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<< Interviews this month
The Canadian forces of Kralizec recently released the ‘Origin’ album on the Portuguese Maquiavel label. The music on the record was already recorded back in 1999 and released in 2000. Three years and lots of stories later the album is finally released outside of Canada. Benjamin Leclerc tells us how this came about in an interview with answers worthy of an author.
Text: Wilf
For the people who are not familiar with Frank Herbert's 'Dune' novels, can you explain what your name means? Why did you choose such a name?
Frank Herbert describes the Kralizec very briefly, as a combat of cataclysmic proportions that ravaged the know corrupted universe, leaving worlds in ashes, from which would arisen a new kind of humanism, overseeing the rule of Rights over the use of force. At least, this is my understanding of it.
Now, why we chose that name for our formation...
François and myself once served under the Deafness banner, brutal unworked death metal. The debutant layout of the only Deafness album represents well the music. Patrick served with Foreshadow, an old-school metal project that printed many demos and I think two albums; I actually saw them live in my teenage years. Pat is our metal dinosaur. Stef cracked the whip with several musicians, but was left unsuccessful in the never ending drummer quest.
We all met at Frank's place, I think six or seven years ago. The situation was as follows: Deafness was agonising, the drummer gone and the main guitarist fired, the second being Stefano (who had just joined the band...), and the replacement drummer we got was a junky. Patrick had just left Foreshadow, fleeing their invasive grunge influences. So, when we met, we were all out of musical disasters. One of us suggested to build a new formation, and we all enthusiastically agreed, when to my horror Pat opened a dictionary and said "let's find a name". I never liked the Deafness denomination, and listening to Pat's lecture of the medical and biological sections, I felt panic gaining on me. I had to find a name, before I got stuck with something like "Gastric Infection", or maybe worse (I know, Pat, you wouldn't have chosen that...). I had read Dune a couple years ago and written a text inspired by the Kralizec concept. I threw the card on the table, and I fought vigorously to maintain it there, at least fifteen minutes. By the time Pat could counter-attack, I had plotted and convinced the band's Senate (well, Stef, as Frank never gave a shit about the name) to christen our new breed Kralizec. In fact, if my memory fails me not, I think Pat finally gave it out of boredom before my dictionary-initiated panic.
How did you find your way to the Portuguese label Maquiavel?
The Portuguese label found us on The Darkest Hours web radio show, an excellent broadcast covering the wide spectrum of the metal genre. We never sought any label, and up to that point all our activities were financed by the band. We had released the album a year before but we didn't bother trying to cross the borders in terms of promotion. When Maquiavel Music contacted us, we were drowning in a promotion effort that seemed to have done as much effect as a sword in the water. It fitted well for a label to appear on that timing, and we humbly thought that since the Americans had crossed the Atlantic to invade Europe, we could give it a try.
You have already released an album in Canada back in 2000. Can you tell us a bit more about that release or is it actually the same as 'Origin'? If not, will it be available again?
The album launched back in 2000 was eponymous, without title. We first launched a dashing black leather-covered book, featuring 68 pages in which French written texts presented the lyrics in a conceptual evolution of the quest for the Origin, separated in chapters and bordered by a Prologue and an Épilogue. The layout actually won a prize of excellence awarded by the local industry, and artist Bernard Lebel then shone in all his glory. The layout is presented on his web site, of which his name are the key search words. Some months after the launch, we released a "normal" or "commercial" version, featuring the sole lyrics.
Since the album hardly left our provincial borders, Maquiavel decided to launch it on a greater scale before continuing with our new material, which should be recorded within a year. When re-editing our debut album, the label required a title; since the prologue's title was "Vers l'Origine", I originally enough proposed "Origin".
When, where and how did you record 'Origin'?
Good question, since the info isn't presented in the album booklet. We recorded in 1999 at Peter Pan Studio, who was conveniently located in the same building as our practice hole. The band financed the whole thing, and the sound engineer did a very good job on the tracking, but he encountered a new sound dimension when he first heard my voice. When trying to mix it up, he looked at me, near exhaustion and sweaty, and said: "what you call a vocal is like a black cloud covering the other frequencies". I had to mix the vocal tracks myself, under his watchful eye, for he was very careful not to let me touch the wrong button. Between that, Pat used to do the "Oh, look there in the sky" trick, to lure our attention away while he boosted the amplitude of his guitar signal in the mix... We really enjoyed that studio experience, even if it had been a battleground throughout the recording.
In Canada you got quite a lot of media exposure for an extreme metal act. How did that came about?
