Asphyx is a legendary band and their craft of classic death metal is unique and exceptional. When I learned about their scheduled concert in Thessaloniki, I got overly excited and I am not ashamed to admit it. They are after all an impressive live band. Anyone who enjoys death metal should give him/herself the opportunity to have this experience on the 26th of March.
I had a chat with them and we discussed their plans for 2016, the up and coming album, touring, concerts, death metal and the current underground scene. They absolutely love and endorse the underground scene and their fans, which is always flattering when it comes from musicians that played and still play an important role in metal music. Please, do read, preferably while listening to the DEATHHAMMER.
Information about the concert HERE
Rock Overdose: Hello guys. I hope everything is ok. I think you are in the process of completing your next album. Would you like to share with us any news regarding the album, if there are any, and what are we to expect from Asphyx in 2016? From what I’ve seen, you only have a few shows planned in the coming months. Is this part of a larger tour that is to be announced?
Asphyx: Everything fine here, thank you Bill. Hope everything is good in Greece and with you as well. Yes, we are right in the middle of that process. We only need one or two more new tracks and I'm completing the lyrics as we do this interview. The news with us is of course that Husky's (Tormentor, the drummer from Desaster) is in his first recording session with Asphyx, after Bob decided that his family needed him more than Asphyx. Husk is with us for a while now, playing lots of shows and it is going superb. Of course he has his own style, as every musician has, but his battering fits perfectly with our sound. Next to that, he is a very dedicated metal-brother. The rest will be typical Asphyx; brutal, filthy and loud, the usual mix of death and doom. Our fans can count on us, metalwise, as we will never change. We don't want to. And, I've said it before, if we like our songs, then our fans will certainly like them too.
A few months ago we did quite an exhausting 10 day tour, all over Latin and Central America, which was bloody fantastic and this year we want to focus on the coming album. It doesn't make much sense to play a lot of shows before you bring that out, even though “The Rack” has its 25th anniversary this year. So once the album is out, I'm sure there will be extensive live performances from us. It may be a tour or just a lot of shows on weekends, since the boys have their jobs. We are, after all, a live band.
Rock Overdose: Your music gives away a concert feeling. It feels so alive and massive. Would you say that you are a live band and that seeing Asphyx at a concert brings someone much closer to the music?
Asphyx: Thank you for those words. I consider this a big compliment. Yes, as I mentioned above, we are a live band. Metal is and always has been about live music. For me, personally, being on stage is the best and most wonderful experience a human being can have. No existing drug can give you that same feeling. We bang our heads off; the metal is very loud; we have a good time with the crowd; interacting and drinking with them and they always feel we are there with them because we are still like them. We are metalheads, blessed to be able to perform and have a very dedicated and fanatic audience wherever we play. We are close to them and they can get close to us. It's hard to try and catch all those emotions on an album. And even if we would try and fail to do so, it would still sound better live.
Rock Overdose: Which songs do you really enjoy playing live? Will you play songs even from your legendary demo “Crush The Cenopath”, from every album, or focus on your latest releases?
Asphyx: We enjoy every song, from the demo days, till the very new ones. The only problem is that we can't play them all in a set of 1,5 or 2 hours. Unfortunately! The worst is at festivals, where you get only 50 minutes of playing time. We always try to make a solid mix of older and later tracks, but 50 or 60 minutes, for a band like us, is just too short.
Perhaps we should perform three days in a row in some great venue somewhere central, in Europe and then play a different set every night, haha! I'd love to play old stuff like The Krusher, Rite of Shades, Pages in Blood etc. But I’d also go berserk on doing tracks like Reign of the Brute, Magma Mammoth, Bloodswamp or Asphyx II. We are a band that is capable of playing every song from our repertoire live. So every now and then we surprise people by doing something completely unexpected.
Rock Overdose: Officially, your first full length is “The Rack”, but “Embrace The Death” was recorded before that and it was finally released in 1996. What was the story that led to this delay?
Asphyx: That's right. To be honest, that was all before my time in the band. I can recall only two possible reasons from the stories I’ve heard back in those days. I think the tape of the recordings got lost, or the label at that time no longer existed and thus there were no finances to release the album. So, later Century Media decided to bring it out, after talking to and getting permission from the band. There were some people that really wanted to add that album to their collection. That's a bit of the story behind it.
Rock Overdose: You are one of the pioneering bands in the classic death metal sound. When was it that you knew with absolute certainty that you found the sound of Asphyx, the sound that would be your trademark? Did you know that you were up to something and that it would end up being a very distinct and influential sound?
