This interview was in Infinite Monkey no.3. I think they've split up now. They played really good metalcore in the vein of At The gates etc
Give us a brief introduction to Absidia.
Marc: Absidia started under the name Countless as a four piece in 98. Only our singer, Daniel remains from that line up. Arne came into the band and we changed the rather generic name into Absidia also to underline the musical development from the contemporary Slayer-mid-tempo-mosh into more gloomy heavy metallish type of music. Peter joined on bass in 2000 and the first full length "written in minor key" was recorded for Per Koro Records/Bremen/Germany. Roland, the drummer, left the band due to personal and study obligations for 1,5 years, but recently came back on guitar duties into the band as Markus, founding member and songwriter, left the band. When Roland left the drum stool I took over. That was right after my old band Man vs. Humanity demised in summer 2001. Arne and me played together in MvsH. At the end of 2001 we recorded the split CD with Six Reasons To Kill that came out on Per Koro and Bastardized Records in early 2002 at the Shadows Fall, Caliban, Absidia, Six Reasons To Kill show in Saalfeld. At that night we got hooked up with Lifeforce Records, which is definately what we were going for. 2002 we absolved a short tour and a couple of shows. Although the past year was quite a slow year for us regarding song writing. Due to lack of creativity and motivation Markus left the band and Roland passed us on a CD with 31 min. of self written, recorded and programmed songs fully with drum machine ect., basically instrumental but finished songs. It was obvious that we had to get him back into the band, cos the shit blowed big time. That´s were we are right now, working on a new album. The new release will be different and more metal than ever. We improved much on our instruments and as songwriters and I can´t wait to get the songs together.
Who is the guy that did the artwork to the Six Reasons To Kill split? How
did it come about because it seems like he is a more "professional" artist?
Do you have much of an interest in art in general?
Marc: The dude doing the artwork for the split is Peter Hoffmann. He´s a full on professional, owning an agency. The contact was through Stefan from 6RTK/Bastardized, cos they are from the same city. Basically my interest in arts isn´t very big. I always though keep an eye on the artworks of the bands I used to be in like in Man vs. Humanity and upcoming Fear Is The Path To The Dark Side records. I like Derek Hess, André Liegl and the works of Dave Mc Keen.
Who is Wotienke Vermeen who did the "Conspiracy Theory" song on the split?
What else has she done?
Marc: Wotienke actually is called Vermeer, sorry that´s a typo and I am so embarrassed that we misspelled her name. Wotienke is a friend of mine, she lives in Amsterdam and released a demo CD. Her vocals are so beautiful and I hope I´ll get her to do another piece for the next record. Her contact is wotienke@hotmail.com say “Hi” and kindly ask for a copy. It´s worth it. She even covers an old Strife song on piano.
Why do you think that Germany seems to breed so many great metallic hardcore
bands (Acme, Systral, Dawnbreed, Heaven Shall Burn, you lot)?
Marc: Man, I have no clue why! Maybe because we have no friends here and as a result sit at home isolated in our “kinderzimmer” and practise our instruments so we get to play difficult stuff easier. No seriously, I asked myself that question for quite some while now. I mean on the inside here, it doesn´t seem like it. You know, it´s just the way it is and your surroundings socialize you that way and you think that´s just like it´s everywhere. But when you read the zines like HaC or the U.K. publications like Reason To Believe or Fracture they always talk about the “german sound” or “another metal band from germany”. Partially that´s the truth, but no one in Germany thinks in these categories at all. There is also a strong indie-rock/emo/rock movement in Germany thats going really mainstream and the media pays attention more and more. Also as the metal bands in our scene become more and more professional the phenomenon with Metal in Hardcore is similar like it´s in the states. It crossovers more and more and the scenes seem to slowly grow together or at least coalesque partially. Things happen like Heaven Shall Burn playing in Wacken (that´s like Donington in Germany!) or other festivals e.g. “with full force” where Caliban, Heaven Shall Burn and Cataract performed already. To get back to the question; as we all know Germany always had a big metal scene that has a huge tradition here and established back in the 80´s and used to be quite a big part of the mainstream music culture. A few of the biggest metal labels of the world are from Germany as well (Century Media, Nuclear Blast, Metal Blade), I believe that this plays a role regarding the cultural influence of metal music in germany. But that´s just a few thoughts from a hobby sociologist.
Apart from the obvious hardcore and metal stuff you listen to what else do
you like?
Marc: Hardcore records become less and less, metal records become the vast majority lately. I dig a whole lot of Hip Hop and current R´n´B stuff too, Drum´n´Bass is cool and there are a few prog rock things that I admire for their abilities and their take on music in general ( check out Gordian Knot feat. Bill Bruford (king crimson, yes) the four dudes from prog-death gods Cynic and Steve Hackett from Genesis!) and a few singer/songwriter records make their ways into my stereo too, like Johnny Cash, Tori Amos and Tracy Chapman. Nick Cave rules too!
