BURST Magazine Issue 15, March 2014

March 2014 Issue 15 | $1.99

Lars Ulrich Love Him

or Hate Him!

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club The band that broke the floor!!!

X RAY STORIES Part II

Deaths of famous artists Let’s welcome

A Beginners’ Guide to

9 772241 538000

ISSN 2241-5386

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American Horror Story

Lemmy Inside BURST!

Kilmister Rebel With A Cause!

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would you kill for a photo? www.argophotography.com

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3 Burst Magazine

pages 6-17 Articles

pages 18-37 Interviews

pages 38-41 Albums Reviews

Lemmy Kilmister

page 42-43 Director’s Cut

Few names in rock n roll elicit the reaction, response, praise and passion, as when the iconic name of the legendary British thrashers Motörhead’s singer/ bassist is uttered. pages 44-45 Film Reviews

Read the whole story and interview on page 18 Cover photo by Robert John

Introducing Knockin’ On

Heaven’s DoorBY helen marie joyce

page 48 TV Series Beginner’s Guide

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Raphael Aretakis

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Spiros Smyrnis

senior editors

Cristina Alossi Sissy Fanouraki Jo Gogou Marianna Kofinaki Panagiotis Tsoutsis

editors

Helen Marie Joyce Kostas Krasonis Eleni Lampraki B|S|Orestis Stathia S. Pedioti Angie Rouska

contributing editors

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USA photographer Spanish photographer special guest Design & Layout

Pana Apostolidou Petros Chatzistilianos Danae Christopoulou George Davleris Giorgos Kotrozinis Dimitris Kotsilinis Paschalis Koutsogiannis Alexandros Nalbanis Korina P. Mike Ritchie Sotiris Stilianos Helen Marie Joyce Matina Katsarakou Marianna Kofinaki Apostolis Kalliakmanis B|S|O Jo Gogou Kalliope Tsouroupidou Raphael Aretakis Joe Prostredny Nat Enemede Karolina Pacan Raphael Aretakis

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by Christina Alossi // Photo By: Tessa Angus

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club

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The idea behind the creation of BRMC started since Robert Levon Been’s (bassist) and Peter Hayes’ (guitarist) school years back in 1996. Their influences range from bands like Verve, the Rolling stones, T. Rex, Oasis, Velvet underground, The Jesus and Mary chain, Love and rockets, Daniel Ash and The Brian Jonestown Massacre and they started from California in 1998. Their first name was The Elements, but later on they switched it to Black Rebel Motorcycle Club; that is the name of the gang that Marlon Brando had in the 1953 movie, “Wild one”. Peter and Robert soon shared the same roof and spiritual guidance from Robert’s dad, who also was in the new wave rock group “The Call”. The band won the title “the band that broke the floor” in 2003, when their concert in Leeds Town Hall, England, was cancelled due to the fear that the 150-year-old floor would retreat from the pressure. Some personal drug related problems of the drummer, Nick Jago, lead them to search for a different third member and the found exactly that to the hands Leah Shapiro, x-member of The Raveonettes. With Shapiro’s addition, the band made its own record label. During the “Beat the devil’s tattoo” album tour, Robert’s father died in the backstage due to a heart attack. BRMC didn’t just lose a member from the crew but their whole musical/spiritual guidance; all these lead to an ocean of insecurity that, fortunately, were able to be overcome very soon.

Their first album, also titled B.R.M.C., had a more pop rock style and they always seemed to have the garage-noise rock sound “after” them. They were a refreshment for the garage rock, and very pleasant to the ears. They add political lyrics to the “Take them on, on your own” and America turns its eyes on the band of California, as their sound gets to be rougher and the guitars dirtier. However the drummer issues seemed to distract them and their third album is not exactly garage

The band that broke the floor!!!

rock and definitely not the style we were used to. Later in the “Howl” album and with the contribution of Jago, the “Baby 81” is a new dynamic comeback and they return with their sound hollow, underground and dry.

Nick Jago is back in his stool for the last time; raw, rough and stronger than ever, “like a tsunami only one person can survive- if lucky”. Jago, once more, abandons the group during their summer tour and the talented Leah takes his place, a charismatic drummer since the age of eighteen. “Beat the devil’s tattoo”, after the psychedelic, instrumental break (The effects of 333) brings them back to the garage sound, gets the best critiques and the songs are being used by advertisements, video games and series. It is a little altered though as it is closer to the darker paths of noisegarage. BRMC have discovered their identity and what expresses them the most; switched their motto to garage and got to work. Michael Been’s spirit certainly has played a part in leading them in the right path.

The world learned about them, spread their songs around, they

raised their way up to the charts and BRMC was established as one of the best garage rock revival bands. Last March the “Specter at the feast” was released and was a tribute and a sign of grief for Robert’s father.

Holding on to their sound and style, all they missed was the production Michael used to do on their records; but they got on that task on their own. The album contains a cover from Michael Been’s band, “The Call”, the hit song “Let the day begin”. A band that started off as a school dream and reached 7 albums, five of them are considered as the finest from the garage scene or else raw rock n roll sound and very mature unlike what the genre is considered to be- and of course finely executed musically.

The name may deceive you, it may bring stoner or heavy metal bands to mind but the Motorcycles belong to garage and that is the first thing that should come to you mind when you hear the words Black Rebel Motorcycle Club.

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Lars Ulrich: Love him or hate him!

By Sissy Fanouraki and Petros Chatzistilianos Photo by Mark Wainwright

Lars Ulrich short bio & some gossip…

Born on December 26th, 1963 in Denmark, Lars Ulrich was expected to be a tennis player, following his father’s steps; Torbin Ulrich was a nationally renowned tennis player.

However, in 1973, after Deep Purple’s concert in Copenhagen, which was actually Lars’s baptism in hard rock and heavy metal music, he decided that tennis wasn’t the life for him and took up the drums. In the early 80’s his family moved to California and Lars was eager to start up a band… Soon, in 1981, he met guitarist James Hetfield and the idea of Metallica was officially born. The name of the band was an idea of Ron Quintana, who was searching names for his heavy metal fanzine. Between Metallica and Metal Mania, Lars encouraged him to choose the former and of course he used Metallica as the name of the band!!!

Lars Ulrich has been married and divorced twice; in 1988 to Debbie Jones (divorced in Burst www.afternoiz.com

1990) and in 1997 to Skylar Satenstein (divorced in 2004).

His second wife gave birth to two sons, Miles (born in 1998), and Layne (born in 2001). In 2007 Lars Ulrich and Connie Nielsen had had another son, Bryce Thadeus Ulrich-Nielsen, but he’s currently engaged to fashion model Jessica Miller.

He made his acting debut in the HBO film “Hemingway & Gellhorn” (released in May 2012).

Two years earlier, he also made a brief appearance, as himself, in the film “Get Him to the Greek” (released in 2010).

About his drumming style now & beyond reasonable doubt…

Lars Ulrich’s drumming style has undoubtedly changed throughout the years. In the 1980s he was fast and we, lovers of Metallica, admired him for his aggressive thrash beats and his ability to differentiate the blasts moving around the rhythmic guitar. The double bass technique in latin breakbeats (as firstly used in Motorhead’s “Overkill”) was becoming a “trend” among

drummers and so, Lars used it too; “Metal Militia”(Kill ‘Em All), “Fight Fire with Fire” (Ride the Lightning), “Battery”, “Damage, Inc.” (Master of Puppets), “Blackened”, “One” and “Dyers Eve” (...And Justice for All), “That Was Just Your Life”, “All Nightmare Long’ (Death Magnetic). In addition he used groove with clean and fast double bass beats and heavy drum fills. Yet, during the 1990s and early 2000s he cut down his drum rhythms and after the release of “Metallica” album Lars Ulrich adopted a more simplified style of drumming while reducing his kit from a 9-piece to a 7-piece. Yet, in Metallica’s “St. Anger” and “Death Magnetic” Lars Ulrich seemed to have returned to his older style. In “St. Anger” he played hard in a total punk sound and the latter is closer to his ‘80s more complex and fast rhythmic drumming.

These changes had a great impact on his fame as a drummer and due to the huge contrast to his previous routine he was, and still is, heavily criticized as being a poor drummer. Accord-

ing to rumours, it is said that in the early years of Metallica, James Hetfield didn’t want to jam with him due to his novice abilities.

A video footage filmed in the mid ‘90s featuring the disputes between Lars and James during a studio session, was “leaked” at YouTube and various social media in 2010. That video vindicated Lars haters’ claims of his poor technique especially on the double bass drumming whereas it infuriated the Metallica fans. Fake or not, this video and many others that followed, sowed doubt and till now the “war” still exists. Lars Ulrich was feeling depressed and hurt by these accusations, in 2012, he finally responded to such criticism and stated “I’m no Joey Jordison. I’m no Mike Portnoy, and I have nothing but love and respect and admiration for all those guys.

When I hear some of the young dudes, they blow my mind with what they can do with their feet and stuff - but it’s not something that makes me go, I need to feel better about myself so I’m gonna learn how to do

what they do with my feet. I’m not a particularly accomplished drummer but I am very, very, very good at understanding the role of the drums next to James Hetfield’s rhythm guitar. I guarantee you I’m the best guy in the world for that, and that’s enough for me!”

XStorieS Ray Deaths of famous artists

by Jo Gogou

Adding just a few more words…

Lars Ulrich is neither the best nor the worst drummer ever.

Maybe he can’t play the drums as Mike Portnoy or can’t be compared to Neil Peart or Joey Jordison. Lars’ ‘poor’ drumming may not be one man’s fault…

You should probably blame it on the band that became very popular!!! Nevertheless, as Lars Ulrich stated, he’s the drummer next to James Hetfield’s rhythm guitar, he had the “imagination” needed to make a difference and to sum up, lots of drummers would love to be in his shoes.

Part #2

Elvis Presley (Elvis Aaron Presley The girl who had a tragic childhood and 8/1/1935 – 16/8/1977 ) managed to change, not only her own life, but the lives of thousand men and women as well.

Ulrich Vs Napster In April 2000, Lars Ulrich, as the spokesman of Metallica, filed a lawsuit against Napster for copyright infringement and racketeering. In July 2000, he testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Metallica’s entire catalogue was found to be freely available for download but the band sued Napster only after they discovered a demo version of “I Disappear” available before its official release.

14 years ago Lars Ulrich stated that the battle against Napster was not about getting money but about having control over how it was shared. During the “Ask me Anything” session of The Pulse Radio, Lars doesn’t seem to have changed his mind about it. “The whole thing was about one thing and one thing only — control. Not about the Internet, not about money, not about file sharing, not about giving shit away for free or not, but about whose choice it was. If I wanna give my shit away for free, I’ll give it away for free. That choice was taken away from me.”

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She was found dead at the age of 36, naked on her bed and her blood full of barbiturates. What really happened that night, well only she knows, as rumors have gone wild around her death.

Elvis Presley, one of the music and the cinematic industry’s greatest names (he played in many movies as well). Passionate with the ladies and the drugs, that was what lead him to his death.

1977: That is considered to be his worst career period as he was addicted to “pharmaceutical” substances that leave their mark on his body and face. His concerts are not enough to keep him calm anymore as the audience froze at his sight.

At the morning of August 16, 1977, Presley is found dead from heart failure, aged 42.

The reason was the drugs that were a constant in the last years of his life.

The bio analysis report showed more than ten different chemical substances in Elvis’ body that day.

Dr. George Nichopoulos, had prescribed him with 199 prescriptions, more than 10,000 doses of amphetamines and other substances- and all that were during the first months of 1977. He is the one charged with his death. In his testimony he will plead innocent and that he was trying to help him not to suffer as much as he claimed he did.

Elvis had serious sleep problems since his childhood and was on treatment for many years.

The autopsy showed 14 chemical substances in his blood, ten of them was of large quantity. The most known among them were morphine, demerol, valium, codeine.

Marilyn Monroe (Norma Jeane Mortenson; 1/6/1926 – 5/81962)

She was an idol of power for many women and a sex symbol for men, Marilyn, was the third person among the Kennedy couple.

That did not remain a secret and many took the liberty to invade her personal life and freedom on this account.

August 5, 1962 at 4:25am, sergeant Jack Clemmons received a call from the psychiatrist Ralph Greenson, that Monroe was dead.

The coroners wrote that the cause was acute poisoning from barbiturates… A possible suicide, but until today nothing has been proved since many wanted her to keep her mouth shut. Conspiracy theories exist

with names like John and Robert Kennedy, even with the CIA itself or the mafia.

Some said that there was a chance that she was pregnant from the President, which may have been the reason behind what ended whatever she had dreamt of to that day.

Paul Gray (Paul Dedrick Gray 8/4/1972 – 24/5/2010) May,24, 2010. The newspaper “Des Moines Register” reports the death of Slipknot’s bassist, Paul Gray.

The report says he was found dead inside the room 431 of the hotel TownePlace Suites of Iowa, local time 10:50am.

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10 The evidence shows that the owner of the hotel had informed the police and first aid.

Inside the room and next to the body were found plenty of pills, a needle and drug substances.

The first gossip talked about a combination of drugs and alcohol but the official report of the coroner left the cause of death undefined, as they were waiting for the toxicological analysis.

The “bad” coincidence was that his wife gave birth to their little girl a few months later. He never got the chance to meet her and she had collapsed during her pregnancy.

Being used to have an audience, Slipknot, appear in May, 225 without their masks to give an interview in Des Moines, of Iowa.

All the remaining members were there, as well as the victim’s wife and his associate and brother, Corey...

“He was kind of the person in the band that really wanted everybody in the band to always get along and just concentrate on the band. He was a really great friend and just a great person. He’s going to be sadly missed, and the world is going to be a different place without him.”

—Shawn Crahan

often yet he disappeared in the blink of an eye.

Days later, June 4, his body was found by two locals in the Wolf River. His body was floating next to a river boat and it was identified as him. In Buckley’s autopsy report was notes about drug and alcohol use.

It was classified as a random death whilst many claim that he was suicidal.

Jeff Buckley’s death was not “mysterious,” related to drugs, alcohol, or suicide. We have a police report, a medical examiner’s report, and an eye witness to prove that it was an accidental drowning, and that Mr. Buckley was in a good frame of mind prior to the accident.

After his passing, Elizabeth Fraser from Cocteau Twins, wrote the lyrics for the Massive Attack song, “Teardrop”, mentioning Buckley: “That was so weird ... I’d got letters out and I was thinking about him. That song’s kind of about him ,that’s how it feels to me anyway.”

June 4, 2009: The actor Carradine is in Tayland for the makings of the movie Stretch. The hotel crew found him naked and choked by a belt.

Suicide or erotic asphyxiation, well these two possibilities were just as plausible.

“There was a dark side to David, there was a very intense side to David. People around him know that.”

“The Barefoot Legend” and included a quote from “Paint” The time of his death, the papers and magazines got rich from his death scene in the hotel... His family pleaded for a dignified mourning.

A month later, in July 30, he is awarded, post mortem, to the “Services to Metal”award.

Jeff Buckley (Jeffrey Scott “Jeff” Buckley 17/11/1966– 29/5/1997) May 29, 1997: Jeff Buckley and his band are on an aeroplane to Memphis to record their album.

According to witnesses, the very same night, Buckley, wanted to go swimming in the Wolf River Harbor, part of the Mississippi river. A mistake he made was that he wanted to swim with his clothes and boots on. That night he went there alone with his guitar and sang “Whole Lotta Love” by Led Zeppelin.

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David Carradine (David Carradine -John Arthur Carradine 8/12/1936 – 3/6/2009)

Michael Hutchence (Michael Kelland John Hutchence 22/1/1960 – 22/11/ 1997)

June, 21, 2010: The autopsy results show overdose from morphine and fentanyl.

A few months later, objects and rembrandts that were on his grave were lost and they tried to retrieve them through internet announcements that pleaded for the return of the stolen items.

In September 2012, his doctor, Gray Daniel Baldi, faces charges for involuntary manslaughter for his and seven other deaths.

The illegal prescriptions and the high doses of drugs lead him to the courthouse.

buckle had broken” The last people that saw him alive were Kym Wilson and Andrew Reyment.

Although the officials stated that it was a suicide, his family and his friend, Paula Yates (ex-wife) and many friends and associates claim that this was a case of erotic asphyxiation.

