Brendon Small's Galaktion

First encountered when interviewed for Errorizer for Art Issue when name had not changed.

He was a fascinating guy, main reason I asked for the Galaktion Record was as a bridge to getting to chat to him again, though I probably should catch up on Metalocalypse before I do that.

The Galaktion record is a downhill ride from the first cut, though there are a number of decent tracks before it gets drossy.

Not a great record but fun, a sign that Brendon Small is capable of more than Metalocalypse suggests.

Honestly, the most exciting thing about this record was contemplating Small teaming with different writing partners and putting together a full-on sci-fi cartoon series about an alien who works as a roadie on earth. I'd help write it.

Primordial RAW transcript part 3

S: What I was gonna relate that to was that you were in Greece shortly before there was this economic collapse and Ireland had the same sort of problems. I mean, it's been interesting I think for you to see some of those countries before that has happened. The UK is sort of heading that way as well. Do you think that'll change the... It's a strange question I suppose but do you think that will change the playing field for new bands and music in general. It's changing people's spending habits and that kind of thing. In metal at least the live concert has become the way for bands to make money where the album used to be the way for bands to make money.

N: Yeah, of course it's going to change everything. I mean, the less money means there's less money... The less money around means the less money people spend on things which are considered luxury items, like music. And we're also living in climate, in an age where people, young people assume[emphasis] that what is created by another person is their entitlement for free. Um. And you mix that with the fact that festival culture is actually, kind of killing tours. Ummmm, bands who are coming across and doing twenty, thirty day tours across Europe are bringing in less people because somebody's going, 'Well, am I going to drive to Bremen from Hamburg for two hours on a cold, rainy night on Tuesday, or shall I just wait and see all these bands at a festival, in the sunshine. But what they don't realise is that, with the exception of the top couple of percent of bands at festivals, most of everybody else is, by and large... are very often being screwed: most of their merchandise is being taken, a percentage of them taxes and [pauses], you know, the counts of the festival cattlemarket season, bands... You know, the kind of onus is placed upon bands: well, you should be happy with your entitlement to play our festival in front of all these people. But you know, just because you play this festival in front of 10,000 people standing in a field watching you, doesn't mean that more than 100 people are going to come to your club show. It just doesn't work like that, you know? For younger bands who don't have any - obviously - history, um... It's very difficult. Bands in the future? I mean, I really don't know. You know, like I know a handful of bands who are being feted by the press, touring both sides of the Atlantic, playing every festival that you could imagine, have a quite a high profile, still[emphasis] haven't sold as much as five figures of CDs, you know? It's just not happening, you know? And I think the underground is collapsing, very much like the mainstream did three or four years ago, you know?

S: With the underground collapse, do you think there's partly a fragmentation effect, because people can make things so much on their own and distribute them on their own?

N: Possibly. Part of it is also there's too many bands, it's too easy to release music and there's no quality control anymore and there's just an awful lot of crap, you know, so something good? Does, um, make it difficult to sell it and also of course this eBay/forum culture which is all about who has the most limited edition of whatever vinyl and, you know, but nobody seems to really[emphasis] be talking about the music anymore and, you know, I mean, it all collapses <there is a part here I cannot decipher, I need Nemtheanga's help> already go for 400 euro in a day. I mean, it's only been out for a year and a half. It's fuckin'... It's just retarded, you know? It's not[emphasis]. It's actually, to be honest, it's sort of symptomatic of the hipster culture which most metal people avoid[emphasis], you know? It's just hipster fucking liking something because it's cool, you know? And it's just everywhere. You know, people even ask, 'Why are you playing that vinyl?' Well, that's what it's for, not to be piled away on a shelf, and, you know, it's not an investment [said with sarcastic scorn - laughs]. But I think a lot of people look at it like that. Or they just don't, you know, they don't pay attention to the music anymore, so... I don't know. It's all going in a weird direction, you know? If people aren't showing up to club shows, they aren't buying anything, if they aren't buying the shirts or... it's hard to know, you know?

Primordial RAW transcript part 2

This is the transcript accompanying 'Primordial interview pt2: "We cannot play a Wednesday show to 50 people anymore". It includes near-word-for-word transcription of Nemtheanga and at least get-the-gist renditions of my questions and comments, and also includes [in square brackets] notes on noises the interviewee made, intuitions about their feelings, reflections on my interviewing and the like. I try to keep these to a minimum...

