A
lot has happened to the hugely talented and ballsy lead vocalist of
ALUNAH since I last interviewed Soph Day. ALUNAH have been signed to
NAPALM RECORDS who are about to release their stunning 3rd
album – Awakening The Forest – which is currently kicking up a
mini-tidal wave within the Doom/Stoner Metal community.
We
love it here at Sludgelord HQ as well. Hakan recently said this about
their brilliant new album:
“Having
always focused on nature and the mysteries that the old mother
emanates, Alunah has also brought in other inspirations. This time
around though, the band has really embraced Mother Nature and steered
their creative forces towards her. Tales of withcraft and magic are
still present which is only natural since especially witchcraft has
strong ties with nature.
What
can I say? Alunah is one of England's best bands and although it's
been a long wait - well, two years can be a long time for a fan and
everything is relative - for 'Awakening The Forest' to be released,
they are now dead set for greatness and the exposure they truly
deserve. They have a true gem in their hands and the sky is the limit
for them.”
Soph
has kindly agreed to do another interview with me. If you want to
hear how the band started please read my previous interview from Sept 2012. That will cover all the basics. This interview is about the new
album and other stuff going on with Alunah.
So
lets get started.
Q1
– Hi Soph. How are things with you all today.
I’m
good thanks, off on tour in a couple of days so really busy getting
last minute things sorted.
Q2
– It's been a very long time since we last spoke. So what have
you all been upto since Sept 2012 apart from recording the new album.
I’ve
gone through so much since then, a lot of lovely things have happened
such as our Napalm signing and our new bassist, and also some
horrible things such as the loss of my father, and grandparents. Last
year we toured Europe for the first time, and had the opportunity to
play with some of our favourite bands, as well as writing for our new
album for Napalm Records, so “White Hoarhound” had a very
positive effect and opened a lot of doors for us.
Q3
– We are here to discuss your excellent new album – Awakening The
Forest. Fantastic album. Can you tell our readers what the album is
all about.
Thank
you for your kind words. It’s not about one thing in particular, I
quite like listeners to be able to gather their own meanings but it’s
a positive album about death, rebirth, the power and beauty of
nature, and comes from a pagan perspective most of the time. The song
“Awakening the Forest” came before the album title, but I think
it sums up the overall vibe of the album perfectly. It was written
after a walk with my husband Dave and my dog Olive, we’d been to a
forest near us and it suddenly struck me in the middle of the forest
that this could be the last time I saw such beauty, I could die that
day, that week and I was none the wiser. It made me have a new
appreciation of sights, sounds and smells and everything appeared in
a new light.
It made me wonder what the last thing of beauty my dad
saw before he passed away, and because he had a terminal illness, did
he know when he saw it that it could be his last time? I went home
and wrote that song, and we decided a few weeks later to use it as
the album title. This is why the pagan/occult bandwagon that people
think we have jumped on, offends me somewhat. I’ve used certain
texts and beliefs to help me through a difficult time, and would
rather write about that than sex, drugs, booze, war, hatred or
whatever everyone else is writing about… don’t get me wrong, I
like some of those things hahaha but they just don’t inspire me to
write.
Q4
– Congrats on signing to Napalm Records. How did that come about.
One of the best labels currently out there.
Thanks,
yeah I agree, they’re one of the best and we’re honoured to be
part of their family. They received our last album and contacted us
about releasing it on vinyl which they did in January 2013, we spoke
again later in the year and they were interested in releasing our 3rd
album, it was as simple as that and we signed last December. They
have some great people working there, you ask them a question or ask
their advice on something and you get an answer almost immediately
which we like in Alunah, we’re a very efficient band hahaha. We
don’t get pushed to the back due to us being one of the lesser
known bands on the label, which we were concerned about. Everyone
gets their equal time.
Q5
– Did you have offers from any other labels to release your new
album. Or did Napalm make ALUNAH feel most wanted.
Secretly
we wanted Napalm, so when they contacted us about it we were really
happy. There were a couple of other labels that we may have
considered, but felt like Napalm had offered us the best deal and
could do the most for us.
Q6
– I have to say that Awakening The Forest is your best album yet.
It's darker and more spiritual compared to your previous albums. Did
you do anything different when recording this album compared to your
other albums.
