diumenge, 27 de febrer del 2011

...a dead spot of light #13 - 2011

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Would you mind introducing the band a bit? Where are you from, what are its members and what part do they play in the Akollonizer? Do they have some additional side projects?


Hi Oneyoudontknow!! First at all, thanks for your interest in the band.
Well, I’m from Andorra but I’m living in Barcelona. The first time I thought about starting the band was in 2003 but it didn't become a reality until 2004 when Karkassa (O.D.I., Ze Pekeño, Entropia) and I started to work on some ideas about how we wanted them to be reflected in our proposal.
It was a long time until the first work was released because of several problems unrelated to the band
Nowadays, Karkassa is not a member of the band. The updated line up is:

Wilhkiem - Double bass & guitars (Shemhamphorash, Foscor)
Iker – Guitars, keyboards & noises (Soizu, FFTPlayers, ex-Sorcun, ex-Atomoog)
JNTrio – Drums (The Kokongs, JNTrio, One Million Skulls)
Panta Rei – Voice & Screams (One Million Skulls)

What does the band name refer to? Is it an artificial term or is it based on a word from a certain language?

It’s an artificial term created from the catalan slang word “Acollonir” which means “to make people fear” or “to scare”. It’s a kind of a joke about all the bands which finish their names with –zer like Brutalizer, Sodomizer, etc, especially non-english bands with non-english names like Petardizer, etc

When I informed correctly, then you have only released one album so far, or? How did this release cam to happen and who is the other band O.D.I.?

Yes, it’s Akollonizer’s only release until now. In the begining, the idea was to release a tape with only Akollonizer.
After a few rehearsals, Karkassa, who plays in O.D.I., told me that he just finished a new work with his band and he’d like to edit it on a split with my band.
I really like his work with O.D.I. and, for me, it was a great pleasure to see my first release with his work in a same edition.

O.D.I. is one of Karkassa’s side projects, as I said in the first question. He is a really good friend of mine and a multi disciplinar artist. He writes poetry and organises poet’s meetings, he is involved in paintings and sculpture and, of course, is extremely focused on music and sound research.
The misticism of his music comes from his interest in ancient religions and brotherhoods.

This split album with O.D.I. is quite peculiar in its style because your tracks are based on the works of the Prague writer/novelist Franz Kafka. Why him? He is rarely picked in the extreme realms of the music. Do you enjoy his writing or what would be the background for your reasons?

The choice comes from a metamorphosis’ reading I did when I was in school (I was 12), somebody becoming cockroach was something incredible for me but I did not understand anything because of the ineptitude of the teacher who showed us the text as a horror story. The point is that over time I recovered the text after reading a biography of Kafka and Wham! my eyes were opened.
Then, I could see, from my point of view, the message of the text and I could see my personal experiences in the story.
My background definitely influenced the perception of the message.

And yes, I enjoyed his writing both for its sense of humor as for his description of feelings and the dark atmosphere that surrounds the entire work. I think there are a lot of stuff in his art which can be brought to the music, as for the concept or message to his way of writing. (Sadly, I don’t understand german which doesn’t allow me to enjoy and understand 100% all the aspects of his writing. Translations always miss part of the authors style)

To hear an interpretation of ‘Die Verwandlung’ (The Metamorphosis) is not such a surprise actually, because it would be one of his few completed works. How do you feel about what the setting, the story and the meaning of it?

I identified myself with Gregor and the story.
I see Gregor as the guy who wants to find his own path in life but he can’t because of the society (represented by his father, tenants, boss) rooted in old and conservative values.
But this isn’t the problem because he wants to live, work and love his family as usual but they don’t accept the new path chosen by Gregor.
Regarding how I feel about the story, I sympathize with Gregor, actually I do with everybody who fights for his own goals, ideas and life style.
I do it if these people respect the choices of others.
Gregor doesn’t get this from his family, boss and tenants (society)

Do you think that this text is still relevant today? Does today’s society create situations that are or might be similar to the one lain out in the text?

Absolutely!! I think the society has been built like the father who wants, or thinks, that his work and statement is the correct way of living, beliefs and everything involved in it.
If some individual or group is making its own path he is called a madman, asocial or anything else to erase you or, simply, not leave you develop as an individual.
Look, we are in a great crisis provoqued by the same guys who are getting money from goverments to fix all this mess. Would you trust somebody who steals and corrupts??

