Antares Predator
Wywiad przeprowadził Wouter Roemers
In early February this year Australian label Battlegod Productions released "Twilight Of the Apocalypse" - the debut full length of Norwegian symphonic black metallers Antares Predator. The album featured the considerable talents of German drummer Jan Benkwitz (Belphegor) and Keep Of Kallesin's Øyvind Winther (guitars). In order to get some clarity regarding the inspiration and creation of this album, Masterful Magazine arranged an interview with main composer-guitarist Øyvind Winther. He was eager to talk about the band's past, their deal with Battlegod Productions and how it is working with a drummer located in a different country than the rest of the band.
Hi! Thanks for agreeing to do this interview with us. Antares Predator certainly has an experienced line-up, uniting members from Keep Of Kalessin, Belphegor and Scariot. What prompted you to form Antares Predator in the first place?
Antares Predator started as my experimental solo project in the mid 90's. It was my personal playground where I would explore anything that came to mind musically, and I would involve my friends occasionally. There were no particular ambitions for the project in the beginning as my main band at the time Keep of Kalessin took priority. The project grew to a 5 member lineup rehearsing for a CD recording around 2003, but things didn't exactly turn out as planned. Me and Mikal (Bass) moved from Trondheim to Oslo and would be occupied with other obligations for some years, but around 2007 we started looking for a new singer and drummer to bring the band back to life resulting in Steffan Schulze (Vocals) and Jan Benkwitz aka Blastphemer joining forces for the release of the Twilight album. Antares Predator has been a tremendous learning process on so many levels, and we were never in a hurry to get an album out. The goal for me is the creation process itself so this is the main reason Antares Predator was formed.
Antares is a red supergiant star in the Milky Way galaxy and the sixteenth brightest star in the nighttime sky. Along with Aldebaran, Spica, and Regulus it is one of the four brightest stars near the ecliptic. Have you always been interested in space and the galaxy?
I have been intrigued by the universe for as long as I can remember. The vastness of space and the evolution of matter resulting in what we are and see around us today is just mind boggling. Everything we ever did and ever knew took place on this little dot we call earth, hidden away in a sea of galaxies in a universe so big we can't imagine the end of it. I find it hard not to be interested in that. It's quite fascinating how so many people can stand with their heads deep in the sand in some drunken religious illusion regarding how everything is connected in this world. I will not pretend to be an expert, but I am deeply fascinated and very curious about the universe.
The cover artwork features a dragon-esque robotic creature that carries an uncanny resemblance to Mark 13 from the 1990 cult sci-fi flick "Hardware". There's also a track a named ‘Mark 13'. In what degree was Richard Stanley's "Hardware" an inspiration for this album?
"Hardware" has been a big inspiration, not for this album in particular, but more for me personally since I saw it back in the early 90's. This post-apocalyptic radioactive world and its brilliant soundtrack made me interested in this direction of art and atmosphere to begin with. The underlying theme of the movie is quite close to the theme of the "Twilight of the Apocalypse" album in a sense: We are the twilight of the apocalypse, our own worst enemy, thus all songs on the album deals with some dark side of the human race.
In "Hardware" the name Mark 13 relates to the 13th chapter of Marks gospel in the Bible where Jesus is depicted as giving his followers an extended prediction of a coming apocalypse. Being an anti-theist myself I find this quite outstanding as this man made robot named Mark 13 set out to "control the population" under the banner of a man made Biblical apocalyptic prophecy.
Let me tell you that the cover artwork is phenomenal. With who did you work to produce this amazing digital artwork? Will the winged robot become a mainstay within Antares Predator's artworks from now on?
The cover was done by the Swedish artist Pär Olofsson who also recently did the artwork for Immortal on their "All Shall Fall" album. It shows the robot with delusions of grandeur that see itself as the angel of death on a mission to eliminate all humans. Pär is an amazing artist and it was a very cool experience to see him work with the ideas I threw at him. You should check out his other works at his web page www.parolofsson.se/.The idea was to have the robot become a mainstay with Antares Predator, but in other settings. On the Twilight cover the robot sees himself as the angel of death and he builds wings to fully play the role as the biblical executioner. I do see religion as a major problem and a major setback and in this sense the Mechanical angel, created by humans, illustrates the human race as the twilight of the apocalypse perfectly.
