Redemptor arose in my consciousness in the summer of 2014, when by some weird coincidence and YouTube I’ve heard the album teaser for "The Jugglernaut". I ingested their version of technical death metal with no chaser. After the purchase of said album it stayed in my player for a long ass time and not without reason, it also appeared on my Top Ten of 2014 at #1. The said ranking I take with a grain of salt, however, it’s with the full knowledge of consequences and without any brown nosing action that I’ll keep repeating that Redemptor is in the first league of the world’s technical death metal bands. This is supported not only by the band line up, but in this case, also by amazing music itself. "The Jugglernaut" is a gem, which for reasons unknown to me did not spill out all over the world yet.
During my visit in Krakow, I had quite a long chat with Daniel Kesler, guitarist and co-founder of Redemptor. I want to invite you to read it right now, and later, of course, I encourage you to listen to the album.

Arek

Let's start with an ordinary question about the history of the band. I know and understand that this is not too popular of a question, because you can reach the bands bio on the net, but bearing in mind human laziness and in order to facilitate the introduction of the band on the other side of the Atlantic - tell us about Redemptor.

The band was formed in 2001 in Łomża, in Podlasie. I was 17 years old back then. In 2 years we recorded two demos. The first one we recorded with a full line up, drums, bass, two guitars, vocals and keys. On the other one, our drummer was no longer with us, so the drums were programmed. Generally, Łomża is a small town in which there are not many musicians, certainly not metal ones, so we had to help ourselves by using a drum machine, and that is how we also played concerts (laughs)... for example in Warsaw we played as two: from a drum machine we had snare and bass, and the two of us did guitars and vocals. We played the same way on the Creation Of Chaos in Białystok. After the recording of the second demo we really wanted to record an album. We had such a plan to record in 2004 in Hertz Studio. We even started to book the time, but still have not found a drummer. Finally, in March 2005 we recorded an album ("None Pointless Balance") in Hertz Studio with all mixes and mastering.
In 2006 I moved the band to Krakow and here in Krakow, I started to assemble the line up. First I met Kuba Chmura, who played in Sceptic, Anal Stench and Headless. I suggested to Xaay (Michał Loranc), that he became a singer, Konrad Rossa, who was from Gorzow, played earlier in Dished, and as he moved here, we played together in Sothoth and Redemptor. Bassist (Andrzej Pichliński) was from another band that I also played in Privateer. And so we recorded a demo ("Nanosynthesis"), which was never put out. Later on, we experienced changes in the line up again. Guitar and bass have changed. We recorded a EP ("4th Density") with the new line up and there was a tour with Sceptic, Banisher and Sammath Naur.

After this tour I had to suspend the band. I had really mixed feelings about the future of Redemptor. After a few years of playing together we parted ways with Kuba Chmura. Each of us got a little tired of playing together. The chemistry, which we had while recording “4th Density”, was all gone. At that time I began mine, as it turned out, brief adventure with the band Disperse. I played in Sceptic since 2010, so generally I had things to do. The break lasted for a year. After what we have been able to achieve with the recording of "The Jugglernaut" I can confidently say that the break was needed. We recorded this album in April and finished in November of 2013. We haven’t published it until June of 2014. And so we got to the end of the story. At this point we’re making material for the next album.

Since you mentioned touring, for the time being, no tours have been played?

With the line up from "The Jugglernaut" there was no tour or any concerts for that matter.

Is there a possibility?

Interesting, very interesting, we'd like to, but Kerim joined SepticFlesh so...???

By the way, how did the knowing of this Austrian buddy come about?

We got to know Kerim when he came to Poland for the auditions for Decapitated. And so it happened that I have worked with Vogg from Decapitated in a music store. We were buddies. I traveled with them to concerts as an instrument tech and so inevitably I got to know Kerim much closer. He lived in Krakow back then, I met with him few times, and he lived close to the headquarters of my guitar school Guitarmanic.
When the final version of the album with programmed drums was ready, I and Xaay decided that we need to find someone who will pull through it. The first and only who came to mind was Kerim. He agreed to record and that’s how it came out.