Simon LeBon, Duran Duran, dedicated him the lyrics, “Michael, You’ve Got A Lot To Answer For”, a song that was released in October, 1997.

“And I know that you’re going to call... if you need me.”

U2’s singer, Bono stated: “Stuck in a Moment You Can’t Get Out Of”

It was not that long ago after Kurt Cobain’s death and before the healing had started another death shook everyone.

The singer and songmaker, Michael Hutchence, INXS, is found hanged by his own belt. The case seems fairly easy for the authorities. A man in trouble, depressive, with drug substances and alcohol in his blood and ends his life. In that period and as everything points at suicide there is something interesting in the official report of the autopsy.

11:50 “He was in a kneeling position facing the door. He had used his snake skin belt to tie a knot on the automatic door closure at the top of the door, and had strained his head forward into the loop so hard that the

Buddy Holly (Charles Hardin Holley 7/9/1936 – 3/2/1959) One of the pioneers in rock n’ roll, that as many claim, started with Buddy Holly, aged 22 and with a career waiting to happen, Buddy didn’t manage to cheat death.

February 1959: The successful end of a concert ignited a new tour, with a new band, The Crickets. With him are Tommy Allsup (guitar), Waylon Jennings (bass) and Carl Bunch (drums), and they all go America together. In February 2 they have another live in Iowa and then they would have to go to Minnesota. Due to frost they decided to go there by plane. They rented a small one and initially Buddy would be left

11 out, due to space limitations, but then he took the bassist’s place, Waylon Jennings.

They even joked about it, “I hope your ol’ bus freezes up!” “Well, I hope your ol’ plane crashes!”.

Irony? The plane crashed minutes after it was in air killing everyone inside instantly.

In a way, I blame myself. I was not feeling well when he left. I was two weeks pregnant, and I wanted Buddy to stay with me, but he had scheduled that tour. It was the only time I wasn’t with him. And I blame myself because I know that, if only I had gone along, Buddy never would have gotten into that airplane.

His wife, María Elena Holly, miscarried that day to their only child.

Twelve years later, in 1971, Don McLean releases the single, “American Pie”, dedicated to Buddy Holly’s loss.

What is even more tragic, is to be killed by you own game. Cause of death? Russian roulette. Passionate for this bizarre sport, Ace, couldn’t stop playing, just like he did that December evening. His favorite toy was a 22mm, that he always carried around.

He started pointing the gun to anyone in his range and enjoyed the adrenaline rush.

His passion only grew and by pointing it everywhere it shot him in the head. It actually happened at his new home.

The funeral was in January 9, 1955, Memphis. It was reported that 5.000 people showed up.

Terry Kath (Terry Alan Kath 31/1/1946 – 23/1/1978) death as in September, 1977; he was killed in a car accident, aged 29. Gloria Jones was driving the car and she was severely injured. After 4 years in another car accident, T-Rex’s bassist, Steve Currie was also killed.

Keith Relf (22/3/1943 – 14/5/1976 )

The Chicago’s guitarist found a similar death in January, 1978.

Again, the cause was a gun that he thought was empty. He even told a friend, “Don’t worry, it’s not loaded”. Minutes later he turned it on himself and died.

He left a widow, Camelia Emily Ortiz, and a daughter behind.

He was just 32 years old.

Weird incidents, staged or not, suicides or murders, funny or serious, all are around as... Written in pages of music and cinema... but above all humane stories. Many more were heroes of their own dreams, Elliott Smith, Randy Rhoads, Marvin Gaye, Les Harvey and the list just keeps sadly growing throughout the years.

“The Day the Music Died”.

Cass Elliot (Ellen Naomi Cohen 19/9/1941 – 29/7/1974) This was one of the deaths described as grotesque and years later it was classified in the deaths related to food. The rumors wanted Cass Elliot, Mamas & Papas, died from a bite of a sandwich. The tabloids sold and sold falsely relying on a fake autopsy report.

The truth lies in the official documents and the cause was a heart attack. Friends and family believed that her heart had grown weaker due to a recent weight loss.

Marc Bolan (Mark Feld 30/9/1947– 16/9/1977 ) One of the ironies in death is to die from what scares you the most. That was tragically proven true for the singer and songwriter of the T-Rex, Marc Bolan.

Marc Bolan, had an irrational fear of cars, ever since he was a child. That was why he never learned how to drive. Another fear he had was that he would die young.

His phobia played a role in the cause of his

“Record Collector” magazine, January 1981

Spring of 1976, the 33 year old singer of the Yardbirds, Keith Relf, tries to play with his electric guitar at home. That action proved tragical for his life. The announcement said: Yardbirds was electroshot.

Johnny Ace (John Marshall Alexander, Jr. 9/6/1929 – 25/12/1954) “I will tell you exactly what happened!

Johnny Ace had been drinking and he had this little pistol he was waving around the table and someone said ‘Be careful with that thing…’ and he said ‘It’s okay! Gun’s not loaded…see?’ and pointed it at himself with a smile on his face and ‘Bang!’ – sad, sad thing. Big Mama ran out of the dressing room yelling ‘Johnny Ace just killed himself!” Big Mama Thornton Burst www.afternoiz.com

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K C O L B D L O E A CHIP OFF TH

tlow their parents’ foo artists’ progeny to fol s ou of t fam ou y for sta e tic to k ac tas s common pr ’s legacy. It’s no easy l far from the tree. It’ live up to their parent to d daughters who an ng gli ns The apple doesn’t fal ug so str ve s, ha es ls” music “roya in show busin y er an re eir M ca . a all e er rsu aft , pu d ian , and thus making th steps an s music most very successfully e the child of a famou s, ar u lve se yo em en th wh t for gh me eli the lim equently a na paths in life and subs have made their own ry proud. mamas and papas ve

By Dialekti Angeli

Like father like son All Beatles’ members have at least one child who engaged into the music business at some point. Julian Lennon is the only child of John Lennon and Cynthia Powell. He made his musical debut when he was only 11 years old, on his father’s album ‘Walls and Bridges’ playing drums on the song ‘YaYa’. He was also nominated for a Grammy Award for Best New Artist for his album ‘Valotte’, in 1985. Sean Lennon is the fruit of the love of John Lennon and Yoko Ono. He took his first steps into the music world at the age of five, when he recited a story on his mother’s album ‘Season of Glass’. He continued to collaborate with his mother ‘til his teen years, mainly contributing to vocals. By 1995, he had formed the band IMA. Sean also appeared in Michael Jackson’s movie ‘Moonwalker’.

James McCartney is making a career as a musician and songwriter for the last four years. He learned how to play the guitar at the age of six, but he refused to do so professionally. Instead, he studied architecture and pottery. He tried music for the first time at the age of 33. Unlike some other Beatles’ sons, he hasn’t adopted an anonymous band name.

On the contrary, his father coproduced his album ‘Available Light’, and Neil Young covered the song “Old Man” for this album.

Zak Starkey is an English rock drummer and the son of Ringo Starr. Zak was an unofficial member of the band ‘The Who’, with whom he performed Burst www.afternoiz.com

and recorded since 1996. His first contact with a drummer kit was when he was eight years old. Keith Moon – The Who’s drummer – gave him a drum kit as a present. He is also the third drummer to work with Oasis. He has also worked with musicians and bands such as Paul Weller, The Lighting Seeds and John Entwistle.

Dhani Harrison is the son of the Beatles lead guitarist, George Harrison. He debuted as a professional musician in his father’s final album, ‘Brainwashed’, which he completed with Jeff Lynne after George’s death. Dhani formed the alternative rock band, Thenewno2, in which he plays lead guitar and sings lead vocals.

The rock legend, Bob Dylan, passed his music genes on to his son Jakob. Jakob Dylan is

sidered by many, as one of the greatest musicians, while even after his death, his work remains popular and he regularly featured in various lists of ‘best musicians’. He is the spitting image of the American folk singer and musician, Tim Buckley. Sadly, both father and son died very young. Tim Buckley died at the age of 28 from ‘acute heroin/morphine and ethanol intoxication due to inhalation and ingestion of overdose’ as the coroner’s report stated. Jeff’s autopsy on the other hand showed no sign of drugs or alcohol and his death was ruled as an accidental drowning in Wolf River Harbor in the Mississippi River, where he went swimming, while wearing all of his clothing and his shoes and singing the chorus of the song ‘Whole Lotta Love’.

Jason Bonham is the son of Led Zeppelin’s late drummer, John Bonham. He started playing drums at a very early age.

He even appeared alongside his father in the film ‘The Song Remains the Same’, perform-

joined Jimmy Page for his album ‘Outrider’ as well as on the homonymous tour. In 2010 he formed ‘Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Experience’, a live homage to the legendary English band, which toured worldwide during 2011.

Wolfgang Van Halen grew up to play along the same band as his father, Eddie Van Halen. Having replaced Michael Anthony in 2006, Wolfgang is currently the bassist for Van Halen. He once said that he didn’t know his father was a famous musician ‘until I started picking up CDs and saw his picture on them’. He used to watch his father’s rehearsals and at times would try to play the drums. He was nine, when his father gave him his first set of drums. Later he learned how to play the guitar and the bass and he can even play keyboards. Wolfgang started participating more actively in the band, making guest appearances during Van Halen’s tour in 2004. He recorded his full length album, ‘A Different Kind of Truth’ with Van Halen in 2011. The album was released on February 7, 2012.

Like father like daughter

the lead singer and songwriter of the band ‘The Wallflowers’.

He has recorded solo albums since the late ‘80s, when he actually formed ‘The Wallflowers’. The band had a massive hit with the song ‘6th Avenue Heartache’. Jakob has also released two solo albums, one in 2008 (‘Seeing Things’) and one in 2010 (‘Women and Coutry’).

The late Jeff Buckley is con-

Photo by Glenn Francis

ing on a scaled-down kit. After his father’s death in 1980, he played with Led Zeppelin on different occasions. In 1988 he

Unlike the majority of the sons of famous musicians, who have chosen a musical career, the female offspring seem to have taken another road. They mainly chose to be fashion designers, models and actresses.

They are all gorgeous and that reminds me of some kind of karmic debt, those rock daddies pay back, as they now must try to protect their own daughters from guys like themselves.

13 It’s no surprise that the female progeny of Mick Jagger, are ridiculously beautiful, while the frontman of the Rolling Stones has paired up with some of the most beautiful women over the years. His daughter, Jade, is the only child of Bianca and Mick Jagger.

She is a jewellery designer, socialite and a model. Mick Jagger had three children with Jerry Hall. Elizabeth Scarlett Jagger is a very successful model, working for Tommy Hilfiger, as well as representing the Spanish fashion line, ‘Mango’. Lizzy Jagger is known as the one who posed for Playboy. The 27 year-old Lizzy has got her good looks from her mother and she inherited her father’s free spirit, turning it into a career. Georgia May is the youngest of the Mick-Jerry progeny and she joined the fashion world at a very young age. At the age of 19, she has already been featured by Harper’s Bazaar, Versace, Vogue and Chanel.

Another member of the Rolling Stones, Keith Richards, has two insanely good-looking daughters.

It seems like these guys not only know how to rock n’ roll, but they are good at choosing women with whom they have beautiful children. Theodora Richards is the eldest daughter of Keith Richards and Patti Hansen. In 2006, she joined the group of models working for Tommy Hilfiger and has since graced the pages of magazine and clothing lines. She seems a good girl altogether. However, she was arrested in New York in 2011, for painting the walls of a nunnery while having marijuana in her possession, proving that she got a little bit of rock star running through her veins.

I can see Keith Richards right there! Alexandra is the youngest one. She modelled for many huge fashion magazines, like Vanity Fair

and Vogue, and she even appeared in the pages of the French edition of Playboy.

AP Photo/Evan Agostini

Apart from modelling, she is an artist and a DJ in New York. She might inherit her good looks – thankfully – from her mother but surely, papa Richards is happy his baby girl has inherited the music gene from him.

Aerosmith’s frontman, Steven Tyler, is the proud father of three gorgeous ladies. His first born is the well-known actress, Liv Tyler. She didn’t know that Steven was her father, for her mother, Bebe Buell, claimed that Todd Rundgren was Liv’s father. However, she revealed the truth about Liv’s real father when she was nine years old. And we ‘re thankful for that, because it led to Liv’s breakout role in Aerosmith’s music video ‘Crazy’ and an impressive film career (Lord of the Rings, Armageddon, The Incredible Hulk). Steven has also fathered Mia, a plus sized model and a fashion designer. Like her half-sister, she has also taken on some acting, most notably in ‘Rush Hour 3’. Chelsea Anna Tallarico is the youngest daughter of Steve Tyler. She kept only the best part of her father’s look and she is making a career as a model and a low profile actress like the other two Tylers.

Minka Kelly is the only child of the former Aerosmith guitarist, Rick Dufay

and exotic dancer mother, Maureen. Minka started as a model, but she eventually become an actress, best known for her roles in TV series ‘Friday Night Lights’ and movies like ‘The Roomate’ and ‘Charlie’s Angel’.

Lauren Harris is one of the few daughters of famous musicians that actually follow a music career.

Being the daughter of Iron Maiden bassist, Steve Harris, Lauren got a giant boost when she started her career, for she opened for Iron Maiden shows during 2006 and 2007. Lauren decided to put together a band and formed ‘Six Hour Sundown’. In mid-2012 she moved to Los Angeles and started a musical project called ‘Kingdom of I’, with the help of Dave Stewart, the songwriter of the Eurythmics.

Frances Bean Cobain is the daughter of Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love. Frances Bean grew up to be a fine young woman, with an artistic temperament, recently exhibited her artwork at a Los Angeles gallery under the pseudonym ‘Fiddle Tim’. She couldn’t have gone far from the rest of the famous rock daughters, as in 2006, she also began modelling. She famously appeared in ‘Elle’ magazine wearing her late father’s famous brown cardigan and pyjama pants.

WordsOf Wisdom

by Karolina Pacan

Computer games VS Real life My dear Friends and Spartan Warriors, Today I wanted to speak to you about something that touches all of us in a certain way.

Reality has pushed us to become more and more dependent on computers; we have created our second reality inside a virtual world. Not many of us still remember the feeling where you have fun in a real forest, inhaling fresh air.

There was a time, when we were kids, that we had the ability to appreciate the simplest things around us. We could spend almost our whole day outside, playing normal games, socializing, really getting to know each other...

Nowadays, the outside activities have been replaced by computers games, and social networks (in a way they’re good, you can know people from other countries), we rarely take our time to be spontaneous and make surprises for our friends.

Haven’t you missed your childhood when the garden of your neighbors was the most mysterious place to conquer? Haven’t you missed simply having tea and cookies with your friend? Try, from time to time, to close your computer, and go live a real life, make real adventures, go and have real fun, meet, laugh, create memories. Life is too short to sit in one place. Try to find a balance, between games and reality.

We first met this last lady on our list, when she participated in her family’s reality show, having pink hair, tattoos and when she was heavier than now. Kelly Osbourne is the daughter of the Prince of Darkness, Ozzy, and media personality, Sharon Osbourne. Kelly got in shape, sobered up and is now a correspondent for the E! Channel television show, ‘Fashion Police’.

She has even gone into the business of fashion design.

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14

Knockin’ On

Heaven’s BY helen Door marie joyce

Fact File Days on Earth: February 20, 1967 - April 5, 1994 (aged 27)

Associated Act: Nirvana, 1987 - 1994 (Grunge, Alternative Rock)

Biggest Influence: The Beatles.

Quoted: “We’re just musically and rhythmically retarded.

We play so hard that we can’t tune our guitars fast enough. People can relate to that.”

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Kurt Cobain (almost entirely reluctantly) became a legend for a musical genre of Alternative Rock that surfaced in Seattle in the early 90’s called ‘Grunge’. The sound is heavy, unpolished, and distorted, with angst-y lyrics and growling vocals and Nirvana’s second album Nevermind (1991) became the ultimate Grunge sensation, selling 30 million copies worldwide, making it one of the best-selling albums in musical history. Nevermind is now considered a ‘classic’ album that has heavily characterized the 90’s decade, and has aided in bringing Alternative Rock music to a global level.

