Leak
Leak is a newcoming powerful
force from my hometown Thessaloniki. I have seen them quite many times
playing live and I can guarantee you they kick ass!! I'm honored to say
here that this is Leak's first interview ever, so I'll have the right to
brag about it in the years to come when they become a worldwide well known
band! Here we have Vaggelis, the guitarist, casting light upon the past,
present and future of this group...
So make sure you check
them out byvisiting their site at: http://www.myspace.com/leakband
1. FIRST OF ALL I THINK IT’S IMPORTANT TO
INTRODUCE YOURSELVES TO OUR READERS AND TO GIVE US A BAND BIO IN A FEW
WORDS.
Hi! First of all let me introduce the line
up: I’m Vaggelis and I play the guitar, on the vocals we have Dimitris
Traskas, Tasos Matsounis is behind the drums and Christos Samaras is on
the bass guitar. The band was formed in 2003 and from then on we have released
a demo CD titled “L.S.D.” that consists of 3 tracks and our style mainly
belongs to the thrashcore genre.
2. YOU WERE FIRST NAMED IT AND THEN YOU’VE CHANGED
IT INTO LEAK, THAT’S CURRENTLY YOUR MONIKER. WHY? HOW DID YOU SELECT LEAK?
WHAT DOES IT STAND FOR?
Before we formed Leak, I used to be a member
of another band called It. We formed that band with another guy who was
a member of the band, he was our previous bassist. At some point we decided
to change name and for a period of time we continued playing live without
having a certain moniker. Finally I read somewhere the word Leak, which
means nothing in particular to us, I liked it, I proposed it to the rest
of the guys, they liked it too and it just happened to coincide with the
departure of our x-bassist.
3. YOU HAVE A DEMO CD TITLED “L.S.D.” PLEASE TELL
US A FEW THINGS ABOUT IT. IF YOU WERE ASKED TO WRITE A REVIEW FOR “L.S.D.”
WHAT WOULD YOU SAY TRYING TO BE AS OBJECTIVE AS POSSIBLE?
The demo that bears the title “L.S.D.” has
3 tracks and the same titled song is the third one on the CD. The other
two are “Face The Day” and “Living In A Hole”. As far as the song “L.S.D.”
is concerned it’s not our most representative song, but we liked the idea
of having a catchier song, something like a hit, you can say. We truly
love this song!
4. MENTIONING SOME OF YOUR MOST BELOVED BANDS
AND INFLUENCES IS INEVITABLE I THINK FOR THE READERS TO UNDERSTAND YOUR
MUSICAL DIRECTION…
I can only speak for myself here of course.
My influences come mainly from the Swedish scene and the American sound
and more particularly from bands like Metallica, Pantera, The Haunted and
Nightrage. It’s a combination, let’s say, of the Swedish melody with the
volume and the riffs of the American groups.
5. WHAT’S THE BEST AND WHAT’S THE WORST PART OF
YOUR MUSIC, ACCORDING TO YOU?
I really can’t tell what’s the best and what’s
the worst part of our music. What we’re trying to do is create accessible
songs, songs the fans can relate to, simple structures and themes that
can stick to your mind. As far as the worst parts are concerned…well I
think we don’t have any! (Laughter)
6. HAVE YOU GOT ANY NEW SONGS READY? HOW WILL
THEY SOUND? I HAVE TO ADMIT HERE THAT “LSD” IS MY FAVOURITE TRACK, BUT
ACTUALLY IT’S THE MOST DIVERSE OF ALL. ANY THOUGHTS ON HEADING TOWARDS
THAT DIRECTION AGAIN IN THE FUTURE?
There are some more songs we have composed,
but we just haven’t recorded them yet. They don’t move on a certain pattern
or style. There is variety in our material and as for “L.S.D.” now I want
to thank you – it’s what I said earlier. It’s a hit track, which I have
to admit didn’t absolutely please us in the beginning, but little by little
we adored it, cause I think it’s a really groovy composition, very accessible
and an easy-listening.
7. WHICH ARE THE TOPICS YOU DEAL WITH LYRICALLY?
WHICH ARE YOUR SOURCES OF INSPIRATION?
I’m not responsible for this field, so I’m
not the right person to talk about the lyrics. Dimitris is responsible
for them, he is the one writing the lyrics – so I think you should better
ask him!! Haha!
8. I LIKE THE COVER ARTWORK A LOT. SIMPLE, BLACK
AND WHITE AND YET IT HAS POWER AND DARKNESS POURING OUT… WHO CREATED IT?
A friend of ours created it. His name is Peter
and he is a designer and a graphic artist. He had created 3-4 cover artworks
for us and we chose this one, because I think it suits us and fully represents
us. And as you said it’s simple with black and white colours and it shows
a withered tree, trying to suggest the emotions and the direct feeling
you get from this demo work… simple and yet beautiful!
9. BY THE WAY, WHY ARE ALL YOUR PHOTOS AND THE
ARTWORK IN BLACK AND WHITE COLOURS ONLY? THE ONLY EXCEPTION IS JUST THE
BAND LOGO.
Well it just happened to be like that, since
we haven’t still made a professional photo shoot in a studio. All our photos
are from our live shows and I think they fit very well to our overall image.