We
wrote and recorded it in roughly the same time as “White
Hoarhound”, so there was nothing different in that respect but we
did spend a lot longer on the sound. I was using the writing process
to help me with my grief so the spiritual perspective probably comes
from that. I was searching for things to help me come to terms with
what had happened to my family, and the best way for me to do this
was to write lyrics. We always make sure the music compliments the
lyrics and vice versa, so the darkness was probably reflected in the
music. Between us we were also listening to a lot of dark and more
melancholic bands and artists such as Ahab, Rose Kemp, Hexvessel,
Esoteric, Jex Thoth, Dax Riggs and lots of dark blues. We also had a
new bassist in Dan, so he bought a new sound to the album.
Q7
– Looking back on your first two albums. Would you change anything
about them or leave them as they are.
There
are always things you want to do with an album, that you never have
time to do. You could spend 10 years recording an album swapping and
changing things but we prefer to write, record and release while it’s
still fresh for us. We need to enjoy playing it as much as people
enjoy listening to it. Overall, we’re happy with both of the
albums, they gave us the step up we needed to get to the next album.
We were pretty brutal with this album though, we scrapped a lot of
material and started the songs from scratch as we weren’t happy
with them.
Q8
– What is your fave track off the new album and why.
I
love singing and playing “Scourge and the Kiss” live the most;
but if it is purely to listen, my favourite is “Awakening the
Forest”. If I do say so myself I think it is just a beautifully
dark song, and the lyrics have helped me on a personal level just
like the “White Hoarhound” lyrics did on the last album.
Q9
– Will you be doing more UK/European Tours for this album. Please
say you will come upto Newcastle Upon Tyne at one point. But that's
me being very selfish. HA HA.
We
would definitely like to yes, it just depends on whether we get the
offers haha. We have confirmed some great gigs already for next year,
both in England and abroad, but we will make a special note for
Newcastle. We played there years back, and had a blast.
Q10
– I feel on your new album you now have your own style of music
that goes across a lot of different genres but with a heavy
progressive feel. How would you describe your own music.
When
Napalm heard it for the first time their response was that it was
“darker and heavier, with a progressive feel” and yeah I think
that is a good description. “Beautifully dark” would probably be
mine.
Q11
– Has the early reviews to your albums surprised you in anyway. As
I have seen some brilliant reviews for the album already.
I
always get massive album review nerves around this time, I try to
tell myself that I don’t care what other people think, but deep
down I think we all care. I haven’t read any negative reviews so
far which is lovely, there have been elements in certain reviews that
aren’t wonderful, but overall people have liked it. We’ve been
compared to everyone from Adele and Jex Thoth to The Obsessed and
Santana, so a real mixed bag. I think we’re doing something quite
different to everyone else, yeah the music may not be re-writing any
music books but couple it with the vocal style and you have something
new.
Some of our reviews have criticised us for not swaying far from
the doom scene, but if we had have done that, we would have been
criticised for not writing a doom album. Some say we’re original,
some say we’re not. You can’t win, so we concentrate on making
sure that our fans enjoy it, we enjoy playing it and the label are
happy. If the press pick up on it also, that’s a massive bonus. Our
amazing press ladies at Napalm do a great job in getting us reviews
and interviews, and this upcoming tour is going to be the busiest yet
for us, in terms of press.
Q12
– Apart from Alunah – you have your record label – Catacomb
Records – which has released two excellent albums so far- General's
– Where Are Your God's Now and Gringo's – The Cold Burn. How is
that label going. Any further releases from that in the future.
We
also released our debut album “Call of Avernus”, and the sole
reason for the label was to help Alunah back when no one was
interested in us. Since then we have helped our friend’s bands
release their debut albums, and those two albums you mention there
are up there with my favourite albums, they’re massively
underrated. Clutch loved General enough to take them out on tour last
year though. We don’t have anything planned at the moment as we’re
so busy with Alunah, it wouldn’t be fair on the bands to do it
half-arsed, it hasn’t closed down though, just having a rest.
Q13
– How does running the label impact your time with Alunah and also
your personal life. It must take a lot of time as I know your other
passion in your life is your lovely dog Olive.