Kurt’s early days Cobain’s early life was tumultuous and troubled.

He was born in Aberdeen, and at 7 years of age his parents divorced, which was the main source for many of Cobain’s inner struggles. He felt ashamed of them, and ended up resenting his father for re-marrying, adding two step-children into the Cobain family mix, and a half-brother born in 1979. The multikid environment scathed Cobain’s young ego which was used to being a single child, receiving undivided attention. Cobain began bullying in school and became increasingly insolent and so was forced to see a therapist.

Cobain did not accept his father’s new family, and witnessed on occasion his mother being abused by various partners. For a brief period in his youth, Cobain was taken in by a ‘born-again Christian’ family and for some time young Cobain embraced the Christian religion, before snapping out of it. He later embraced the values of Buddhism and

Jainism, naming his band Nirvana meaning ‘free from pain and suffering from the external world’, as a cry for inner peace.

Song Alert! There are strong references to this period of his life in the lyrics of “Lithium” which conveys the manicdepression that Cobain suffered from, in a very nonchalant relationship with ‘God’ and loose terms around what is right and what is wrong, which is further reinforced by the sound of the sound, which alternates between soft and loud parts, and interchanging between single notes and ‘double stops’.

Music was always in the greater family background and he received his first guitar as a gift on his 14th birthday. He began to learn hymns from his favourite musical decade, the 70’s, with Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, AC/DC being on the forefront of his musical education. He also enjoyed proto-punk bands such as The Stooges and The Velvet Underground.

Of course, his love for the Beatles was un-matched and has claimed that he was singing along to their ‘Hey Jude’ as early as 2 years of age.

In his late teens during the early 80’s, Cobain was drawn to the Seattle music scene which was predominantly Punk Rock at the time, with his first concert ever being one by Melvins, a local Montesano band.

While frequenting the Melvins rehearsing studio, he began listening to punk records like the 70’s old-but-gold, Sex Pistols, whom he greatly admired, Black Flag, and Bad Brains among others.

There he met co-founding Nirvana member Krist Novoselic, and Nirvana was conceived in 1987.

Cobain’s Nirvana The band saw a rocky start, having trouble finding a drummer who would stick. They had little appeal at first, and early touring proved to be a disappointment in Cobain’s eyes, as they frequently ended up playing on scarcely crowded shows. When Chad Channing joined as drummer in 1988, Nirvana were able to release their debut album, Bleach (1989), which sold around 40,000 copies in the U.S. before Nevermind (1991).

The sound of Bleach was the fuzziest and bleakest sounding record under the Sub Pop Records label at the time, yet very much in line with the sound of the scene, with Cobain claiming that the reason for sparse lyrics is that they were not a priority on this album, often written the night before recording, and often drawn from personal influences in Cobain’s early life in Aberdeen. Bleach is an album that showed the tenacity of Nirvana, yet it was clear that it was not a full-potential sample of work. Channing managed to stick around for a year before leaving Nirvana drummer-less again, and in search of, perhaps their best match yet. Dave Grohl entered the Nirvana band member bill in early 1990, and went on to form what started off as a one-man project, Foo Fighters, after Cobain’s passing.

Nevermind (1991) was the point of no-return, for Nirvana and Cobain especially. With its release under DGC Records, Nirvana became the name which today stands for one of the most influential, if not the most influential, band of the 90’s.

It exceeded expectations, it became massively suc>>

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16 cessful and within 5 months of its release, it had already displaced Michael Jackson’s Dangerous album in first place on Billboard 200 in January 1992. Nirvana’s most famous tracks are on Nevermind, that is, the first single of the album and largely popular “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, followed by “Come As You Are”, “Lithium” and “In Bloom”, also released as singles. The album had much stronger and more emotional lyrics, often drawn from his personal experiences again, this time influenced by his dysfunctional relationship with love interest at the time, Tobi Vail. The sound on Nevermind is broader than Bleach that Cobain felt was a bit limited for his growing musical taste. It combines a Pixies element in melody and structure but with the signature distortion and pedal effect of Nirvana, thus setting this as the sound of the 90’s according to general opinion. The album cover was also quite poignant, signifying the depth of Cobain’s psychology – a baby, underwater (standing for water birth), chasing a dollar sign on a hook.

It seems like this is sticking it in the face of capitalism, if you ask me.

Cobain had strong opinions on various socio-economic issues such as capitalism, racism, and sexism among others.

He was generally pro-choice on the subject of abortion, and he was an opponent of homophobia and an open gay rights and welfare supporter; he had even played gigs supporting these two causes at benefits in 1992.

Quite rapidly, the massive success of Nirvana, which had put Cobain in the global spotlight, came into conflict with Cobain’s personal demons; he had difficulty coping with the constant media exposure and his private life, and the fact that he was reluctantly placed in a position of influence, as his persona had become ‘a spokesman’ of Generation X. This put a lot of pressure on Cobain who did not necessarily want to have this burden of social responsibility.

The third and final album, In Burst www.afternoiz.com

Utero (1993) was greatly anticipated by fans. Cobain was desperate to depart from the aggregate, “one-dimensional” Nevermind sound, and wanted to create an album that had the best of two worlds: maintaining the rawness of Grunge (as in “Rape Me”) yet incorporating some more obvious pop melodies (as in “Heart Shaped Box”), and by interchanging between restraints and build-ups. In Utero was influenced by Cobain’s feelings towards his new bride, Love, as well as his frustrations with the media and the world.

Nirvana also played the infamous MTV Unplugged sessions in 1993, bringing a new appreciation for them. MTV was a medium to extrapolate Nirvana’s success and further reinforce the success of the band, by breaking through state and national boundaries that radio inherently has.

Cobain’s personal demons The convoluted Cobain married the controversial Courtney Love, front-woman of all-girl alternative rock group, Hole, in 1992. Cobain was intrigued

by strong-minded, creative women who were part of the scene, as was Vail before Love.

The couple shared the stage together for the first and last time in the Rock Against Rape benefit in 1993. Their relationship was complicated, and they often bonded through the use of recreational drugs. Heroin was a favourite one. Their daughter, Frances Bean Cobain, born 6 months into their marriage, and the couple found themselves in a very public predicament for Frances’ custody when Love’s mention of drug use and pregnancy was construed as Cobain and Love being unfit parents. His ‘Journals’, published in 2002, provide further insight into his sad, mad mind; the collection of lyric drafts, notes, writings and drawings shed light into his struggle between his personal image, and his public one. He felt frustrated and unworthy as he felt he was losing creativity and enjoyment, when his public image was that of a flourishing music pioneer. In what is believed by many to be his suicide letter, addressed ‘To Boddah’, his childhood imaginary friend, he says “I need to slightly numb in order to regain the enthusiasms I once

had as a child”; this was behind his heroin addiction, and his strong self-criticism and doubt that came through in most of his lyrics. Cobain’s reclusive manic depression fits, led him to be perceived as suicidal with two other incidents on his track record – one mixing substances leading him to be hospitalized for 5 days in Rome, the other in Seattle while he had locked himself in a room with a gun, “to hide from Love”. Both incidents involved Love, and there has been great speculation in the past around whether Cobain’s death was actually a suicide, or a murder, even questioning the hand-writing at the end of the alleged suicide note. He was found dead by a shotgun wound to the head on April 8, 1994, presumably dead for 3 days, with the ‘To Boddah’ letter next to him.

Cobain’s erratic life, his 90’s Fender-fuzzic music and his 27 club death have been topics of fascination, ‘til this day.

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Lemmy Kilmister

Inside BURST!

Rebel With A Cause!

Brief and right to the point, Lemmy Kilmister talked to Spiros Smyrnis about everything.

Article by Mike Ritchie Interview by Spiros Smyrnis Photos by Robert John

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19 Few names in rock n roll elicit the reaction, response, praise and passion, as when the iconic name of the legendary British thrashers Motörhead’s singer/ bassist is uttered. Whether spoken in reverence and respect by fellow musicians or yelled and screamed by fans worldwide, Lemmy is not only a metal royalty -at its most outspoken- rebellious, not giving a shit what others think, of the highest nobility; but, also, the man who’s entertained over a thousand women, drank more booze and consumed more drugs than the body was thought to be able to handle and has taken his thunder-making Rickenbacker around the world, who knows how many times. Lemmy, as many have christened him, is God. There would be no Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax or Slayer or metal as we know it, without him.

The man who has lived life by his own rules and flipped the bird attitude-wise for almost 50 years was born as Ian Fraser Kilmister, on Christmas Eve 1945. The future mutton chop wearing, mole sporting genre kingpin started his early career after hearing Buddy Holly, Little Richard and seeing The Beatles ‘before’ they had a record out. He stinted in local bands, The Rainmakers and then The Motown Sect. At the age of 20 he joined the Rockin’ Vickers signing with CBS, releasing three singles, touring Europe and reportedly being the first British band to visit Yugoslavia. In 1967 he roadied for Jimi Hendrix. A short stint in Opal Butterfly followed two years later, just before the band folded shortly after. In 1972 Lemmy joined Hawkwind assuming half of his future, life-long position on bass. Ironically with no prior bass experience, his style was shaped from his previous rhythm guitar work. In 1975 he was mugged while taking pictures on a tour in Michigan, while the band ate. He woke up, having to hitchhike across the state, making it to the gig.

The next day he was arrested on ‘possession of cocaine’, charges which turned out to

be speed and serving for a few days. Based on the Canadian law at the time he was released without charge or conviction, made it to the next gig and was fired.

We are Motörhead and we play rock n roll.

He then formed Bastard to which his manager said they’ll never get on Top of the Pops with that name, so he changed it to Motörhead, after his final song with Hawkwind and a guttural voiced, raised-mic’d chapter of the rock/metal book of Genesis began. From influential milestone records like Ace of Spades, Overkill and Orgasmatron, to 90’s loud gems 1916, March or Die and Bastards through early 2000’s, We Are Motörhead, Hammered and Motorizer and most recently The World Is Yours and Aftershock, Lemmy’s cranked out over twenty records, ten official live recordings of loud, brash, decibel bashing, cigarette smoked, bourbon soaked, rock n roll mayhem. He’s made numerous guest appearances on other bands records including Ugly Kid Joe, The Ramones, Doro, Probot, Airbourne, Slash and Foo Fighters, along with a cameo and soundtrack work on Airheads- including the famous ‘Lemmy is God’ quote.

ECW Extreme Music compilation and Banger Films Metal A Headbangers Journey are just some highlights from a long, expanding list of collaborations. Motörhead performed at WrestleMania 17 and 21 and worked on three Troma movies and was the subject of the autobiographical 2010, namesake documentary Lemmy.

gospel.

He wrote several songs on Ozzy’s No More Tears album including Desire, I Don’t Want to Change the World, Hellraiser (which he later recorded on March or Die, releasing a video with Cenobites and a scene of him playing cards with Pinhead for Hellraiser III) and Mama I’m Coming Home; a song he’s said several times, that the royalties of which made him more money than his entire Motörhead career. A man, who’s penned hundreds of head-banging anthems that metal heads have slammed, drank, snorted and shagged too. Overkill, Damage Case, No Class, Stone Dead Forever, Orgasmatron, Eat the Rich, I’m So Bad (Baby I Don’t Care), Born to Raise Hell, Sacrifice, No Remorse, Rock Out and of course the classic Ace of Spades. Everyone has their favourites but every song composed and album released is taken by the global metal legions as instant

Displaying a flare for self-deprecating humor he’s appeared in Kit Kat and Walkers commercials along with an appearance on an intro spot of the Drew Carey show. Notably he appears in the late 80’s documentary Decline of Western Civilization Part II The Metal Years.

He released his autobiography White Line Fever in 2002 and won a Grammy for Motörheads’ cover of Metallica, Whiplash in 2005. For all his fame, notoriety and status since 1990 he’s lived unbelievably humble in an apartment two blocks from The Rainbow in Hollywood.

‘I remember before there was rock n roll’ and he can legitimately say he witnessed and watched its birth. So many stories are a part of the Lemmy mythology. “Lemmy’s a living, breathing, drinking and snorting fucking legend. No one else comes close.” -Dave Grohl Though the exact number may never be known, Lemmy’s bedded over 1000 women earning the 8th spot on Maxim’s Living Sex Legends list. Known for his legendary boozing, it was revealed that since age 30 he’s consumed a bottle of Jack

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20 Daniels every day until just recently, when he stopped last year due to health reasons. He also developed an appetite for speed and its utilitarian qualities. In 2005 when asked to speak on the detrimental effects of drugs at The Welsh Assembly he said that as much as he hated the thought, legislation to legalize drugs like heroin would eradicate the drug dealer from society. Known for being a war history buff and historian specifically World War I & II Lemmy’s dwelling was shown with its abundance of battlefield memorabilia and he often dresses in military attire. Also known is his love for slots namely, one armed bandits.

That’s the way I like it baby, I don’t wanna live forever.

Recently his lifestyle and career spanning anatomical abuse caught up with him forcing them to cancel a European tour slated for February due to complications with Type-2 Diabetes diagnosed in 2000.

Being a non-stop road warrior for over 50 years, he understands the disappointment and frustrations this causes the fans and himself but sees the bigger, long term picture and is focusing on getting well and recuperating.

Whenever Lemmy does take his rightful place in the mighty rock n roll heavens sitting side by side with Dio, Hendrix, Elvis and all his heroes, his mortal legacy and legend will live on forever in the countless bands he’s influenced that had the fortune of living during his time on the planet and those to whom the music and influence of Motörhead will be passed on, to countless generations to come.

‘The secret to longevity is not dying.’ And though the title of the Godfather of Metal may be forever debated between Dio, Lemmy and Ozzy, Lemmy’s secured his stature as a living legend and made millions of eardrums worldwide Stone Dead Forever, that’s right.

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The Interview

21 22 Albums, Do you remember the titles of them all?

Don’t know… if I had enough time to think about, I probably would.

Aftershock, cool name and beautiful cover! How did the name come up and who is the man behind this awesome cover?

A Swedish guy came up with the cover. We gave him the idea what we wanted and only had a few changes. We are very pleased with it.

What is the feedback you got so far from fans and reviews?

Excellent, only good reviews.

I believe that Cameron Webb did an excellent job as a producer, making the album sound ass-kicking.

What do you think?

Great.

Yes, Cameron is a good boy, he knows what we want and how we want it and how it should sound and is not trying to change our style.

Aftershock was also released in a special edition via Classic Rock Magazine, like ‘The Wörld Is Yours’!

What lead you to this decision?

We did it already with ‘The Wörld Is Yours’ and it was successful in the UK. They approached us again and we agreed.

Aftershock climbed to number 22 on the U.S charts. And it gets even better: it’s the 22nd official album 22 on US charts, this cannot be a coincidence!

Let’s focus on the technical stuff on the making of Aftershock. Mixing? Mastering? How much time did the recordings take?

How do you feel about it?

We started with the mixing and final mastering in May and were finished in August.

I always enjoyed your blues side and “Lost Woman Blues” is definitely one of 2013’s best songs. Bitter and tasty like a fine glass of bourbon. Is this dedicated to all the women or to a special one?

I guess everyone had this experience – one woman … All women… You can take whatever you want.

You’ve lived the glory days of Music Industry; as for now, we’re living the days

of decline. How do you feel about it as we step in the time of self -releasing and crowd-funding?

Not sure if it really changed so much for Motörhead. We still have a good set up and founding Motörhead Music was only a step to keep up with the new age.

Luckily, vinyl’s are back on track during the last few years! Are you happy that the new generation could also buy Aftershock in vinyl format?

We have always been offering Vinyl as we all love the old, traditional LP.

We are living in an era where Internet rules the world, consumption eats us all and depression hits millions of people.

Through these difficult

“Rock ’n’ Roll will never die”

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22

“I can only say I have a good life” times, Motorhead is our rock’n’roll alternative, a reason to believe that alcohol, women and music taste better when having the right company. I know this is a difficult and cliché question, but what’s Motorhead for you?

My life. This is what I can do best.

I don’t think so. Bourbon would be next.

The documentary of “Lemmy” is already a cult classic for music lovers. Don’t you feel afraid of being exposed?

I mean one guy was shooting your life 24/7!

Through your career, you had some line-up changes, but I think that you have found the right persons to do the job. Am I right? Do you remain in touch with former Motorhead members?

