VERDICT DENIED
Six years after their debut album Verdict denied are present with their " State to end all Terror" Ep. Metalzone.gr met Vasilis and Dimitris and has all the details.
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You ’ve been around for many years .Give us a brief bio.
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Vasilis: All started in 1995 few friends from school in the beginning with cover songs and afterwards with our own material. In the beginning it was all traditional bay area sound but in the way more various stuff came up. We released a demo tape in 1997 and later a few more promos. In 2005 me and Dimitris wrote together the "condamned" album. The album was mixed in 2006 by Jeff Waters. We had an agreement with a local label which went bankrupt. The solution was found through Theodosis and Secret port records and the album was set to be released in 2009.After all these a few members left the band and all this is means a tough period since every member that leaves Verdict Denied is hard to replace because our material is very demanding because of its complexity. Two years ago we found our current members we recorded our new ep and we are scheduling live shows.
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Which were your musical influences ?
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Vasilis: We started as a metal band without musical boundaries but as a basis we had the bay area scene along with the technical thrash bands like Coroner, Watchtower, Mekong delta and others. It was the begging in order to build our musical style. Nowadays you can find folk elements from traditional Greek music from Thrace and Pontos.
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Dimitris: Each one of us has his own style and influences.
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Which is the story behind the change of the band’s name from Verdict to Verdict denied ?
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Vasilis: There were about 4 - 5 bands around with that name so we had to change it. But we need to keep the word" verdict" and the logo as a link with the past in order the people to be able to recognize the band and to know that the band carries on. The word "denied" it’s like saying that we had been denied the right to be called Verdict. It is also has a very strong meaning: resistance to a form of unfair authority for example an unjust decision in a court and your need to go against it. We had this idea from a very famous court case here in Greece were all the evidence shows that a person was innocent but in the end he was sentenced.
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Why it took you so long to release a debut album ?
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Dimitris: When the band was set to release an album we decided to make an experiment : to write the four first tracks and then musical differences took place and along with our every day problems in the band we were left only me and Vasilis to arrange everything and it took us more time.
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Vasilis: Is a matter of money when everything is being paid by the band. It is more easy to split everything in 4 than in 2. Beside this everything had to be arranged by two persons (rehearsing mixing and producing) and all this consumes time it’s a painful procedure !
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Dimitris: Two persons had to do everything.
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Vasilis : Two persons have better cooperation but everything is on the double work, time, money. The first album had the following peculiarity : i took it to five studios to be mixed but the result wasn’t satisfying except from the work we got from a guy. I got in touch with foreign labels and everybody was looking something better. So then even that we liked the mix we already had we decided to work with a known name and we ended up cooperating with Jeff waters. Then we started to look for a record contract and we ended up with a deal from a local label which included and live shows. But the label went bankrupt and then we made the deal with Secret port records to release the album in 2009.
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Dimitris : It’s total of four years after the recordings of the album.
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Do Verdict denied have a sort of mentality in the way they work ?
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Dimitris: This band seem to work under any condition. Pressure has a positive effect when we have to do something we just do it .
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Vasilis: Is something complicated. Me and Dimitris have been in the band for many years. In the past one and a half years we decided to do something unusual. We put a pause on Verdict denied and we putted out a cover band because we thought we weren’t ready to record and we needed something different like the cover band and experimentation with music instruments. We were getting ready to record our material.... we always take our time. If we are not ready to record a track we won’t do it. If somebody says but " what they do all this time" we just don’t care!
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Dimitris: Verdict denied is not the band which puts out a record every year. When you will listen our next album you will understand.
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A few words for your first album and its great artwork !
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Vasilis: It was written by two people Dimitris played drums and bass.
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Dimitris: I also wrote a riff .
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Vasilis: I played all the guitars plus the vocals. We ended up the two of us and we decided to finish it the two of us !
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Dimitris: We ended up being two.
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Vasilis :For the cover now .... look these are my hands. We though our style is a little bit complicated and it goes along with Rubik’s cube. You need to think in order to solve it. There are ways to solve it but you always have to think. Besides being complicated our style is let’s say a little bit claustrophobic and stressing so we thought that the person who tries to solve the cube is under pressure so he is in a cell and there are four people waiting from him to solve it . In the moment of the solution in one of the cube sides the VD shows up from the name of the band. Condemned the title comes from the lyrics.
