THE DEVIL’S BLOOD: THE METALSUCKS INTERVIEW

In the scramble for stability in today’s panicky music business, one casualty is honesty. That’s totally understandable and a lot like life: Who among us has never prioritized coolness over self? In other words, always waiting patiently is the temptation to impress, not express. And that tips the first domino in a chain of intellectualization, as artists predict and reinterpret novelty, and the individual voice joins the chorus.

This is not an issue for Holland’s The Devil’s Blood, authors of recent memory’s purist, most vital album, The Thousandfold Epicentre (out today on Metal Blade). At its center lies a heedlessly honest relationship between frontman Selim Lemouchi and his sister, singer Farida. But the heart that pumps The Devil’s Blood is Selim (known simply as SL), the guitarist, composer, and visionary behind Epicentre, a masterful, vivid, and warmly fluid occult rock album that’s as commanding as the most ear-unfriendly, bombastic black metal epic.

That makes sense coming from a fervent Satanist whose Eindhoven home is decorated by inverted crosses and blood-encrusted altars (view here). And when I phoned SL at that home, our conversation began guardedly with business talk about the launch of The Devil’s Blood in America and the imminent clamor of a stateside tour. But soon we were chuckling about our sisters, about having fun, about making movies, and about a potential EP to come.

Anso DF: In America, your first album The Time Of No Time Evermore was released on a small scale. Now that The Devil’s Blood has a deal with Metal Blade, what’s your level of excitement for a bigger release of your next album?

Selim Lemouchi: We’re just focussing on spreading the music that we make as far and wide as we can. I think we just about managed with the previous album to do it as far and wide as our record label was able to at that point. In Europe, they had already been doing an excellent job; we felt absolutely no reason to change the team over there. But the American experience was slightly less than stellar? [laughs] We thought it might be a good idea to go with a partner in the USA. One of the companies interested in that was Metal Blade.

That’s what we did with every opportunity that we come across: We always look for the best deal we can get. I guess [in] Metal Blade we’ve found that for this point in our career. It’ll probably give us a chance to do a lot more touring, promotion, and interviews — all that stuff — in America. Which brings us one step closer to having the record and the band available to everyone everywhere. It’s just one of the steps in the life of The Devil’s Blood, I suppose.

To introduce The Devil’s Blood to America, do you foresee a lot more work in your future? Does that scare you at all?

Well no, stuff like that doesn’t scare me at all. Everything boils down to having good people working for you who can make good plans and good itineraries. They’ve been doing a good job. There’s no reason to complain. If a problem arises, we’ll just deal with it.

The same goes for touring and for everything we do. We always try to be as spontaneous as we can without ever looking at it as a job or as work. But, y’know, the whole promotions thing … It’s one of the things that comes with the territory, that you just need to be professional and do.

Can we talk about the line-up of The Devil’s Blood? In the studio, is it just yourself and the singer?

No, no. We have almost the same line-up that we used on the [first] record. We have a bass player, our singer, a drummer, and a guitarist, and we record the core of the songs in the live setting. After that, I and the other guitarist this time around did a lot of the extra parts. Then, of course, we had our piano player come in to add keyboard parts, and a percussionist to do that kind of stuff. Then also some vocals from me and the producer involved.

We try to find the person most fit for the job; in an ideal world, I could do everything myself. But I’m just not good enough a drummer or bass player to do that. I’m good enough that I can write the parts that they should be playing, but they are the ones who go actually play the parts in a way that makes sense. Everyone has their personal [pauses] style and it’s up to me to find the person most fitting for the job.

It’s weird to say this after such a strong debut, but The Devil’s Blood has improved on The Thousandfold Epicentre. The singing is bolder, the playing is more forceful, and the scope is wider to my ear. Is that result of your ambition and focus, or of being more comfortable with the process of making records?

I think that last point you make is very valid; we are becoming more comfortable … At least speaking for myself, I’m becoming more comfortable with my own role as a creative person and as a songwriter and producer. And we grew up simply by doing a lot of live stuff. Also, there were a few line-up changes; we have a new drummer and guitar player as opposed to the sessions for The Time Of No Time Evermore. Which makes a difference, a very big one if I may say so myself. Basically, a band should always be evolving. Perhaps not in a way that changes their style drastically — but sometimes also that. It doesn’t really matter. But there always should be hunger to do something that you didn’t do before. Not that that makes the previous record any less important, or any less beautiful. But it makes sure you don’t walk the same path twice.

I’m glad you used the term “beautiful.” The Devil’s Blood’s music is very harmonious and beautiful. So it might surprise fans at a big heavy metal festival, like Hellfest, expecting a band called The Devil’s Blood to be a tuneless and super-heavy, screaming metal band. Do you like to take metal fans by surprise like that?

