### Solace of Requiem - Jeff

#### 25/08/06 || Global Domination

Introduction by The Lord: When ex-staffer/bitchass JD Provorse mysteriously bailed on us a while ago we all feared for his health and whereabouts since we knew he was heavily (no pun intended) into German hookers (male ones) and poker. He seems ok though becoz he still sends us some stuff for the site every now and then but choose to stay off staff for now as he doesn’t feel he can contribute on a regular basis. I’m sad to say that JD is actually better at sending in stuff as an EX-staffer than the fucken idiots ON staff are so hey, I dig this shit. JD’s welcome back anytime. Let’s move on… He apparently interviewed some band called Solace of Requiem recently. A band I never heard of but judging from their MySpace-page, they sound good enough to be featured here and judging from the effort Jeff put into his answers, they definitely belong here. I’ll leave it to JD now.

JD: Solace of Requiem is a damn fine death metal band from Virginia Beach, Virginia. I was going to do a review of their first album before I lost all motivation to be on the staff. I had promised Jeff I was going to do an interview with him a while back, though, and I figured I might as well try to keep at least one promise in my life, so here you go. Want a review of that first album anyway? Alright fine:

The self-titled debut album from Solace of Requiem is a solid, rockin’, no-frills bit of groove-laden death metal that harkens back to the elder days when technicality wasn’t necessarily the most important thing and you could still be simplistic without being simple-minded.

7/10.

There, happy now? Let’s get on with the interview then.

JD: Let’s just get this out of the way in a big hurry because it’s always the kinda boring part of the interview: give us a brief explanation of what people can expect from Solace of Requiem musically, and a quick rundown of some influences and inspirations as a point of reference. Also, give us a link to where people can go to find out more of this generic presskit information about your band so we can get on to the meat of the interview.

Jeff: Musically speaking, Solace of Requiem is a band that has tried to elaborate upon the roots of death metal. I personally feel like death metal took an unexpected turn in the later 90’s into 2000. SoR has the intent to bring back all the good things about early death metal and incorporate them with a more modern musical approach. There is no mistaking our traditional death metal sound, but it is also obvious that the sound is not purely “old school”. SoR also has a tinge of what could be considered a European influence, mixed together with the undeniable presence of American brutality. We are really proud of our new CD (“Utopia Reborn” on Ruptured Silence Records) and we have posted some mp3s of the new material on our website (www.solreq.com) as well as our label’s website (www.rupturedsilence.com), so everyone can go listen and determine for themselves if they like the SoR sound.

We are hoping that the new CD does well. There are some ads coming out this September and October 2006 (Decibel & Metal Maniacs) in support of the album’s release. We will be touring the USA and Europe during that time as well, so we have high hopes that the CD will gain popularity with new and old school fans. Only time will tell. Just as a quick reference, I’d say some of our biggest influences are bands like Morbid Angel, Death, Carcass, Malevolent Creation, Grave, Unleashed and so on. We also have a ton of non-death metal influences as well such as Alice in Chains, Rush, Def Leppard and all other kinds of great artists. There are so many bands we love, it’s hard to name them all. I think the SoR sound is something that you have to hear for yourself in order to fully understand. There is a kaleidoscope of different influences that are in the SoR sound and I think it makes the music very interesting to listen to. The SoR sound is like a good piece of gum that doesn’t lose its flavor after the first two minutes. I hope our fans enjoy it as much as we do.

Man, I hear you, there’s nothing more annoying than shitty chewing gum. Or shitty death metal, for that matter. Anywho, with a name like Solace of Requiem, one might expect to hear music more along the lines of Nightwish instead of brutal death metal. First and foremost, what’s your take on Nightwish? Are you a bit cheesed off that Tarja isn’t in the band anymore? Are you already making preparations for the inevitable reunion? And while we’re at it, why don’t you give us the lowdown on what your band name means to you.

I really don’t know much about Nightwish other than their album covers look pretty cool. As a matter of fact, we viewed several Nightwish covers when we were looking for inspiration for our “Utopia Reborn” CD. So, unfortunately I can’t give much input on the subject of Nightwish.

I don’t know if I should pity you or envy you your lack of Nightwish knowledge. Check them out sometime, you’ll see what I mean. But, I digress, what was it you were saying now about the band name?