Yeah
it can take up all of your time, and when you have full time jobs, a
busy band and an energetic dog to look after, it can get pretty
crazy. Olive keeps me sane though.
Q14
– Awakening The Forest – is your first album with Dan on Bass.
What has Dan brought to Alunah's overall sound and how well is he
fitting in.
It
feels like we’ve known Dan forever, he’s been a perfect fit with
the band. We’re quite a smutty lot; we love our dirty jokes and
love taking the piss out of each other which I’m sure most bands
do. From the off, Dan fitted right in! Our previous bassists were
primarily guitarists, whereas Dan has always played bass, so he has a
completely different playing style. He also has a cleaner bass sound
than we have had before, so the bass lines cut through more.
Q15
– The UK Sludge/Doom/Stoner Metal scene is currently over the last
few years. What have you noticed over the last few years or so. Can
you see this trend continuing or do you think the bubble will burst
at one point.
It
seems like there are a lot more promoters and independent record
labels cropping up, which would have been most helpful when we
started. Catacomb Records was started for this very reason, no one
locally was putting on gigs we fit in with, and smaller labels were
few and far between. When you have a boom like this, you have a lot
of bands playing similar music, and people criticising them for
jumping on certain bandwagons but if they’re enjoying it, leave
them be. We’ve been criticised for copying certain bands that
started AFTER we did, it kind of bothers me but misinformation is the
spice of the internet isn’t it? I don’t know if the bubble will
burst, I hope it won’t as it’s lovely to see so many bands out
there doing what they enjoy. I don’t like the jealousy, bitchiness
and attention grabbing that I’ve seen over the past year or so
within the “scene”; it only seems to be coming from certain band
members though. We had some directed at us after the Napalm signing,
thankfully most bands we come across are lovely humans.
Q16
– What is your musical setup when playing live or recording new
material. Do you have an advanced setup or basic setup.
I
suppose it depends on what people think is advanced or basic haha. We
had more equipment at our disposal when we recorded due to our
producer Greg Chandler letting us play through some of his Esoteric
amps and pedals, and Fen who were also recording at the time, very
kindly lending us theirs. So on some of the tracks we have layers of
guitars played through different pedals and amps to get different
tones. Live, we’re a bit more basic. I play a Washburn P2 guitar
through a Mini Big Muff pedal straight into a Sound City 120 valve
amp, Dave plays a Gibson SG Standard through
a Russian Big Muff pedal for his main rhythm tone, and also uses a
MXR
MC404 Custom Audio Wah and a Tubescreamer Clone for solos. We both
use a delay pedal for clean parts, and I also use a phaser. He plays
through a Matamp GT120 valve amp, and will also be running through a
Sound City 120 on this tour. Dan plays clean mainly, but uses a Big
Muff and Mole for certain parts. Our sound guy Mez also aims to
recreate our album sound as close as possible live.
Q17
– What are your verdicts on the crowd-funding scene going on within
the Hard Rock/Metal scene. Are you fans of this medium and would
ALUNAH ever go down this route.
It’s
not something I would put money into, especially what happened with
ALT Fest, nor would I particularly want to go down that route for
Alunah. I’ve seen it go wrong for people, but also propel careers.
We’ve always clubbed our money together to do things with the band,
and have put a lot into it, so I would hope that this would continue
with or without label support. However, it’s a great thing for
helping creativity along.
Q18
– Last question Soph. Promise - Last thing before you go, Do you
have anything else to say to your fans. Can you also tell us what’s
on your personal playlist this month?
Huge
thanks to everyone for sticking by us, and to the new fans for taking
time to have a listen to us. We have our album launch party this
week, and a lot of the people who are going were also there at the
same venue two years ago at our White Hoarhound launch, so it’s
great to have that support. This month I’ve mainly been listening
to Hexvessel “No Holier Temple”, Blues Pills ST, Opeth “Pale
Communion”, and Orne “The Tree of Life”.
Well
Soph thanks for doing this interview. All the best for your new
album as it's a brilliant album which we do freaking love here.
Thanks
to Mona at Napalm Records for arranging this interview. Awakening The
Forest will be available to buy from Napalm Records from October 3rd 2014.
For
more information
Written by Steve Howe
