Rockezine.com interview with Undertow on Jun 10, 2003

with Tom on Jun 10, 2003

Doomcore fanatics Undertow from Germany are back in the game with their new album 34ce. Ready to rumble, Rockezine has a chat with Tom.
		Your new album 34ce is due to be released, what are your expectations for the album or in other words, what would satisfy you as a band? See, in the past we were happy for every step forward. We never expected to gain a record deal, tour with “big” bands, play festivals or record 3 albums that are available in stores… It would be nice if the message spreads and we maybe manage to become more popular, play some bigger concerts and so on…
		For everyone who’s not familiar with Undertow, can you give us a short history lesson in the band? We started as a fourpiece, almost ten years ago but never played a gig with two guitarists. The guy left the band since then we are a threepiece. After the Harm On E album (our first for a more or less professional record label) we had to part ways with our drummer and replaced him with Oliver Rieger. In that line-up we recorded the follow-up Unit E and now 34ce. We toured as support for Crowbar and Pist On and will be touring this fall with our labelmates end of green.
		What have the reactions been so far on the new album? We are really stoked because of the reactions to the album. We did 3 albums for a record label and everytime we thought that it is a good record and hoped that the press would dig it too. But in the past the reactions were mostly just “ok”, which was ok with us, we never planned our music to gain popsitive press-reactions. We just did our thing and were happy if someone liked it as much as we do… And then the first reviews for 34ce came in, and I honestly didn´t believe it, when our label boss phoned me an told me that we will appear on the second soundcheck-position in the june-issue of german (metal) Hammer mag, I thought he must be joking…But then we received even more very positive reviews, so it must be the truth – fine with us!
		Are you satisfied with the way the record turned out? Definitely. We worked for about three weeks on that record, and we did it very concentrated because of the short time. So we were very focussed on our tracks, single parts of some songs and did not really realize what it will be like in the end. And then our label boss stopped by to get an impression and we heard three songs as a rough-mix for the first time… and we got an impression, that this would turn out great. For the first time we had a producer who was really devoted to his work and understood what we were thinking and wanted to sound like.
		You had some difficulty with the original artwork. This problem seems to be solved perfect with the new artwork. Is there a story behind the new artwork? Man are we glad, that it all turned out well, this could have been developping in a real bad direction for our label – and noone wants to mess with global players like AOL Time Warner… Meanwhile I think the new artwork fits us even better then the old. My girlfriend and I did it in just one really long night in front of her mac. There are three fingers pointing at you, we are three guys in the band and its our third official release. Four fingers point to the top, if you count our first self-released cd we have four albums. And the gear-wheel like black part in the center matches us as a band, we work together to keep the motor running…
		What are your main influences as a band? I think that’s a question that the audience should answer. I don´t think that we are very aware about influences on our music… The musical direction is mostly influenced by our singer/guitarist Joschi but we all bring in our ideas. Sure we all like certain bands, machine head, life of agony, helmet, old metallica, and, yes crowbar for example, but it´s not like we gather in our band-room and decide “Come on lets do a tune that sounds like Prong!”. In one way or another you are always a product of your influences.
		Any tour plans or festivals this summer in support of the album? We will play, as usual, a lot of gigs on the weekends, ´cause we all have daytime-jobs to do. Festival-season has just started and we are happy that we were invited to do some (the biggest is the Summer Breeze). And like I mentioned already above, we will tour during September/October with our labelmates end of green. The tour will be more than two weeks (17 dates I think), we will play not only Germany but also Belgium, Austria and maybe the Netherlands.
		What’s your opinion on the internet and the online magazines in relationship to Undertow? Since my first contact with the net around 1992 I´ve been a fan of it and quickly found my way to the resources that fit my interest and a lot of them was concerning music.
		You have a history of using remarkable album titles. What does the title of the new album, 34ce, exactly stand for? So, I see, someone did his homework… no honestly, it´s good to see that someone really cares and not just repeats the same old questions he used on hundreds of interviews before… Sine we don´t tune our instruments to E no more I had to come up with another good idea to carry on with the “tradition” of special album titles. 34ce equals, if it is spoken english, the word threeforce, which you won´t find in any dictionary, it just combines two things: that we are three people in the band and that we together are a force. Beside it has the number of releases in the title (like explained above in the question concerning the cover).
		Why should people who don’t know your music buy the new album? Good question… lemme think… Besides the usual business-blabla like it is our best album ever and so on. I think it´s an honest album, true to our roots and not pretending to be something that we aren´t. People that like the above mentioned bands might have some fun with the songs and it offers also a wide variety of moods. We have some quite slow, melancholic songs, than there are some midtempo groovers and even two almost classic thrash-like speedsters. But noone should buy something he hasn´t heard in the store, so, check our record out and give it a try!
		Can you tell us a little about your lyrics, what inspires you to write your lyrics? Talking about lyrics it is important to know, that our singer and I both wrote lyrics for the songs. I heard of bands that first do the lyrics and then write the music, but that was never the Undertow way. We build our songs, our singer does some fantasy English or whatever singing during the first sessions and then I try to find some lines that fit his singing. That does not mean, that we are not serious about our lyrics, in fact it’s the contrary. We collect inspiration all the time, our singer works at a psychic section of a hospital and that is for sure some inspiration. I get inspired by a lot of things, for example books I read or movies I saw, world politics, human behaviour or the eternal relationship thing…
		Any final words for your (new) fans? I´d be really happy if someone checks out our record and likes it, drop us some lines on www.undertow.de (sorry, still only in german, but you will find your way to the guestbook!) or meet us live and maybe have a drink with us. We only do it for the joy we have playing this music, so if someone shares that, that would be great! Thank you for the interview and for spreading the word, take care! UnderTOM
(Marc Lochs)