass and Marcel´s deep growling-voice.
We try not to repeat ourselves and the next album will sound different
than the first one but it will stay death metal.
4. IF YOU WERE ASKED TO WRITE A REVIEW OF YOUR
NEW ALBUM, WHAT WOULD YOU SAY TRYING TO BE AS OBJECTIVE AS POSSIBLE? IN
OTHER WORDS, WHY SHOULD THE METALLERS CHECK YOU OUT? WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO
OFFER TO THEM?
Our new album isn´t finished yet. We
even did not start to record it because a few song lyrics are missing.
The new album will contain 9 songs of pure death metal. All songs will
be different from each other. The metallers should check us out because
they like to headbang and listen to good music and with our new album they
will be able to combine both.
5. PLEASE FILL US IN ON YOUR RELEASES AND POINT
OUT THE MOST IMPORTANT SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES AMONG THEM. ARE YOU
CONTENT WITH YOUR EFFORTS UP TO NOW?
In the end of 2003 we released our first and
only album yet. It´s a ten-track-self-produced death metal album
called Fiendish Gloom. We will start recording our second album as soon
as possible. The nine new songs of the second album will be different than
the old songs. They will sound better because we all improved our skills
on our instruments. The songs will be more complex and demanding but they´ll
stay similar to the old ones in beeing deathmetal.
6. WHAT’S THE BEST AND WHAT’S THE WORST PART IN
YOUR MUSIC, ACCORDING TO YOU? ARE THERE ANY THINGS YOU’D LIKE TO IMPROVE
IN THE FUTURE?
I´m very happy with our music but it´s
always possible to improve everything. Especially I´d like to improve
the motivation of the other band members. Haut mal rein Leute! ;)
7. TELL US A FEW THINGS ABOUT YOUR LYRICS. WHICH
ARE THE THEMES THAT YOU MAINLY DEAL WITH?
Uh, Marcel is our lyric-commander. No one
really knows what he´s singing about. It´s his big secret.
But I think he tries to process his past job as a transvestite in a Cologne
gayclub. :)
8. HAVE YOU GOT ANY PLANS FOR LIVE SHOWS? HAVE
YOU EVER PLAYED LIVE OR IS IT DIFFICULT OVER THERE?
As I said somewhere before I´d like
to play live everyday, but it´s not that easy for a small band like
us to get that many concerts. I´m happy about every small gig we
can play. I hope that there will be more gigs after we released our second
album.
9. IF YOUR MUSIC WERE AN EMOTION, WHAT WOULD IT
BE? IF IT WERE A PAINTING, WHAT WOULD IT SHOW?
The emotion would be fear, horror and fun
(… is horror an emotion??), and the painting would be some kind of a Giger
painting (I love his art and ALIENS the movie!).
10. ARE YOU SATISFIED BY THE FEEDBACK YOU’VE GOT
THIS FAR? WHAT WAS THE MOST FLATTERING AND WHAT THE WORST COMMENT YOU RECEIVED?
Most of the feedback was positive. But there
was not much feedback yet because not many people know us. The worst comment?
I´m good in repressing I think. ;)
11. LET’S SUPPOSE THAT YOU HAD THE CHANCE TO INVITE
FAMOUS MUSICIANS TO PARTICIPATE IN YOUR LIVE SHOWS. WHO WOULD YOU CHOOSE
AND WHY?
I just wanted to invite Dieter Bohlen (Ex-Modern
Talking), because he is the real godfather of the guitar.
12. WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF THERE WAS NO MUSIC IN
THE WORLD? HOW WOULD YOU CHANNEL ALL YOUR CREATIVE ENERGY?
I can´t imagine a life without music.
I would use my creative energy to build a spaceship and fly to planet metal.
13. THANK YOU! IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE YOU’D LIKE
TO MENTION AND I FORGOT TO ASK YOU? LEAVE A MESSAGE TO THE READERS…
Hey, it was fun to answer your questions.
Maybe you forgot to ask me about how I am able to make music with such
a shizo like Marcel, but that´s okay and I don´t want to mention
it. Thank you for doing this interview with me. Hope you hear a lot of
us in the future. Take care and support metal!!!!
Niko
http://www.fiendish-gloom.de
Christine Parastatidou
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