I had a hard time being followed around and being filmed, I hated it. But I agreed to it and I was very happy when it was over.

Your lifestyle became a synonym to sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll. If someone could impersonate this motto, would be you. Anyhow, my question is: “Is it as good as it sounds”?

No, it’s the expectation of people … I can only say I have a good life.

You have thousands of fans around the world, who could kill in the name of Motorhead-and you personally. Which was the strangest thing that a fan ever did for Motorhead? I mean weird stuff.

I guess the weirdest things are mostly the presents I’m getting.

Strange paintings, dolls with Hawaiian shirts and a ukulele and my face.

I have an order to make: After the Bastards Lager, we wanna drink the Weiss and the ale version. Plus, a Motorhead rum would be nice!

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Rock Science Motörhead Game would be the proper gift for a Motorhead fan!

How did the whole idea come up?

I really don’t know… Guess someone asked if they can do it… I haven’t seen it yet.

Once in a while, but not really.

Which are your tour plans in order to promote Aftershock?

Spring tour has been booked as we had to cancel the fall tour.

We start in February.

It’s been a while since your last visit in Greece so I believe that Aftershock is a fine reason to revisit us!

Any plans?

We would love to and hope to return to Greece in the very near future.

When you were a kid, did you see this future coming?

No, how could anyone imagine?

Almost 40 years of musical career on your back… Do you have any regrets?

None.

The last words of wisdom are yours!

Rock ’n’ Roll will never die.

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BURST is against animal cruelty.

“Only when we have become nonviolent towards all life will we have learned to live well with others.”

-César Chávez-

www.argophotography.com No animals were harmed in the making of this fur coat Burst www.afternoiz.com

24

Swedish metalcore outfit Dead By April’s origins began in Gothenburg with a tentrack self-titled demo in 2007, releasing a 19-track edition online in 2008. Signing with Universal Music, their 2009 debut spawned two-week, number one single ‘Losing You’ on the Swedish singles chart then releasing their self-titled full-length reaching number two with the single ‘What Can I Say’ touring Japan, Europe and Scandinavia.

Pontus Hjelm left the band in 2010, remaining as a songwriter replaced by ZanYou have a unique band name. Strictly speaking, it could have a double meaning of having foreboding connotations or negative thoughts about the fourth month or being snuffed out by someone named April.

Is there a literal meaning or is that just thinking too hard?

Pontus: We think the band name represents the contrasts in the music we play and perform. Dead representing the heavier/darker parts, and April being the period of the year when everything in nature is starting a new life-circle and begins to grow - Representing Burst www.afternoiz.com

the melodic parts.

Your fans funded the live DVD through a pledge site, achieving your goal in early 2013. Do you feel that this avenue brings the fans closer to the band?

In the sense that they feel a closer connection now that they’re personally investing in the production of the bands output vs the option of buying what’s already been made and released?

Pontus: Honestly I think the whole pledging-idea is brilliant in general. However, I experienced that a lot of people did

not fully understand what it really was about. Many asked about it, many thought it was some kind of auction, which is not. There’s no bidding as there is in a traditional auction, at least there weren’t in our campaign. In the end, we actually canceled our pledge campaign.

Was the re-recorded version of Found Myself In You a gift or incentive for those who pledged?

Pontus: We made Found Myself In You available for free to anyone who pledged. That felt like a very natural thing to do, giving back to those who put their money down on other

dro Santiago then rejoined in 2011 on guitars and keys. Santiago’s first appearance on 2011’s Stronger featured heavier mixes of several tunes and a Killing Joke cover. That spring, sophomore album Incomparable released reaching number two on album charts. Toured constantly throughout 2011- 2012 including a sold out North American debut at Webster Hall.

Currently they have eight singles/EP’s, two full-lengths, one compilation album and six music videos and the last February release of Let The World Know looms.

By Mike Ritchie

stuff we offered.

Will there be any surprises, covers or rare tracks on the upcoming compilation CD? Pontus: No covers. However, one could say that the whole album consists of rare tracks and that Let The World Know will be a big surprise itself :-) From the beginning a pop influence was added to the sound, a keyboard. Was that a conscious decision or a natural progression while playing with a more straightforward metal approach?

25 Pontus: The synths have always been a big part of the Dead By April sound and were included from the very start.

With that being said, none of us said out loud “And there shall be synths”, it just felt right to do. There is so much energy in the synth domain that you can elaborate with, no matter what music you play. However, there is a track on the album with no synthetic keyboards at all. Only human live-played organic instruments like piano and strings.

Have you had or do you think you would ever have a problem sharing a bill with a band based on music, lyrics, image, etc.?

Pontus: Not really, we have played with most types of bands throughout the years. Of course we’d never perform with some racist-band or anything like that of course.

What are the best and worst concerts or live experiences you’ve had so far?

Pontus: To me, I remember Wacken Open Air to be a very special show. That was an amazing festival to play at in every way. The worst must be the ones, when my stage fright doesn’t come off after a couple of songs in of the show; can’t name one in particular as it strikes me very sporadically.

Stoffe: For me the best show with DBA so far must be the last one we had in Moscow, it was the last show on our last tour and it couldn’t have been any better finish to it, the crowd was amazing, I never wanted to leave the stage that night! I don’t think I’ve had any “worst” show with DBA so far, I always try to make the best out of every situation, always have this positive thought in the back of my head, so there and NO worst shows only better :)

Is there a band(s) that you’d consider a goal or dream to play/tour with?

Pontus: We all love 30 Seconds To Mars and would be ever grateful to join them on tour!

Stoffe: Agree, would be awesome, touring with 30STM, I think that they are that one band that in some way combines all our different music tastes in DBA. Papa Roach or Linkin Park would also be a great match.

Do you have any influences people would think were unusual or bizarre, given your sound?

Pontus: I don’t know bizarre but my main influence as a writer is Michael Jackson.

When that question comes up, and judging by the reaction of people during live-interviews, that seems to be fairly unusual.

Stoffe: For me the biggest influence as a frontman would be, as number one, Jared Leto! Freddie Mercury, Jacoby Shaddix and James Hetfield, are also big favorites of mine, haha! That’s an unusual mix right there!

Do you have a favorite song on the new CD or live?

Pontus: That’s really hard.

But as for now, I think it’s ‘As A Butterfly’.

Stoffe: Yeah, “As A Butterfly” is really one of my favorites as well along with “Same Star”, “Empathy” and “Replace You”.

Haha, guess I could put all of the songs here, I seriously can’t choose just one :) The first single, ‘As A Butterfly’, has very personal lyrics. Is it about the last moments of one of the bands family members?

Are you using the term butterfly to mean their spirit will watch over you in the afterlife?

Stoffe: All of that, it’s a song about losing someone really close to you, and I guess everyone that has lost someone can associate or relate to this song. For both me and Pontus,

our grandfathers meant a lot to us, and I think I can talk for the both of us saying that this song is about them and losing them.

We pretty much have the same story about them since we both had a really close connection to our grandfathers and we both can relate to the others story.

As I see it, I wouldn’t be the one I am today, and I would definitely not be where I am today if it wasn’t for him, he’s really my role-model and I got so much of the great things in my life to thank him for. I miss him every day one way or another and I know that he is watching over me, leading me and protecting me every day along the way. As long as you keep the ones you lost and love in your heart or mind they’ll live on forever. That how I see it and that’s what this song means to me.

Let The World Know is your first album with the new vocalist Christoffer Andersson. How has the group dynamics/chemistry changed both in the studio and live with him vs. your former singer?

Pontus: The chemistry has changed in every possible way to the better. The band feels whole now. I love being in the studio with Stoffe and the recording process is easier/ smoother than ever! And live it’s really uplifting as Stoffe has this positive energy that is incredibly contagious.

Stoffe: Oh thank you Pontus :) I can no more than say the same about you. Since day one it has just felt right with everything, in the studio we complement each other really good, I’ve kind of had this studiofright in the beginning and that was one of my biggest fears, but since me and Pontus can relate to each other in so many things in life, one of the things was his experience of stage-fright; so with some good advices and pushing he got me get rid of it, and in the end of the recording I remembered that I just wanted to scream more, do more parts, more songs and so

on. So thank you for your help brother :). And on and off stage it’s the same. The whole band really gets great along together, it’s a great chemistry between us and we all aim to get better and grow as a band, it’s kind of “your tears are my tears” or “my happiness is your happiness” feeling in the band, we push and support each other thought it all. I haven’t been a part of DBA for a whole year yet, but also since day one it felt like we’ve known each other since childhood. I’m truly grateful for getting the chance and for being a part of this band and I just can’t wait to conquer the world with these guys!

Will you (Christoffer) be splitting your time between DBA and What Tomorrow Brings?

Christofer: DBA is my main priority all time, but I will still be a part of WTB, play live shows and write songs, when the time and energy is there.

I have a different story with WTB, some of us are childhood buddies and we’ve been through a lot together, we’re like brothers and even if there will be times when I’m of touring or doing others things with DBA for a long time, WTB will always be there and that’s for sure! They support me though it all, because they know that this (DBA) is my biggest dream.

Is there any meaning or significance to the new album cover?

Pontus: Yes, it’s an effort to basically evoke reasoning as well as feelings. One could look at it from different angles and I think it connects beautifully with the album title.

Stoffe: Four words “Let The World Know” the whole title speaks for itself and like Pontus said, the cover can be interpreted in many different ways, it’s really only your own imagination that sets the standards for what it means or what you can relate to in it :)

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26 Hello there! How are you?

An interview with Biff Byford

By Sissy Fanouraki

Burst www.afternoiz.com

Thanks, I’m fine, doing great!

So, few months after the release of “Sacrifice,” your 20th studio album, you also decided to release an unplugged one. The 2nd disc of the deluxe edition of the album in question featured some acoustic, orchestrated and some re-recorded versions of older songs. Back then, there was still a rumor of making an acoustic album. Firstly, I’d like to ask you whose idea it was to do such an album.

We wanted to release something different, not just the usual format; so we tried a bit of acoustic and orchestra.

It basically started out doing an acoustic album but I went off the idea then when we re-recorded some tracks.

Charlie Bauernfeind and I had the idea to try and have a song orchestrated.

Then, tell us a bit about the track selection. Based on which criteria were the particular tracks chosen and by whom? What was the purpose of such release? I mean, was it a “wish”, a “dream” or was it a spontaneous decision?

I wanted to try something different, to give our fans something special, not just the usual thing. For us, it’s also the very first time with all these mixed styles. My criteria for the songs were the orchestrated ones had to have space for the other parts. The unplugged had to have melody and interesting lyrics. Paul and Doug came up with great ideas and parts.

Your new album debuted at position No.52 on the Billboard Heatseekers Chart and at No.89 on the Billboard Top Rock Chart in the USA! Well done! How do you feel about it?

Great, of course. US is always a tough market so we are very happy.

Next year, you commemorate your 35th anniversary, which also coincides with the anniversary of Crusader. Should we expect another anniversary collection alongside a headline tour?

We are talking about doing a special

tour next winter. Don’t think that we will have an Anniversary release Yes, back in 1984, Crusader was a mixed album. In the beginning, it was liked more in the US but has achieved legendary status over the years.

Honestly, you are one of the most influential singers, with your voice, stage performance and general attitude shaping the genre. You “created” the ‘New Wave Of British Heavy Metal’.

Please tell us, which was your main influence and when did you decide to become a singer?

There are too many bands to mention but a few US bands that we loved had a great impact, Mountain, Grand Funk, Black Oak etc. I was 19 years old when I was in Blue Condition before I formed Saxon, guess it just happened and I was a singer all my life...

Any secrets you wanna share about keeping your voice in such a great shape?

No secrets that I think of, I’m not smoking, drinking tea and a good glass of red wine. Maybe that helps.

So far, you’ve been a singer, a songwriter, an actor, an author, a producer… What else is there to expect from Biff Byford?

Hmm, nothing I can think of other than the singer of Saxon.

You’ve been in Greece several times. Which are your fondest memories of our country?

The fans, they are so warm-hearted and welcoming and they are also a bit crazy. That’s the perfect mixture. And they enjoy heavy music and they love Saxon; and, of course, the weather and the great wine.

In your long career, if you had the chance not to release one album, which one would you choose and why?

Maybe Destiny. Because we were dropped after that and we had problems with our career and after that album. I think it was the lowest point in my career. After all, it’s a fact and it makes no sense to look back... you can’t change anything. We still move forward.

27

Burst www.afternoiz.com

Danny Bryant

28

Danny Bryant: This is the name of one of the greatest bluesmen of our time. Having released one of the most beautiful albums of 2013, Danny was in the process of writing a brand new album, when I spoke to him, so the interview became even more interesting! He’s still got the blues for us, mate, so read it loud!

By Spiros Smyrnis Photos by Kevin Nixon

Hey Danny I hope you’re doing well, mate.

Hey Spiros, I’m fine mate.

So what is the feedback you received from Hurricane album? Ιt was very good actually ‘cause Hurricane was a different album. It was a song-orientated album. Hurricane -as I saidcomes from a song-oriented background. It helped me develop the songs a lot more, even if it sounded different from my previous albums. It was accepted very well, though.

People seem to like it best of our albums.

I personally saw Hurricane on every blues rock list of 2013’s best, so I think that makes you very happy.

Yeah, yeah you’re right. Hurricane is our best-selling album so far. You can’t argue actually with what people think so Burst www.afternoiz.com

it’s good. Actually, I’m writing some stuff this time, so I can get into the studio in March and work again with the same producer!

I think that Hurricane is the most mature album of your career, like a fine glass of wine gets better as it gets older.

I want you to name all the people responsible for making “Hurricane” happen.

Hehehe. I think so too and this goes to Richard, the producer who made me work hard. Having him recording the record took off me a lot of pressure ‘cause I didn’t have to worry about arrangements and stuff like that.

It is a quite small group actually. My dad (who was on bass) retired few months ago so Hurricane was his last album. Now he is at home, as he stops touring. Hurricane was engineered and produced by a guy named Richard Hammerton. We’ve worked together over the years, we recorded a song together for a Walter Trout album so I kept in mind to work with him again and Hurricane was a great opportunity for both of us. We went to his studio in England and we worked separately for about three weeks and then it was sent for mastering and that’s also going to happen with the new album.

I also think that in this album you give more space to your classic rock influences and you show a different side of Danny Bryant, like in the case of the song “All or nothing”!

You are right, it’s true. I always listened to a lot of music; people like Bruce Springsteen for example. Ok, I’m a blues guy who signed to a blues label so I have to play blues, which I love, but I do listen to these guys and I allow some of these influences

on this album a little bit more.

You have to find new ways to make your new album interesting so I allow some of these influences to come up more on Hurricane.

I ask this question to every musician! Which is the strongest memory of yours from the recordings of Hurricane?

It was quite a few really. The studio was a nine-hour drive road from where I live, five or six miles from the closer pub, or shop or everything. The wifi wasn’t working I couldn’t get a decent phone signal or anything. Some of the stronger memories was from the recording session ‘cause there was nothing else to do really. There were no outside distractions so we worked till three in the morning. So -if I had to chooseI would pick those memories of all.

Let’s focus on the lyrics for

29 a while. You know that shouldn’t be read by broken men, or those who fell in love with the wrong woman.

Thank you. You know I try to write stuff that I know, ‘cause I found it hard to write songs if it’s something you don’t understand, or if it’s something you haven’t personally experienced. Again that was Richard pushing me every day writing what I know, or I understand. It’s funny, you know, because I’m in the studio and writing songs about the new album and I have to say that a lot of the songs I’ve written are personal experiences, some other happen to people I know. I’m not writing about cornfields in Mississippi ‘cause there not the experiences I have.

Is the new album going to start where Hurricane ends, or are we to listen to something new?

I think that will probably start where Hurricane ends. Hurricane, as we’ve already said, was my first album, where I explore this side on my songs and I feel that I have a lot more to explore in that area. It’s hard to say plenty at the moment ‘cause I am in the middle of writing but I am excited to do it. I think that the new album will be songbased again.

At what age did you start playing the guitar?

Fifteen And when did you get into the blues?

