Graveyard
Wywiad przeprowadził - Wouter Roemers
The Spaniards of Graveyard have only released an EP and full length to date, but are well underway making a name for itself in the underground scene. Unlike many other Spanish bands Graveyard is far more traditional in its sound. Inspired by scene monuments such as Bolt Thrower, Death, Incantation and the classic Swedish fiends their debut album "One With the Dead" is an album that will appeal to fans of older forms of death metal. Talking at length with Masterful Magazine is guitarist Javi Bastard.
Hello! Thanks for doing this interview with us. Your new album is out for a little while now, and I must say, it is absolutely monolithic! I guess you are knee-deep into promoting this new album in the metal press. Is BlackSeed Productions setting you up with a lot of promotion work, interviews and such?
Hell-o!. Javi Bastard here... Thanks a lot for your kind words, yeah, "monolithic" sounds really appropriate to me!. When it comes to press and promotion, both the label and the band have worked together in order to deal with it. I mean, of course the label must promote the band and the album, but you can't leave the whole thing to them, you have to work hard as well. And I think one of the secrets in Graveyard is that the guys in the band have also spent a lot of time and dedication in the promotional issues. If you just leave it to the label, it's not going to work, unless you're with Nuclear Blast or some other big label, you know...
Since this is your first interview for Masterful Magazine, could you briefly introduce the band and its members? A short history, so to speak, to get our readers up to speed with Graveyard.
No big secret here. We're a bunch of metalheads that drink beer and play death metal. Graveyard started back in 2001 or so but it didn't take form until 2007 when we found a drummer and recorded our demo "Into the Mausoleum". As soon as it was recorded, we spread it everywhere and BlackSeed Productions offered us a deal so it was released as an MCD (and vinyl few months after). Graveyard was planned as a side-project initially, but due to the good feedback we received from the underground, we decided to bring the band to a more serious level, find a second guitar player, rehearse, arrange shows... And here we are almost 3 years after, with the same passion, dedication and love for that shit.
The preceding EP "Into the Mausoleum" had you going for a more traditional US death metal approach, in the vein of "Onward to Golgotha" era Incantation, "Ritual Of Infinity" era Morpheus Descends and (early) Immolation. This new record embraces the band's love for Stockholm death metal fully. From the band pictures it's clear you are fans of bands such as Carnage, Dismember, Necrophobic and Unleashed. I guess it was only natural to evolve to a more Swedish sound, no?
Mmmm, I don't agree with you at all. Being part of the writing process, I can tell you that we wrote the songs on "Into the Mausoleum" and "One with the Dead" in exactly the same way, same people, same influences around... The only big difference is the sound. "Into the Mausoleum" had a pretty raw production, actually it was written, rehearsed and recorded in one day and a half with a cheap sound equipment. For "One with the Dead", on the other hand, we spent months rehearsing the songs and we recorded it in 5 days (+2 weeks for the mix) on a professional studio. The guitar and drum sound is quite different on both releases so it makes the sound quite different, of course ("One with the Dead" sounding a little bit more Swedish when it comes to guitar distortion...). But anyway, for me, the only big difference between both albums is the sound.
On both the previously mentioned EP and the new full length you re-instate the feeling of darkness, hatefulness and dread in a classic death metal package. Is this a counter reaction to today climate of sterile and technical sounding records, who don't quite harness the same oppressive atmosphere that the earlier death metal records had in years past?
No, because we don't really care about current modern death metal bands. I mean, we're all on our 30's (except for our drummer, who is 24) so we grew up with classic death metal bands. I mean, when I started listening to death metal more than 15 years ago, it was all about Morbid Angel, Carcass, Entombed, Pestilence, Morgoth, Obituary, Bolt Thrower... And to me it is still the same right now. I tried in the past to listen to some brutal death or modern death metal and it didn't work, sorry. I think it's the same with the other guys in the band. Julkarn and SBE are 35, too old for your new modern death metal type of band... For me, death metal should be heavy as fuck, brutal (which doesn't necessarily mean "fast"), atmospheric and evil. If the "evil" thing is not there, you can't label yourself death metal, that's a fact. [I agree, death metal has lost too much of its atmosphere, ed] I'm so fucking close minded when it comes to metal music... I listen to the SAME hard rock, heavy, thrash, doom, death and black metal that I used to listen to 15 years ago. Of course, there are new bands, and some of them are pretty cool, but when it comes to styles, it's all about the same shit as 15 or 20 years ago... Remember, we're a bunch of outdated bonehead idiots!
