ERYN NON DAE

PHOTOGRAPHY BY SANDRA KEO
WEBSITE: www.myspace.com/end1freefr
COUNTRY: France STYLE: Metal / Progressive / Ambient

EACH BAND MEMBER MUST HAVE HAD AN IDEA OF HOW THEY WANTED THE BAND TO SOUND “MUSICALLY” WHEN YOU STARTED OUT. HOW CLOSE DO YOU THINK YOU HAVE COME TO THAT SOUND IN YOUR OPINION AND IS IT A BIT DIFFICULT WHEN YOU HAVE TO CONSIDER FOUR OTHER BAND MEMBERS IDEAS AS WELL?

MIKA (BASS): I guess there were a few ideas in common like sounding intense and a kind of sincerity in darkness if I can talk like that. With time and work we manage to all go in the same way, I mean at a time even if some of us doesn’t understand where the song is going he manage to catch the thing since we’re not anymore in trying to make the band sounds like this or like that according to one’s will, it’s quite common and focused now, the band was formed in 2001 so I think we know where we want to go when it comes to composition. But to go further with your question, each of us have really different musical tastes!

I’VE COME ACROSS A FEW FRENCH BANDS LIKE ERYN NON DAE THAT MAKE ALL KINDS OF HEAVY MUSIC I’VE NEVER HEARD BEFORE, IS IT A CASE OF FRENCH BANDS BEING MORE OPEN TO EXPERIMENTATION?

I guess that bands who sound more experimental are emerging now because a lot of Metalheads are tired of hearing always the same clichés but it doesn’t mean that every French band is inventing something of course. But you’re right when you talk about this open minded attitude that can be found in French bands like Hacride or Scarve, but it’s also about digging the underground scene I mean it’s not always possible for a big band to go as far as they could have go without the audience pression for making an album that must sounds the way everybody is waiting for, In France the only exception actually is Gojira but all the other emerging bands can carry on experimenting since there are new bands for most of the audience. But if it’s something particular to the French scene, I feel at ease with it!

LISTENING TO YOUR SONGS ON MYSPACE, YOU HAVE SOME INSANE SONG STRUCTURES AND ARRANGEMENTS GOING ON THERE, HOW DO YOU GUYS USUALLY APPROACH THE SONG WRITING PROCESS?

This process has been evolving with time, at the beginning Yann or Franck (the guitars players) were coming with a few guitar riffs or some drum patterns that were close to a song, and then we were working on it in rehearsal but for Hydra Lernaïa, it became more collective and more natural, songs like Existence Asleep or Through Dark Skies have been built in rehearsal from a strong idea with everyone involved. But it’s always about trying to express a feeling or creating an atmosphere.

I ONLY HAVE THE SONGS ON YOUR MYSPACE TO GO BY BUT DO MOST OF YOUR SONGS GO PAST THE FIVE MINUTE MARK AND IF SO DO YOU THINK SONGS SHOULD SOMETIMES BE LIMITED TO A CERTAIN TIME IN SOME CASES OR SHOULD A SONG BE LEFT TO EVOLVE TILL IT’S DONE (I HOPE I MAKE SENSE)?

First thing is go buy the album if you want us to have a chance to record another one! More seriously I think it goes with this need to set an atmosphere, it takes time if you want the listener to go into the song, for this album each song was pretty epic so I think that there’s only one track that lasts 2 minutes but it’s a kind of intro to another song!

But the question is interesting; I often wonder when can we consider that a song is over? Things are not definitive in music but an Origin song just can’t last 10 minutes if you know what I mean and It must be quite hard for Cult Of Luna to express what they want in a 3 minutes song but who knows...About Eryn Non Dae we’re not blocked on the 8 minutes song format but it just happened like that until know, but since it’s something we’re pretty aware of… and some of our most brutal new songs seems to be more straight forward so shorter, one more time it’s a question of intensity I think...

TELL US MORE ABOUT YOUR LATEST RELEASE “HYDRA LERNAÏA”. HOW MANY TRACKS, HOW LONG DID IT TAKE TO COMPLETE AND IN WHAT WAYS WOULD YOU SAY THE BAND HAS PROGRESSED MUSICALLY?

Hydra Lernaïa is a nine songs album since this concept turns around the nine heads hydra thing. We have written it during two years since we were also playing gigs at the same time, so we always have to rehearse for the live thing while composing the album so it took time.

As I said upper the composition process is a bit more collective now and maybe a bit quicker, I think we are now more conscious about what we want to do and also with what we don’t want to do anymore, I can feel it when we’re on rehearsal the music seems to come from somewhere deep inside each of us, it’s something pretty comfortable but hard to explain, I hope this feeling to last for a long time!!

ONE CAN REALLY HEAR THE ANGER AND FURY IN THE TONE OF YOUR VOCALS AND CRUSHING GUITAR DISTORTION. WHAT “EMOTION” IS THE MAIN DRIVING FORCE BEHIND YOUR MUSIC?