So Kerim had a short episode of living in Krakow?

Yes, and then he moved to Warsaw.

Let’s talk Hertz Studio a little. First album was recorded over there so why this time, the decision was made to record in your - Guitarmanic Studio and the Sound Division in Warsaw with Arek Malczewski turning knobs?

Daniel – Those were different times back then. In 2005, for an hour of work in the studio you would pay like 35zł/h, today its 120zł. “None Pointless Balance” we recorded with them for 5600zł. At this time around, well, times have changed a little. 10 years have passed and after this period, prices have gone up so terribly that recording this material in the Hertz Studio would have cost us 4, maybe 5 times as much. At this time however all material can be done at home, so the experience that we have gathered playing over the years, has allowed us to record the album ourselves. Guitars were recorded at home on a variety of plug-ins, basically on some of the cheapest equipment available- Line 6 Pod GX. The guitars were recorded, registered by the tracks clean, what later was re-amplified by Paweł Grobler of Forgotten Souls, then that was turned around by amplifiers. Final recording of guitars cost us pennies, but it took quite a lot of my time and work, because I did it all myself, it was put together all by me.

So, basically you have done it all thanks to your own knowledge and skills.

Exactly, we used our knowledge, because it is hard to do this when someone doesn’t get it. if someone doesn’t know, but still doesn’t want to spend ton of money on the studio, he should learn it and it can be done. You can record well sounding material with a low budget; it's just that the whole force of it sits in mix and mastering, so you need to give it to someone who knows this well, so you shouldn’t try to save on that. On the recording you can do the same. Vocals and bass were recorded in the same way. Only drums were recorded in the studio and we chose Sound Division Studio in Warsaw. Kerim lived there already, so it was so much easier, there was no need to drive him anywhere anymore. He learned the material in a month. In the studio he worked with Heinrich (Filip Hałucha) from Vesania. The session lasted 4 days and so the album was closed up. Malta did mixes and mastering later.

Why did you choose Arek Malta and not Wiesławski Brothers?

It is just that Malta did the mixing and mastering on our previous material for the EP "4th Density", we knew him for several years, actually Xaay knew him. We liked the direction he is going as far as sound, that he wants to make it the most natural, not corrected. There was no editing of drums or guitars, we didn't use any tricks. This is simply natural recording. Moreover, everything that Kerim played on the album is natural, because it has not been corrected, or aligned to the grid, etc. This is the way we wanted this to happen.

So if I understood correctly, all material was done by you and Xaay, yes?

Here is how it happened, I started to do the numbers, that is, pieces or skeletons of them on the guitar. I was recording it, programming drums, then sending it to Xaay. He made sure that these pieces had the form of "songs". We can say that the music of this material is in 90% mine, lyrics and graphic design are his work.

You mentioned something about the new material. Are there any outlines, plans, how and when?

Well, OK, I could even play some for you. I do have some things outlined, hehe ... we would like to keep the style, you know. I'm sure guitars will be tuned a little lower. Some songs will be faster, but you will find some extra slow ones also. There will be more ambient, spacious fragments but also, it will be more extreme, although given in an accessible way. We would like to make a listener absorb our music as a whole, rather than a separate puzzle pieces that cannot connect with each other.

How will the new stuff sound?

Well, it will be just as it was. I wouldn't want to compare myself to other bands. I listen much less to technical metal type bands such as Necrophagist and Psycroptic recently. It will be more atmospheric, but nonetheless still technical.

I know musically you have been around quite extensively, is Redmemptor, your most important band right now?

Yes, this is my most important band. This is the only band in which I play at the moment. Previously I participated in 3 bands at the same time Sothoth, Redemptor and Privateer, later Sothoth, Redemptor only, and then came Sceptic. Sothoth ended and then was Redemptor and Sceptic, and now it’s just Redemptor. One, I no longer have enough time for a greater number of bands, time to sacrifice myself and play more, and two, I just like to focus on one project only.