As far as our band name goes, I love it. I think it’s a perfect fit for what we are trying to do with our band. “Solace” means comfort in sorrow or consolation. “Requiem” is a hymn for the dead. So the band name means the consolation received from death metal. Music to me is an attempt to find personal relation inside of art. Usually, the songs you love are the songs that you’ve most related to. Sometimes they just remind you of something or someone, but it’s usually always a form of relation. When that relation occurs, it normally brings empowerment to the listener, especially during rough times in that person’s life. Therefore, if someone relates to SoR music and finds that empowerment during a trying time in their life, we will have given them the “solace of requiem”. I feel that the name describes our entire purpose as a band and not just our sound. To me it’s a description of the overall effect of the band. I’m not saying we are inspirational, because empowerment doesn’t necessarily mean that the feeling is non-aggressive. Being at peace doesn’t always mean you are feeling or acting peaceful. Aggression is our main resource when attempting to grant empowerment to our listeners.

You’ve said on your website that it seems a lot of bands just don’t care about lyrics anymore. I feel the same way about band names. Anyway, care to elaborate on that whole lyrics issue a bit? This is where I’m giving you the soapbox for just a little while, feel free to rant a bit.

When I was young and still in high school, I used to hear people joke about all us “metal heads” because we listened to crazy lyrics about gang-raping dead bodies, suicide and killing our parents. I knew all along that the majority of the bands I liked never sang about such stupidity. Death did have “Scream Bloody Gore”, but that’s about the only exception. Now there was Cannibal Corpse and a shit load of others that did have some psychotic lyrics, but I was a fan of the more philosophical lyric writers. So it always pissed me off when people would say all that bullshit about me, because I knew they had no idea of the pleasures of listening to and playing metal music. Now I think that the better lyric writers are gone forever. I know there are a few that are still around, but there’s definitely not as many as there were ten years ago. I take a lot of pride when I write my lyrics. I try to assimilate the words into the music so that the feel of the riffs tells the same tale as the words, so that a complete atmosphere can be created to shape your impression of the experience. I think that the lyrics are a very important part of SoR.

So what is it your lyrics mean to you? Your website says “Solace of Requiem has substituted philosophy and mysticism in place of gore and blasphemy to produce a dark and surreal new vision”. What kind of philosophy and mysticism are we talking here? What kind of things do your lyrics bring to the table? What’s new about your surreal vision? Do you write all the lyrics, for that matter, or do all the members contribute?

I write all the lyrics with no collaboration. My lyrics are all dark reflections of my own life. It’s a captured moment in time, but not like a photograph. The scenes I try to capture are only feeling, thoughts, ideas and emotions of all kinds. So there is no one specific story, it’s just the raw emotions and mind set of a moment in time. My lyrics are also written in a way that allows the listener to draw out what is relevant to them. As I have said before, I believe that relating to the song is the key. I feel like I try to keep that in mind when I write. My lyrics are meant to drive your mind into a situation where it has to find a relation. The songs all have a “true” meaning, but if I ever gave away that information, there would be no more need for the mind to try and relate. Unless there was a relation to my interpretation of the lyrics. Seeing how there’s a slim chance of the listener relating to my judgment more readily than their own, I let all the interpretations be made by the listeners.

Spinning off the last part of that question, what’s the music writing like for Solace of Requiem? Do you write as a team, or does each member write their own stuff completely and then bring it in, or does one person pretty much write everything? Is Jeff the musical “I in team” for Solace of Requiem? And if so, does this ever cause any tensions within the band?

I am the man, so to speak, but I listen to the entire band’s input. I bring in all the music and lyrics and present the full idea to my band. We then take the ideas and turn it into SoR. It’s definitely hard to do it all alone, but no one could possibly see your vision better that you do. I think I do better alone when it comes to that stuff. It never causes tension, but I’ve always been around people that believed in me. As long as no one loses faith in you, writing and creating seems to be a smooth process.

It’s been known for a while now to people who are into your band already (i.e. the really hip kids) that guitarist and founding member Chris recently left the band in pursuit of other things. How is the band dealing with that? Have you had any luck finding a suitable replacement? Have you considered going the Local H route if you can’t find anyone worthwhile? Did you get that at all, or am I the only one who remembers Local H?

I actually saw Local H one time. 2 guys in the band, hahaha. I wouldn’t want to be only a 2 piece.