The album was mastered by acclaimed Swedish music producer, multi-instrumentalist and one-man metal industry Dan Swanö at his Unisound Studio in Örebro, Sweden. Besides that he had a hand in any number of extreme metal classics, what made you choose him specifically and how was it working with a man of his stature and experience?
Dan Swanö only mastered the album, we did the whole mix on my own Moontower Studios in Barcelona. We worked with him first of all because of his past works and also because of the friendship I have with him, I mean, we needed someone for the mastering who really understands what Graveyard is all about. Dan is a fucking legend, he has been part of the movement since day number one. If he doesn't know how death metal sounds, who knows?
With song titles like 'Riding A Pale Horse', 'Carven Epitaph', 'Walking Horrors Of the Undead', lyrically, you aren't dealing with stereotypical death metal subjects either. It all sounds very dark and horror inspired. It made think of The Blind Dead trilogy by Spanish horror director Amando de Ossorio. Tell us about the lyrics and how they relate to the central concept of "One With the Dead".
"One with the Dead" is a compilation of thoughts about the dead, death and other related issues. For us, lyrics are a only a part instead of being the main point on the whole thing. I mean, on our album we have guitars, drum patterns, bass lines, grunts... And lyrics (as it happens in some other death metal bands...). Lyrics are another "instrument" if you get my point. If I wanted to express something really deep and personal, I would write a book, not scream the lyrics growling in a way that you cannot understand a fucking single word. For me, lyrics have to fit with the music, that's all. When I hear our songs, only creepy / horror / dark stuff comes to my mind.
"One With the Dead" once again comes with elaborate handdrawn artwork by tattoo artist Roberto Fernández Giordano, with whom you also work on the preceding EP. Is he a personal friend and supporter of the band, that you work with him so closely?
Yeah, Roberto was the owner of the garage where we recorded "Into the Mausoleum". He's a death metal devotee of the ancient bands. Nowadays he's a little bit "out" of the scene (married with kids, you know...), actually I think he bought his last death metal album back in 97 or so! He's a close friend of the band and has come to some of our shows (and after-show parties, he used to be a wild party-animal, haha!). We have done 3 covers with him (MCD, LP and 1 split with Deathevokation). I don't know what will happen in the future, I would like to work with him again but maybe we will look for another cover artist, we have seen some very good works out there...
This album is your second effort for Spanish label BlackSeed Productions, who seem to building a strong catalogue of underground death – and black metal. How did you hook up with BlackSeed Productions, were there any other labels interested and what made you sign with them in the end? Are you happy the way BlackSeed Productions has been pushing and promoting its bands and releases so far?
BlackSeed Productions was the first one who came to us and we signed with them immediately. We had a close friendship with them previous to Graveyard and that was more than enough for us. Remember that Graveyard initially was kind of a side-project instead of a "serious" band so we were happy with the idea of having a label releasing "Into the Mausoleum". After its release, some other labels offered us a deal for our full length. Some of those labels were "bigger" than BlackSeed, but 
we preferred to stay with them as a symbol of gratitude for the opportunity they gave to us by releasing "Into the Mausoleum". For "One with the Dead", BlackSeed Productions has done an amazing job, quite unusual in a small label. I mean, I know some other bands in labels ten times bigger that never got the help and support that BlackSeed has given to us.
On the EP you covered cuts from Bolt Thrower and Death, for this album you cut a cover of Candlemass' doom hymn 'A Tale Of Creation'. Is this to remind younger listeners of the more classic sound of the death – and doom metal genre of old?
As you have said, we did covers of Death and Bolt Thrower (both death metal bands) in the past so we wanted something "different" this time, something outside of the death metal genre. We took the Candlemass song because all of us are Candlemass die-hard fans. 'A Tale of Creation' is a rather obscure song on Candlemass' back catalogue so we preferred to cover that song better than the more classic 'Solitude' or 'Well of Souls'. Mr Swanö joined on clean vocals and it gave the song a whole fucking new amazing vibe! Now we're working on some covers from Celtic Frost and Motörhead for upcoming releases...
