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Interview: Traumatic Voyage

  Tobias

How did you feel and how old where you when you first realised that life leads nowhere and to nothing?
Damned, unleashed and unborn... Somehow I've got this feeling of senselessness in me since I can remember. The first time I've experienced the nothingness behind life in a very personal form, was at the age of 17 years, during a near death-experience. I've seen for myself that there's no divine or higher concept behind existence. All what humans think they are is just an illusion fading in the black void beyond flesh. Everything that exists will end someday and if no one is left to remember it's like nothing had ever existed.

Every way will finally lead to nowhere! There's no meaning in life! But what does life need a meaning for? Aren't the needs of flesh enough obligation for a lifetime? Living with this knowledge makes life somehow shizophrenic and twisted. Because on the one side it's a form of release to know that I don't need to make any sense. It helps to enjoy being alive and it frees me to follow my own will inependently. But on the other hand, the revelation of nothingness doesn't make it easier to live with all this pathetic stupidity of human non-sense everywhere.

How would you define humanity?
Somehow it's hard to define something that's indefinable. Humanity as a feeling is just the arrogance of mankind thinking they are the masterrace on earth. They think every human life is worthy and needs to be protected. Every other life-form has to die to make place. As long as humans won't respect life, they're not worthy of life themselves.

Humanity as a race is the peak of evolution, which leaves only one way for the human race: down! Mankind is the result of the evolutionary process to create the most vital and resisting life-form. It's clear, that the fittest will always dominate and erase everything weaker than itself to multiply until global collapse. So, there's no need to wonder why the earth suffers under humanity. The human world is going down, not with a loud burst, but silently and slowly the downfall progresses with every human that is born.

When it comes to every single human, humanity becomes an individual state of unawareness. Everyone here is a mindless slave of perverted instincts. Mankind's bloated civilisation is just a perversion of life, an illusion of freedom, a golden cage in which they've trapped themselves. They all are trying to escape their own nothingness without knowing where to go or even from what they are trying to flee. Gathering in hypocritical communion to find collective oblivion. But in fact everyone lives in his own narrow-minded fancy, his personal, superficial chimera, and doesn't care at all about any other life or the world. Human society is nothing but an artificial world of lies, held together by fear and insatiable desire. So, humanity itself is a lie and therefore indefinable. But all this will find an end with the answer to the question: "How much humanity can the earth bear?"

Is music a self Therapy for you? Does it provide you with a feeling of freedom?
Real art is always some kind of self-therapy for the artist, that's the difference to all cheap copies and fake-art of all those "wanna be somebody" - maggots. Also it's much more than just a therapy, in fact it's more like a bizarre form of possession. Every true artist doesn't really have a choice. Those visions are inside of me, if I want them or not, they are there. And I need to get them out, to free myself from the pressure of negative emotions and thoughts to keep my "insanity" within bounds. So, yes it helps me to feel free enough to be able to handle my life in this sick society. The only freedom left in this world is the spiritual freedom of the mind, but only for the ones who are strong enough to take this last freedom for themselves.

Quite a few of your works have not been released. How come?
I make my art just for myself. It's an essential self-reflection of my quest for the final truth and the revelations I've discovered for me. I don't need self-confirmation by other people. I'm not trying to escape my own senselessness like the rest of the world, I've accepted it. Most important for me is to make music and listen to it for myself to expand my inner universe and learn more about the truth hidden within me.

So, I don't give a shit if someone likes Traumatic Voyage or not and for sure I will never be the music-whore for the taste of tasteless fans and the music-industry that delivers the tasteless pseudo-evil phrases to them. Unikhanya and I live an almost solitary life as far away from the human slave-society as possible. We don't have much voluntary contact to other people. Also I was really pissed off by the over-saturation of the Black/Death Metal dimension with innumerable imitators and their embarrassing cliché-copies. All that commercial consume-theatre have taken the last bit of seriousness from this artform. So I didn't had the nerves and patience to "promote" Traumatic Voyage during the last years. I didn't send a single copy of "Cogito ergo sum" (1998) and "Überlebenskunst" (2001) to any labels or magazines. And if there wasn't Merciless records, which I've always respected for having the true spirit, there wouldn't probably be any new Traumatic Voyage - release at all.

Do you feel close to the black metal scene?
No, I don't feel close to any "scene"! It's all just human chimeras! There's no real difference between all those "scenes", religions and life-styles. Just the outlook of the surface changes, nothing else. I don't believe in anything mankind is doing here. There's no truth to find in humanity. The Black metal scene is a ridicilous circus of fools like the rest of the spiritual crap called human race. Especially Black Metal is nowadays just a hook for losers, mental cripples and all sorts of low-lifes to pull themselves up. So that they can think about themselves, that they're "V.ery I.mportant P.issheads". There were some real extraordinary intentions in the early days of Black metal which are forgotten and betrayed today. But there will always be some exceptions that will keep the black spirit alive.

I think Black and Death Metal are the most misunderstood music of all. It's the most extreme form of music and should be used to reflect extreme emotions and thoughts. Not as a empty entertainment-background for over-styled "wannabe demons" and their childish image-games. Black Metal is the pure, musical extasy to express real pain, real hate, all that wrath, anger and sorrow of a life in human hell. This intense form of music is the only fitting soundtrack to spite the dark truth, that no one wants to hear, into the filthy face of mankind. That's "true" Black Metal!!!

Are you working on a new album?
I'm always working on new material. Traumatic Voyage is my life. I do what I have to do, there's nothing else here to do for me. My next album will be finished in the next years. The farer my traumatic voyage progresses, the longer I'll need to create a new album. Every little fragment of my art has a reason and must be thought over very well to reach a higher level of intensity. And as I do it all by myself, it takes time to get it done! The next chapter of my traumatic voyage will be a consequent developement of my art and another step towards veracity. As always you can expect nothing less than the worst!!!
By the way... ...there are NO keyboards on "Khiaoscuro"!!!

By Guillaume Dulhoste

Homepage: Traumatic Voyage
Homepage: Merciless Records