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Oct 06, 2006 04:28 am
Edited : Apr 15, 2008 01:19 am |
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Interview with Vampyrouss by Abortedlife
Vampyrouss was envisioned in 2006, still adding more audio recordings to their debut album. So, how would you introduce your band to us?
KAZRAINE:
I guess we officially became a band In late 2005, as prior to that we were more of a project I suppose. We released 3 demo CDs and 2 VCDs as a 2 piece project from 2004 - 2005, and then with the full band line up we have released the “Gazing Upon The Harvest Moon” Demo CD and 3 singles.
Over the years we have merged dark soundscapes and gothic imagery with electronic darkwave style beats and rhythms to become what we are now. I think the song 'My Gothic Heart' is the summation of everything we have learned through the demos, and is a good representation of the present Vampyrouss sound!
Does the group name represent a certain liking for the dark world?
KAZRAINE:
There is no real explanation for the band name. Vampyrouss was created by Lazerous Yazerall, our ex-guitarist, when he asked me to join the band with him in 2002. I think he wanted a dark evil sounding name but to me Vampyrouss always sounded more gothic and mysterious, so I instantly liked the name.
When we decided to dissolve the band I continued to use the Vampyrouss name in my comic books (Vampyrouss: A Gothic Romance) as well as a novel I started writing (Vampyrouss: Clasp Of The Vampire) and even a script for a film (Vampyrouss: The Dark World). So when I started recording music with Azrael in 2004 it seemed natural to call the project Vampyrouss!
Who are the contributing members and what are their respective roles?
KAZRAINE:
I perform all vocals and write all the lyrics, and Azrael creates all the music. This changed for 'Reflections Of The Past' as the whole band wrote the music for it, but Azrael still put it together, and basically he will change the other guys ideas if he needs to. But he will always be our main songwriter!
Since late-2005 Bob and Jaman joined the band as live bassist and drummer respectively, followed by Rejon as backing keyboardist in mid-2006. Now they will play live with us, but also contribute ideas to the band. They are a part of the band full time, even though Azrael has the biggest part in the writing.
Discuss with us your creative process and how you approach your concepts or ideas.
KAZRAINE:
Usually I will approach Azrael with an idea I have. A song idea will come to me and I will explain it to him with an emotion or theme, and he will begin writing a piece of music based around those emotions. Once we have a basic song written I will take it away and write my lyrics to the song, and if it needs changing to fit the lyrics I will ask Azrael to change it, and then we will record a demo version of the song. Then once we have a completed version of the song we will rehearse it with the band, iron out any problems, and then record the final version of it!
There seems to be no problem for you guys in making videos that every time you release a single, an audio-visual presentation
of it is always a promise. How do you guys find the time, budget and motivation to do it?
KAZRAINE:
The other guys in the band sometimes call me 'the fuhrer' because I am always telling them we will make a video, or another demo, or single. I always tell them what we are going to do, but not because I am bossy, but because I always have ideas for the band! And the way I see it if you have an idea you should always do your best to see it through. So our motivation is generally me! But sometimes even I find it hard to be motivated when our ideas are bigger than our budget!
We just try to do our best with what we have! We never have a budget for our stuff; we really just try to re-create our ideas as best we can with the environment we have around us! We usually shoot our videos early in the morning, and so we are usually really tired and exhausted in the videos! But we just put ourselves through the stress of doing it all ourselves because we love the outcome, seeing our songs come to life in a different way!
"Gothic Romance" is a perfect description for Vampyrouss. How would you further define that in your own words?
KAZRAINE:
I think both of those words have 2 sides that are very similar. Gothic can be seen as dark, morbid and doomy, but there is also a sexual, passionate feeling going right back to Gothic Literature. Romance is usually used to describe happiness, passion and hope, yet at the same time you can have a morbid romance, tragic romance or illicit romance as Shakespeare often wrote, none of which are very hopeful!!
I think that sums up Vampyrouss very well. I often write about good experiences and bad experiences, often in the same song, and Azrael has some dark haunting melodies, as well as some really uplifting movements as well! Vampyrouss is a mixture of the dark and light side to everything, and the struggle to find a balance between the two!
Is Vampyrouss your first band or were the members formerly involved with other acts prior to it?
KAZRAINE:
Azrael and I played in several school bands, the usual stuff that kids do, but aside from that our first real band experience started with Vampyrouss. We have all got other projects but none of them will ring a bell with anyone but us at the moment!
Give us the total songs you've completed so far and please discuss each one of them.