I couldn't help but notice the profound influence from bands like Emperor, Limbonic Art and the Theory In Practice black metal side-project Mutant (specifically their sole album "The Aeonic Majesty"). How would you consider as the band's main inspirations?
I think the essence of Antares Predator is that we tend to pick up influences from a wide variety of genres even if the result is a controlled metal that surely won't blow any fuses for being over the top experimental wise. We listen to all kinds of rock and metal from the past 4 decades and occasionally jazz and folk music. I rarely think about what bands influenced us the most, but I have to think Devin Townsend, Pantera and Bathory play a significant role even if it's hard to tell by our sound. Most songs were written prior to Jan and Steffans involvement, and I hear influences from all the past members as well. Vegar (drums Keep of Kalessin / Gorgoroth) and Ghâsh, whom I played with for many years in both Kalessin and Antares Predator, has influenced and inspired much of what you hear on the Twilight of the Apocalypse album for sure. Mikal (Bass) and I have for many years been throwing recently discovered bands and music at each other because we like to cover new ground instead of getting stuck with a feeling everything was better 10 years ago. I believe the people you work with tend to inspire you the most at any time. That being said I find it very inspiring to play around with different guitars and different sounds as they tend to trigger ideas. A low tuned Les Paul will bring out something very different than a slim Ibanez of the 80's.
Prior to this album you released an EP called "Banquet Of Ashes". Two tracks (‘As Dragons Roam the Sky' and ‘Sacrament') were re-recorded for the debut album. ‘Erosion Of Eternity' and ‘Midnight Wolf' plus the outro were not re-recorded. Didn't they fit within the concept of this full length?
‘Erosion of Eternity' is actually a previous version of ‘Downfall' where Italian drummer Gionata Potenti (Handfull of Hate / Frostmoon Eclipse) wrote the lyrics, and did the drums and vocals. Midnight Wolf is a song that, even if it represents very much the essence of what Antares Predator is about, does not work with the current line-up. It is extremely slack and shabby and even if it is a low tempo song, it's perhaps the hardest of them all to get right. It is the kind of song you need a somewhat slack band to play, because that's the idea with this particular song. We realized the old demo version found on the Banquet EP, was far better and figured that song was best left behind in its shabby state where it belonged. Most people don't enjoy the groovy irony going on anyway, so it's best left for the history books. ‘Sacrament' almost suffered the same fate, not because it is hard, but it required a different approach than most of the other songs. ‘Sacrament' was supposed to be really doomy, with a monstrous choir, way too much reverb and echo, an extremely distorted bass, harsh and very atmospheric and dark. Most of our other songs are based on high precision and dry thrash riffs, and combining those two are not easy it turns out in terms of production with limited time. What I did like best with the new version of ‘Sacrament' is the vocals, which I think Steffan really nailed to the bone. The song worked perfectly in the end, but it might be the one that is farthest away from its intended sound. There was also a song called ‘Engl of War' that was intended to be on the twilight album, but it would require a baritone singer to make right, and the style of the song is too far away to fit the album anyway. This one is the oldest of them all, originally a Wolf327 song (Previous banner of Antares Predator until about 1999). We might complete it one day if the right voice shows up.
For this record you've signed with Australia's Battlegod Productions, who seem to have a more than decent global distribution network. Are you happy the way they handled the album regarding promotion and visibility in the international metal press?
So far Battlegod have exceeded our expectations by far. I think we all are a bit surprised by the quality of the relatively small labels promotion work. At our current state of development as a band this was exactly what we were looking for. For a while we were discussing releasing the album ourselves, but realized this was better left with somebody who knew their way around that part of this business. Most of the distribution is taken care of by Twilight Vertrieb in Germany which is a bigger distributor and they have all done a very good job so far.
The drums on this album were done by Jan Benkwitz (Belphegor, Sanctification). In the band pictures he isn't visible in the line-up. Was he merely hired on a session basis for the recordings of this album or will he be joining Antares Predator full-time?
He was hired for a session basis for this album. Still he made a significant impact on the end result, and in the future we are certainly open to the possibility of him becoming a permanent member of Antares Predator. He lives in Germany so it is not likely to see him as a part of a traditional rehearsal regime, but that is not necessary either with the current technological advances. It also depends a bit on the direction we will be moving musically in the future if Jan is the best choice for us.
