Hi all.
Here is my first interview for Sludgelord. Probably one of many soon coming up. Make blog a little bit different from reviews and free stuff. First subject is Viez from brilliant Romanian Sludge Metal Band Mediocracy.
Thanks to Viez for answering my pitiful attempt at questioning. I promise they will get better as times goes on. Anyway without further ado. Enjoy reading them.
Q1 – How did the band get together and can you describe the style of music you play.
Hey!Thanx for having us here!Well the band formed after almost 4 years of struggles,when I was trying to put up a band that would play crust punk or at least something related.This only became real after I met Radu and Costin and after a few more changes we had a steady line-up in the summer of 2010. From then on we never stopped!
Well I don’t really know anymore how can I call our style…initially I wanted a hardcore/crust/punk band,but since the guys I play with are more into metal,the band became something a bit different with a lot of other influences.I starded calling it just punk/metal because I think it’s closest to what we sound like.
Q2 – How has the reaction been like to your music national/international
The reactions where mostly good all over.Everywhere we’ve went,we have met people happy that they saw us and really enjoyed our music and message.
The reactions where mostly good all over.Everywhere we’ve went,we have met people happy that they saw us and really enjoyed our music and message.
Q3 – Which bands influenced you as I can detect a whole range of bands.
Well I can only speak for myself and name bands like From Ashes Rise, Tragedy,Disfear, Wolfbrigade, Ekkaia,Ictus and so on…but also Entombed,DarkThrone,Slayer,At the Gates etc.We all listen to very
different stuff and it comes out nicely when we write songs together.
Q4 – Do you find getting gigs hard in your town, city or country
In our country no.At least we can say this much,especially in Bucharest,we have no problem getting shows.There are enough venues for this so anytime is good.It’s harder to get shows outside of Romania I guess…
Q5 – You have toured with some great bands. Who are your fave bands to tour with.
Well we’ve only toured with the guys from The Arson Project in december 2010.The second tour we did alone. So I can’t say about others haha. The guys we’re great and we had a lot of fun.Really hope we can do another one some time!
Q6 – Is the band your full-time job or do you have other jobs. If so how does this impact
on family life and social life
Haha! I don’t think it could ever be a full time job.We don’t exactly play a style of music that could support 5 people and I don’t think ths was what we were aiming for…We all have jobs,school an so on but we find the time for the band also.There are times when we don’t have enough time to
do everything…band,job,school etc…but we try to make it work as much as we can.
Q7 – You give your music away for free which I really think is great. But some bands are against downloading free stuff from the web. What is your view.
My view is that it will end up there sooner or later anyway so why slow down the process haha!But yeah,I don’t mind our music being free on the internet because my first wish is for it to travel as much as possible and probably reach places that we will never reach.I wanted to share our music with the rest of the world so more people would pay attention to our scene aswell.
Q8 – Do you make money from selling merchandise because of this. As its a known fact people who usually download stuff usually goto the bands website to buy merchandise. I do it all the time. (I mean merchandise).
I don’t know what you understand by making money.Yes we sell a lot of merchandise but the money we make from it goes back into the band..paying for gas or rehearsal space rent and so on. We don’t have an online shop and mailing the mech is a bit harder for us because we have to do it ourselves and man do I hate the post office!!! We never make too much merch as we can’t afford too much but we do our best to make enough for everyone who is interested.
Q9 – What is your stance on Record Companies clamping down on blogs and files-haring websites.
I fucking hate that!That is the first place I go to when I want to listen to a new band or any for that matter.I don’t know what they imagine will happen…record sales going through the roof?
I for one can’t really afford to buy records all the time,even though I do have a pretty nice record collection,but it’s mostly favorite bands that I could find on distros in tours or other concerts.Plus I don’t trust the post office because of past experiences to those sites are my only option.It actually feels like a fucking Inquisition because it’s not just the music..
Q10 – Have you had Record Label interest in signing you guys. As I think you should be signed as your music is brilliant and should be heard as many people as possible.
My view is that it will end up there sooner or later anyway so why slow down the process haha!But yeah,I don’t mind our music being free on the internet because my first wish is for it to travel as much as possible and probably reach places that we will never reach.I wanted to share our music with the rest of the world so more people would pay attention to our scene aswell.
