Rockezine.com interview with Deathrage on Dec 08, 2006

with Ruben Vermeulen on Dec 08, 2006


		Please introduce yourself and the band to the rest of the world. My name is Ruben Vermeulen and I play the guitar in the metal band Deathrage. We are hailing from The Netherlands; Emmeloord and Dronten. Before we started with Deathrage, Merijn, Pieter and I played in a band called Celestial Sanctuary, of which the musical genre could be described as (melodic) death/thrash metal. After a year we decided to quit Celestial Sanctuary, because we had some problems with the vocalist. In August 2004, Merijn, Pieter and I decided to continue in the metal genre by starting a new band; Deathrage. After a few `auditions` in search for a bassist, the complete and current line-up of Deathrage became the following: Marcel Tjepkema – vocals Pieter Visman – drums Henri Frietema – bass guitar Merijn Groeneveld – guitars Ruben Vermeulen - guitars
		Can you describe the type of music that you play? Deathrage is a death/thrash metal band, with black metal influences. The guitar and bass work in our music contain harsh, chopping and fast (technical) riffs, sewn together by melodic parts and strong tempo changes. Those parts are getting mixed up in a decent way, so you`ll get pretty variable musical parts in the songs. The guitar and bass work is supported by the drums. Fast changing rhythms, from polka beats to blast beats, from strong double base rhythms to rhythms cut in half. It all fits perfectly with the riffs and it will make your head bang! This whole mixture is topped by the growls and screams of our vocalist. Growls over the slow, bashing parts and screams over the crushing, fast parts. It perfectly fits to the music.
		Who`s the main influence for Deathrage? That varies. Merijn (guitars) came up with complete songs, mainly in the beginning. The rest of the band members gave their opinion about them of course, and so we collectively changed some parts if felt neccesary. Later, I wrote some songs together with Merijn as well as on my own. Also, Pieter (drums) and I rehearsed quite often without the rest of the band, thus we wrote songs with just the two of us. In general, I think we all are the main influence for the band. The opinions of all of us are important for our music and for us to like it. If you mean which big names in the big world of music are giving us inspiration, I think we would find out that it will be some great bands of the metal scene. Bands of the (old school) thrash metal genre and death and black metal bands.
		What`s the best part and what`s the worst part from the mini-CD? I think the best part from the demo-cd is the last track, called `Creature of the Night`. Personally I like this song very much, because it`s rough, blasting and harsh with good tempo changes, but also very melodic. I also think the sound quality fits the song very nice. If I may name one more thing I like from the demo-cd; the many good reactions on it! In my opinion, the worst part from the demo-cd is (especially) the beginning of track two, called `Souls of the Lost`. In this song, both the guitars aren`t really recorded on level and I think that`s too bad. Also some other small parts we would like to be different, but because of the short amount of time we had to record the demo-cd, we weren`t able to improve these parts.
		Could you give some insight in the writing process? n general, one of the guitar players or the bass player (or both) has written some material on his instrument. This can be a whole song or just some written parts which can be useful for a song. Anyway, the material is getting introduced to the rest of the band members, so they can give their opinion about it and we collectively can change some parts or whatsoever. If the material is "approved" by the rest of the band members, the drummer is going to adapt the drums to the guitar riffs. If he is finished, we all give our opinions about it, and again change things if we think it is needed. In fact, this is the whole base for a song already. Then the two other guitar players and the singer will fit their parts into the song. In general, Marcel and Merijn write the lyrics for the songs, before or after a song is created. Finally, again our opinions will be given and eventually some parts are going to be changed. Approximately, this is our process for creating a song.
		Could you define with five words what the band stands for? For me, Deathrage stands for creativity, amusement, corporation, friendship and of course… heavy metal! But the band itself stands for death, thrash and black metal combined.
		What are the future plans? We hope to do as many performances as possible, and if it`s possible even over the Dutch borders. We are also very busy creating new songs, which is working very well. We already have plans for recording a full-length album, but until that time we have to work hard on our (existing) songs to get them exactly as we want them to be. For now, there are a few details in the songs which we want to improve. Let`s say we want to have them ready for a strong, brutal album for everyone to enjoy! And until that time we are trying to play as many gigs as possible in the Netherlands and maybe over the borders!
		(Jeroen Habets)