Right at the same age actually. My father

and mother had a really good record collection, so it was the blues I was interested in and that made me to become a guitarist, listening to the blues. My parents had albums of Jimi Hendrix, Rory Gallagher, Eric Clapton etc. so I got a guitar and become a blues rock player straight away.

How did you decide to follow the lonely road of a bluesman? I think it’s very difficult, especially these days!

It’s not a mainstream music; especially in the U.K. it is very hard to get any support from TV or National radio. This time, things are better in the National radio but it is a lonely road to follow if you’re into blues, but this is what I love and what I do.

I’m very lucky for doing my job and making my living from touring mostly.

I think that most people in music business treated blues as an oldfashioned dying music genre. Have you encountered such behavior in your career?

Yeah. I think it’s a shame. In my opinion this happens because most people really don’t know what blues is. They are not well educated; they think that blues are still some strange old guys holding a guitar. I love older blues, I loved ‘em very much but there are big differences between blues and blues rock. In the U.K., I very often meet people who think they know what blues are, but actually they don’t.

I think that Joe Bonamassa proved all these guys wrong and gave blues a

piece of the music business pie.

I totally agree, very much though. Joe Bonamassa helped us all very much by making blues popular. Hats off to him! This is very important for us all. He is probably the main reason that this music enjoys a bigger popularity.

The same guy who hand-picked ‘Prisoner of the Blues’ is to appear on the cover mount CD of Classic Rock Magazine issue!

It is, it actually is. I didn’t know him personally, I’ve met him twice but I didn’t know him. He had a very popular show in the UK, where he plays some of my music.

This was the first time he was aware of me and then, when Hurricane released, he picked ‘Prisoner of the Blues’ and it was really nice, too. Very helpful to me also, when someone like Joe Bonamassa says great things about my music!

I know that 2013 was a kind of strange year, since your father retired from the road in the summer.

How are you dealing with his absence on stage?

It’s hard in one way ‘cause I’ve missed him ‘cause we were playing together for years, but in another way I feel relieved, ‘cause, you know, he turned 70 and I looked over him and he feels tired to me. He couldn’t deal with very long shows. So it is a relief to see him resting now, but on the other hand he is my best friend and I love him dearly; but I m happy now he is in home, happy and resting. I love him.

In October, Fret King announced an official DBR Danny Bryant Signature guitar model, designed by legendary guitar guru Trev Wilkinson. I think that lots of guitar players envy you!

Well it’s an honor. I’ve known Trevor for a couple of years and we discussed to make a signature model when my profile will rise up a little bit and thank God it was much more successful than we expected. I hope people will like it and as I said it was an honor.

You had a very long European tour in 2013 and you have many gigs announced.” Living on the road”, Could be a nice title for an upcoming album! Seriously, I’m sure you enjoy this part of the job!

I’m gonna write that down actually. I do enjoy, I mean I have to, ‘cause I have to come up to this experience. I enjoy it very Burst www.afternoiz.com

30 much, I really do. I don’t really enjoy flying very much.

and I want to share these with us.

Give us more info about your tour plans!

I’m gonna do that in the next couple of days. You’re right; it’s been a long time since my last update. That’s a good point cause I really listen to a lot of music. I enjoyed the new Bruce Springsteen album very much, Popa Chubby’s album likewise.

You know, for a long time I couldn’t play any vinyl, just CD’s, but Hurricane released in vinyl as well so I wanna to hear it on vinyl. I’m buying a lot of vinyl records recently. A lot of old blues, actually.

I have three shows in Germany, one in Belgium, then we go to the UK. In the UK, we have few shows in March again. Then in May, we have 10 shows in Germany and Switzerland. In June we’re gonna tour in Ireland, our first tour there! The album is to be released in August so we are going to give some shows in Spain, Poland and Czech Republic. I hope we can manage to play in Greece once.

I loved your recommendations on your official site so much. However, your latest recommendation was the King King album on April 2013. I am sure you have listened to some interesting stuff since then

What makes you keep going on in the blues?

The love of music. I love playing the blues, going to different places, meeting new people and, to me, that’s it! I love to see people getting pleasure from my music.

Have you found jesus?

www.argophotography.com Burst www.afternoiz.com

31

Interview with Per Wiberg of

Kamchatka

By Christina Alossi // Photo by Lars Glendell

5th album, “The search goes on”. Is it a musical research in time, a research in the type of music or does it have a deeper symbolic meaning?

It’s a cool title ‘cause it works on so many different levels. It’s more of a statement I think, like when you stop searching for things(in a musical sense) or being curious there’s no music left to play. We’re still here and our search goes on for new sounds, new collaborations etc..

How did the cooperation with Per Wiberg come up?

We’ve been friends since the early 90’s and me and Thomas played together a lot back then. Later on I’ve helped them out with graphics and I’ve also played some keys on a couple of their albums. They asked me if I wanted to produce their new album and they lost a bass player, so one thing lead to another...

The album contains lyrics that speak of the sea, and there are references in the album’s cover as well. Has the Swedish Varberg had any part in this?

Yes I’d say, Thomas who wrote all the lyrics for this album comes from a family of fishermen, he’s been one too. If you live in Varberg you live by the sea pretty much so it’s an important part of both Thomas and Toby’s lives.

In the past you have cooper-

ated with the Clutch’s drummer, Jean Paul Gaster. Tell us a few things about this experience.

The band has toured with Clutch several times, both in the US and Europe. JP would come up on stage to guest on a track by Allman Brothers and later on the recorded version for Volume III also featured JP. If the opportunity came, would you collaborate with musicians from other music genres? If so, who would you want them to be?

Most definitely!, I would love to do something with a horn section. Maybe not the traditional rock & blues styled horns but something a little bit wilder.

I’d say a Swedish guy called Mats Gustafsson would be very interesting to work with, he’s a well known sax player and has worked with loads of great stuff like Sonic Youth, Merzbow and Jim O’Rourke for example.

Your name was inspired from a volcanic area in Russia, how was that decided?

What does that name state for the music you play?

It’s always inspiring with Mother Earth’s different powerful creations and the name is cool I think. It’s a huge piece of land and it’s got a lot different things going on nature wise. I’d like to think we also got lots of different things going on musically

and nature is always an endless source of inspiration.

How would you describe your music for someone who has never heard you before?

Rock with many different spices.

They say that the kind of music we listen to a young age defines us in the future.

Which was the first vinyl you listen to and loved?

Actually the one I remember listening to when being a kid was a Jimi Hendrix’s single, Freedom w/ Angel on B-side.

You are starting a European tour in February, what should the audience expect from your lives?

We’ll try to change it up every night with songs from all the albums but the main focus will be on the new album. There will plenty of improv stuff as well.

In your course up to now, was there ever an obstacle, a challenge that you had to overcome?

I think for all bands and artists there are always obstacles to overcome, could be anything like losing band members for example. If you continue most of the difficulties will make you stronger and tighter as a unit.

Sweden is one of the most

advanced countries, musically. How easy or how hard is it for someone to sing in a different language than your mother tongue?

For some reason I think English a lot of times comes naturally for the kind of music we play, even though we’re Swedish. There’s definitely the history aspect of it with all the music we grew up listening to, where 99% were sung in English. Also singing in Swedish limits your touring a lot since generally English is the rock language worldwide I’d say.

Would you ever release an album in Swedish?

It’s nothing we talked about yet but it’s an interesting thought I think, maybe someday...

Is there any song from the new album that you love to play more live?

Those things always change but right now I’d say I really enjoy playing a track called Dragons.

Do you have a worldwide tour in your fore-coming plans?

We’ll play where people want us to play, hopefully the new album will take us to all kinds of places all over the world but at the moment we’re on a Euro tour and then Russia’s coming up and then we have some more dates through Europe before summer festivals.

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32

Interview with Kyle Gruninger

By Jo Gogou // Photo by Mark Maryanovich

When you officially started out your musical journey did you ever expect that, 10 years later, you would have so many albums on your shoulders and such success?

I knew when I started INCURA that it was going to be a long journey. I didn’t want to write a few songs and stop, or have one big hit and never write again. I wanted to have a lengthy career based upon being artistic, creative and pushing the musical envelope.

In your early days, did you take the first step in finding a record label or was it the other way around?

Our first step was writing Burst www.afternoiz.com

the music we all wanted to. A record label can act as a bank, or help you with distribution, but, in all honesty, a band can do very well, and in most cases better without label support.

The band should be focused on music first; by doing this we generated interest from a few people to help us along the way.

Most of you have known each other since high school. Do you feel that your relationship has become stronger now? Do you feel closer to each other now, both as a band and as friends?

We are no longer just friends.

We are more like brothers. We are much closer in the fact that we are a family and nothing will

ever change that. We all have our own lives, hobbies, other projects, so we don’t hang out as much as we used to I guess.

But the second we hit the studio or get back on the road, it’s like a good old-fashioned family reunion.

Do you find the terms ‘friends’ and ‘associates’ different? Are there parts you leave out of the studio and the concerts?

The studio can be a very intense process. We have a rule that when we are at the studio; it’s work, work, work. When we get home we don’t talk about the songs or what happened that day. We more focus on playing video games and raiding the closest orange orchards

in Southern California.

Could you describe to us the moment, when you said “Yeah, now we’re officially a band”?

It was a long time ago, back in the “jammin’ in the basement” days. As soon as you write your first few songs, or play your first show... that’s when you feel like a band.

Your first album “A Way Out” was released back in 2003. From then to now do you find differences in your sound? Do you have a personal favorite album?

Our sound is ever evolving.

From day one, we have always made it a goal to get better and

33 not be afraid to try something new, or different. We consider “INCURA” to be our debut record and its defiantly my favorite.

Your name “Incura”, is partly from your initial name (Invein) and the other half comes from a spell in Final Fantasy. What does it mean to you? What does it mean to your fans?

Is it a spell of breaking a curse from the past?

The name is just that. It’s a name. It’s a word that we can call ourselves when we hit the stage. In music, the name of the band almost doesn’t matter; music makes the name.

Of course, the name is a tip of the hat to videogames and the influence they have brought to our lives.

Would you ever give your music for a video game theme?

Of Course!

Do you believe in fate or

hard work?

I don’t believe in Fate; and only hard work focused in the right direction will get you to your goal.

Apart from your rock-progressive-metal elements, your sound also has operatic/theatrical elements. If you were given the chance to risk a little bit more in that area, what would you do?

The balance between the theatrical and the other pieces is what makes the sound. If we were to take the theatrical side and make that 100% of Incura, it just wouldn’t be Incura; it would be something completely different.

The come back to Canada came with the “Theatre of Anarchy Tour”. Was that one of your life’s dreams?

Touring Canada was always something I wanted to do.

Traveling coast to coast with your best friends will always

be something I’ll remember for the rest of my life.

they seem affected by your style?

What have you gained with the new album and what vibes are you receiving from your fans?

Again, we have a very close relationship with our fans. We get messages all the time about how our music has helped someone through a bad time in their life. The style attracts a certain type of person/personality. People who are creative, open-minded, looking for something more, or have a passion for music are the kind of fans we attract.

Creating the new album was a huge growing experience for the band. It gave us a completely different look on our entire career. Our fans connect with our record emotionally.

We write music with 100% of our hearts and souls. We want to put out quality-not quantityand we think our fans respect that.

The album has your own name; does that imply that you have given it an extra kick of power and passion?

Is there a song more signature than the others?

“We” song is what we consider to be our debut record. This album is who we are. This album IS Incura.

What is your relationship with your fans? Do

What are your future plans? Should we expect a new album in 2014/2015?

Where could we see you?

We plan to tour, tour, tour; Europe is our main goal right now. No new music is coming soon; we are really going to focus on this record and bringing it to the world. Quality, not quantity, we aren’t rushing our creative process for anyone.

We are planning to be in Europe in Spring though nothing is confirmed.

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34

THE

NOISE FIGURES Let’s talk about your first self-titled album. How long have you been preparing it and how did you decide to be involved in this particular musical genre?

We have been preparing for the album for about one year. We had the material in hand, entered the studio, more material came out during the recording process, so all the album production actually took place in six months’ time. As for the musical genre, it came out because of the duet needs, e.g. we couldn’t play symphonic metal (laughs); at first, the music was heading towards the blues and then towards garage. Generally speaking, although there has been much material available, ten tracks were selected. Plus, there’s some new material to be featured in our next album, which is set for release real soon, during 2014. We have recently shot a video alongside Bleaker, a team of young directors who have also made the video for Plissken, as well as clips for bands such as Baby Jesus for the single “Out of your mind”. The record is a “blend” of garage, 60’s, blues, stoner, punk and psychedelia.

What does Noise Figures mean? How did you come up with the band name?

A friend of us gave us that name while we were still nameless; he had been studying on his Masters Degree on noise figures (e.g. diagrams in physBurst www.afternoiz.com

ics), he believed that this band name was appropriate for us and we agreed.

We had the White Stripes, we still have the Black Keys, our very own Big Nose Attack and now we have you, the Noise figures. Are duos in fashion in some way?

When we decided to create the band, we haven’t been inspired by the Black Keys and the White Stripes; However, the fact that those are two of the hugest rock n roll bands of the last two decades, surely gives us the motive to move on, gives us a “push”, so as long as they can do it, why can’t we?

How easy is it for you to play as a duo live?

On the one hand, it’s easy; on the other hand it’s hard. In terms of communication and in terms of speed in composing, in live shows and in rehearsals, everything is done faster and more effectively. On the flip side, it’s harder because two people should come up with a fuller, bulkier sound, which should be performed in that way live, so in that case it needs some more work to be done.

Technically, there are more requirements in comparison to other full bands, in which we participate.

What’s the first and what’s the last album you bought?

Once again, Spirtokouto made warm coffee, as we took our seats in the comfortable cushions of the benches. Stamos Mpamparis (vocals, guitar) and George Nikas (drums, vocals) of The noise figures started talking to me about their first “child”, released by Inner Ear in November 2013.

After having heard their first studio album, titled “The Noise Figures,” I was already too excited to meet them in person, since the album is a concise and complete release, featuring many hits, which get stuck in your head from the very first time you give them a listen, full off beats the band itself calls “bluesy garage rock”.

George: The first one was Alice Cooper’s “Trash” and the last one was “Pebbles,” a surf rock compilation.

Stamos: The first one was Michael Jackson’s “Dangerous” and the last one was “In Utero 20th anniversary” by Nirvana.

Who inducted you into music and at which age?

George: My cousins when I was in school. When I was visiting their place with my parents, they usually had me play Atari.

However, one day they brought me into the room, where they had been listening to music and they made me listen to Metallica’s “Kill ‘em all”; at first I was scared (laughs) but then, when I was leaving, they gave me the album to take it with me, along with Iron Maiden’s “Somewhere in Time”. I started being involved in music since then.

Stamos: Same applies to me with kids of family friends, during the last years of school, in the beginning of the 90’s, except for the pop songs we’ve been listening in Jeronimo Groovy back then, Green Day, Offspring…more punk in general.

With which bands would you love to share the stage when playing live?

Queens of the Stone Age! We like them so much. What we would like to do the most is take part in one of the Desert Sessions organized by Josh

By Christina Alossi

Homme alongside other artists.

How important is the way an artist looks, the artist’s image, to you?

For better or for worse, it’s 50%; it plays a significant role, especially the stage performance when playing live. We believe that the on-stage performance should be balanced with the music, since both those elements are essential for a band.

Are there any plans of playing live abroad in the near future?

Yes, we’d really want to play abroad, although it’s too early yet. We have just released our album, however we keep this plan in stock.

Misfits: You’re in the middle of a storm and the electricity produced by lightning gives you superpowers... Which ones would you choose and what would you do with them?

Stamos: I’d gain the power of teleportation; live in America for free with just one “snap”. It would be awesome, plus we’d tour around the world absolutely for free.

George: Invisible! It would be fun, plus I would be able to follow on the tour for free (laughs).

35

Cemetery Dance Ladies and Gentlemen Cemetery Dance are: Jojo (Buzz), Omen (Guit & Growls), Lazy (Screams), Teo (DrumZ), Ares (Guit) Give us a brief bio about Cemetery Dance! Date of Birth?

Ares: We all are close friends.

We played or worked together in music in the past. At some point in our lives -some of ushad a long break from bands, gigs, recordings etc., until we got together in the studio just for jamming. This happened during the spring of 2012 in Athens, Greece. And that was it!

