INACTIVE MESSIAH - Thanos
Sinful Nation is the title of the new album of the Greek band Inactive Messiah. The guitarist of the band, Thanos, talked to Metalzone.gr and Vaassilis Mazaris. Read the chat below. \r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: At\r\nthe moment you are on tour with Vader and Septic Flesh. How are things going?\r\nWhich countries have you already visited and what was the response you got from\r\nthe fans abroad? \r\n
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\r\nThanos: Yeap, tour is goin’ really great so far. Today\r\nwe’re in Porto and till now we’ve visited Germany, Holland, Belgium, UK, France\r\nand Spain. There are like 25 to 30 shows more till the end of the tour so there\r\nis much still to come. The response of the crowd is really good in all the\r\ncountries we’ve visited so far. First show today in Portugal for us so can’t\r\nwait to see the crow here as well.\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: Your new album is called Sinful Nation and\r\nit is most definitely more mature than your previous one. Was it easy to record\r\nthis album, and are you satisfied with the result? You used a new Greek\r\nrecording studio which is run by well established professionals of the scene.\r\n
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\r\nThanos: We’ve worked much more for this album than "bE\r\nmY dRug" that’s why I could say it sounds more mellow. Recordin’ an album is\r\nnever easy since you have to be concentrate 100% and take care of every single\r\ndetail. On the other hand sure it’s easy since it’s something you really like\r\nand feel so you just express yourself. So it’s kinda complicated it depents how\r\nyou wanna see it. We’re totally satisfied with the final result. Fotis Benardo\r\nwho was our producer for this album did very good job and we had really good\r\ncooperation.\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: Why did you name the new album Sinful Nation? Is it a concept? What themes\r\ndo you touch with your lyrics?\r\n
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\r\nThanos: Sinful Nation is a title that\r\ncan be easily connected with everything. By the times that the Old Testament of\r\nBible has been written, all the "good" persons are trying to withdraw all of us\r\nwho enjoying life. Since the original sin till nowadays every human being is\r\nfull of sins but most of the religious addicts don’t wanna see it or pushing themselves\r\nby tryin’ to have a saint life. But in the end who really has a "saint\r\nlife"? The answer will come if you try\r\nto find and name one person that abandons lust that is just one of the "7\r\ndeadly sins". For us sins are just a better way to live your life. \r\n
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\r\nOur lyrics are about human\r\nfeelings that also fit with our music. Anger, sadness and darkness are some of\r\nthem. Domination and death though can be added on the previous subjects. We’re\r\nall gonna die one way or another but how would someone fill during his last\r\nmoments that maybe come in a natural way, a suicidal way or anything else and\r\nwhat are we gonna do if we will reborn?\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: What are you expectations of this album? The previous one got you to tour\r\nwith very important bands. Do you expect things to go even better with Sinful\r\nNation?\r\n
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\r\nThanos: Of course in every album you expect something\r\nbetter than the previous one. However I don’t wanna say that we expect\r\nsomething specifically. We’ve worked hard for this album so we really lookin’\r\nforward to see the reaction of the people. As about touring, we promoted "bE mY\r\ndRug" with three tours almost all over Europe. Already on the road for "Sinful\r\nNation", doin’ a really big tour (44 shows) with Vader, Septic Flesh and\r\nDevian, besides that we have a festival in France in September and maybe we’ll\r\ndo some more touring for the countries we’ll not visit on this tour and of\r\ncourse several shows in Greece.\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: How would you introduce the music of Inactive Messiah to a new listener? You\r\ncombine many diverse elements in your music? What should we be looking for when\r\nlistening to Sinful Nation?\r\n
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\r\nThanos: We don’t like to categorise our music. As a\r\nband we listen to many different things and all of them affecting the music we\r\ncompose for sure. We also have members of ERT coir on this album as well.\r\nResponsible for the arrangements of symphonic part and coir is Chris Antoniou. Listening\r\nto "Sinful Nation" you have to expect in your face guitar riffs and dark voices\r\nenriched with symphonic enchantment and sinful melodies\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: Your sound if I am not mistaking has grown rougher. Why did you make that\r\nbrutal turn should that be the case?\r\n
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\r\nThanos: Through our music we express our inner self.\r\n"Sinful Nation" turned more aggressive indeed but that’s how we felt during\r\ncomposing it and recording it.\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: Your label is Holy Records. Tell us about your co operation so far. Are you\r\nsatisfied with the promotion you’re receiving?\r\n
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\r\nThanos: Goes really well till now. Our contract just\r\nexpired with this release so in some months we’ll discuss some stuff and see if\r\nwe’ll continue with Holy Records or not. I don’t think we have various\r\ncomplains though.\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: What are the differences we can spot since Womb Of Maggots till today? Do\r\nyou believe there is evolution since then? Are you more mature? Even though\r\nit’s a little late how come you decided to name your band Inactive Messiah?\r\n
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\r\nThanos: To be honest I don’t think you can spot any\r\nsimilarities. There where many member changes and also various changes to the\r\nway that the band acts. It’s for sure another band I could easily say. We came\r\nto this decision about the name since by the time we’ve chosen it the world was\r\ngoin’ down, like now as well. So if there is or was a Messiah that some say\r\nthen for sure would be totally Inactive.\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: How do you compose your music? Do you all brainstorm together? \r\n
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\r\nThanos: In most of the songs there is a main composer\r\nthat brings the song to the studio and then the whole band with the producer is\r\nworkin’ on it. Makin’ changes most of the time on some small details and some\r\ntimes ending with some most various ones. Of course really important to our\r\nmusic are the symphonic parts and choir parts so the songs takin’ their final\r\nshape during the recordings\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: Is it easy for a band to survive in the Greek scene? What comments do you\r\nget from the Greek fans?\r\n
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\r\nThanos: I could say it’s quite hard. There are too many\r\nbands in Greece and good ones but it’s difficult to make something bigger. The\r\nwhole system in Greece makes things difficult. It’s not easy to leave for tours\r\nin order to promote your band. The comments from the Greek fans are in general\r\nquite good but still there are some people that behind our back talkin’\r\nbullshit. We can accept any criticism as far as it’s after some consideration\r\nand not just something to say.\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: What are Inactive Messiah’s upcoming plans? Are there going to be any dates\r\nbooked in Greece?\r\n
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\r\nThanos: Of course we’ll have some dates in Greece.\r\nHaven’t booked anything yet but probably during autumn we’ll make several shows\r\naround Greece. Summer that we’ll return from the tour is not a good period\r\nsince everybody is on vacation and stuff so it will be a bit later.\r\n
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\r\nMetalzone: I hope you have a great rest of the tour\r\nand we meet face to face sometime in the future.\r\n
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\r\nThanos: Me too, thank you for the support and of course\r\nwelcome to the Sinful Nation...\r\n
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\r\nVassilis Mazaris \r\n
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