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How the cooperation with Jeff Waters came up ?
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Vasilis: We had sent our material to some labels and one of them with a great name and history in the metal scene answered us :we would be interest hearing something new for you". We answered that we have five more tracks but then they answered that if we were talking for the same recording session they wouldn’t be interested. An easy and quick solution is to make everything more professional. We got in touch with some names with a status in our music especially with three. The first on to answer was Waters. He told us that he could do it in two weeks we made a deal and three weeks later it was ready.
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The experience from this cooperation ?
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Vasilis : It’s a clichés when you talk with this kind of people they teach you. I remember talking with him and suggesting something very plain as an idea and he answered "hey you want your album to sound like this". Make you feel a kind of shame .
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An EP is coming out and a full length is scheduled what we have to expect ?
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Dimitris: It has nothing to do with Condamned.
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Vasilis: The next step from condamned . The same guys a few years later with new members.
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Dimitris :Nothing and everything.
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Vasilis: It’s a concept. Not a simple story with a begging and an end it has some thoughts and links with history and mythology and all these in a way bring you to today. Some say that old school is good but you have to have an open eye for what is happening around you. We answer to that you have to see what is not happening around you We are not going to make the style more modern we are going to make the style more unique.
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What’ s the reaction from the fans you ’ve got all these years ?
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Vasilis: We have the reputation of a serious band which does look what happens around and what the people will say. A band with good players. I know this guy who took one of our members and when he was asked where he had played and got the answer "Vedict deneied" you said "hey you must be good".
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Dimitris: Every member that left the band made a career Verdict denied won’t make a career.
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Live shows: Memories and what the fans should expect from you ?
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Vasilis: You always remember the support gigs: Sepultura ,Mekong delta,Anvil, Paul di Anno. But the Greek gigs are more enjoyable because you have less stress. But on the other hand playing with a big name is always an experience. When we release something we would get chances to play live. We already have some gigs booked more information soon.
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Being active in the metal scene for many years do you see the things to be different from the past ?
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Vasilis. There are out there great players who don’t want to play with us (laughs).
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Dimitris: It’s getting better.
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Vasilis: Better musicians and productions.
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And what about the attitude? Are there the things better or the people simply behave better to the other members of the scene ?
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Vasilis: A musician is always competitive by nature because want to win the same audience with the rest. So you always will have the back stabbing behavior .
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Dimitris: What you said is correct. It is very easy to get the news for somebody’s bad behavior so everybody seem to be more careful for what he says for others even if sometimes we are just pretending to be nice.
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Vasilis: The back stabbing behavior has been reduced.
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In the 90’s speed/thrash metal had to face a hostile reaction from the labels. You were forming the band then were there any thrash in the Greek scene ?
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Vasilis: We formed the band in 1995 in those days power metal was strong (Gamma ray, Iced earth, Blind guardian) , doom death (Paradise lost ,Anathema, My dying bride) and of course the black metal scene (bands with a career abroad). No thrash metal except Brainfade. Nowadays an 80’s revival is taking place in both hair and thrash metal. Is like saying today is in fashion the 60’s or 50’s. The same thing happened with musical styles they belong to history and you can have a comeback with their whole aesthetic (hi top sneakers, patches, sleeveless shirts etc). The style goes hand in hand with the full culture and image in the revival of a musical style.
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As fans now do you believe that the 90’s music was a little bit fake and the good music simply survived ?
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Vasilis: Commercial music always will sell. In the 80’s was in fashion to be commercial in the 90"s you had to be non-conformist is a little bit complicated all this .Popular or not good music always survives.
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Dimitris: Nowadays the hard music is in fashion. You see slayer fro example to be awarded with a grammy. I can’t accept from a metal-head to say I am a fan of the underground. No my friend you just like the term "underground" and when a band from that scene will become mainstream you ll just stop listen to their music.
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Your future plans ?
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Vasilis: A second album.
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And then ?
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Dimitris : A third one !! (laughs)
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Metalzone.gr wish you the best for the future ! Your final words?
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Dimitris: Expect our releases !
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Vasilis: We are talking here for an honest band, we didn’t jumped on any train, we didn;t follow any trend. We started having as basis an almost dead musical style.
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https://www.facebook.com/verdictdenied/
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