This time Lachryma Christi proudly shares an interview with Alboin from Eïs, the German Black Metal leading top 10 Black Metal albums from 2012. Eïs released their latest album Wetterkreuz in 2012 through Prophecy Productions. A very gelid and skincrawling work. (Please find a review in here: http://lachrymachristizine.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/review-eis-new-album-wetterkreuz.html )
Let's see the interesting things Alboin has to tell us.
Why Eïs as a name of a band? What is the main idea you want to transmit to the public?
We had several band names during the past ten years, and to me Eïs is somehow destilled into one word what is important for this band: atmosphere, coldness, solitude... something like that. Actually, a band name should just be fitting to the music and easy to remember, and I guess Eïs succeeds here.
There were a few changes of line up along the time, do you want to tell us a bit of the story of the band and how that happened?
To be honest... no. It's best to keep internal things internal, and to understand what happens inside a band is not only hard to get for external viewers, it also destroys a lot of spirit while listening to the band's music. At least that's the case with me. So, it's done with telling you that we had serious musical and personal differences, and that's no cliché this time. I had the impression and later the urge to change something within the band, to give the whole thing more intensity and focus again, so it was necessary to act.
What are your favorite artists? Who has inspired you the most?
Mainly norwegian (and some swedish and finnish) black metal bands from the early to late nineties – like Emperor, Satyricon, Troll, Covenant, Arcturus, Morgul, Burzum as well... and a lot more, plus some genius stuff from Summoning for example. What I always find inspiring is music composed with the heart, with not too much thinking about it and handcrafted afterwards with not too many skills, but with the certain atmosphere and spirit only these bands managed to compose back then. This is about feeling and intuitive melodies, and I always tried to come close to this atmosphere with our music.
What are your lyrics usually about? Is there a main concept behind Eïs?
No concept, except for some themes and metaphors returning regularly, like solitude and loss for example. My lyrics are very personal and metaphoric, usually I try to work with personal struggles and experiences and clad them into some kind of metaphoric set by describing certain pictures I see in front of my inner eye. So to say, a lot of it is a katharsis for me.
What comes first when you compose? Lyrics or music?
Music. I'm picky when it comes to composing and arranging music, but it's even MUCH extremer when I'm dealing with lyrics.
Thanks for the kind words. To record an intense and atmospheric album was of course intended, also the sharp sounding production has been a goal we wanted to achieve. Though, I was a little suprised myself afterwards when listening to the final album. To me, it seems exceptionally rough and aggressive compared to our former albums. Probably a result of the last couple of years, with all these internal band struggles and a bunch of serious personal problems I had to face... seems it was about time to let it all out. I suppose a lot of the inspiration came from these experiences, and the rest – all the metaphors and pictures – just arose when I noticed that this was an album sounding like a blizzard raping a mountain summit.
I don't expect anything when recording an album, at least not from the press or something. Still, it's of course very flattering to read and hear all the positive feedback, and that's some that makes an artists even happier with his piece of art, of course. To be fully honest, we thought „Wetterkreuz“ would some kind of split our listeners – the retro black metal listeners on one side (very much admiring the album), the avantgarde folks on the other side, saying it would be too much nineties style. Seems we catched them all somehow, and that's nice to see.
Germany used to be one of the most famous places for their Metal scene. How do you see this nowadays?
It still is! We have so many bands, big labels, tours, concerts, magazines... in certain regions of Germany you're free to visit two or three metal concerts every weekend, with bands from all over the world... not to speak about festivals. This has positive and negative aspects of course – we have the biggest and most interesting market for metal music of course, but otherwise it's hard to persist as a small band amidst all these giants of rock stopping in all the time. Altogether, we can be pretty happy to live and play in Germany I'd say.
What is your favorite track in Wetterkreuz? Why?
Probably the opening track „Mann aus Stein“, followed by the last track „Bei den Sternen“. Both are really really personal songs, both the music and the lyrics, and it's always moving to perform them live or only to listen to them. Of course, as the composer, I actually like all our songs, but some are just a little more intense than others, of course.
What about next gigs? Anything happening soon that you would like to share in here?
Yes, of course. Next for us are some smaller club gigs all around Germany, plus Ragnarök festival in April and TNT festival in the summer. As we're all employed guys, we can't play as much as we would want to, but we always try to present our music on stage... let's hope we'll be able to play abroad one day, that would be truly fine.
What would you advise to bands that are starting right now? There so many bands now, and some of them seem to disappear quickly, why do you think this happens?
Good questions. Well... we've never been too talented when it comes to composing complex music, or in our instrumental performance and skills. Instead, I always followed a clear vision of what I wanted to express, I never wrote a riff or song I was not 100% happy with, and adhered on my personal taste without turning left or right too much. We always did personal music with true emotions, and I'd say this comes across quite well.
I have no clue about bands disappearing quickly... maybe they just don't have the perseverance to keep doing a band, or just dissolve in their structure, split apart due to personal progression or something. Some bands just start making music to become famous or to copy their faves. Well... that may work for a couple of months, but you can't persist under these per conditions.
Anything else you would like to add?
Well... thanks for the support! Keep updated with our activities by joining us on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/eis.official
Line up:
Alboin - Guitars, Bass, Synths, Vocals
Marlek - Drums
Marlek - Drums
Latest release:
Wetterkreuz (2012)
You can find more information and music of Eïs in:
http://www.facebook.com/eis.official
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