Even if you had one of those neat guitars rigged up to play both guitar and bass parts at the same time like the guy from Local H? Man, you’d be the shit. Or maybe just shit, no “the”. You never can tell, the potential for great success always comes with the risk of great failure. But here I’ve interrupted again. You were talking about Chris leaving?

Chris has left, but we do have another guy in place. I’m going to release all that info on our website as soon as all the September tour dates are scheduled and ready to be posted. The fans do need to know that SoR will be just as relentless and brutal as ever. No fucking compromise!

Hell yeah, man, compromise blows. Meet in the middle? Fuck that. GLOBAL DOMINATION! Sorry, I keep getting carried away. I think I’ll blame the death metal. So, Joe the drummer also plays in a band called Alethian who are, if I’m not mistaken, a Christian-oriented band. Does this ever conflict with his place in Solace of Requiem, who seem to push forward an image that isn’t blatantly anti-Christian but doesn’t seem to exactly support those ideas either (I’m thinking the lyrics to “Stir No Echo” in particular here)? Or am I just completely wrong about Alethian in the first place?

It is important to know that Joe is a drummer in the true sense of the word. He has played in Latin jazz bands as well as working as an instructor, so he is a drummer through and through. Joe is one of the most professional and easygoing friends I have and he’s all about business too. His band Aletheian is Christian-oriented, but he doesn’t write the lyrics, he just plays the drums. Joe is all about drumming, no matter if it’s on the moon. Like I said, he’s a very professional dude. So Aletheian being somewhat Christian has never presented a problem with him playing in SOR.

Your first album was originally supposed to just be a demo to shop to labels, correct? But the folks at Ruptured Silence Records liked it so much they said “fuck demo, let’s release the fucking thing!” Is that pretty much how it went down, or did your connection with Ruptured Silence come about in a completely different manner? Because I have the album, and it’s damn good, I could see it happening like that. Is the band satisfied with it as a first release, or do you still kinda wish it had just stayed a small-time thing? Or does it make you feel like a big rockstar to think your demo was good enough to be a big-time release?

No rockstars here man. Rockstars have money.

And chicks. And drugs. But most of them don’t have a demo that became a first album, I don’t think, so that’s one you’ve got up on them. Please continue.

We sent the first CD to a bunch of labels. Most of them just wanted to give us consignment deals. Ruptured Silence gave us the chance to record an all-new CD and distribute it in Europe and the USA. We took the opportunity and created “Utopia Reborn”. Ruptured Silence wanted to release the first CD under their label, but I never want it released because of the lack of quality in the production. The production on the first CD was very thin, but I’m pretty excited about the new sound we have on “Utopia Reborn”. It sounds 100% thicker in my opinion. I think that for now the first CD will just stay available only on our website for the diehard SoR fans.

What exactly is the nature of your relationship with Century Media Records? Are they connected with Ruptured Silence somehow, or do they just happen to have a few copies of your record in their warehouse? Does it make you giddy to think that brand-spankin’ new copies of your album are in the general vicinity of brand-spankin’ new copies of Grave albums? Ya know, because you did that Grave cover and all?

Century Media has helped us a lot. They distribute both our CDs here in the USA and they also distribute the “Utopia Reborn” CD in Europe. They also gave us permission to use the Grave song on our first CD. They have helped us with some of our questions regarding the future of SoR and have been very supportive of us. Ruptured Silence is not affiliated with Century Media in any other way than Ruptured Silence CDs are distributed through the Century Media distribution department. It definitely makes me excited to know that the CD is in the same bins as some of our favorite artists.

I bet Jörgen Sandström is just as pleased to be in the same bins as you, too. I’ll ask him, he’s a semi-regular member of our forums you know. So, the sophomore album, “Utopia Reborn”, was originally slated for release in April 2006, but there’s been some delays. What exactly has been the trouble? Ruptured Silence not holding up their end of the deal? Dingos ate my master tapes? When can we expect to see that bastard up and available for online piracy?

The problem has been mostly the language barrier. It has been a great effort on both SoR’s and the label’s part to see this CD on the streets. We had Brett Hoffmann do some vocal work and even waited a bit longer on the mastering to have Andy Classen do the job. The CD has been a long wait, but it will be out August 14th, 2006. The mp3s are all available for sale through legaldownloads.net , the link to the exact page is on Ruptured Silence’s website.