A band is one thing and guitar school-Guitarmanic, is your second musical pursuit, yes?

This is my main and most important job, because this is my work. Initially, it was a passion and a little bit of a part-time monetary project for a few hours per week. Now it’s regular work. It’s running your own business, taking care of everything so it moves forward and grows. So every now and then I wonder what clinic to organize ... I organize workshops recursively. I did a guitar workshop: Jacek Królik , Piotr Żaczek, Tosin Abasi, Decapitated also played, Hoffman from Turbo. There was quite a bit of it, organization of such events consumes a lot of time. The work itself, despite the fact that it is a passion, steals my time to practice on the instrument. But I'm not complaining, because I'm the boss to myself.

How does your adventure with a guitar look, was it Ibanez from the beginning?

No, my first electric guitar was a BC Rich Warlock. Later, it was a Jackson Warrior, which is in the shape of Ibanez Xiphos, which I have here, but I encountered Ibanez later when I wanted to play 7-string guitar. I remember I got my first Ibanez from Pawel from The Sixpounder, it was a guitar such as the one here, the Ibanez Universe Steve Vai model UV777. Later, there was the second Ibanez, and eventually I merged officially with this brand.

Thanks for tea and a nice chat in Guitarmanic Modern Guitar School

I hope I presented Redemptor at least a little bit to the metal maniacs across the pond. See you at Redemptor shows.

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Yesterday, the new album "When the Gloom Becomes the Sound" by Tribulation was released. They started as a black metal band in the style of Watain, but in the course of time and with each album they have moved away from their roots and brought many other musical influences into their songs. The new album is again a consistent further development of their own style, whereby this time a stringency is to be recognized, which was somewhat missing at least on the last album "Down Below". Reason enough to ask a little more closely, for this Tribulations guitarist Adam Zaars took time and we conducted a conversation via Skype.

Michael

Hi Adam, first of all thank you for taking the time to do this interview! How are you doing?

I'm doing well, absolutely.

You had a lot of interviews already?

Yeah, a ton.

You have evolved on the new album after all. If the last album was quite uniform, this time you managed to combine quite rocky parts with calmer passages. Was that intentional or did the songs develop more spontaneously in the studio?

Not in the studio but we never talked about what we wanted it to sound like, it was both me and our previous guitar player Jonathan who wrote the songs and we didn't really talked about what we were going to do in advance so it was a very natural thing as it always has been. We never really planned anything.

I think that you have a wide range of musical influences. Clearly Iron Maiden, although I think their influence has diminished a bit compared to your last album, The Cure, Dissection, but I also sometimes feel reminded of Ghost and even Heroes del Silencio and also some classical composers from the riffs and the sound. Am I right?

Yeah, absolutely. We get inspiration from a lot of different things. Well, it could be anything, the style of music is varied, just trying to express some feeling that you get from another piece of art, whatever it is. A movie, a painting or architecture or some kind of printing, whatever. And musically it is like you said, absolutely Dissection and so on but it's also ever been since we first started that we are quite heavily influenced by movie soundtracks, particularly some German and Italian horror movies, like the band Goblin who made music to Dario Argentos movies like "Suspiria". We also draw a lot of inspiration from Swedish folk music, just the vibe of it as well as the melodies. Especially the melancholic sites of these. So, the inspiration comes from anywhere.

If I think back to your beginnings, which are in the black metal area - how deeply are you still rooted in this style and do you still have contact with BM bands?

Yes. I wouldn't say I was equally involved as I was then because then you would go to every show you could, but not only extreme metal but also metal shows in general and other shows as well. I mean since we've been playing and touring so much, going to shows on our own is something that's rarer these days. But of course, most of my friends are from the metal scene and particular from the black metal scene. We recorded a video a couple of weeks ago for the song 'Funeral Pyre' from the new album and we got help from a few of the guys in Watain. They built and lit the pyre that's in the video, so yes, we do have contact with other bands in this scene.