More than a precise emotion it’s about intensity, there’s intensity in hate of course but also in love or in so many...Mathieu our singer wrote about nine human feelings that can all be very intense, it’s an important aspect of these nine songs, you’ll have to figure it out with the lyrics !!haha !!

THE BAND ALSO DID A COOL VIDEO FOR THE SONG “THE DECLINE AND THE FALL”, IT ALL STARTS OUT WITH MOVING PAINT TEXTURES MIXED WITH CLOSE-UPS OF YOUR INSTRUMENTS, BUT YOU CAN PROBABLY GIVE US AN BETTER IDEA OF WHAT THE CONCEPT WAS FOR THE VIDEO?

The interesting thing is that there was no real concept given to the director, it was more “we don’t want to see ourselves in it, or be playing in a hangar blababla” we just told him make what you want with knowing that the song is about decline and fall. And to be honest us playing our instruments is the thing I see the less! Another interesting thing is that he’s a friend of us but he doesn’t listen to Metal music so it was really exciting for us to have something unusual and fresher! All is about falling, fading and reducing everything to its purest form. When he came with the video we’ve been totally blown away!!! It was ten levels up from our expectations, we are very thankful to him for his amazing work.

It’s one of the most pleasant things when making music, waiting for someone to come out with his interpretation of your work, a video or an artwork or a design, it’s a great moment for me when I discover someone else’s contribution and this video was a killer time !

THIS IS ONE OF MY STANDARD QUESTIONS NOW BUT I MUST ASK WHAT GUITAR TUNINGS AND GEAR THE BAND USES TO CREATE THAT “MASSIVE” SOUND?

Since now we didn’t speak a lot about this to be honest, the guitar tuning is B flat, nobody in the band is really a gear geek except me! Haha and since I also play guitar in a few bands I’m totally into gear! For Hydra Lernaïa Franck used a Rivera Knucklehead 100, Yann a Mesa Boogie Dual rectifier, both on mesa boogie cab about guitar they used the Yamaha’s drop 6 AES, which isn’t an incredible guitar but these are of the rare guitar that can keep clear and in tune the B flat correctly!

For the bass we used a shitty Ibanez BTB, an Ampeg SVT 3 with an Ampeg cab and some tricks with a POD, I hate to say it but it’s true...but especially a lot of great microphones and something that we’ll keep secret! The drum is an old Pearl that sounds quite good to us...but we can’t speak about the sound without mentioning our particular wizard Mobo and his Conkrete Studio! We know that we can improve our sound again and again, so since this recording we changed a few things, Franck buy two Les Paul for instance, a lot of details have their importance in the way a band sounds...

DO YOU THINK YOU’LL EVER INCORPORATE ANY OTHER INSTRUMENTS INTO YOUR MUSIC?

As an intervention on an album why not, and it’s something that we could do with the next album , we would like to invite a band that we really love but we don’t know yet if we will manage to find the time to do it... but we hope! But as a permanent member I don’t think, it should have a particular interest, I mean not just adding something to add something, we don’t feel that something is missing in our sound actually but who knows in the future...

NOW THAT “HYDRA LERNAÏA” IS OUT YOU SHOULD PROBABLY BE PLAYING A WHOLE BUNCH OF SHOWS TO PROMOTE IT BUT I DO NOT SEE ANY GIGS LISTED ON YOUR MYSPACE?

It’s our actual matter, we never spend so many time without playing but we just found someone that’s going to help us booking shows, and pulling out a record before the summer isn’t the best thing to do! But Hydra Lernaïa was ready since a few months and we couldn’t wait any longer so we have to wait until the summer ends to take the road again! Don’t worry and feel free to contact us if you’re interested!

WHAT ARE STILL SOME OF THE THINGS THAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO DO TO MAKE YOUR LIVE SHOW “BETTER” (IF THAT IS POSSIBLE)?

I think we can improve the visual aspect, work more on the light thing and have some elements remembering the album artwork could be good ideas but it’s always about money! An important thing when you play extreme music is to be careful with how long you play, More than an hour diminish the impact I think and we know that our music is hard to apprehend with a too long set, we have to build a coherent set... But as every band the more you rehearse the more you kick ass live so we will do our best to bring on stage all the album intensity, it’s the main thing for me...

WHERE WOULD THE BAND LIKE TO TOUR MORE IF GIVEN THE OPPORTUNITY?

I think we have to start with Europe, we played a lot in France and the next thing is Europe but personally I would be very happy with visiting Italy and Sweden, I know that eastern Europe is a great place for Extreme Metal with a dedicated audience who knows what music is about...We had an opportunity to tour the US but finally it failed...next time I hope!

ANY COMMENTS; THINGS FANS SHOULD LOOK OUT FOR OR PEOPLE YOU WOULD LIKE TO THANK?

We have to thanks everybody who still buys albums because it’s the only way for a band like us to carry on with making what we love! Thanks! We hope to come and play for all of you as soon as possible! And for fans looking for sensations what about the latest Sunn o))) album?? Haha !

Thanks to you for your questions!!

Cheers
Mika