S: So these are your first UK club shows in quite a while, right?

N: Three or four years I guess, yeah.

S: Is there anything that has made you avoid that or is it just a case of what the band has been offered and what one has time to do?

N: It really depends on what you’ve been offered. I mean, four or five years ago, I don’t really think there was a climate to do maybe a week or something in the UK. I don't know, you know? I mean, look, we did... the last time we played four or five, maybe six dates was with Rotting Christ in 2003, and a lot of those days were, to be honest, quite pointless, you know? Like 23 people in Cardiff and this that and the other. It's just that now, at the age that we are, the responsibilities that we have, that kind of thing – not that we're ancient or anything, but we just can't do that any more. We cannot do, we cannot do, errrr [he pauses, thinking of the best example] a Wednesday show to 50 people any more, it just doesn't work like that in our lives. And we also can't do a Friday or Saturday show to 100 people. It's just... We're not Marduk or Vader or Rotting Christ, it just doesn't work likes that. It has to be... It has to be, more or less, this way. I mean, it's nothing particular, it's just all those tours that we've done... you know, unless they go to Paris, it's very seldom that they'll go to London, you know? It's really not very much to do with us, you know?

S: There is only a given amount of time that any band has. The older you get as a band, the more responsibilities one has outside of the band, the more you have to pick carefully.

N: This is true, but also the fact that we aren't a professional band, that we don't make our living from Primordial. Maybe if we were twenty-two or twenty-three we could have thrown our hats in the ring and gone, 'Right, let's take everything that we're offered. Let's tour for three months...' and this that and the other. But that's just not the way life has worked out, you know?

S: That's just what I was thinking. If you don't mind talking about it, I was going to ask about how it is to be in the business of being a metal band but not to have it be a professional gig. I gather it requires a lot of discipline, in your lives in general.

AN: Well I mean... You know, there's no pension plan in heavy metal. [chuckles] You know? I mean, it's different for me as I don't have [pauses] kids or family or, you know, some of the bills to pay that some of the other guys do. Mortgages and this kind of thing and stuff. And it's just, when you have those responsibilities... And also Ireland is a very expensive country to live in. You know, it's not like the money we have goes as far as it might do for Vader or Behemoth in Poland or, you know, something like this. It's not like in Scandinavia where you can apply for grants from the state or anything like this. It just doesn't work like this so, um [pauses] the balancing act between picking the things that you're able to do, that financially make sense. And of course, in the current economic climate in Ireland, if you have a job you really have to hold onto it, which means that maybe some of the, um, leeway you might have been allowed with your job four or five years ago, as regards to like unpaid leave, just doesn't really exist any more. So yeah, it's just a balancing act, you know? Like anything else. We do enough, but maybe we don't do as much as we'd like, but we do enough to be able to, you know, to make it sort of sort of tick over, you know?

S: Yes absolutely. I mean, would you do a lot more shows if you had the ability? Some bands get to the point where they don't want to do shows at all. Some people even - professional musicians: Kate Bush is an example - actually avoid doing shows because of all the things that it involves. I just wonder how much of your life per year would you want to spend on the road in any case?

N: Most of it, probably. [laughs] It suits me. You know, I mean that's what I like. I don't really like being in the studio, you know, it bores me. You know, people being in a heavy metal or rock band complaining[emphasis] about being on the road I mean that's... You know, you don't realise what sort of opportunity you've been given to see the world. Well, maybe the toilets of the world but you're still [breaks into laughter, as does his interviewer] seeing the world. I would do way more if I was able. It just doesn't necessarily work out like that, you know? Like I said, we do enough that there is things to do, but you know, trying to get away for more than 14 to 20 days at any one time, I mean... That said, you know, if you were, I don't know, the Vaders or Rotting Christs of this world, doing a hundred days, ninety day tours in a hundred days and stuff, I don't know whether that would suck the joy out of it, you know? But if that's you're living that's also your living, you know? The other thing I just thought: if we were a professional band then we would have to, probably, make an album every 18 months at least, you know, which, ummmm, might[emphasis] impinge on the creativity of the music, you know? If we had[emphasis] to do it.