Lazy: Yeah! Cemetery Dance is about brotherhood. Something like a gang. And this is what we bring out to our music Personal Heroes?

Ares: We all grew up with the metal, punk and hard rock music of the 80s. We got lots of heroes from that era! I play the guitar, so if I have to choose from guitarists, I would say Tony Iommi for his superheavy-skull-crashing riffs!

There are many others, of course!

I f***ing love the vinyl’s revival! And what I love even more is the fact that there are bands out there who release amazing albums in vinyl format. If the name of Cemetery Dance doesn’t ring a bell to you then maybe read their interview below on Burst Magazine and learn everything you need to know about these badass rockers!

By Spiros Smyrnis

The name story?

Lazy: Omen came in the studio one of the jamming days with the lyrics of the Cemetery Dance track. I suggested we should go for it; we got into deep thinking (laughs), until we were convinced by several funerals in the cemetery opposite the studio we rehearse. No, the truth is that the name is all about how we march to this world; we march dead!

So CD dies! Let’s get back on vinyl. Why do you choose to release Poser Zombies only in vinyl format?

Aris: Personally, I prefer vinyl a lot more. I love the warm sound of it. But there is one more thing. I will have to take you back to the 80s. I remember myself going to the record store and buying vinyl’s with my HUGE deposits -under the pillow- of my allowance and exploring every detail of that big artwork cover, while getting back home by bus. Reading the lyrics, checking credits, everything in detail! Even smell it!!! (hahaha). We shared that thought in the band and we agreed it was such a strong memory to all of us. Decision made! Let’s do vinyl only!!!

Tell us everything we need to know about your debut album, Poser Zombies; production, mixing mastering?

Ares: Metal, punk and rock n’ roll into the mixer! We like to jam and play live. There is nothing like the live vibe!

That’s why we recorded the whole album live, like most of the bands we worshiped when we were kids! So, we got in the studio for 6 days playing over and over the album’s songs until we were satisfied with the outcome. This was something new for us and the process was really exhausting yet so cool at the same time! What you hear in your record player is exactly the same -only louder- in person!

The moment of Glory for Cemetery Dance so far!

Lazy: Every time we hit the stage to share our music!

Efthimis Karadimas, the mastermind of legendary Nightfall, has a guest appearance on Cemetery Dance. How did this come up?

Lazy: Great friend!

honor

Ares: He is a great friend indeed! We had this killer part in the Cemetery Dance song. Evil lyrics, I tell ya! So we had to “hire” the man to do it! And he nailed it!

The members of Cemetery Dance are veterans in the scene. How do you feel about our scene of today, which is to me alive and kicking?

Lazy: Lots of cool bands full of energy and a great vibe!

Ares: I’m so happy to see so many metal music bands that play so fucking good! They have energy and pathos for what they do and that’s what matters the most! I recently heard a friend’s band called Scumjack. They fuckin’ rock!!!

Before you spread the last words of this interview share with us your upcoming tour plans.

Ares: For now, we play gigs wherever we can. Our plan is to support a band in a European tour. There is no specific date yet.

great

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Burst www.afternoiz.com

37

Meet& GREET

Everyone hides a hero inside, just dive deep into yourself.

The name story?

By Spiros Smyrnis

Markos is the godfather of the band. We wanted something straightforward, simple and catchy. He came up with this idea sometime in early September 2010. We definitely love the name. Not only does it represent our band, but also our way of life.

Ladies and Gentlemen My Turn are: (bio and members)

The feedback of “Athens” release so far…

My Turn Yo! My Turn is & always was a pack of friends, full of passion for hardcore / punk music and unconventional ideals, with the sole purpose to do their best and create something unique in the hardcore scene worldwide.

Just like any other band, we’ve changed members throughout the years. We started out in the summer of 2010, with Markos, Fotis, Apostolis & Sergios being the first line up. Nowadays, My Turn are Markos, Apostolis, Nick & Stelios. Drossos (of Bandage) was also a part of My Turn for almost a year, while Dimitris (of Soundkrash) rehearsed with us for a month or so.

I dare to say that My Turn are all the people that support us since day one and every single one of you who feel what we feel and sing along to our songs. Every single guy or girl who feels that does not fit in this corrupted society, which also affects the hardcore scene, is also a part of My Turn.

My Turn are -and will always be- our songs, our lyrics & our beliefs.

Date of Birth (of My Turn)?

It was a hot summer evening in early July 2010, when Markos, Fotis & Apostolis rehearsed in a filthy studio in the north suburbs of Athens city. Our very first song ‘Noble Intentions’ was created at the same rehearsal, so the rest is history.

Personal Heroes?

No more heroes anymore.

We played tens shows all over Greece, mainly promoting ‘Athens’ from the summer of 2012 to summer 2013 (when our new release; the split 7” with The Bridge came out). The feedback is awesome, we still get reviews from fanzines & magazines from the worldwide scene, and that’s really cool. We have managed to sell, trade or just give away around 1100 copies (CDs, vinyls & tapes) of ‘Athens’ till now. We are very proud about this because we released, funded and distributed the record ourselves, totally in the DIY way. Of course, fellow labels & distros helped us too.

So, ‘Athens’ is our very beloved first full length and even it is maybe too punk rock comparing to the style we are playing nowadays, we like it a lot and we always play 4-5 songs out of it during our shows.

The men behind your debut album! Mixing, mastering, production, artwork.

‘Athens’ was recorded in Jack’s (Despite Everything) DIY studio in downtown Athens during the winter of 2011/2012. Peio and Zahos (Despite Everything) and Orestis (Vodka Juniors) did guest chorus vocals in a couple of songs. The record was mixed and mastered in Germany by Robin Volkert (of The Now Denial & Dean Dirg fame) in the summer of 2012 and right after it was sent to a pressing plant in Germany called Handle With Care. The artwork was done

by Ultra Grim (ex- I Want You Dead & The Oi!lers), while the

cover photo is the first photo our singer, Apostolis, took via Instagram. It depicts a place in the south of Athens called Alimos.

Our good friend Natalia provided us with live pictures, as well.

That’s all, I guess.

You have 30 words to present us “Athens”. Use them wisely!

We’ll quote a couple of lyrics. It’s exactly 30 words, what the fuck!

‘Let’s laugh to death, this is our time. Stand up and single this simple rhyme. Scream your lungs out, it’s never late. We are the ones to choose our fate’ Which is the biggest obstacle in the way of a newcomer band in order to release a debut album?

Dunno… Maybe money… But I guess that if you have the passion and the will to release your music, you’ll do it for sure; doesn’t matter if it’s sooner or later.

The moment of Glory for My Turn so far!

Giving a couple of autographs in Spain maybe, haha. I’m kidding, although such a thing happened.

Playing in Fluff fest’s tent stage in Czech Republic in 2012, in front of more than 500 kids, was definitely cool. Sharing the stage with some of our favorite bands like Negative Approach, Comeback Kid, Trial, GBH, Death Before Dishonor, No Turning Back, Venerea, Wolf x Down, Strength Approach & Γκούλαγκ (Gulag) was also cool. Playing 4 shows in 3 cities / 2 countries in 3 days in early September 2013 was undoubtedly cool.

Too many awesome moments; it’s hard to choose.

On the road to hell! (Upcoming gigs and tour plans?)

We promote our new 7” called Dead Weight like hell, which was released some days before the end of 2013. We have 2 great shows in Athens in February, the Vive Le Punk Rock! Festival with Infa Riot from the UK plus a bunch of amazing local bands, and the opening act to Backfire’s

(one of our favorite bands ever) Athens show. You’ll be informed on anything else that occurs.

Which band would you like to play at your funeral?

Markos says Mercyful Fate. Why not?!

You have a brand new 7” named Dead Weight. Tell us everything we need to know about it.

Yeap, it was officially released on December 23, 2013. Anchored Records from Germany & Scarecrow Records from Greece are the labels involved in our 7”.

It was printed in 320 copies of black vinyl and features 4 songs that we recorded in 4 days in September 2013 at SP Studios in Athens. It was also mixed & mastered in the same studio in October 2013. We know it’s kinda cliché but we believe that these 4 songs are our best stuff till now and the feedback we are getting is almost the same. Among the 4 songs there’s one that we used Greek lyrics in the refrain for the very first time since our inception. It turned out good.

The artwork was done by the Spanish tattoo artist Colo Lopez and we love it.

Get the record now & by the way check the 7” related merchandise here: www.myturndeadweight.bigcartel.com After Athens you released 2 7”s, one of which is a split release. Why don’t record a second full length instead?

Firstly we wanted a split 7” to be released almost after a year of the release in Athens, in order to go on tour. Goodwill Records took care of it and our brothers from Serbia, The Bridge, were the best band we could do the split with. We like split 7”s, to be honest. Then we needed a quick yet quality release, so that we could record with our new guitarist. And here we are with ‘Dead Weight’. Maybe it was too early for a second full length. We don’t regret anything. We love our releases.

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MUSIC REVIEWS

Anette Olzon Shine

Anette Olzon’s debut solo album will be released in late March. However you should not expect to listen to any heavy tunes or crazy solos.

“Like A Show” opens the album in a wonderful and smooth way and from the very first moment you get a nice idea about what to expect. The title track is a very positive one in which the Swedish singer gives us a good piece of advice in her very own way.

“Floating” was one of the songs that has been actually shared (in a demo version) via Annete’s Myspace page some years ago.

It’s a pretty simple and likeable track. “Lies” is the first single of the album. The strong chorus and the melody which definitely sticks on one’s mind prove that this track was written to be a radio hit. “Invincible” is a love song which features a beautiful and smooth melody and it’s probably dedicated to Anette’s older son. “Hear Me” starts off smoothly but don’t get fooled; actually this is not a calm track, especially when it comes to its lyrics. This song is more like Anette’s call for help in a way as the whole album reflects all the tough experiences and feelings she had to deal with in her life. “Falling”, the most well-known track of this album; it is a really inspired track and certainly a radiofriendly hit. Despite its grim lyrics this song is definitely a really powerful one! “Moving Away” is one of the most beautiful tracks being featured as well. The album closes with “One Million Faces”, a wonderful piano ballad that will certainly make you thoughtful about various things, and “Watching Me From Afar” which is a love song probably dedicated to Anette’s husband.

To sum up, Anette managed to express herself in a rather pro-active and powerful way and “Shine” is the result of this effort.

Korina P. Photo by Ear Music Burst www.afternoiz.com

39

Iced Earth

Incura

SlaveAtGod

I’m a huge fan of Iced Earth and since the band changed its singer I had a great feeling of something new and different, which is a pretty amazing thing after all these years. A new era started for Iced Earth and the band’s latest album was the proof.

Incura’s self-titled album was released in 2013 in Canada and it is set for release in Europe too, this year. It is an album consisting of diverse shapes and elements from various rock genres, such as hard rock, progressive, metal, combined with a lot of theatricality, all of which I truly enjoyed.

It features 10 songs, its total duration is 42:20’ and the longest song is the “Get the Gun” (5:22’).

Some people call it djent, others progressive metal, others metalcore. I am not sure which is the label that fits best on SlaveAtGod’ s music but rest assured it is ass-kicking! SlaveAtGod’s story so far: “The band was formed in 2007. After endless rehearsing, they managed to melt together a sound of their own, combining metal-core grooves with heavy guitar parts and catchy melodies, which along with the brutal and clean vocal lines make the whole output sound fresh and varied.”

The band is about to release “The Skyline Fission” album via No Regrets Records (A division of No Remorse Records, about to release W.E.B.’s new album too).

Plagues of Babylon

Now, a year or so later, the band returns with “Plagues of Babylon”; a pure heavy metal album with classic Iced Death riffs and drum blasts. “Dystopia”, the previous album, released in 2011, set the bar pretty high and maybe you expect too much from this album. Besides Matt Barlow’s heavy legacy, Stu Block managed to show his personality and gave Iced Earth a new voice… “Plagues of Babylon” though is an album that troubled me a lot. What I mean is that it was the first time it took me so long to decide whether I liked it or not and I guess many fans share the same thoughts. I was prepared for a killer album and when I first listened to it I couldn’t believe my ears! In this album Stu’s voice is stuck in a mid range, thus reminding me of its former vocalist. The highly anticipated new album didn’t meet (my) expectations. Don’t bother to put it side by side it to the previous one, there’s nothing to compare… If you bear in mind the old Mat Barlow-era material you’ll most likely find many familiar sounds.

In order to have a proper perspective of this material, when you listen to “Plagues of Babylon” you have to think outside the box.

So, open your ears, and appreciate the heavy catchy riffs, the headbanging drumming blasts and the angry vocals.

Sissy Fanouraki

Incura

To this day, I have never checked out any of their previous work, which is something I regretted when I listened to “Who you are” featured in the album in question, which gave me a whole new perspective and the will to find out more about the band. Apart from the melody and the musical style, the tension and power of the vocals (Kyle Gruninger) demonstrate a wide range, especially at those parts that bring to mind, mine, at least, eccentric cabarets of psychopaths (in a good way, of course). The band managed to hypnotize me and made me hit the repeat button again and again.

From “Get the Gun”, with its strong and detailed introduction, to “I’m Here Waiting” “Incura”, “Who you are” and “Here to Blame” with its - totally unexpected brutal vocals in the end.

In each and every song, you can see the vocal range, with a diverse style springing up. Each song has a different musical identity and gives something new, unique, as your mood and state of mind are “tamed” by what you’re about to hear each time.

Europe is surely longing for this album.

Spiros Smyrnis

The Skyline Fission

The Skyline Fission is the second full length album (after Black Core Inn debut) for the Greek metallers and definitely better in my opinion. Jon Howard (Threat Signal, Arkaea, Vise Versa) is the new SlaveAtGod vocalist, as well as the one responsible for the mixing and mastering of the album. The fact that Howard joined SlaveAtGod helped them to find their sound which pays tribute to bands like Meshuggah and Dillinger Escape Plan, so it can’t be bad. More than welcomed are also the Between Buried and Me and Tesseract influences.

I wanna congratulate the band for the detailed and hard work they did and I am pretty sure that the final result makes it worth it.

Chris Nanos made an excellent work on guitars and production as well, without losing the balance in the use of guitars and keyboards. All the compositions honour the djent roots of SlaveAtGod, driving you with them to a music journey that you will enBurst www.afternoiz.com

40 joy. Neurotic rhythms, distorted melodies, futuristic keys and songs like Wreck Age and Corridor’s Swirl that are about to remain insane! Thumbs Up! Spiros Smyrnis

producer of the album; he has also produced for Candlemass, ex-Opeth, King Hobo, Spiritual beggars etc. He truly is one of the best of his kind, plus, apart from the excellent production, he has also solved the band’s bassist issue. To quote Kamchatka, hopefully the album will travel “from coast to coast”. It is a magnificent one anyway. Rock on!! Christina Alossi

Christian’s vocals and the general feeling, whereas Jimi Bell’s solos and melodic riffs “upgrades” the sound and catches your attention from the very beginning. For me the best and powerful parts of the album are the tracks “Epic” with a stunning solo, “Battle” as well as the title-track.

As far as the overall sound of the album is concerned it’s undoubtedly an excellent production.

The band’s latest line-up seems to have raised the bar higher and if nothing changes in the near future I think that we will witness great new music.

Petros Chatzistilianos

Kamchatka

The search goes on The Swedish Kamchatka are always in action, following the release of their fifth album, “The search goes on”, an album that includes musical diamonds, plenty of lava and electricity that reminds us of Jimi Hendrix, Clutch and blues rock with a lot of dynamic ballads.

The trio consisting of Per Wiberg (guitar, vocals), Tobias Strandvik (drums) and Thomas “Juneor” Andersson (guitar, vocals), rushes to the band’s studio Shrimpmonkey in Varberg, Sweden, almost three years after its predecessor, “Bury your roots”. Forty minutes full of stoner, blues, hard rock and psychedelic garage music with dynamic lyrics and power guitars that can surely rock your world-and feet. The Swedish quest for deep to more mellow melodies turns the album into a magical acoustic journey you will not want to end. I’m looking at the cover with the divers and the connotations are inevitable; the quest for powerful rock, the magical recipe, the best album, the perfect harmony, the awesome riff, a pursuit of personal happiness and maybe more… It is somewhere there in the depths of the Bering Sea that separates the volcanic active Kamchatka Peninsula and the Okhotsk. “Somedays”, “Coast to coast”, “Son of the sea”, “Broken man”, “Thank you for your time” and “The search goes on” are the songs stood out from the very first time I gave the album a listen.