KAZRAINE:
I'll start with our 4th Demo as that is where our story really began!
'Gazing Upon The Harvest Moon' (2006)
'Imbolc' is about the beginning and the end of everything, its very spacey and calming, yet brooding at the same time! A perfect Azrael instrumental!
'Karma Of The Wicker Man' is a song I don't agree with anymore; I like the music, but I dislike the lyrics. They are too dark and pessimistic for Vampyrouss. I think its lacking the hope of most Vampyrouss songs, even the most depressing ones have some light to it, but this song is just malicious all the way through. It does work though, and it is based around the film 'The Wicker Man' with a personal twist!
'Gazing Upon The Harvest Moon' is a personal favourite song of mine! Azrael wrote the song without me, and it stayed pretty much the same as when he first showed it to me, as I thought it was instantly perfect! The lyrics are about hope I suppose, and how the moon is always there, and has always soothed me in times of need, and so this is a song dedicated to the moon and humanities deep (yet ignored) connection to it!
'The Graceful Gait Of Time And Fate' is a strange instrumental. Its dark and brooding and very minimalist for Azrael… It builds and builds like a fire, the perfect intro for the next song!
'I The Samhain Feast' is the most quirky Vampyrouss song so far! I told Azrael we needed a Halloween sounding song, and that it should sound like a Tim Burton movie; and this is what Azrael came up with! I think it has some of my most clever lyrics, and is a fan favourite due to its groovy bassline! The lyrics are fictitious for the most part, the only personal meaning is the feeling of being devoured by others and having everything you put your heart and soul into consumed by uncaring people. The story is about a young man entering a graveyard on Halloween only to be sacrificed by mutants and demons similar to those in Clive Barker's 'Cabal'.
'Midwinter's Eve' is another incredibly personal song. Its almost a ballad! A lot of people have said it sounds like Sinead O'Conner or something, and I think that is why this demo stands out from all the songs are so thematic, and all sound so different. This one is about Winter obviously, and about loss and loneliness. There is also a lot of Nostalgia in the lyrics, as well as a glimmer of hope at the end. It reflects very well how I was feeling at that time, about the band and life in general! This is the end of the story, which would be followed by 'Imbolc' and everything would repeat from the start, the cycle of life, or the Pagan cycle of the year.
'Reflections Of The Past' (2006)
'Reflections Of The Past' was the first song we wrote as a band. It came about with Azrael telling BoB to play a couple notes, and Jaman to play some drums. They jammed the notes for a whole practice session, and by the end they had most of the song written as it appears in the song. The title was originally going to be the title of our debut album, which at the time was going to be re-recorded versions of the demos… but we dropped that idea, and the title was too good, so I applied it to this song instead.
The chorus 'The long days and lonely nights, waiting for seas to part; comes from a piece I wrote years ago entitled “Long Days And Lonely Nights (Waiting For The Ocean To Part)' which we were also considering as an album title! The lyrics are about my life really, and a retrospective look at that horrible time in 2005 when we were writing the 3rd Demo; It is also a nostalgic look at the band and how far we've come, and a good starting point for the full Vampyrouss line up!
'Bastet Of The East' is about religious politics. Something I usually stay away from in my lyrics, as it has nothing to do with my life. The story concerns itself with a fictitious adaptation of the Egyptian Goddess Bastet. In my story she is a beautiful enchantress whom keeps her men from fighting with her allure alone. She is murdered by some unnamed opposition, and her people take it upon themselves to exact revenge, even though Bastet was strictly against violence in favour of love and peace. This is similar to any religion in the world killing in the name of a loving God. I find it a bizarre concept and had to write a song about it!
'My Gothic Heart' (2006)
'My Gothic Heart' was written for you guys at www.mygothicheart.com as a promotional song and an experiment for the band into a more electronic direction. We recently finished the accompanying music video that can be seen on our official website. The song itself refers to the darkness of the heart, the parts which aren't positive feelings. That is how I construed the title, and so I wrote it based around those feelings. Summed up, I guess the song is about longing to be free of pain and needing something to help you escape from the darkness. The video shows my attempts to break free of the familiar wreckage of modern life and to escape to nature, but being to afraid to seek it alone thus ending up back where you started or something to that effect!
How is the dark music scene like where you are based?
KAZRAINE:
It is non-existent! There is nothing like that here… There are a few fans of the emo and hardcore/metal scene, and they have really embraced us locally and internationally, but there is really not a dark music scene in Devon, in fact there isn't much of a music scene at all unfortunately!