S: Yeah. That ability to do not be tied to the constant album cycle I think, for Primordial at least, is certainly an advantage. I mean, 'The Gathering Wilderness' was a pretty good record, but 'To the Nameless Dead' and 'Redemption' are really outstanding pieces of work and it's really nice to see that you've actually got some mainstream recognition for them and that sort of thing. But I think, if you're carrying on making records that good, it's good that you're not having to make them on someone else's schedule.

N: Yeah, I mean it's not impossible. I mean the only thing is that don't forget that, you know, when you pick up the new Primordial album and you compare it to the new Satyricon album you have to make [pauses, wry chuckle] a judgement there that here is a band who are professional musicians who can... Hey, that's what they do is make music. So this is what they can do for the whole week whereas we might rehearse, I don't know, once every six weeks sometimes. [interviewer exclaims 'Wow'] Yeah, sometimes not for two or three months if there's nothing to do. When you're having to juggle all the other things in your life with[emphasis] trying to be creative as well, it's very difficult to find that... that equilibrium, that balance, you know? So I think that's probably something that most people don't appreciate but, you know, that's life, what can you do, you just get on with it.

S: I think it doesn't show, if you see what I mean. It doesn't show that Primordial aren't practising every week. I think there's something about what you do or how you do it that makes it hold together in any case. It has a very strong feeling to it. That's a very weak way to put it but what I'm reminded of is when I was lucky enough to go and see you in Greece and how those shows went and that sort of thing. I think opportunities like that are a wonderful thing for a band like you to be able to take up.

Primordial RAW transcript Part 1

This is the transcript accompanying 'Primordial interview pt1: You took the words right out of my mouth, it must have been when you were using a smoke machine'. It includes near-word-for-word transcription of Nemtheanga and get-the-gist renditions of my questions and comments, and also includes [in square brackets] notes on noises the interviewee made, intuitions about their feelings, reflections on my interviewing and the like. I try to keep these to a minimum...


Primordial transcript #1

Schwaz: Did you ever figure out what it actually was that made you lose your voice at Bloodstock?

Nemtheanga: Well, what it seems to have been is something called temporary vocal chord paralysis. It seems to have been an allergic reaction to a certain chemical in the smoke machine. I do remember being on the stage at the time, singing fine, and literally [pauses] I remember thinking to myself: fucking hell, I’ve never experienced smoke that intense on the stage – literally, you couldn’t even see the crowd at some stages. And I remember taking a big, well [slight chuckle], breath of it basically and from one line to the next my voice just completely disappeared – well, obviously. What can you do? I guess I’ve done 400-and-something gigs and that’s the first time it’s ever happened [emphasises the last two words, frustration showing through his voice]. Sod’s law that it had to happen at that particular moment. But, you know, what can you do? You just have to take it on the chin and go: OK, well... [trails off, his last words echoing disappointment] You know?

S: Could see how much it bothered: know he’s the kind of person who is frustrated not being able to give his all. But for us watching it was kind of a special show, despite the disappointment of not being able to see Primordial in their full glory [I hate listening to this bit of the recording as I actually said, ‘Primordial in their full… whatever’, pretentiously wanting to avoid the glory cliché but coming up empty on something better - I feel like an MP, relying on Hansard to sort out my speech later on, thus this confession, a search for absolution]. It was great to be with everyone else at that gig and try to sing along. What was interesting was that it revealed how difficult it is, even when you’re quite a fan, to remember exactly where the vocal patterns go [Alan has what sounds like an understanding laugh] when there isn’t a person who knows them by heart leading you through a microphone, and all you have is the music heard out in the open air at a volume that drowns the tune of your voice [I didn’t explain all that to Alan, but that is what a former interviewee I shall call Warhelmet would call ‘the propaganda version’: covers all the logical bases, the way some musicians do in email interviews but only the least interesting to talk to in person actually produce as responses]. You know what I mean?

N: Well I mean… You know, look, the whole thing was… It was very cool, it was quite, I suppose quite touching or moving or something, to hear everyone singing, to realise that that was the level of people’s support or the popularity of the band or [he trails off with a noise like a shrug – like he feels to go on would be superfluous speculation]. You know, that obviously the lyrics or the message in the band means that much to people that they know all the words. And yeah, I mean it was, it was… it will be remembered. I’m sure that it will be remembered. Not for reasons I would want it to be. Ummm, I mean, it never crossed my mind that we should stop or stop playing or anything. To be honest, what we should have done is let our drummer sing, cause he can sing really well. But at the time you don’t think of these things. But I mean what can you do? You just have to take it on the chin and go, alright, this is sods law and if you play X amount of gigs I suppose eventually you’re going to play one where your voice gives in, you know?

