- To be honest, we are not sure about the future of Raspatul. Seems like a very hard question to answer for a first question! When Ayim was in the hospital, no one had the time to think about what was going to happen to the band. We were more worried about Ayim�s condition. But slowly as reality sank into us, we realised that Raspatul without Ayim could just break the band. Raspatul was scheduled to record the new album two weeks after Ayim�s death. Believe it or not, the three of us started jamming a week after Ayim�s passing and it was extremely tough. We had jammed with Ayim on several occasions, but now it�s totally different because we know that Ayim is gone forever. So to answer your question, Raspatul will still continue with the recording of the new album, but what lies after the recording, we don�t know for sure.
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2) Will there be a release of the band�s long awaited album?
- As I have said in the first question, we will still continue with the new album. We might not get a replacement for Ayim because we found no good reason to find anyone to just sing for the band. Ayim has been singing with Raspatul since day one. The three of us will have to try and give it a go at singing the songs on the new album, but we know for sure that it�s impossible to fill Ayim�s shoes.
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3) When u guys started out playing covers (Green Day & Nirvana) back in �96, were u guys subconsciously beginning to master your instruments?
- Well, I wasn�t with the band in �96 so I might not be able to answer this question fully. But from what I know, the guys were slowly improving on their instruments after they started writing originals and found the direction that they want to take for the band. I remembered them telling me about their �Black Metal� days though! They would dress up as Black Metal guys; you know, the usual black-coloured Metal t-shirts and black jeans. I am sure every Metalhead had gone through this phase!
4) Besides Metal, what are the bands/artistes do you guys listen to? (ahem.. and besides Green Day & Nirvana too)
- I am not too sure what the rest of the guys listen to these days, but I guess all the 3 of us have our own personal taste for music. I know they kind of like some stuff that are played on the radio though. For me, it�s strictly Metal music, but I really like what the pop bands from the 80�s were doing. Stuff like Tears For Fears, Level 42, Chicago, Air Supply, Wham!, Michael Jackson, etc just to name a few.
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5) I�m curious. What does Raspatul actually meant?
- The name Raspatul was actually given by a local recording engineer Leonard Soosay a long time ago when Raspatul used to jam regularly at MYX studio. The reason why Leonard gave us the name was because he thought we sounded like a mix of Pantera and Sepultura.
6) Razorback Records is proud to be sending out copies of Raspatul's 2004 promotional CD, 'The Perfect Realm Of Jharkyannarkh' to a LIMITED number of magazines, webzines and labels, are they going to be your label?
- Billy and Jill from Razorback Records were extremely cool to help Raspatul out in such a big way! Well, we certainly are not on the Razorback records roster now. Razorback Records has a lot of killer gore-grind bands including our country�s very own WTN. This label is very unique as they sign bands that have very strong themes, concepts and visual imagery. How Raspatul came about getting help from Razorback Records was pretty much an accident. I was talking to Jill one day and she was interested to hear how Raspatul sounds like and so I sent her an MP3 of our new song off the promo CD and she went berserk after hearing our stuff! She quickly asked if Razorback Records could distribute our CDs but unfortunately our promo CDs are on crappy CD-R format. She still insisted on doing something about it and she decided that she could buy our promo CDs and help us send them to zines for reviews. She also gave it away to some of their regular customers. It was definitely an honour for Raspatul to be getting such excellent support from a reputable label like Razorback Records!
7) How do you feel the impact of Mp3 on Metal & music in general?
MP3�s definitely have a fair share of pros and cons. Finding out how a band sounds like is so easy these days. I got a great advantage using MP3�s as I can now send our music over to anyone from all over the world via email or MSN Messenger. But it did hurt the overall music industry as well in every possible way. I don�t know if you have noticed but these days I don�t get as much anticipation and excitement when a band releases a new album. That is because I could easily check out a MP3 sample online or even download the whole album before the album is released officially. From the way I see it, the impact of MP3 affects the overall music industry and not just Metal alone.