So you said Brett Hoffman from Malevolent Creation does some guest vocals on the new album. Give us the lowdown on that: how’d it all come together, where will we be able to hear him when the album comes out, and who had to strap on their kneepads and grease the wheels on this deal, if ya know what I mean? Also, were there drugs involved? We like drugs at Global Domination. We like kneepads and greasing the wheel, too.

Nah, none of that. Brett was a friend of ours from our playing days in upstate New York with his other band Down the Drain. We obviously knew Brett from his work with Malevolent Creation and we spent a lot of time asking him a million questions about the “good ol’ days”. We became pals and when the opportunity presented itself, we asked him to be on the new CD. Sadly, no drugs or axle grease were involved.

Man, that’s too bad. All the best stories involve axle grease. And drugs. We really like drugs at Global Domination, I mean it. We like alcohol, too. Probably more than we like drugs. Do you like drugs and alcohol? What are your favorites? I always thought you could judge a man’s character by his choice of intoxicants. I like pot, pharmaceutical narcotics, Jägermeister, single-malt scotch, and all things beer myself. And I mean beer, not that lame-ass piss-water you get from most major American “breweries”. What can fans buy you at the bar the next time they want to slip you a roofie?

I like beer. My favorite kind is… shit, I can’t remember the name of it. Oh yeah, I remember now: “Cold”. I like Cold Beer! I knew it started with a “C”. I also smoke dangerously large amounts of weed and take the occasional Tylox. But for the most part it’s just beer and weed, but not necessarily in that order.

“Dangerously large amounts of weed”, eh? That sounds like a challenge to me. I bet I could smoke you under the table, we’ll have to give it a shot the next time you come through. Okay, I wasn’t gonna do this, because it’s a bit of a played out joke these days, but with you being a death metal bass player from the American south, it seems too appropriate to pass up: do you know Mike Poggione, bass player for Monstrosity and Lecherous Nocturne and Capharnaum? Just curious, he’s a friend of ours.

No, sorry man, I haven’t gotten a chance to meet him yet.

As with Nightwish, I don’t know if I should envy you or pity you. Mike’s a different one, that’s for sure. He’s a good sport, though. Well, most of the time. Alright, you’ve got more touring coming up soon, and you’ve toured both the States and Europe in the past, so let’s just cut to the chase: where are the fans the best? Where do the fans suck? There were, like, less than a dozen of us at the last Fargo show but we rocked out like a motherfucker, right? Didn’t somebody shoot video of that show? I’d love to see video of my fat ass moshing out with half a dozen other dudes to some killer death metal. Hook it up if you can!

Fans never suck, as long as they’re fans. It’s the faggot metal fans I can’t stand. I hate emo.

No sign of that video from the Fargo show, though, eh? That’s too bad, I bet it’s a hoot. Speaking of videos, though, Solace of Requiem made a video for “Beyond Grace” from the first album. What was that experience like? It’s a full fricken video, after all, with actors and everything, not just the band rocking out to some fancy camera work. Did you ever try and get it played on, like, Headbanger’s Ball or Uranium and such? Has it ever played anywhere other than the internet, for that matter? Whose hands are those pawing at you towards the end when you’re all covered in mud or blood or whatever? Because they kinda look like dude hands to me. Set the record straight!

Ok, the record is now straight: one girl and one guy! But it looks cool, right? We haven’t tried to have the video put on anything other than the net. I don’t think the production is up to MTV’s standards. Maybe we can do a new video someday when we have the money. If we can get one we are 100% satisfied with, we may consider doing something grander with that video.

I don’t know, I’ve seen way shittier videos on MTV, that’s for sure. They tend to like crap music, though, so it’s not like you’re missing out on a cool party by not having your video in rotation. Speaking of crap music, do me a favor: finish this whole thing off by ranting about fashion-core kids a little bit.

There’s nothing to rant about with those fuckers. There ain’t nothin’ metal about faggotry. Dress like a man, be a man, stop wearing your sister’s clothes. These are all things your dad or other male parental influence was supposed to teach you. Don’t leave it in the hands of the mosh pits to teach you! That’s the last place a fake-ass pussy wants to learn about manhood. Fuck emo. Period. Enough said.

That’s all I’ve got man, thanks for your time. Shoot us those websites again just to remind people where they can find out more about you. Don’t forget to tell everyone how awesome an interview you thought I wrote!

Ok bro, later.

Solace of Requiem Solace of MySpace Ruptured Silence Records