The first thing that stands out about "Where the Gloom Becomes Sound" is the cover. You used a bust instead of a painting this time. Who is it supposed to represent, and which artist did it come from?

It's supposed to be a Sybil (Greek meaning for prophetess; Michael), an oracle and the artist was active around the turn of the last century. It was a Belgian artist called Fernand Khnopff. I guess he did both – sculptures and paintings but all of this is more a kind of coincidence. It is not really the reason why we chose it. The fact that it is a Sybil fits quite well with the lyrical content actually but that's just synchronicity I guess. The reason why we chose it was that we didn't quite know what to have on the cover and we never really do when we're in the studio, we never really have a cover, we don't have a title, it all comes from the songs because we have to hear them and see what it awakes in us.

So, you mean first the sound and then the picture?

Yes, and that is what it represents for us. Our singer Johannes brought a poster that he recently purchased that he hung it up in the studio and we always try to make the studio as much Tribulation as possible. This was one of the things and when we were discussing the cover, all of us, or at least a few of us had been thinking maybe we can actually use this. That would be a new thing because Jonathan has always drawn the covers before. We wanted to try something new and we really felt that this image reflects the music well. So, it doesn't really have anything to do with lyrical content or a concept, I guess it's more superficial. My first idea was to find a statue and take a photo of it but we found out that it was probably destroyed in the war (WW2; Michael) so that was impossible but we had fortune in a way because the print that we have on the cover is a photo from the late 19th century. It fits well with our aesthetics.

I've read in the German Deaf Forever magazine that your studio had a window the first time…

(laughs) Yeah, times change, I guess. When we did the second album, we were in some kind of bunker and we only recorded in the evenings and during the night. So, this was a daytime recording with sun and windows and fresh air.

Your first video 'Leviathans' was released on the same day as Therion's "Leviathan". Pure coincidence or is there more behind it?

Yes, just pure coincidence. It was quite funny!

The song is about the powers of water, more on a metaphysical level or are you referring to the cleansing or even destructive power of nature?

The lyrics were written by Jonathan, but I would say that it is probably both. At least this was my idea for it. But it is also a coincidence – we had working titles for the songs named after the elements, both of us, Jonathan and me and that is why we took advantage of that I guess. 'Funeral Pyre' for instance is obviously a fire song and in that song it's definitely both, the metaphysical level and the material reality of the fire.

If you look at the song titles - 'Djinn', 'Leviathans', 'Innana', 'Lethe', these are all terms of the ancient times. Did you put a focus on ancient mysteries and gods lyrically on the album, or are they all just metaphors for things of today?

Well, it could be both. I mean 'Lethe' for instance is about forgetting and that title and concept crept into the one or the other songs like 'Daughter of the Djinn'. I guess it's some kind of using the language in a more poetic sense, writing about both – actually myths and also to some extent describing the reality we still live in.

Who in the band can play the piano so well? I think 'Lethe' is a beautifully composed piece. According to the ancient Greek word for forget - what do you want to forget? The actual situation we live in?

Jonathan is the one who is playing the piano and the one who wrote the song as well. I think it's about forgetting, but I'm talking about his song, so I'm not sure if he would agree. And again, it is related to 'Daughter of the Djinn', so it's also about a kind of escape I guess. And at the moment I think that's what most of us are doing on a daily basis with an increase of people who are listening to podcasts, reading literature, watching movies, watching Netflix I guess. So, it could be a comment for that, but it could be a comment on trying to get away from a lot of things, maybe also from the contemporary world.

I already mentioned the name Ghost earlier. In 'Daughter of the Djinn' you sing "Drink me, eat me...", a passage that Ghost already sang on their last album in "See The Light". In addition, Tom Dalgety, who was already responsible for Ghost, is responsible for the mix. Is that pure coincidence?

I didn't know about Ghost. I mean it's from "Alice in Wonderland". And Tom did the mixing and did a fantastic job. We met him on the tour we did with Ghost.