We worked hard on our local promotion effort for quite some time. It enabled us to be seen live by major promoters and they gave us opening opportunities. We also entered all-genre musical competition, one of which being sponsored by Pepsi, the local MTV and a major beer distributor; Kralizec made the second place out of 107 contesters. The judges were as surprised as us to see Kralizec in the finals, not to mention the audience that underwent a violent cultural shock. Since the event was covered by the media and that the contest saw the prestations I evaluate as our best to date, we were approached by a reporter from a show presented on the national TV network to record an hour long show and an interview, two weeks notice. The event took place in January 2002 and its recording was played on the radio, TV and web, thus reaching about 250 000 countrywide (their estimation). The diffusion, in fact reached far more people than I hoped it could have.
I serve in the army reserve, and a year ago, while attending a military conference, a general came to me asking: "Could it be possible that I saw you on TV yesterday?". I babbled something, saluted, and went out for a cigarette. Later on, while serving as a duty officer on the Governor General's guard, a soldier of my platoon told me, after the morning run: "Sir, I saw you on TV yesterday, but I don't understand who the hippie besides you was". Well, that was Frank, and the long-haired fellow is far from being a hippie...
It would be erratic not to mention the live appearances themselves; Kralizec received a very warm welcome on the local scene, and it culminated when we opened for Cradle of Filth in Montréal. That gave us the chance to perform in front of metal addicted freaks from every corner of the Québec province (which is actually very vast; some maniacs drove up to 15 hours to get there).
Seeing as not every country would give a metalband any credit would you say Canada takes extreme music very serious?
Definitely not, as the metal genre is generally seen as a marginality feeding the pop-culture malcontents. If a mass media covers a metal event, either Metallica arrives or a whole crowd burned to death in an over-crowded, backstreet hole. Otherwise, the local scene is supported by a few hard-working lads, helping the young bands to emancipate, the audience being spread on the whole territory. The show that hosted us is dedicated to the discovery of the sub-culture, small crack in the media granite blocking the access to the masses.
What could make Canada's attitude towards metal seem serious may be the dedication of that small web of individuals (of which I am not) that created, supported and expanded the structure of our metal scene. One you might know and a good example is Neuraxis' Steven Henry, who sacrificed everything to the scene (and by extension to his band) and has done everything to strengthen its vitality (well, I haven't seen him sell benefit hot-dogs yet...).
You have some touring experiences as well. Did you also play outside Canada and how does a Kralizec concert looks like?
Since our promotion range was quite short, we never established any outer-borders fan base strong enough to support a tour. These projects depend only on the reception of our music by the local crowd.
What does a show look like... Hmmmm.... Well, I've actually seen all the shows, since I get off the stage when they play "Néant", so either at the start or at the end of the appearance, I've seen them from the pit. Now, what do they look like... Pat looks like a metal dinosaur, and he's really having a good time on stage, with the devil-fist high above his head while his left hand keeps on the riffing... He sometimes does tricks in a solo, like the guitar behind his head (ok Pat, I know you haven't done that in a long time) and other secret stuff. Stefano looks like all the noise was on the verge of breaking is concentration, and thus he looks angrily concentrated, well, maybe dramatically concentrated, with his head banging from time to time over his perfect picking. Frank's hair is so long that by spinning his muff he hits nearly everything on the stage. I remember a backstage moment when Pat and Stef where comparing the amount of Frank's hair stuck in their guitar gears. He's the tattoo guy that makes the band look like a metal outfit. As for myself, I strive to do my best, sometimes avoid the worse, and I try not to let the voices take control.
Since the Kralizec line-up doesn't list a drummer, we have to fill the void it creates on stage, and we've done that with a theatrical approach, which we didn't develop very far. I wrote introductory texts to each and every song of a given show, then the guys would bring the musical background and I'd fit the texts' vocals on them. Then, I'd bring the lighting responsible in a dark corner, I explained what I needed for the intros, I gave him an album, a beer, an introductory booklet, and I threatened him. It worked pretty well. So, every show opened each time on a new symphony and had a new theme attached to it. This went on between the songs and created an ambience that we couldn't have attained otherwise. Since my voice isn't that easy to decipher, show booklets were distributed at the entrance, featuring the introductory texts and the program of the night. The crowds really like that measure and the vast majority kept the booklets as souvenirs (a good precision to insert here; Frank is a professional printer and quality maniac, therefore the booklets were nearly always of top presentation and printing, just as his madness drove us to the leather book...).
Would you consider using a drummer on a next album?
No. Mankind is well known for its insatiable quest for power, and since we now have total control over the percussion, we will harshly give it away. We are continuously equipping the band with the technologies that enable us to create human-like drumming and musical patterns.
We once tried many drummers, and the guys all scared them away. When all three stringers tried to program the drummer, the latest took his feet to his neck and ran to safety. Furthermore, I am sometimes a crude bastard, and that scared away our last trial drummer.
We don't definitely close the door, but we don't search anymore, and if someday a drummer wants to develop Kralizec with us, he'll have to prove he's worth more than all the equipment we've summoned to pretend he doesn't exist.
The strongest point of 'Origin' is the use of some great melodic material on guitar and synth and combining it with brutal speed and very low vocals. Where did this idea originate from?