S: I remember the drummer saying he could sing and you could scream. Maybe that was just too difficult to rig up at the time?

N: No it wasn’t too difficult. I couldn’t actually make a single noise. I couldn’t even whisper. I couldn’t do anything, at all. He can actually sing really well. He sings Irish Shanoh [phonetic reproduction, guessed it was Caoineadh based on a quick wikipedia search: need to follow this up, get it right] songs and he’s a very good singer. So if we’d thought of it or there was a headset he probably could have sang, actually.

S: Maybe you should have him sing some other time just because it would be good.

AN: [chuckles] Yeah. [there is a note of bitterness, on relistening I feel my laugh after the above was ill-chosen, came across almost snidy when it was meant to just express that though such a phenomena would be irregular, I’d be interested to hear ‘the drummer’ alongside Alan – I have now looked up his name, it’s Simon Ó Laoghaire]

Mixed memories

2010 was an interesting year. I heard less new (as in new out in the shops, not new-to-me) albums than has been the case in a decade, probably. I used to write about music for a rag whose pages now line my garden, so that somewhat compelled me - in the interests of 'objectivity' - to listen to as many of a year's records as possible. On reflection, it was really refreshing not to be (even more, not to FEEL) so overloaded, this year, by knowledge of what was out there. And of the records I did hear this year, a pleasingly disproportionate number came to feel inextricably intertwined with experiences which have helped reshape my thinking, ultimately for the better.

But enough o' my yakkin. I started today's post because I just purchased one of the records which soundtracked 2010 for me. 'Dethonator' by Dethonator is an independent production put together by people I met, so I can't really be 'objective' about it. On the other hand, publicly verifiable objectivity is somewhere between overrated and impossible when it comes to judging music. The most important thing is whether you are independent in your opinions. This can be a tough thing to judge in yourself, but it is what matters. I spent years agonising over whether others would PERCIEVE what I wrote about music as being unduly biased. Reflecting back, I wasted an inordinate amount of time trying to predict how the language I used would guide people's thoughts. I wanted to find the right formula to make this incredible disease that is language communicate my real feelings - my really feeling, indeed - for what I was hearing to any given reader. This is of course impossible. Different observers will take different impressions from the words, individual observers may even take different impressions at different times. I was always disinterested (not motivated by vested or monetary influence) but felt tainted by a 'scene' which is inherently interested. But I'm going on again.

At first I thought that my enthusiasm for 'Dethonator' must be related to my feelings for those who made it. Having been savagely critical (and primarily negative) regarding the band's previous work, I figured the nice part of me must just be trying to see the positive. Admittedly I did initially lambaste the band's chief composer, Adam Lineker, with snide comments running along the lines that typical music journalists might take ('It's just Arch Enemy with singing', that sort of lazy shorthand) but as I listened again and again out of politeness, I realised that I wanted to listen again and again. And again. And again. As modern metal albums go, there were few in 2010 which topped Dethonator. But that's just the opinion of someone who, for the first time in years, didn't even try to listen to everything that was out there. So why trust me?

That's enough for now. I already let this take to long.

First spew

THESE ARE JUST NOTES

Voivod's 'Fix My Heart' heals the wound. It must be laughed at, but somehow I haven't been able to get Fire Inc's 'Nowhere Fast' out of my head. I only DLed it because I saw the Streets of Fire cover in Portable Grindhouse, and I was supposed to be looking for the Stunt Rock soundtrack anyway. A definite guilty pleasure. “There ain't nothing wrong with going nowhere baby, as long as we're going nowhere fast.” It's like ersatz Bonnie Tyler mating with Meatloaf infront of your eyes, but the vacuum sealed, metronomically punctuated opening does its job of pumping blood like any good film score.

Earlier this evening it was ZZ Top. Remember it from Virginia, driving past houses with 2 functional and more rotting hulks of cars per front door, and about as many bikes as Schwarzes, probably. Maybe less. It's goregous giving it to someone else who shares one's passion for the pumping pound of automobile motion. Like Motorhead, Rio Grande Mud was made for driving. And yeah, it just won't seem the same if you have to use an electric car, but then again Hank Williams would sure sound better on a horse, but I can't afford to keep one in London. Take my point?