What are your ways of promoting your music?
KAZRAINE:
The official website and forum is our primary source of promotion, as well as websites such as MySpace, YouTube, Bebo, Soundclick and of course MyGothicHeart! The internet has been so good to us, and people really seem to understand us!
Do you perform in clubs as well, or is Vampyrouss limited to the studio?
KAZRAINE:
So far we have been stuck in the studio, but now we are a full band we hope to play live soon if enough people would like us to play!
Our main problem is transportation, as we have no managers or record companies to promote us or send us on tour. So we will have to arrange all of those things ourselves too!
How many tracks are needed for your upcoming album and are you excited about it?
KAZRAINE:
At the moment we are working on a new CD… but it won't be an album. We have decided to make an E.P instead, and this is the first time we have mentioned it to anyone! It will be 4 tracks long and will be a concept as well, We don't want to give away too much about it, but its beautiful so far, and by far the most epic thing we have created yet! We are VERY excited about it! We hope to have it finished in early 2007, and then we will continue working on a full length album!
The "Clasp of the Vampire" was made only with a synthesizer accompaniment. How was it that there were only two of you
in that video?
KAZRAINE:
At that point we were only a 2 piece band, so all the drums were programmed. So in the video we just had to go without a live drummer!
In retrospect it would have been amazing to have all 5 of us in that video dressed as vampires, but we had finished it before we were a full band!
'Clasp Of The Vampire' is a really simplistic song anyway, apart from the drums there is only the bass and melody which Azrael played in the video, and my vocals of course. I still love the song and video, it is supposed to be an echo of my favourite Hammer Horror movies!
How long does it usually take to compose a song? It only took a week or so to complete "My Gothic Heart" upon request.
KAZRAINE:
We were lucky with that song. It was originally a Siberia song, Azrael and Rejon's old project. They suggested to me to update the song for Vampyrouss but I was uncertain, as I loved the original version! But I listened to it and began writing the lyrics, and it fitted so well that we all agreed to use the song in the end! That is how we got the song finished so quickly! But it is very different, there is no violin in the original, and it was a lot less atmospheric and comparatively simplistic. It also had Azrael singing on it! Its one of my favourite Vampyrouss songs now!
"Reflections of the Past" was a great video. Was it the first time you used a live drum set?
KAZRAINE:
'Reflections' was the second time we used a live drummer in a video. The first being 'Angel Midst The Storm' however you barely see the drum kit in that video anyway! We are really glad Jaman could appear in the 'Reflections' video though even though it was a nightmare! We filmed it at my house, in my living room!! And fitting the entire drum kit in there was not an easy task.
Are you fixated on your album release? In that sense, what are you working on at the moment?
KAZRAINE:
As I say we have put our album ideas on hold. We want to have a bit of budget to record an album, ideally some record label backing! So for now we will continue to write an album and perfect it, and in the meantime we will release our E.P ourselves! Hopefully a friend of ours will help to mix the E.P. and make it sound really professional!
What can we expect from Vampyrouss in the near future?
KAZRAINE:
The E.P. is going to be more orchestral and beautiful, more dark and electronic, and more grand and majestic too! Its going to be a roller coaster ride, and will be a huge thank you to everyone that has supported us so far! Also, we hope we will be playing live by next year!!
Any last words? Thank you very much.
KAZRAINE:
Thank you, writing 'My Gothic Heart' was a pleasure, and has opened so many doors for us. We are grateful to you and to all the fans out there! Visit us on the forum and we will be glad to chat about the music, lyrics and anything else, and we hope you will like the E.P when its finished!
Visit the Official Website:
http://www.vampyrouss.co.uk
Visit the Official Forum:
http://vampyrouss.forumup.com
Email the band:
vampyrouss@vampyrouss.co.uk |
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| Oct 06, 2006 06:11 am |
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| awesome interview aborted love it |
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| Oct 06, 2006 08:55 am |
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| It is a good interview, there were a few questions we were not expecting to be asked. Its great to be kept on your toes |
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| Oct 06, 2006 08:58 am |
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| Of course it is :) Thats rad haha, can't wait for more to come =] |
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| Oct 06, 2006 11:30 am |
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I enjoyed writing it! :D Definatly some well thought out questions! Hopefully I gave some well thought out answers!
I do tend to rant though... |
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| Dec 03, 2006 06:00 am |
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| mmy favourite band is him of course!!! |
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| Dec 03, 2006 06:13 am |
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| May 08, 2007 05:20 pm |
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| May 09, 2007 01:39 pm |
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