I like to confuse them, certainly. The highest power that an artist has in confusion. If you can wield that sword, then you can literally change lives as an artist. I truly believe that this were our biggest strength in life. But on the other side, music flows as water does: downhill, down the path of least resistance, so to speak. [carefully] When I write music, I never judge what I do. I never second-guess what I do. I never make myself walk a different path just because I think I should; I just see where the song takes me. If the song takes me into a very harmonious, melodic way, then that’s where it’s supposed to be. Sometimes I [may venture into] murkier territory. That’s also a very comfortable place for me to be. So it’s very hard for me to say where this will lead or where it came from. We’ll have to see whatever we do next.

I think The Devil’s Blood is a band that’s very easy to trust. Does that make sense?

I don’t know. If it does to you, that’s all that matters.

Well, part of my perception of The Devil’s Blood is that you guys have firm, good motives. It’s easy for a band to get concerned about commerce, or other demands, on a subconscious level.

I think that’s a problem that’s not new at all. Since the birth of pop music, this is something that has been a problem. The only thing that might’ve happened in the last 15-20 years is that for all intents and purposes, metal music has become a definitive part of the pop music culture. Before that point, it was always a counter-culture. So much money is involved in the creation and promotion of bands, in the maintenance of bands. Ultimately, they become crowd-pleasers. Or record label-pleasers. They become very aware of such things as trends, or the new, hip thing to do, so to speak.

Not only as a musician, but most definitely also as a spiritual person, I could never allow myself to travel along those roads. I do not need to be here; there is no reason for me to do what I’m doing for any other motivation than simply wanting to create the best possible thing that I can create. Then if that doesn’t meet with success, then perhaps success is not what I need.

The best bands, the ones that last, have to be real first. In that sense, to be real is the only way to be successful. 

I guess so.

I watched an interview that took place in your house. It was really interesting. One point that stayed in my mind was that you once gave up music. When you were in your 20’s. Is that accurate?

It is.

At this point, I hear a lot of joy and fun in The Thousandfold Epicentre. Are you having fun?

[pauses] That’s a good question, actually. Well, I’m most certainly enjoying the creation process of the record. Let me put it that way. To have made this thing is something that [brings] tremendous amounts of joy and pleasure and pride. And hunger. Now that we’re bringing the show to the road — if you’ll allow the cliche —

[laughs]

— that is also a very rewarding experience. Or if I’m completely honest, it’s not really met with the same joy and pleasure as does the creation process itself. I do appreciate the chance to bring our thing to the stage, to perform our rituals, and to express what we want to express — and we’re becoming extremely good at this, if I may say so, and are working very hard to become even better — but some part of me is already hoping that I will be able to enter a studio very soon to finish what might become the third album or whatever else might come. For me the creation process and the recording process is definitely the most rewarding.

Would you say you have material for the next album already?

No I wouldn’t say that [laughs]. We have some outtakes from the last record which we might form into some kind of EP maybe next year. Or maybe something as a small document of things from the past. But nothing new has yet surfaced. I’ll have to wait until that happens. I really have no idea what kind of time frame we’re looking at here [laughs]. Last time I thought it would never happen within five or six years, and it turned out to only be two, so [laughs].

I hope it’s gratifying to you that a fan already wants more. I want more.

[laughs] I guess the hunger is part of what we are trying to achieve. But that’s the hunger [that] would be best served elsewhere.

Elsewhere?

There are several things at play with this record, I think. What still strikes me … And I am its creator, or at least I’m the one responsible for its creation. But what still baffles me about it from time to time when I listen to it, and when the entire thing is done, I’m still slightly confused over how I got to where I am at this point. I started a little over an hour ago with it, and now I’m here and I don’t really know how I got there. There are these burning question marks in my mind, but there’s no definitive question attached to it. And all this makes me hungry; all this makes me want to understand more.

I think one way to approach that hunger, is to say, ‘Well, I need more of this music. I need the next record.’ But a different approach could be to ask, ‘Why does these words and this music create this hunger inside of me? What does that say about me? What is it about myself that I’ve not yet [pauses] analyzed or not yet brought into the light? If you will.’ For me, this record is a doorway into myself that has probably less to do with the music as it has to do with the energies that created the music.

The Thousandfold Epicentre really is an experience for a listener. Of course, I reject the idea of asking you to explain the meaning of your art to me. But this time, I want to know what the message is. You are expressing something with this album.

Well, you’ve already more or less answered your own question by suggesting my unwillingness to … um … I think I couldn’t possibly explain any further that which I’ve tried to explain. A good friend of mine, Pelle from In Solitude, a metal band from Sweden, is often asked if he wants to explain his lyrics. What we have in common is we each write lyrics from a very personal and a very spiritual point of view. I’m going to literally steal his quote here, but he said somewhere, ‘As close as I can get to explaining what I feel are the lyrics of In Solitude.’ I just exchange the words In Solitude for The Devil’s Blood, and that’s my exact feelings on the subject.

