Interview: Anaphylactic Shock
TobiasHey! We’re just fine at this moment. Enjoying our summer holidays etc. We had a few really good shows last 3 months, in the aftermath of the “2000 years” release. We did shows with Black Cobra, Saviours, Nachtmystium, Cursed, our label mates AmenRa, and some more. And we have a few really good ones coming up. We’re playing shows with Bolt Thrower, Shining and Pulling Teeth the upcoming months. So yeah, we’re doing pretty well.
We’re not touring. We’re all quite busy with other bands and other stuff, such as work, so touring is hard for us. We are planning a few weekends in the fall and winter. So if you are intersted in booking, just contact us.
What kind of concept is 2000 years based on?
I think you mean the lyrical concept of “2000 years”? Well, that’s pretty much our singers thing, but since he is in Ireland right now, here’s what he said in another interview:
When we first started out we wanted to play d-beat crustlike hardcore. Bringing back the hard in hardcore so to speak. Bands like Tragedy, Skitsystem, Disrupt and Cursed come to mind. As you can hear we strayed away from that primal idea, but we took the lyrical tradition of those bands with us. The end of the world, no future, unending wars, humanity is lost apocalyptic kinda thing. Take this anti human feeling with some personal experiences in life and you got the base of our lyrics. Twothousand years of sorrow and negativity and we’re still counting…
Your album debut has been out for a few months. What kind of feedback have you received until now?
Feedback has been pretty good actually. We’re gaining attention in a lot of mayor magazines such as Terrorizer, Metal Hammer and Aardschok, but also a lot of ezines like yourselves are writing reviews. The thing that strikes me most in the feedback is that everybody is surprised by the sound and style of the album. The combination of the drive and aggression of a hardcore and punk rhythm section, the doom-drenched 70’s rock riffs of our gitarist, and the hateful black metal vocals is one that not that many bands do. But people seem to like it, so yeah, feedback has been good!
How would you describe your composition process?
Composition process is pretty spontaneous. Our guitarist usually comes up with a riff or two, and we all do our thing with it in rehearsals. We record rehearsals, listen to it back home and come back the next time with new ideas. Our singer is pretty important is the whole process, since he has a really good overall view on the whole thing, when us musicians are mostly busy trying to master our instruments. This combination seems to work out pretty well. We are composing pretty easy. The first 3 songs of the next album are already written.
Is every member fully involved in Anaphylatic Shock?
I guess you mean that every member is only playing in Anaphylactic Shock, and has no other bands? Because I don’t hope you have the illusion that we live of Anaphylactic Shock......?
In case of the first. No, we all have other bands and side projects we do. Our drummer is in Union Town, a DC-like punkrock band, that just released an awesome first full length. Our guitarist is in Hooghwater, a 70’s rock / psychedelic band. They just started playing live, and they sound very promising. Think of a combination between Queens Of The Stone Age and Black Sabbath or something. I myself also play in a Dutch 70’s rock ‘n roll band called The Spades. And finally, our singer does vocals for a black metal project which name I cannot mention, but keep your eyes open, they will be releasing an awesome new album in a few months.
In case you were wondering if we live of Anaphylactic Shock. No. Of course not. There’s not a dime to be made with this music. We don’t have the illusion this will change either. We just enjoy the ride, and make the music we like. We all have jobs or do a study. This by the way does not mean we think of Anaphylactic Shock as a hobby. We invest time and money in this band, we are dead serious with it. It’s a personal outlet, which we all need, and we would really like to take this band to the next level.
What is the Dutch scene like at the moment?
That’s a hard question. I don’t really know which scene you mean. We’re in between a lot of scens. We obviously have roots in the punk- and hardcore scene. That scene is doing pretty well, there’s a lot of bands and shows and kids active. However, this is not the scene we are focusing on. We played a couple of hardcore shows, and noticed that most kids are simply to narrow minded to get the idea of what we are doing. So, to be honest, we don’t really care about 90% of that scene. The metal scene on the other hand is also not something we are that familiar with. I mean, once again, it is doing pretty well, especially in a city like Tilburg, where we are from. There’s a lot of metal bands and fans, and they are all pretty cool here in Tilburg. But in general, a lot of those metal guys just don’t have a clue either.
What we did notice is, that there’s a really cool scene in the southern parts of the Netherlands, and Flanders, the Dutch speaking part of Belgium. I mean, we’re on a Belgian label, and we live really close to the border. There’s a lot of progressive kids there, that have their own taste in music, and are open for ideas and developments in music. So we are focusing more on that area, and we notice that we are accepted well.
In Tilburg, the city where we’re from, the extreme music scene is really well developed. We have cool festivals like Roadburn, ZXZW and Neurotic Deathfest. There’s some good record labels like Neurotic Records and Relapse Records that have their headquarters here in Tilburg. Besides that, we have good venues like 013 and Little Devil, that host a variety of extreme music shows. We have a really good record store called Sounds, and we have active booking agencies and promoters here in Tilburg, that organise a lot of extreme music shows. So, in my opinion, the extreme music scene in Tilburg is doing pretty well!
Interview conducted by Guillaume Dulhoste
Homepage: Anaphylactic Shock
Homepage: Hypertension Records
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