"Twilight Of the Apocalypse" was recorded at Kohlekeller Studio with producer/engineer Kristian Bonifer (Agathodaimon, Crematory, Flowing Tears). The production is more than adequate, only the drums sound a bit impotent. Are you satisfied with how Bonifer has captured Antares Predator on tape?
I am very satisfied with the work Kristian did on the album in general. In my opinion the drums are not impotent, but I think they lack some dynamics and organic feel. Jan's ultra tight and machine like style combined with a very German industrial approach made the drums sometimes sound almost programmed. This works very good with some songs but not so good with others. We had all kinds of ideas regarding the particular sound of each song, but when you put them together on the album the overall sound soon end up as a compromise of them all in a way. Sometimes the result is better than planed and sometimes not. Ideally I would like to make the album sound as organic and atmospheric as possible, and the next time we will record with lower tuned guitars and more focus on a wide and powerful fundament. Given the opportunity I would have worked a bit more on the bass sound, and probably brought the symphonic and melodic elements more in the foreground to give the songs more definition. Like most bands we will probably never be 100% satisfied with the sound, but that part of the game when you have limited resources and time to make it all work.
Both Øyvind Winther (guitars) and Jan Benkwitz (drums) have been involved in big name bands in the industry, Keep Of Kalessin and Belphegor, respectively. Are there any lessons you learned while involved in these acts that help you elevate Antares Predator to a higher level compared to other young bands starting out?
I think that if you work with music for many years and take part in the production of a number of albums you tend to change the way you work because you know what you have to focus on and what is important to get the job done. Also you get a few contacts during the years, people that know their way around the business. Along the way there have been a great many lessons learned, but I don't think most of them help us significantly compared to other young bands starting out. What I have learned is that if you want to play metal for a living, you have to work your ass of and dedicate your whole life to the process and you need band mates with the same attitude. Quite a few people out there have the impression that bands like us actually make money from doing this, but I will be more than happy if we break even in the end. It also helps to have seen a fair share of bad contracts and deals to know what to stay away from of course, but in the end we are in the same boat as any new band besides the obvious selling points our former bands provide.
The music business in deep trouble, there's no doubt about that. Illegal downloading is killing smaller record stores and decent small labels are going bankrupt every single day. The sales of physical CD's is falling drastically each year and not only due to the recession of the last years. What's your opinion on all this, has Antares Predator or any of the other bands you all were involved in suffered the consequences from all these events?
This is a really tricky question. Nowadays you can make a decent sounding album for significantly less money than earlier, resulting in more bands actually recording and releasing albums. Digital distribution can help bands sell music directly without a label in between and you can promote your album on the internet. The result is less money involved for everyone, and more albums produced than ever before. This might be a good thing for the general consumer. Labels are definitely more careful to sign new bands now, because the lowered CD sales won't support the promotion cost to the same degree. You see labels like Earache that first of all ask how many hits you have on your MySpace page before even considering signing your band. We actually considered releasing the album for free on the internet just to save everybody time because the CD release itself doesn't really generate any money to speak of. The more known bands get their income from playing live, but I see lesser known bands paying themselves to go on tour. Still I'm not sure if this is a good or bad thing in general. The consequence for Antares Predator is that we continue in our own pace to create music because we enjoy the process with no ambitions of ever making this a significant source of income. Even if all of us enjoy playing live, seeing us financing a tour ourselves is extremely unlikely to happen. The only thing I am sure about is that streaming services like Spotify should have been out there a long time ago, because you really need a decent way of listening to a band before buying their music. Most people download illegally because it is so ridiculous easy, and a convenient way of checking out new albums.
Thanks for the interview! Good luck with all your future endeavours. I would like to extend my praise to you for a killer and menacing debut album. The last words are yours.
If anyone wants to contact us for any reason, give feedback or whatever; feel free to send a few lines to 666@antarespredator.com I recommend people to join the Out campaign outcampaign.org to unite atheists around the world, make a unified stand against religion and to promote skeptical and rational thinking. I also urge you to check out Steffans band Harm at www.myspace.com/harmmetal for some heavy duty thrash metal. Feel free to join the Antares Predator team at Seti@home (setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/) Thank you for the interview!
Info: www.battlegod-productions.com/
