Rockezine.com interview with Cataract on Jun 08, 2006

with Simon on Jun 08, 2006

Last week Cataract released their newest album ‘Kingdom’ on Metalblade Records. Time for us to have a short mail conversation with Simon from Cataract.
		Please introduce yourself to me and the rest of the Rock-e-Zine readers. Hey, my name is Simon and I play Guitar for Cataract! There is also Fedi-vocals, Greg-guitar, mike-bass and rick-drums. Its normally me and Fedi sharing the duty of answering interviews. Well, as a band we started out in early 98. That was right around the time a lot of thouse so called «new bands» came to light as heaven shall burn, born from pain, caliban or us. We all glued together in a very strong harcore scene back then. There was no such thing as Metalcore or so. Everything was hardcore and totally underground for all of us. In the US it started to get big at that time with bands like hatebreed, snapcase or buried alive. We put out a demo soon after we started playing. The response to that was amazing. We sold a lot of copies. O.k., its probalby because we all plalyed in bands before and everybody was waiting for that release. After that, everything went fast, we started touring in 99 in Europe, singed short after that to Ferret Records in the US. That was a major step since we were the only band from europe on an american label back then. In 01 we toured the US and Europe again. We toured till like late 02, recoreded then «great days of vengeance». This was all still underground but a huge following already. Everything mostly happend by mouth to mouth propaganda or interzines. That record opened up the eyes and ears to bigger labels. They became interested in us since in the US such bands were huge by that time. In 04 we signed to Metal Blade Records. Best thing ever! «With Triumph comes Loss» followed and opened up a whole new audience to us! It was amazing. We still had our old following and gained so many new kids. It s crazy. Also the touring thing became a huge step forward. We toured with Amon Amarth, Six Feet Under, Dying Fetus and so on. We also did our first headlining tour ever. Now we recorded «Kingdom» and it will be out right when that interviews will be out I guess. We are very excited.
		Are you satisfied the way the new album turns out? Totally! It’s a 100% cataract! For the first time, we are satisfied with an album. It starts out with the songs. They are the best we have written in our carreer. More hooks, more riffs, better leads, super cool vocals and the drumming is just cool. So from the artist side we are very happy with it. Productionwise we also took the next step. Tue Madsen did a great job. And third, the layout just turned out better than we ever dreamed off. So the whole thing is 100% cataract. We are very proud of it.
		How was it to be in the Antfarm studio again, and how is working with Tue Madsen? First of all I want to say that we feel very good about the whole recording process of “Kindom”. Tue knows what we want to do, what we can do and what we won’t do. And sometimes he knows it better than us, he’s kicking our butts from time to time, making sure we’re doing our best and not some half assed attempt. I’ve caught myself many times listening to “Kingdom” and remembering how we actually recorded that one part and how we thought it was great but Tue had us recording another take. He’s been giving us lots of inputs about arrangements, some of them were just little fills and breaks, some changed the mood of a whole song. He is a professional and we can only profit from someone who has a go at our songs from a completely different point of view. He is more a sixth bandmember than a producer by now. And of course also a friend!
		Cataract is some kind of eye illness. Why did you chose to give the band this name? Because its short and you can pronounce it in every language first of all! Its important to have a name that everybody can releate to and remember. Second we felt the combination of eye illness and a geometric form very cool. The word cataract means both. So it has good and bad in it. Its everything in one. That’s what we liked about it.
		Does anybody of you guys have any side projects? No, we fully concentrate on cataract. If we feel like, we play some covers with guest apperances like on the record releaseshow for example. There is no time for that. We play nearly every weekend and practise a lot since we like what we do. So we are happy, we don’t have to fullfill our need with other bands. Everything is covered with Cataract
		What are the future plans for Cataract? : We will be touring a lot! First we will start out with some smaller touring right after the release of the CD. Then summer festivals come up till the end of july. In sept./oct we’re part of the “Heall On Earth” festivals in fall, and then the “X-Mass” festivals in December. So those two tours will lead us up and down the continent. We’re looking forward to all those shows as this is a great chance to get to places that we normally don’t play as they are just too far away for a weekend trip. We are also working on a headliner tour, but that’s scheduled for 2007 and probably a bit early to talk about it. Everything else is in some other hands, like label, booking agency, etc. but we have some cool activities planned.
		What your biggest goal you want to achieve with this band? Just go on as fun as it is and fullfill dreams step by step. We always tried to stay true to ourselfs, set achiving goals and work for that. For example it was a dream/goal to tour with Amon Amarth and it happened last year. Now we had the dream of a “kingdom” rising. We did that too. So now we will be working on touring as we wanted to (see above). We want to come around and introduce our kingdom to more and more people. Its more that we achieve things for us and not for someboday else. It’s a persona thing more than anything else. We are Fans playing for fans. So we want to achieve what fans want to achieve basically. Beeing close to his/her idols and have a good time at shows.
		Do you know any talented band who need some attention? You mean in switzerland? Yes!!! Requiem is my favorite at the moment together with Disparaged and Dark Daydungeon. Further one there is Despise, another great band. If you ask outside Switzerland, than Maroon, Born from Pain or Heaven Shall Burn come to my mind. There are quit some good bands around I have to say. American bands there is As I lay dying which I Like a lot!
		What’s in you compact disc player at this moment? Right now I am listeing to the new Bleeding Through record while answering your interview :). Then Kill from Cannibal Corpse, our CD of course, the new atreyu, Kataklysm, necrophagist, nasum, napalm death and Grimlock.
		What you favourite classic album? Classic? You mean classical music album? Then its Carl Orff’s Camina Burana. If you mean Metal Album than its Raining Blood from Slayer, Hardcore Album its Cro-Mags’ Age of Quarrel.
		Did you ever visit www.rockezine.com? What do you think of this e-zine? Well, I have to be honest. I have only seen it because of this interview. It’s a good site. A lot of informations and reviews. I don’t like the navigation too much personally :). Sorry. But the site is cool, also the guestbook and the specials! I will check it out more often from now on for sure
		Do you have any famous last words for me and the rest of the world? hahaha, thank you very much for doing this interview and for supporting cataract. Keep checking www.cataract.cc for updates and live show dates. Come along and say hello.
(Jeroen Habets)