The title of your album "Where the Gloom Becomes Sound" you took from the song "Hades »Pluton«" by Sopor Aeternus & The Ensemble of Shadows, a German band. The song is about a love that ends tragically united in death. Apart from the fact that the song is quite different from your style – death is also a central element in your music. 'The Funeral Pyre' is also about a tragic love and the transition to the other world by burning the corpse. Is the song a tribute to Sopor Aeternus?

You could see the title as some kind of tribute. I listen to them for many years now and am inspired by them, but I also think that we share similar influences. But the title is more than just a tribute. It also caught my attention because it describes what we've been trying to do ever since the first album. In the sentence it is labeled as gloom, but it also could be darkness or some other word because it's quite vague. It's still that thing that we're trying to express in the music for such a long time now. So, it was more a term that is quite fitting, and we already thought about naming out previous album Where the Gloom Becomes Sound as well but for some reason Down Below was just a better title for that album. It fits better on this album, I think. But in general, that could be a label for our vision.

What is your belief - what comes after death?

Well, I don't know. I really don't know what to think. I do know that I don't think that we just vanish. I don't believe in that materialistic view of life. I think it would be a strange thing. It's been something that people have been believing for a very short amount of time in a very small part of the world whereas almost the rest of the world at least believes or experiences something else and that's been a truth for millennia. So, I know what I don't believe but what really happens then is really interesting to discuss but I don't have anything that I firmly believe in.

'The Wilderness' also reminds me of another band - maybe it's completely wrong, but from the choice of words I spontaneously thought of "Where The Wild Roses Grow" by Nick Cave. Is this the Tribulation version or am I absolutely wrong with that?

No, you're not wrong with that. It's a song written by Jonathan. I think that's where he got the inspiration for the verses, but he asked me to write the lyrics. In a way it was like a blueprint. The working title was 'The Wilderness' and usually we change the working titles into something else, but I felt that it was just the right title for the song, and it has also this story-telling vibe like in "Where The Wild Roses Grow". So, you're absolutely right, that was an inspiration for the song.

If you had to decide which 10 songs absolutely have to be played at your next concert, how many from "When the Gloom Becomes Sound" would be there and which songs from the previous albums?

Oh, wow…well, we always want to play a few of the new songs. It feels ridiculous to write music and not to play it. I understand bands that are playing the old songs because the fans want to hear these songs. I am often feeling the same, but I would probably choose from our new album 'In Remembrance', 'Leviathans', 'Hour of the Wolf', 'Daughter of the Djinn' and 'Funeral Pyre' I guess. And older songs, wow…I would like to play 'Subterranea' from Down Below because we only played it once I think and it's been a song that people have been requesting a lot and we just never did it. I would also choose 'Nightbound' from that album, maybe I would choose 'Rånda' from our second album and 'Strange Gateways Beckon' from our third album The Children of the Night and I would spontaneously choose 'Lacrimosa' from Down Below as well. That would be my setlist for today.

Let's get back to something completely different. You probably can't hear it anymore, but Corona unfortunately keeps the whole world in suspense. Sweden has taken its own path in the Corona policy and it was proved to be not that good. What do you think about it?

Honestly I think it's horrible. I'm amazed to see what's going on and I'm constantly amazed to see our politicians in the government talking about it. Not everything but a few of the things are mind-boggling to me. The resistance to recommend the use of wearing masks for instance. They just now did this on the 7th of January. They recommended the use of wearing masks when you use public transportation but only at certain hours of the day, but it doesn't work, so it shouldn't really matter. I mean there are a lot of things that have obviously gone wrong and they seem incapable of any self-criticism and they keep changing the story. It's ridiculous. They keep saying that they said something else in the spring. There are clips from Swedish television where they are saying these things, but they keep denying it, it's like living in a farce. It's very strange.

Are the stores and schools still open?

Yes, the stores are open, universities are closed and have switched to home-schooling and some schools are open. The older kids go to school on certain days, one half of the kids is at home, the other half goes to school and it seems that people get infected in the schools, too and this is also something that the government denied for a long time.
Unfortunately time is already up, so thanks a lot for the interview!

Thank you, too!

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