Anyhow, Kamchatka are finally on to something, with an album, melodies, guitar riffs and imposing drums that get to you from the very first second. Per Wiberg is the bassist and Burst www.afternoiz.com

Supercharger

Broken Hearts and Fallaparts Swinging rock n’ roll with a touch of metal! That’s how Supercharger describe their music in the press release we received on their third official album. For me, it’s badass swinging rock n’ roll, with a fine touch of metal! I really enjoyed the album. How couldn’t I? Supercharger put Hellacopters, Turbonegro and Therapy? in the blender and they’ll not charge you a dime! High energy rock n’ roll with harmonica and crazy guitar riffs! Sing-along choruses, bombastic drumming and a straight, street rock feeling! If you wanna meet Suzi the Uzi, then you gotta listen to Broken Hearts and Fallaparts!

Spiros Smyrnis

Nachtmahr Feindbild

After an one year break from official releases, Nachtmahr hits the dance floors once more with its newest album, “Feindbild”.

The Band Nachtmahr is a concept of an enemy to all those who envy Thomas Rainer’s success and want to dethrone him. He decided to dedicate this album to all these people. “Feindbild” is the name of the album.

Starting the album, is the track “Wir sind zurück”, explaining how all our music has grown dull and overdone, bringing the return of “Nachtmahr” to lead the revolution back to true music. The remaining tracks, in my opinion, literally alternate from club ready, danceable tracks to ones that are bit slower. Whichever group the track falls into, they are all powerful. “Wir sind zurück”, “I Hate Berlin”, “Feindbild”, and “Liebst du mich?” each create an invigorating energy that is impossible not to move to.

“Go on with your backstabbing. ‘Feindbild’ is the musical counter strike that will silence the opposition once and for all.” -Nachtmahr

House of Lords Precious Metal

American hard rockers House of Lords officially released their 9th studio album on February 21st in Europe and on 25th in USA (Frontiers Record). “Precious Metal” comes after the very successful 2011’s release “Big Money”. In this album you’ll listen to 12 hard rock songs, which are one step ahead of the previous albums, both lyrically and musically speaking. I was thrilled by James

Oddly enough however, the album ends with “Wache”, a two minute piano solo. No vocals, no beats. I found it touching and invoking, comparable to “Schweigenminute”, VNV Nation’s “Moment of Silence” ending to their album “Praise the Fallen”. My favorite track is “Liebst du mich”.

Finishing up, “Feindbild” is worth the buy, revitalizing the harsh military style industrial needs.

Its heavy beats and strong vocals are a strike, with Nachtmahr written all over it, to the envious faces of lesser bands, and while their new tour begins in Europe, I can’t wait to see them in Wave Gotik Treffen. Sotiris Stilianos

HIT&RUN

OT It’sN all Greek to me

by Spiros Smyrnis

by Spiros Smyrnis

Mustasch

Need

Orvam: A Song for Home

Thank you for the Demon

‘It’s Not Greek to Me’ started as a way of expressing my admiration to Greek musicians and bands of the rock/metal community! I have already written 35 articles and I am happy to have material for a hundred more. Τhis proves that the Greek heavy/ rock/metal scene is one of the hottest and most underrated in the music planet! So here we are to set the record straight!

Greece used to have some very interesting progressive metal bands like Horizon’s End, Fragile Vastness and Wastefall, all of which released some excellent albums that honor the name of progressive metal, but unfortunately they didn’t enjoy the success they deserved. I hope that NEED will make it and share their music with thousands of people around the world because their new third full length album totally is totally worth it. But first things first: NEED’s journey in the metal world kicked off in 2004 when the first line-up of the band around guitarist Ravaya recorded their first promo CD titled “Avoidinme”. Following several lineup changes, the band took its current form in the beginning of 2006.

After that, they recorded two official albums: “The Wisdom Machine” via Burning Star in 2006 and “Siamese God” via Venerate Industries in 2009. In 2013, they signed with Trailblazer Records (Lucky Funeral, Speedblow, Automaton) to release “Orvam: A song for Hope” worldwide on January 10.

In this album, NEED really aim high, judging from their decision to work with the legendary sound engineer Neil Kernon (Queensryche, Nevermore, Kansas and many more) and Alan Douches (Mastodon, Converge, The Dillinger Escape Plan, etc.) while the production was done at Devasoundz Studios (Rotting Christ) by Fotis Bernardo . This helps “Orvam” in sounding amazingly solid yet heavy, supporting the band’s dark, melancholic lyrics.

With new members, Victor Koloubis on bass and Stelios Pashalis on drums, NEED seem to be ready for the next big step, now that their songs are fucking flawless! The lineup changes refreshed them for good and set them free to dive into the depths of their souls. Jon’s amazing voice completes their compositions, while they sound more solid than ever, but I’ve mentioned that already, right? Doesn’t matter to me and neither to you, trust me! Despite the fact that I personally hate the progressive label, when it comes to NEED’s case, it suits them just fine! “Orvam” is something like a place you’ve been once but you couldn’t stay long, so this time you wanna spend every goddamn minute, trying to get as much as you can before you get on with your music journey! “Lifeknot” and “Mother Madness” have already become personal favorites, let alone the blasting “Construct” and their magnum opus, “Orvam,” with its fantastic guitar leads. Progression, evolution, inspiration; that’s the triptych to success! “Smell my color if you can… Orvam”

41

Conan

Blood Eagle

Fliptop Box Unbeliever

Eyes Wide Open Aftermath

Nymph

Theories of Light

Mustasch have had quite a success in Sweden as the 4 Swedish Grammy Nominations and 2 Grammy Awards are a great achievement. And when listening to “Thank you for the Demon”, I can understand why! Metal-ised hard rock, staring with one eye at the heavy metal classics and with the other to the straight rock n roll feeling of Motorhead! Ralf Gyllenhammar’s voice is definitely one of their hidden aces, as it colors the compositions of “Thank you for the Demon”, “All my life” and it has already been in my personal favourites. Cutting, straight, to the point! Personally I don’t ask more when it comes to heavy metal!

Don’t be misunderstood! Conan is not an epic metal band, who copies Manowar, Manilla Road, Cirith Ungol etc. On the contrary they are the doom/drone leaders of their generation. The bastard sons of Eyehategod, who are not joking! Firm, solid, heavy, repetitive doom with cutting-throat vocals and sick atmosphere! Monolithic and underground the second album of the British doomsters just came up to reassure the metal community that doom or be doomed is the appropriate choice for every one of us. If not, then Conan will behead you, with no mercy, no mercy at all!

Fliptop box formed in 2003 in Athens.They play the music that they want to listen to. AlternativeMetal..something. I have to say that Fliptop Box’s alternative metal… something is more than interesting - I won’t lie! I liked them very much because they reminded me, on their 3-track EP, of bands I really love. Bands like Alice In Chains and Danzig.

Plus, I wanna give them an extra point for the use of sax on Brother Kein (Zenjungle mix) which was awesome. My only objection is the vocals, which I wanted grungier!

Seriously, how many metal bands come from Sweden? I bet there are millions of them out there. One of them is Eyes Wide Open who are staring at melodic death metal (some may call it N.W.O.S.D.M) with one eye such as bands like At The Gates, Dark Tranquility and (early) In Flames, and with the other they glare at American groove metal, bands like Shadows Fall for example. Groovy and guitar-based they’re gonna make you have a good time! Interesting “riffology” and well-written choruses! Keep your eyes wide open and give “Aftermath” a shot. Νymph are coming from Italy and thank God they are not playing Power Metal (Rhapsody style)! The Italians mix different kinds of music trying to find their unique sound! “Theories of Light” album trips into 70s prog rock, alternative metal and post rock. From Anathema to Rush and Isis, Nymph experimented with their sound and managed to release an interesting album which is recorded at The Basement studio, mixed by Matt Bayles (Mastodon, Isis, The Sword) and mastered by Ed Brooks from RFI Studios (Rem, Isis, Pearl Jam). “Death and Rebirth” is definitely the album’s highlight.

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42

Director’s Cut

Yorgos Lanthimos From Kinetta to Alp; the strange journey of Yorgos Lanthimos

By Spiros smyrnis

Burst www.afternoiz.com

43 Yorgos Lanthimos was born in Athens, Greece. Throughout the 90’s he directed a series of videos for Greek dance-theatre companies. Since 1995, he has directed a number of TV commercials in addition to music videos, short films and theatre plays.

Kinetta, his first feature film, played at Toronto and Berlin film festivals to critical acclaim.

His second feature Dogtooth, won the “Un Certain Regard prize” at the 2009 Cannes film festival, followed by numerous awards at festivals worldwide.

It was nominated for a Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award (Oscar) in 2011.

Alps, his latest film, won the “Osella for best screenplay” at the 2011 Venice film festival and best film at the Sydney film festival in 2012.

He is currently working on his first english language film “The Lobster”. These were the lines with which Yorgos Lanthimos describes himself as a filmmaker on his official website, www. lanthimos.com. If the name doesn’t ring a bell to you, then I have to add that Lanthimos is responsible for Dogtooth, a film that many cine-philiacs have put it in their favorite list with the strangest films they’ve ever seen! Lanthimos draws cinematic’ s world attention, along with other Greek Filmmakers like Panos Koutras (immediately check out his wonderful Strella), Yannis Oikonomidis, Alexis Alexiou and Athina Rachel Tsangari to name a few. “The growing number of independent, and inexplicably strange, new Greek films being made has led trend-spotters to herald the arrival of a new Greek wave, or as some have called it, the “Greek Weird Wave”. Whether or not the catchy label fits, if there is a wave, weird or otherwise, Lanthimos and Tsangari are undoubtedly at its crest” states Steve Rose on Guardian, trying to explain what’s going on over the last years in Greece. Lanthimos on the other hand says that: “Well, the truth is that at some point people have a need

to start noticing something,” he says. “It’s not quite a coincidence, but I’m afraid there is no foundation for this. There is no common philosophy, which is a good thing, I think.

The common thing is we have no funds, so we have to make our own very cheap, very small films.”

Lanthimos made his first feature film Kinetta, in 2005 and gained some recognition out of it. Kinetta, is a defunct Greek resort town, inhabited by migrant workers during the off season. A plainly clothed cop with a passion for automobiles, tape recorders and Russian women, investigates a series of recent murders in the area.

He enlists the help of a photo - store clerk, a loner who is a part - time videographer and a young hotel maid who will be performing the role of the female victims.

This trio engages in a succession of murder re-enactments, directed by the cop with exhaustive attention to detail but questionable scientific purpose. In this film Lanthimos sets his personal style for the first time in cinema, but he is a bit immature. The absence of dialogues may surprise some viewers but the beautiful photo-frames and the intense performances show a man who can guide his actors and his coworkers as well. Kinetta is definitely a difficult movie to watch but you can see Lanthimos’ talent and his interesting point of view. Harsh, violent and tough to handle Kinetta is a place you may have to get back to so you can understand her story!

Let’s go on Dogtooth now, a film which is very important to the history of New Greek cinema. Dogtooth is the story of a dysfunctional family, in which the parents keep everyone isolated from the rest of the world. The only way for the kids to communicate with the outside world is through Christina, a woman who works at their father’s factory! The father, the mother and their three kids live in a villa outside of the city. Τhere is a tall fence

around the house. The kids have never left the house. They play, they get entertained and get bored just like their parents want to, with the total absence of an outside stimulus. They believe that airplanes are flying toys and the yellow flowers are zombies. Only Christina, from the outside world, has access to the house. She works as a security guard in the father’s factory. The father has a one and only purpose for her visits, just to have sex with his son. Everybody loves Christina, especially, the elder daughter. One day Christina will give her a set of tongs, asking for something else in return. Lanthimos wrote this very interesting screenplay with Efthimis Filippou, but after the fame that Dogtooth gained many critics underlined the similarities between Lanthimos’ film and Castillo de la Pureza by Arturo Beristáin. If you want my opinion I think that Lanthimos didn’t steal the Beristain film. He created a unique film experience you should all watch. Lanthimos deconstructed the family idea by putting a dysfunctional family under his lens. We don’t know the names of his characters. With the exception of Christina we don’t who these people are! We don’t know where or when! We can assume where by the use of the Greek language.

Even the Greek language is used in a strange way as salt becomes telephone, armchair becomes the sea, pussy becomes lamp and vagina becomes keyboard.

Dogtooth distorts the ordinary cinematic and narrative structures and dethrones the patriarchal family. Dogtooth, as we’ve already written

won the “Un Certain Regard prize” at the 2009 Cannes film festival, followed by numerous awards at festivals worldwide.

It was nominated for a Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award (Oscar) in 2011. It is definitely one of the most controversial films of the 2000s and one you couldn’t miss.

The next chapter on Lanthimos career was Alps, for which he won with Eftimis Filippou, “Osella for best screenplay” at the 2011 Venice film festival. If you ask me Alps’ screenplay is one of the most interesting and stranger ones in the history of European and World cinema.

A group of people start a business where they impersonate the recently deceased in order to help their clients through the grieving process. Lanthimos uses everything that made Dogtooth such an interesting film and sketches a breath-taking movie with an amazing performance by Aggeliki Papoulia in the main role. With a dark humorous approach, he delivers by captivating the viewer through a story you won’t forget. Violent, dark, strange, of few words, Alps is a film that proved Lanthimos was not a one-movie director. We can’t wait for his upcoming one, “The Lobster”.

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Kraftidioten – In order of disappearance (2014)

By Angie Rouska

Photo by PARADOX Films.

Kraftidioten (In order of Disappearance) is the Norwegian film by the acclaimed director Hans Petter Moland that had its World Premiere at this year’s Berlinale and also competed for the Golden Bear. Although the film left the festival without winning any prize, it did receive positive reviews, mostly from the critics and the audience.

Starring a superb cast, such as Stellan Skarsgard, Bruno Ganz, Pal Sverre Hagen, Birgitte Hjort Sorensen, Jakob Oftebro and the upcoming Anders Baasmo Christiansen, the film promises lots of killings, sarcasm and will surely entertain those who love the theme of revenge.

The main character is Nils (Stellan Skarsgad) who snow ploughs the wild winter mountains of Norway and has recently received the Citizen of the Year Award. He is a reputable man, living with his wife in a sort of remote house, doing his job without bothering anyone.

The sudden news of his son’s death put him in a doubtful situation as he cannot accept the cause of his death. When justice is absent, he decides to take the law in his hands… along with some weapons. The main villain, a vegan gangster known as “The Count” is going to face an unforeseen enemy but his actions will bring havoc to his relationships with the Serbian mafia and a blood feud will start for the wrong reasons.

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between Moland and Skarsgard (Zero Kelvin, Aberdeen, A Somewhat Gentle Man) and the reason is easily understandable.

They are the two significant pieces of a puzzle that when it is laid out there completed, the outcome is flawless, a true perfection. Not only because Moland’s filmmaking takes the viewer right in the middle of cold, snowy and captivating mountains of Norway amidst a bloody vendetta, but also because Skarsgard “fills up” every scene with his aggravated hunger for revenge and his beginner’s luck. Definitely in this occasion, revenge is a dish best served cold. Of course there is Bruno Ganz whose presence surpasses every other villain in the film, but Paul Svere Haggen is also doing a wonderful job in portraying the mad –to the point of idiocy- and laughable vegan bad guy who cannot control his wife. Although there are some comical sequences, violence is there in satisfying quantities to keep the balance.

Kim Fupz Aakeson was responsible for the screenplay and has provided a fulfilling script that evolves in a sequential story with unexpected turns, black humor and violent moments that has many familiarities with Coens’ unique atmosphere and Tarantino’s progressive pace.

It will be no wonder if a Hollywood studio decides at some time in the future to proceed with the production of another useless remake.

Nymphomaniac: Volume I (2014)

By Spiros Smyrnis

Photo by Photo credit: Mary Cybulski - © 2013 Paramount Pictures.