I can’t explain any further that which is explained in the confines of those 74 minutes. I think that if there is any kind of revelation to be gotten there by you, or anyone else, I think that revelation should and can only come from introspection and from personal meditation on what it is you are hearing and what it is you are feeling, how you’re being affected. The answer is truly and totally in the listener’s hands and no longer in mine.

I know that my mind is completely focussed when I listen to the album. 

That’s something that we can only hope. We can only hope. It’s up to every individual.

Because it’s so vivid, the music stimulates and commands. And It generates a lot of happiness for a listener like me. Which might sound weird, because if we speak in simple terms, we can say that The Devil’s Blood music is fairly dark. 

Yes.

But I feel that the experience is very positive. It’s about individuality —

Had I as a person not experienced darkness as a positive thing, I would have not [surrounded] myself in it. The contention that positivity is light and negativity is darkness is perhaps a philosophical dead end [laughs], something that can’t hold up in everyday experience and in personal experience of any kind. Everything stems from darkness; every kind of illumination must begin in the darkness. There is no other way than from the darkness into the light.

And I [pauses] think that whether this makes you happy or makes you sad, or contemplative or melancholy … I am already glad simply that there’s that emotional reaction. The only thing that I can feel as failure is indifference. If people have indifference to it, that would mean that I had done absolutely nothing to shake them, nothing to confuse them, and nothing to touch them. That still wouldn’t be a disaster, but it’d at least be a failure in the sense that the record would not have needed to be released. To see people react in a positive way or some people in extremely negative ways, or based on their personal emotions, or simply to the grandeur of the whole thing and how mysteriously they experience it, and how much that incites them to do research, or to study or to find out more about what is going on and what is being said — all those reactions are a success to me.

Another strength of The Devil’s Blood is visuals. I’m talking about the live shows, the album art, and The Thousandfold Epicentre’s magnificent teaser clips. Have you ever considered a film or movie medium to express The Devil’s Blood’s message?

We have done such things. When we did the Rock Hard Festival in Germany [in 2010], which is a fairly big deal, we had our own video show which was directed by me and filmed by a good friend of mine. And there are plans in that direction.

Cool!

But these things cost extreme amounts of money, of which we have none [laughs].

[laughs]

We’ll have to wait and see what kind of possibilities the future will bring in this regard. We are always open to those kind of suggestions; the only problem is that we can’t just work with anyone. We can’t just do anything. We have our own, y’know, hidden set of aesthetic ideals that of course we want to live by. But in the future these things might very well become realities.

Say, are you in the mood for a silly question?

[laughs]

Forgive me, but I always wonder about the dynamic between you and The Devil’s Blood singer. She’s your sister.

Yes.

She sings your words, she has a big role in The Devil’s Blood. What’s it like between you two? 

[pauses] It’s very difficult to explain.

For one thing, she’s brilliant.

Well, yeah, obviously [laughs]. She has an effortless … It’s actually quite annoying to be in the studio with her. Because she —

[laughs]

[laughs] I’m not making a joke. It’s hard to say what our dynamic is. Of course we have a very deep and very pure love for each other having come from the same nest. And also having what I feel is our heritage and our lineage, our bloodlines. I truly feel that we are two sides of the same coin, in a way. Sometimes she is the darkness and I am the light; sometimes it’s the other way around. We always revolve around each other, almost never having the same opinion about anything, and always in the state of … cold war?

Hmmm.

I guess that would be the best way to say it? But a cold war in which no party could be without each other and have this tremendous love for each other. Sometimes it explodes into flurries of disgust and hatred [laughs]. And then it becomes impossible to work with each other for a while, and then we gravitate towards each other again, and the whole thing starts again.

We have a [pauses] … I don’t think I know anyone in this world with whom I can be so bluntly honest. I refuse to filter or censor my words when it comes to her, and she never does that to me as well. So our communication is often perceived by [other] people as extremely full of bile and lurid [laughs]. Well, I guess that’s just the way we are and can work best together. And then the day when we work, and the work we have done is good, then we are very beautiful place together. It’s nice to be there as much as we can.

So, at the center of The Devil’s Blood is a very honest relationship between you two.

Yes. Absolutely.

Again, I mention the honesty of The Devil’s Blood and this as another contributing factor. Also, I can relate because me and my sister are like that. 

[laughs] Oh, I guess in a way this is something … I only have one sister and no brothers, so it’s difficult to say how the dynamics work by and large. But you know, when you fall from the same womb, you will always be connected by something whether you want to or not. It’s best to just embrace this and make it work for you.

-ADF

The Devil’s Blood’s 2011 year’s-best album The Thousandfold Epicentre comes out in the US today on Metal Blade. Order it here.