From the bio things on your website I see that a lot of you like reading
(especially herman Hesse - one of my favourite authors). Have you read any
good books recently?
Marc: I never read any piece from Hesse in my life. I lately read “The black Reich- secret societies and politics in the 20th century” from E.R. Carmin, “two different luck” by Bert Hellinger about concept and practise of systemic psychotherapy. “Attack on liberty” by Chomsky, Galeano, Roy – collected essays on the terrorist attacks in the U.S. and the “new world order”. “Kryon – the end times” a spiritual book as well as the triology of “Conversations with God”.
What do you think about the impending war against Iraq?
Marc: I am at a loss for words. Seriously, it´s so super-incredibly obvious that the U.S.A. do want to get that war and I am very positive on the old and I admit stale argument of oil. Pennzoil, one of the worlds biggest oil companies is owned by G.W. Bush sen., they compete with another big oil company and the arabic emirates´oil supplies aren´t as rich as the public voice tells you. Iraqs oil supplies though are along with Afghanistans btw, the biggest in the world right now. So go and figure! I could go on for hours and into detail but the issue bores me to death and it´s just ridiculous! No war is fought for humanitarian issues, ever! P.E.R.I.O.D.!
I believe one of you does Kombat Athletics. Tell us a bit about it. How
would you defend it against the argument that "it is just making hardcore
more of a fashion/all about consumerism"?
Marc: To be honest! I don´t give flying fuck about that. Everyone is free and of age enough to decide whether he/she purchase this or that. Btw Hardcore is fashion, consumerism and even much more about gossip...I don´t care about the scene. That may sound pretty jaded and stupid, but it´s just so many things discussed in hardcore have no relevance in real life or at least not in mine. So many things and energy surrounds over super trivial things that don´t mean anything to me, like who, what, which record or dude did this and that and blablablahhhh... Many of the politics are either on a pretty lame, undifferenciated level or many times I feel pushed off by the extreme conservative, severe ways of fighting the stereotypical HC/Punk positions. If you fit in, everythings fine – if you doubt some of the classical leftist positions or clishee HC positions on message boards or in conversations many times there are taken drastic messures against critical ideas and believes towards the status quo in the scene. Within its idealistic borders the Hardcore scene is a highly conservative, severe and unrelenting spectacle that I don´t feel I have much in common with anymore. Kombat Athletics´shirts are dope shit btw...
I believe some of you are also involved in a vegan caterers. Is this a co
op? Does it just provide food for gigs or do you do stuff outside the
hardcore scene as well? Any specialities? Any good recipes?
Marc: Markus, our old guitar player, indeed is involved with “herbivore catering”. As far as I know they where just cooking food at shows and festivals for bands and visitors.
What was all the naked antics at the Mannheim fest about?
Marc: Hahahaha... the naked dude was Pat Federli and old friend of mine. He sometimes travells with Cataract with whom we played long weekend at that time around the festival. The weekend was crazy shit with flying coffee grounds on the highway, super-soaker action and nudie stuff. He´s a right on, but crazy dude!
Give us your opinion on the following german cultural icons:-
David Hasselhoff?
Marc: Hahahaha...you insane fucks! Why do you guys always push that button?!?! ;-)))
Heino?
Marc: Sunglasses.
Klaus Wunderlich?
Marc: ???
Saxon/Manowar?
Marc: I saw Saxon with Motörhead in ´92 and I was impressed by their bassist circle headbanging a whole hour in extreme speed! I can see that Manowar can be entertaining as for their involuntary trash aspects. But they don´t do much for me or anyone in the band. The consensus NWOBHM band is of course: IRON MAIDEN!!!
What's wrong with music today? Who should be shot and who should be deified?
Marc: Nothings wrong with music today, not more or less than the last decades. I am a pretty open minded and not a hateful person at all. I wish peace and fun to everyone that music spoke to or that spoke though music.
Anything else to add?
Marc: First of all Ewan thanks a ton for the exposure and interest. I hope we´ll meet sometimes. I also wanna point out that this interview reflects my opinions not the bands. We aren´t to categorize and please don´t try to pigeon hole us to your convinience and trash talk. You should know how much you don´t know about us or me. You don´t know anyone by just listen to their music, reading their lyrics or interviews. Life is much richer in facets than this. Love and piece to you, may the force with with you! Thanks. www.absidia.org
* NEW IN * 2 Dayer 5th/6th July 2003 * GIGS * TOURS * ZINE * DISTRO * LABEL * THE DEVILS * LOSING THE BATTLE * INTERVIEWS * PHOTOS * RECORD REVIEWS *ZINE REVIEWS * LINKS * MP3s * FORUM * CONTACT *