It is not an idea, but the clash of our all-diverse influences. Pat brought the melody, Frank the complexity, Stef the technical skills, and I added the aggressive final touch. At first, Pat disliked my vocal assault, Frank thought it would be too much trouble finding another, and Stef just said: "More". The vocal adventure has been highly colorated by its conflictual outcome of dramatic proportion. Still, the result you can hear is the conclusion of our battle; nobody won.
Although I have no booklet I see some song titles are in French. Which language do you prefer to use and why?
Canada is a bilingual country, composed of heirs to the British lords and of their French people, which are mainly concentrated in the Québec province. Still, the economic and cultural anchors lie in the industrial agglomeration of Montréal, south of the cold province. The English-Canadians completely controlled the commerce and its vital centre of Montréal until the mid-50', when the locals began to fight their way upwards. This left the city with a very heterogenic population, nearly equally divided into Frenchmen, Anglos and ethnic minorities. In fact, the whole city could be said to be populated by minorities. This being said, both languages are currently used on a daily basis. I strongly favour the French, as Stefano and Pat can hardly conceive any other mode of expression than English in the fortress of Anglo-Saxon culture that has always been the metal genre (they'll give me a good one for that). Frank, as for almost anything in the band regarding something else than his bass (and now the computer), doesn't care. Nevertheless, I think I have won the freedom of speech, and that our next musical creation might be supported by all-French lyrics. The Anglo-Saxon world finds it exotic, Frank doesn't care, the beauty of Molière's language is summoned in another new avenue, as we rise once again the French flag (!) on the metal hill, and mostly important to me, I am satisfied.
Are you inspired by the 'Dune' novels when it comes to the lyrics?
Absolutely not, not for the lyrics, but he was a strong influence in the writing of the texts that supported the lyrics in the first textual concept. He treats the remnant duality of humanism and morality in a dialectical approach through the words of the worm-like Emperor. That book was particularly hard reading, but his basic concepts (which I don't pretend to have grasped as he intended them to be) were the light beyond the tunnel that helped me vanquish the blank page. He gave us the concept of renewal through violent change (which we all had to undergo to fit the pieces together) and the name of the formation. That was all his contribution to the music.
I got the impression 'Origin' is an album with a tale-like structure. Am I completely off? If not, can you tell us something about the story behind the album, like what the lyrics are about?
What the lyrics are about... In all cases they are very metaphoric and they were hung together by the Origin concept, which developed the quest for the ultimate origin (the basic question "where do we come from") through the perspective of the philosophical approach (Le Libre Penseur chapter -The Free Thinker-, songs Kralizec, Apatride, Oceano Nox), the moral approach (Le Libertin chapter -The Libertine-, song l'Éternelle Danse) and the theological approach (L'Hérétique chapter -The Heretic-, songs Le Vigile, Sailing to the Origin). The prologue introduced the quest, and the epilogue held the conclusion in the song Néant -Nothingness-.
Patrick wrote Oceano Nox and Apatride before joining Kralizec, lyrics comprised, therefore I bailed out of that potential conflict and we left them as written. One important specification here arises; he came to us with the skeleton of both songs, but with complete lyrics (to my horror; he writes pretty good, but on different subjects). Frank gave important root riffs to Apatride, as well as Stefano. Oceano Nox was submitted to my vocal assault but in whole mainly stayed musically unspoiled as Pat had figured it out. I had a hard time fitting these two texts in the concept, and I conveniently presented them in the Free Thinker chapter, in an Emotional sub-division.
When will the website be launched again?
Yes, indeed, I can feel the pressure increasing. That figures on the list of my tasks to the band, and I never reached the resolution to get a webmaster. Frank has recently enflamed the creation sparkle sleeping in me and all my band-devoted time is being engulfed in this time-vacuum. Still, I promised myself (and most importantly the lads in the band) that once Christmas vacation arrived and that work would ease its burden, that I would sit still for a couple of days, rewriting the whole thing.
We won't change the graphical interface, we'll update and modify the info contained in it. You have to understand that Pat left the band a year ago, and I followed him some weeks later. Still, I came back some months before him and up to that time, the web site had been updated three times, mostly by massive erasing of content. Stef never liked writing and is overwhelmed by networking, and Frank doesn't care. Pat spends his spare time writing a book on the world conspiracy to hide the extraterrestrial infiltration and ancient civilisations wonders (he's gonna kick me hard for that, but it's actually true, I'm not sure about the UFOs though), and works as a teacher in primary grades. Therefore, since I've been democratically (!) selected to accomplish the task, and that I don't want any webmaster to corrupt my texts (whim is a French heritage), I'll do it when I'll catch up some time. Even if you didn't say it I heard it and yes, I'll promptly get my head out of my ass and get on it with the web site!
http://www.kralizec.ca
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