As for the logo I think it should be coloured to make a contrast… so that
everybody can read and know the band’s name. The logo stands out, if we
see the cover as a whole entity, with the rest black and white colours
of the artwork.
10. ALTHOUGH YOU ARE A RELATIVELY NEW BAND, YOU’VE
DONE MANY LIVE SHOWS SO FAR. WHAT DID YOU LEARN FROM THIS EXPERIENCE? HAS
IT CHANGED YOUR WAY OF THINKING CONCERNING THE WAY YOU BUILD THE SONGS?
I MEAN DO YOU TRY TO WRITE LIVE SONGS?
We’ve done many live shows, which I think
have helped us a lot so far. Live shows are truly a big school. They’ve
helped us have a better stage appearance and gain more experience to face
problems that often appear in live shows, like for example not being able
to listen to the other instruments, having an overall bad sound, etc. Now
for the songs… No! We aren’t trying to write “live” songs, we compose what
comes out of us and we try to play it as best as we can in our live shows.
11. WHAT KIND OF FEEDBACK HAVE YOU RECEIVED SO
FAR? WHAT WAS THE MOST FLATTERING AND WHAT THE MOST UNFAIR COMMENT YOU
HEARD ABOUT YOUR MUSIC?
This is a weird and big issue I believe, because
when someone listens to your songs in a live show or on the CD, they always
say good things cause they want to look good and nice in front of you.
What I always do is listen to what my friends have to tell me, the people
who know about music and I want them to pinpoint the mistakes or generally
tell me what they think is good or bad. The truth however is that we’ve
had a lot of positive feedback both for our songs and our live shows!
12. WILL YOU SEND YOUR DEMO TO ANY LABELS OR DO
YOU THINK IT’S STILL TOO EARLY?
This demo was recorded for us, because we
wanted
to find out how our songs sound and what appeal they have on the people.
We aren’t thinking of sending this demo to any labels, but we’re thinking
of recording new material, give it a proper recording with a good production
and then we will send it to labels and see if we can get any proposals
from them to reach finally to a deal.
13. WHY DO YOU THINK GREEK METAL FANS DON’T SUPPORT
THE NATIVE SCENE AND ACCEPT A GREEK BAND ONLY IF IT BECOMES FAMOUS ABROAD?
ARE YOU “AFRAID” OF SUCH A POSSIBILITY?
I think we Greeks are a bit reluctant on this
topic. There are many worthy Greek bands out there, that deserve our support,
but we have this problem… I can’t understand which the reasons really are
and it’s exactly as you put it. Only if a Greek band becomes famous abroad
do we start to get interested in them, trying to listen to their stuff
and finding out if they truly deserve our dedication. Why this happens…
I can’t tell!
14. WHAT PROCEDURE DO YOU FOLLOW WHILST COMPOSING
SONGS? IS IT A ONE MAN WORK OR DO YOU ALL HAVE A SAY?
All the songs we have composed so far follow
the same working procedure. First comes the music, then orchestration and
finally lyrics. I don’t know if this is the correct way of writing a song,
but this is how we create…
15. IF YOU HAD A BIG BUDGET TO VISUALIZE ONE OF
YOUR SONGS, WHICH ONE WOULD YOU CHOOSE AND HOW DO YOU IMAGINE IT TO BE?
Well if we had to choose a song for a video
clip, personally I’d vote for “Face The Day”, since it’s the most representative
song of our sound and our best one. What would it contain? I think I would
leave this to the director to decide! Hahahaha! Let’s shoot a video clip
first and then we can talk about what it will show! (Laughter)
16. WHAT’S, ACCORDING TO YOU, THE MOST SUITABLE
TITLE THAT COULD SUM UP THE WHOLE LEAK ESSENCE AND MUSICAL IDENTITY?
I don’t know if it’s able to pull off Leak’s
essence and identity, but I’d go for: “Music till your ears start to bleed”!
Hahaha!
17. IF YOUR MUSIC WERE AN EMOTION, WHAT WOULD
IT BE? IF IT WERE A PAINTING, WHAT WOULD IT SHOW?
Emotion… I think it would be rage, anger,
sorrow, something like that. That’s what heavy metal stands for!
If it were a painting, I think it would be
the cover of our demo CD.
18. WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF THERE WAS NO MUSIC IN
THE WORLD? HOW AND WHERE WOULD YOU CHANNEL ALL YOUR CREATIVE ENERGY?
If there was no music in the world, we’d be
really fucked!!! (Laughter) Seriously now music is our life! I don’t know
what else could replace it… Perhaps I could become an athlete, but I doubt
it cause I’m too lazy to professionally buckle with it! (Laughter)
19. THANK YOU! IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE YOU’D LIKE
TO MENTION AND I FORGOT TO ASK YOU?
I’d like to thank you too very much for this
interview! It’s our first you know! What I have to say to those who have
read this interview is – especially the Greeks – check out the Greek bands.
We have a really strong and powerful scene and it needs our support! We
should also support the Greek musicians who are abroad and work really
hard in order to play the music they love! YEAH!!
Christine Parastatidou
Special Help: Dimitris Pantsiopoulos
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