Asphyx: I think, back in the days, it was the combination of Eric's guitar sound and my vocals that defined the specific Asphyx sound the most. But it was also Bob's unique drumming style. In his own words, he may not be the best percussionist in the world, and he doesn't want to be, but he sure is recognizable. And lastly, we do play very loud. There are people that can't stay in our rehearsal room because the wall of noise makes their ears bleed. And that's Asphyx too. Savage! haha! But we knew that when we were rehearsing for The Rack. We knew we were different, louder, and simpler in our compositions and approach. And Eric had this way of tearing his strings apart. Of course we were not so aware at that time that it would be a kind of a trademark for us, but we had a feeling we were doing something others weren't doing.
Nowadays, we are very aware of that and cherish our sound. When Paul joined Asphyx in 2007, the first think he did was to blow us away, me and Bob, in the practice-room with that distinctive sound, which was sacred to us. So, right then and there we knew we found the man. And Paul continued to become more and more a part of Asphyx and now his riffings and sound are the fundament of the band. After all, he wrote all the music on “Death… The Brutal Way” and “Deathhammer”. The Asphyx fans totally celebrated the albums, which was the biggest compliment we could get. I was very much influenced by bands like Venom and Motorhead. If we influenced others with our sound just as positively as the two mentioned above did with me, then we can be very proud of that. And grateful too! And we are!
Rock Overdose: I would definitely place “Death…the brutal way” amongst the best of Asphyx and amongst the best death metal albums for 2000-2010. Which album of yours do you consider your most complete work?
Asphyx: “Deathhammer”, until now that is, as the new one isn't finished yet. But it's all a very close call, since I love 'em all. Just not that much with the “Crush The Cenotaph” EP. The production sucked big time. It was too slick for us. Songwise, of course I do like it. But, cheers again!
Rock Overdose: You accompany every song with lyrics about torture, war, the occult and death (obviously). Could we say that these lyrical themes are a natural expression for your music? I mean, it is death metal, right? A gore horror movie will have a soundtrack that suits the atmosphere and not a pop song. What are the lyrics of “Deathhammer” about?
Asphyx: You got that right indeed. And, as we also have our doom tracks, apocalyptic topics are required too. Death metal is not about the birds and the bees, and if so, then it will be about vultures and killer bees. There's plenty of inspiration to find in mankind's history. It is a well that will never dry out. The lyrics have to fit to each specific song. A doom track should have misery in it. Or a powerful track can visualize blunt aggression, or a force to be reckoned with. And Death is always present. Just look around you, new diseases, catastrophes etc. They feed my output. At times I like to be a bit cynical or sarcastic too, since Asphyx is a band that laughs a lot. We have a good time wherever we are. And don't we all love the gory parts in the movies? We cheer, we roar, we laugh when bowels fly and skulls crack. So some humor here and there is essential I guess.
Do you mean the entire album or just the song Deathhammer? (ed. I did mean the song) I hope the latter or else it's going to be a long one here! Deathhammer is about a fictional manual on how death metal really should be made. It is a book with our rules and we show one how it’s been done. The thing is, I noticed that there were, and still are, a lot of bands with a shitty attitude, playing terrible, awful metal and not even showing people that they are enjoying themselves. It seems they are on stage just to collect their money afterwards. They are an insult to any metalhead, in my opinion. So one evening I wrote a few words down and in a couple of minutes I had it on paper. The boys liked it, they knew what I meant with it and they thought it would be cool to use it. It's also an ode to the early years, when we were all a big global death metal family supporting one another. Fortunately, there are a lot of new coming bands nowadays that have that same spirit I recognize. A fresh wind starts to blow and thus they understand what Deathhammer is all about. Haha!
Rock Overdose: Do you follow the current death metal scene? Are there any bands from the underground scene of the Netherlands, or globally, that you enjoy and would like to recommend? What is on your playlist these days?
Asphyx: Of course I do! Thanks for giving me this opportunity. From The Netherlands we have, to name a few, Bodyfarm, Funeral Whore, Entrapment or Nailgun Massacre. Globally, uff… there's so much I listen to, but right now the bands I play the most are Outre Tombe from Canada, Beton from Slovakia and of course, Malignant Tumour from The Czech Republic. But there are tons of great and dedicated bands coming up all over the world. Necrovorous from your own country is a fine example. Putrid Yell from Chile. Bloodfiend from Argentina. Grond from Russia. Or the good old Graveyard, the one and only, from Barcelona.
I try to keep up, which is tough, but it pleases me to see old school death metal being on the rise everywhere in the world today. I wish I could mention all of those bands I met, saw and listened to and had a good time with, as they all deserve it. Maybe next time I'll have an extra page attached with all of them on it.
Rock Overdose: Thank you so much for this interview. We are looking forward in seeing you performing here in Thessaloniki.
Asphyx: Thank you too Bill. Asphyx is really looking forward to come back to Greece. A country that has always treated us very, very kind and has some of the most insane and dedicated deathsters with whom we would once again, love to have an Ouzo with.
For Rock Overdose,
Bill Xenopoulos
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