All Rights Reserved.

I am writing the review on Nymphomaniac right after the screening of Trier’s new masterpiece, so I will do the same thing with volume 2. I think that this will help me to express, in full extent, everything I felt during the film.

Before I start I have a confession to make. I enjoyed the fact that most of the critics and viewers loved Nymphomaniac. Finally I am not the only one defending the Danish Filmmaker (with a capital F), the one and only Lars Von Trier. As far as those who couldn’t watch the first part of Nymphomaniac, I advise you to go to a cinema close to you, as fast as you can, so you can enjoy one of the best films of 2013.

A self-diagnosed nymphomaniac recounts her erotic experiences to the man who saved her after a beating. These were the two lines available as Nymphomaniac’s plot since a long time ago. There were also some amazing teasers and some extreme, intense, beautiful photo frames.

Charlotte Gainsbourg is Joe, a Nymphomaniac, as she is to confess to Seligman (Stellan Skarsgård), the man who saved her and offered her a bed and a cup of tea at his house. These were the five lines that described the main idea behind Nymphomaniac’s story.

Volume 2 starts when Joe finishes her 5th chapter and doesn’t feel anything. She

cannot come to an orgasm anymore… she cannot have a sexual stimulation. Seligman, as well as the viewers, wait patiently for the next chapter on Joe’s story. The chapters 6 to 8 had much more sex and nudity than the previous ones. Joe pushed her sexuality to the edge just to fill an orgasm again. Trier like the maestro that he is, directs his actors intensely by pushing them to the edge as well! Charlotte Gainsbourg gives a memorable performance. She is devoted body and soul to Joe’s role and portrays a haunting female character, even more haunting than her previous one in Trier’s Antichrist.

Stellan Skarsgård reveals his talent as he is great for one more time. Jamie Bell on the other hand handles a very difficult role excellently, far from what he’s acted before.

Blasphemer, provocateur, misogynist, sexist; I am sure that there will be plenty of viewers and critics who will accuse Trier for the second part of Nymphomaniac. I am also sure that the man who wore a Persona Non Grata Official Selection T-Shirt at Berlinale won’t mind at all.

He will continue to provoke our senses, pushing European and world cinema to the edge. In his late fifties he identified and marked the film world forever. Nymphomaniac vol 2 is just another piece in his puzzle.

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Do you dare?

The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)

By Spiros Smyrnis

© 2014 - Fox Searchlight Pictures

If you are looking for the movie with the best cast, released on 2014, then Grand Budapest is definitely the chosen one! Just grab a piece of paper and write down the actors starring in the new Wes Anderson film.

Take your time, I won’t go anywhere.

Are you ready yet? Nice. Ralph Fiennes, F. Murray Abraham, Jude Law, Edward Norton, Willem Dafoe, Tilda Swilton, Tom Wilkinson, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman, Adrien Brody, Owen Wilson, Harvey Keitel, Lea Seydoux, & Mathieu Amalric, all hold smaller or bigger roles in The Grand Budapest Hotel. Most of them were there, at a strange point of their lives (paraphrasing Fight Club). But let’s say more about Grand Budapest Hotel, which “recounts the adventures of Gustave H, a legendary concierge at a famous European hotel between the wars, and Zero Moustafa, the lobby boy who becomes his most trusted friend. The story involves the theft and recovery of a priceless Renaissance painting and the battle for an enormous family fortune -- all against the back-drop of a suddenly and dramatically changing Continent.” The Fox Searchlight Pictures’ storyline may give you a hint about the things that went on in Anderson’s head lately!

Wes Anderson is without doubt one of the most insightful filmmakers of his generation; one of the most interesting as well. That being said, he is one of the few remaining storytellers of cinema. Some call it Independent American Cinema, others the Big

Screen and there are people like me who are used to call it Seventh Art. Anderson tells another humorous, touching story. The story of Gustave H and his lobby boy (welcome Mr Tony Revolori!) through the author’s eyes! Anderson like the true maestro that he is, leads his actors into great performances and fulfills probably the biggest film (considering production, cast etc) he has ever done.

Less sophisticated than his previous works, Grand Budapest Hotel will be the easier way for an amateur to dive into the surrealistic world of Anderson. Beautiful photography, inspired performances, and flawless direction has already made this on my favorites list for 2014. Please join me at the Grand Budapest Hotel and I am pretty sure you will enjoy your stay here!

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WAR OF THE WORLDS (2005) The movie starts off pretty decently; Tom Cruise’s character is a crane operator at the docks whose ex-wife is bringing his 15 year-old son and 10 year-old daughter to stay with him for the weekend while she’s in Boston. As it is expected, both his kids resent him and prefer their step-dad who buys them stuff. About 20 minutes in the film, a huge thunderstorm breaks out (with great sound effects) and everyone is puzzled by thunders that strike at the same spot for over 20 times.

By Kostas Krasonis

WO RST M OV I E S EV ER

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Then, as Tom Cruise goes to see what’s happening, the movie starts to suck donkey balls!

Science-fiction movies in the 50’s and 60’s were bad. There were no visual effects, no believable plotlines and most of the time very little acting.

So when someone decides to remake a 1953 film called “War of the Worlds”, in 2005, everyone would expect it to be better, updated in every aspect. Unfortunately that wasn’t the case for Steven Spielberg’s remake, starring Tom Cruise.

A huge tripod emerges from the ground where the lightning hit, driven by Martians, and starts shooting everybody with its laser-beams which can evaporate a human-being, but do absolutely nothing to fabric. Ray (Cruise) escapes the wrath of the tripod and even though an electro-magnetic pulse has disabled all electronic devices, he manages to fix a car using his protagonist superknowledge of stuff and skips town with his children.

While in the car (the only car running in town by the way) his daughter has an extremely annoying nervous breakdown, screaming and crying and is eventually calmed by her brother who does some ritual to take her to her happy place.

© 2005 Paramount Pictures. All rights reserved.

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They decide to spend the night at the basement of Ray’s ex-wife’s place for safety. All night they hear loud noises and explosions and it’s fair to assume than some kind of battle is being fought outside between men and aliens. How did you get that idea? It turns out that a Boing 747 has crashed right on the front lawn of the house!

Ray then talks to a stranded

news crew who inform him that the tripods have been planted in the ground for many years and the aliens got on board using the lightning.

After some unfortunate events involving angry mobs and tripods, Ray has lost the car and gets some help by a man who provides his home for shelter. At that point Ray’s son has run off to fight the aliens because he thinks he is in some kind of video game and is presumed dead; so it’s just Ray and his daughter. The man helping them seems to be unstable and, afraid that he might give up their position to the aliens, Ray kills him.

It may seem that my summarizing skills need improving but I assure you, the events in the movie are as random as I describe them to be.

All this time the tripods release some red goo everywhere which later is revealed to be human tissue because they drain people. Ray and his daughter get captured by a one of them but the heroic crane operator saves the day blowing up the huge vehicle!

The plot so far was so unbelievably stupid and the characters so irritating, that I found myself wishing they’d die at some point! And wait ‘till you hear the ending! After all those years of examining and biding their time to destroy humanity, the aliens hadn’t taken under consideration that common Earth bacteria might be deadly to them so they caught a cold and died! How lame is that!

Morgan Freeman’s voice narrating it didn’t make it more credible.

The final scene shows Ray and his daughter reaching Boston and finding Ray’s son safe and unharmed waiting for them!

Frankly, I was just glad it was over!

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“Auschwitz begins wherever someone looks at a slaughterhouse and thinks: they’re only animals.”

-Theodor W. Adorno-

www.argophotography.com Burst No animals were harmed in the making of this furwww.afternoiz.com coat

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Ghosts, Mentally ill people & Witches

A Beginners’ Guide to

By P. Tsoutsis //Š Copyright 2011-2014, FX Networks. All rights reserved.

The Show American Horror Story is a TV miniseries, which first aired in 2011 and has reached its third season. The show belongs to the horror genre, with each self-contained season consisting of 13 episodes, is, focused on a specific theme and time period. Another characteristic of the show is that many of its actors (e.g Jessica Lange, Sarah Paulson, Evan Peters, Frances Conroy) portray different characters in each season.

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Murder House Season 1 centers on a house, where brutal crimes were committed over the years. The season is focused on a modern family, the Harmons, who have just moved to their newly acquired house; there are also flashbacks of the lives of the previous owners and the way they died. The main characters are Ben (Dylan McDermott) who’s a psychiatrist, his wife Vivien (Connie Britton) who suffers from depression, and their neglected teenage daughter Violet (Taissa Farmiga). Vivien receives regular visits by the mysterious neighbor, Constance (Jessica Lange), and her daughter Addie (Jamie Brewer) who has Down syndrome, while Ben also uses the house in order to see his patients, one of whom, Tate (Evan Peters), is being treated for psychosis. Being unaware of the history of the house, the Harmons try to have a normal life, but eventually strange events make them dig out its past.

Psychological Profile: Jessica Lange

Asylum Season 2 takes place in a 1960’s mental institution in Massachusetts; it’s focused on the lives of its occupants (nuns, doctors and patients).

The season starts with Kit Walker (Evan Peters) being accused of being a serial killer, and with Lana Winters (Sarah Paulson), a young reporter who visits Briarcliff Manor in order to cover the story, but ends up hospitalized for her homosexual tendencies. The institution is run by the strict Sister Jude Martin (Jessica Lange) and her superior Monsignor Timothy Howard (Joseph Fiennes). Other occupants of the asylum include the naive Sister Mary Eunice (Lily Rabe), who soon becomes possessed by an evil spirit, the ex-Nazi Dr. Arthur Arden (James Cromwell), who performs secret illegal experiments on the patients, and the visiting psychiatrist Dr. Oliver Thredson (Zachary Quinto), who comes to evaluate Kit Walker. As the season progresses, the true nature of each character unfolds.

Coven Season 3, taking place in the present day, is focused on Miss Robichaux’s Academy, a place where young witches can develop and enhance their abilities. The academy is run by Cordelia (Sarah Paulson), and her mother and Supreme witch Fiona (Jessica Lange). Fiona, in her pursuit for an elixir for eternal life, discovers buried-alive Delphine LaLaurie (Kathy Bates), infamous in her era (1830) for torturing and killing her slaves. With the Supreme’s health constantly failing, the rest of the witches, Zoe Benson (Taissa Farmiga), Misty Day (Lily Rabe) and Madison Montgomery (Emma Roberts) become candidates as the next Supreme. As the season progresses, the Academy faces the threat of the rival Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau (Angela Bassett), and an even bigger threat that of a group of witch-hunters.

Plans for the future The show has received many positive reviews and has been nominated for many awards, in acting and artistic categories alike. As a result, it has already been renewed for a fourth season -which is to take place in the 50’s-, with many actors from the cast of the first three seasons already been invited to join (e.g. Jessica Lange, Kathy Bates, AngelaBassett). Jessica Lange has stated that the fourth season will be her last in the show.

Jessica Lange is one of the main characters in all three seasons of the show, either in a supporting role (Season 1), or on main roles (Seasons 2 & 3), and she gives an exceptional performance. No wonder why she has received many awards and nominations for her portrayal of the characters in question.

In all three seasons she portrays strong women with a hidden past. Many of the flashbacks in each season shed some light into these dark secrets.

In season one, she is the next-door neighbor who constantly visits the Harmons for her own purposes.

She is responsible for murdering people inside the house, or influencing other people to do the killings instead of her. At the same time, she is a tragic mother with a cursed womb, as three out of her four children were born with some deformity, and all four of them have died.

In the second season, she

plays the strict Sister Jude, who runs the asylum trying to make it a model institution. Her methods of treating the patients involve some sort of punishment, as she believes that mentally ill people are nothing more than sinners. Eventually, an incident from her past changes her completely and becomes more caring for them. Despite the fact she a nun, she has carnal desires, often having erotic fantasies with her superior Monsignor Timothy Howard.

In the third season, Lange portrays Fiona Goode, the Supreme witch of her coven, who’s obsessed in finding a way to prolong her life.

She constantly confronts her daughter Cordelia, since she doesn’t believe that her daughter is strong enough to become the next Supreme of the coven. Despite her failing health, she is whiling to eliminate any potential Supreme candidate, as she doesn’t want to pass her leadership until the very end.

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Kris Kuksi

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By B|S|O // Photos © Copyright Kris Kuksi

“A post-industrial Rococo master, Kris Kuksi obsessively arranges characters and architecture in asymmetric compositions with an exquisite sense of drama. Instead of stones and shells he uses screaming plastic soldiers, miniature engine blocks, towering spires and assorted debris to form his landscapes.

The political, spiritual and material conflict within these shrines is enacted under the calm gaze of remote deities and august statuary. Kuksi manages to evoke, at once, a sanctum and a mausoleum for our suffocated spirit.” ~ Guillermo del Toro Being a great Guillermo del Toro fan, I came across his comments on this great artist whom, I regret to say, hadn’t heard before. He practices all fields of static visual art, but what amazed me was his sculpting…

He was born in Missouri in 1973 and grew up in Kansas, with issues during childhood, the kind that makes grotesque art emerge from within. Having not (yet) met, there is not much I can tell about him, but studying his work I must say that he is a most complicated individual, and being an artist he has his own trademark to verify his work.

Usually he would create a themed synthesis of statues, either mythological, or religious, inspired from ancient Greece or a social state, space, war, love, astrology, everything. From the distance it looks like a character is presented as the main hero to the theme, with decals and shapes surrounding it, more or less like a three dimensional picture within a multiplex frame. The magic begins as you get closer… and closer! The detail is outstanding and while zooming in you bear witness to miniature masterpieces that form a whole pattern. It’s almost like having a galaxy within your grasp!

Check out the Plague Parade: Opus2 and your jaw will drop! It would take a 1000 pages book to describe one of his sculptures alone. It took me several times of zoom in and out to figure the concept, and even more time spent on the infinite detail, trying to understand structural techniques to such creations.

In few of his own words, his art is inspired BY sex, death, politics, religion, war, and taxidermy! The complexity of each theme reminds me of Lovecraft’s spiritual labyrinths, and if I was to witness one of his works closely, a trick of light to turn shadow into revelation; man(!) it gives me chills just to think about it! I felt A Similar sensation while watching the grotesque triptych of “The Garden of Earthly Delights” by Hieronymus Bosch, only for K.K. they are alive and timeless!

He has received acknowledgement all over the world throughout more than 120 exhibitions, mostly in the U.S. but also in Europe (UK, Germany, Switzerland, France) for the past 13 years, and has created a passion for private collectors (actors, politicians, tycoons etc), and art lovers like myself.

There is still a lot to talk about Kris Kuski, since art always flows endlessly through the minds and hands of the talented, but the realization of all his work into three dimensional structures is phenomenal indeed!

A perfect exercise for the mind, and imagination of the viewer, it helps clear the perception and expand the limits of visual awareness, his work is ingenious and a great tribute to the human legacy.

Also let me commend his website, even though it lacks detail, it still is a great demonstration of the artists’ work and profile. www.kuksi.com

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Η μουσική είναι θέμα... ροκιάς, γούστου, ιδεολογίας, τρόπου ζωής, διασκέδασης, κατάστασης, περίστασης, ακουσµάτων, ψαξίµατος, παρέας, επιρροών, επιλογών, ιστορίας, πολιτισµού, κουλτούρας, ιδιοσυγκρασίας, χαρακτήρα, ταπεραµέντου, ηχοσυστήµατος, συστήµατος, ώρας, στιγµής, λεπτού, τόνωσης, εκτόνωσης, θεραπείας, φιγούρας, φαγούρας, πόρωσης, ευαισθησίας, διάθεσης, ηλικίας, κλιµακτηρίου, εποχής, ταχύτητας, χωροχρόνου, ειδώλων, µίµησης, αποµίµησης, µύησης, σύνδεσης στο internet και τόσων πολλών άλλων πραγμάτων.

Για εμάς όμως η μουσική είναι και κάτι παραπάνω... ΤΡΟΠΟΣ ΕΚΦΡΑΣΗΣ!

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195 million children worldwide suffer from the effects of malnutrition. In 2011, MSF treated 408,000 children in more than 30 countries.

Copyright: Francesco Zizola

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