Q8 – Do you make money from selling merchandise because of this. As its a known fact people who usually download stuff usually goto the bands website to buy merchandise. I do it all the time. (I mean merchandise).
I don’t know what you understand by making money.Yes we sell a lot of merchandise but the money we make from it goes back into the band..paying for gas or rehearsal space rent and so on. We don’t have an online shop and mailing the mech is a bit harder for us because we have to do it ourselves and man do I hate the post office!!! We never make too much merch as we can’t afford too much but we do our best to make enough for everyone who is interested.
Q9 – What is your stance on Record Companies clamping down on blogs and files-haring websites.
I fucking hate that!That is the first place I go to when I want to listen to a new band or any for that matter.I don’t know what they imagine will happen…record sales going through the roof?
I for one can’t really afford to buy records all the time,even though I do have a pretty nice record collection,but it’s mostly favorite bands that I could find on distros in tours or other concerts.Plus I don’t trust the post office because of past experiences to those sites are my only option.It actually feels like a fucking Inquisition because it’s not just the music..
Q10 – Have you had Record Label interest in signing you guys. As I think you should be signed as your music is brilliant and should be heard as many people as possible.
Nope. No record labels so far.I have spent a few moths last witer mailing a lot of labels asking is they would be intrrested in our next release and not one would do it…so we gave up looking and released our ep ourselves…with the help of 2 netlabels from Bucharest,Asiluum and Metalfan Records Division.
Q11 – Have you got plans to gig in other countries (ie like my country the UK. Would love to see you guys live) for your May 2012 European Tour.
We have plans to gig in a lot of places but sadly it can’t always happen.We haven’t thought about the UK yet because it would cost us very much and going there by ourselves I don’t know if we can cover thelosses…it would be great some day though.The plan for the May tour was to hit Hungary ,Austria, Czech Republic, Slovakia Germany and France. But the booking isn’t going too well so I have my doubt it will happen this May. If not we will reschedule it for some other time,probably in the fall…we’ll see..
Q12 -Why the name Mediocracy. Are you making a statement on certain things or the way you feel with the world.
“Mediocracy” is what I think about when It comes to Romania.So as this being the place I live and grew up in,it’s the most familiar so I know what I’m talking about.Everyone is happy with their mediocre lives and their mediocre goals in life and follow mediocre idols and so one.
All of this became our whole society…and the sad thing is that this doesn’t reffer only to Romania…it’s a worldwide status and I understand people are not making the best of themselves,but comply in a mediocre life.
Granted the Eastern Europe is like this because of 40 years of bolshevik dictatorship and it’s harder to recover,but what is the rest of the world’s excuse?
Q13 – We at Sludgelord are massive fans for your music. Have you received any more international press because of your music.
Yes I saw a lot of websites all over Europe and not only…took an interest and write some news about us,did reviews or interviews and I am really happy about that.Hopefully more bands from our scene,be they metal or punk or whatever,will have more attention from people outside of Romania. And hopefully it will become easier for us aswell to tour and everything else…if more people know about our band.So Thank you very much for your support man !It means a lot!
Q13 – We at Sludgelord are massive fans for your music. Have you received any more international press because of your music.
Yes I saw a lot of websites all over Europe and not only…took an interest and write some news about us,did reviews or interviews and I am really happy about that.Hopefully more bands from our scene,be they metal or punk or whatever,will have more attention from people outside of Romania. And hopefully it will become easier for us aswell to tour and everything else…if more people know about our band.So Thank you very much for your support man !It means a lot!
Q14 – What are your plans for the future. Any more full-length releases in the future.
We have an idea for our next full-length but we want that to be something much Bigger in..every way actually.I don’t want to say too much because I don’t know when or if it will happen yet but we will do our best to make a great record.Until then we have some splits planned so keep your eyes and ears on this band because something new might always come up!
Well Thanks for taking the time out to answer the questions. Great luck for the future and your May 2012 European Tour.
Thank you so much for your interest on our band and all your support !Hopefully we will make the tour this May,if not,some other time, but it will happen nonetheless! All the best! Cheers!
Have an excellent day.
And cfheck them below.
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