Spain isn't exactly a country running amass with death metal. I guess everybody will recognize bands such as legendary veterans Avulsed, its studio side-project Christ Denied, Holocausto Caníbal, Machetazo and Uncreation. Then there's more recent bands such as Cerebral Effusion, Dying, Gruesome Stuff Relish, Human Mincer, Looking For An Answer and Unreal Overflows. Is there much of an old school oriented scene in Spain and Catalonia, in your opinion?
Spain has always had a strong tradition when it comes to brutal death metal, grindcore and crust. Of course we know and respect most of those bands you mention but referring to styles, I think Graveyard is quite far from all those bands, I mean, we get our influences basically from the death metal period from 87 to 93 and we have nothing to do with brutal death, groove, blastbeats, -core influences or grind. To be honest, besides Graveyard, you don't have more than 5 or 6 other bands that doesn't sound like us in Spain, but at least have some old school/classic death metal influences. Now Spain is quite popular for his crust/grind/death bands like Machetazo, Haemorrhage, Looking For An Answer, Banished From Inferno, Dishammer or Nashgul. And I'm fucking proud of it because I respect these of bands one thousand times more than your average mega brutal gore grind death metal band... Those bands never had the feeling! Closer to us, in Spain you have Unconsecrated, Ataraxy, Morbid Flesh, Domains and a few more.
What would you say are the primary challenges, trials and tribulations that extreme metal bands face in Spain, in trying to get known and established beyond the country's borders?
Spain always has had to face 3 big problems: professionalism, English language and originality. Most of the bands here only exist to do some small shows, bring friends around, drink free beer and date over sluts who like to be "girlfriends" of some particular guy... That kind of shit. Then, knowledge of the English language here is almost inexistent, unfortunately. It makes it impossible for some bands to spread their stuff outside Spain's borders. Last but not least, Spain never was a place where bands tried to create something "new". I mean, due to our inferiority complex (things from outside are always "better"; typical way of thinking for Spaniards...), bands here were always copycats. I mean, just take a look at every country; All of them develop a particular "sound" or there's an important band that created something "new". It didn't happen in Spain in the past. In Graveyard, we don't try to make something new and original, no! But we don't want to. We don't claim to be original, we know that our formula has been used many times before. That's ok. We just want to play death metal the classic way, the way it was meant to be with good riffs, good songs and good atmosphere.
Death metal and grindcore are no longer the same genre they were back in the early days of Avulsed, Bolt Thrower, Cannibal Corpse, Death, Incantation, Monstrosity and Suffocation. The scene has been overrun by one-man projects that often leave a lot to be desired, conceptually as well as musically. What's your opinion on how the genre has changed over the years?
We focus basically on the death metal bands that we started listening to a lot of years ago. I honestly don't care about how death metal has changed over the years. Now you have a lot of "surnames", groovy death metal, deathcore... Ok, we kind of respect it, but we don't feel as in the same league as those bands. We come from Rainbow, Thin Lizzy, Motörhead and Saxon, not hardcore music or nu-metal. death metal, as all other metal-related styles, will always be in constant motion, but we stay loyal to the roots of the style. The same happens with heavy metal for example; Now you have some bands getting heavy metal to a new level. Ok. I will continue listening to the same Running Wild or Tank outdated albums forever and ever... I think I'm too old to understand some new things.
I take it you will be doing lots of single gigs, numerous festival appearances, etc to promote this new record. Is BlackSeed Productions helping you in any way with that inside and outside of the Spanish market?
BlackSeed arranged one amazing show in Madrid few months ago with GRAVEYARD, DECAYED and DISHAMMER. Besides that (and our appearance on the Portuguese Barroselas Fest 2008), we have always looked for shows ourselves. On the past we did shows with ASPHYX, NECROS CHRISTOS, NOMINON, TORMENTED, KAAMOS, HAIL OF BULLETS, LIE IN RUINS, MACHETAZO, AVULSED, PROCLAMATION, ARTILLERY... Now we've returned from a Swedish tour with our brothers in NOMINON which has been the highlight of our not that large career! Now GRAVEYARD will rest for a while because we need some time to start working on some new material. We will not do more live shows until late 2010 or so...
Alright, that's about it. Thanks a lot for talking to us. If there's anything I've forgot to mention, here's the space!
Thank you so much! Keep an eye on our upcoming releases (2 Splits / 1 EP / 1 live official bootleg), until we record our next full length after summer which will be released in early 2011 I guess, death on!
Info/booking: www.blackseedprod.com/
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