I think that while we live in a conservative society, the text of Kafka will be fully in force

In terms of the lyrics you only seem to have taken rather fragments of the whole story. What passages did you choose and for what reasons? Did you try to put an emphasis on Gregor and was your attempt to provide the listener with some sort of a summarization of the entire text?

Basically, I tried to focus on Gregor; what he feels fighting for his new condition, trying to explain to his family that everything is normal, that he’s still their son despite his new look and praying for respect.

As I said above, I identified with personal experiences in the text, that was what inspired me. The idea was to show how I felt through Gregor’s character and the price sometimes we have to pay in order to achieve our goals.
I think that Kafka’s work, in general, can be understood, depending of the reader.
If you are a conservative guy, you will understand the father who tries to hide his own son because he's a rebel who doesn’t want to follow the father’s way of life, embarrassing him.
But, if you are a guy who wants to make your own path despite the tradition or your social condition, you are definitely going to identify yourself with Gregor who claims respect for his choice.


In what language were the lyrics written?

In catalan, it’s my first language.
My english is not good enough to write a creation and I don’t feel comfortable singing in spanish.

Yet this all is merely the conceptual background of the music, the actual execution is really intense. Why did you choose such an extreme approach? The music is a violent combination of grind, noise, sludge and what not.

We think the main message of the text is about rupture of Gregor with his daily routine, symbolized with his metamorphosis. This means different feelings which we tried to capture not only with lyrics but also with sound.
We must remember Kafka shows us that for Gregor this change is not the most important (he only thinks about his work, family and his love for them and how to help them without giving more importance to his transformation, as if it were something natural)
But this point of view is not shared by his surrounding and that’s the fact that opens the door to all these extreme feelings,ie, hope, frustration, love, anguish, despair, ... They perfectly fit with the intensity of the music.

Besides, I feel confortable performing extreme and experimental music

To me it sounded like you wanted to express the impossibility of Gregor to express himself in a meaningful way to his parents/sister, while at the same time reaching the point of hysteria and being therefore unable to clearly articulate himself in terms of his own thoughts; the panic and the confusion about the situation. Your response?

Absolutely agree with you.
Don’t you think that this is what is happening with us in front of a society, monoteism or boss with a close mind??
Specially when you try to do what you want or express your own point of view out of the majority??
I think Gregor’s situation is a metaphor of this, anihilation of your individuality, your free thinking and your feelings in front of this.

In terms of the vocals, there is some similarity with the Spanish band Entropia, isn’t it? At least when listening to their Takte Mòrbid output.

I think this was inevitable due to the presence of Karkassa (bassist and singer of Entropia) in the band.
Although he only put his voice in one track (Traïdoria), the piggy one.
The rest of voices are mine. I have spent a lot of time with Entropia as a manager, in concerts and participating with them in their live shows which must influence Akollonizer’s voices.

Do you plan to play live or have you already done so? How have the responses been?

Until now we only played in one concert, last November in ANTI-RATZINGER FESTIVAL in Barcelona.
It was a festival organised as a protest against the Pope’s visit in town financed with public money (the Pope’s visit!!! Not the concert)
The plan is to rehearse the new songs, record them and, after summer, start making the first concerts.
We want to mix music with performance, actually, in Anti Ratzinger concert, we mixed music with Butoh and we'd like to work on it in order to create a solid proposal.
The responses were really good, we were the only band which didn’t play black or death, I mean we were the “rara avis” in the festival and the audience were more receptive to our show.
The feedback was really good and people enjoyed and liked our proposal.
We’ll see what happens in a concert only with us, hehehehehe!!!!!

I have a rather vague question:
Kafka was someone, whose writings were influenced by Søren Kierkegaard for instance; a Christian writer, theologian and philosopher. You can further see a transcendental aspect in a lot of Kafka’s works. Yet, when someone visits your homepage you see an inverted pentagram. How are you able to bridge this gap? Is it an artificial one?

It’s a mixture of diferent symbols which represent the band’s philosophy just like the nickname chosen by myself, Panta rei.
This is a concept used by Heraclitus of Ephesus to explain his ideas or philosophy.
This concept means "Everything Flows"and one of his quotations was, "Everything flows, nothing remains" or if you prefer "We never bathe twice in the same river”, that means that we are in constant evolution which is necessary to improve as person and individual and get the knowledge in order to live without restraints and lead by ourself.
Heraclitus was a philosopher who lived in the sixth century BC who rooted his thinking on this constant evolution of all things and beings, and also in the struggle of opposites "War is the father of all things " , A struggle that tends to get the balance between opposites as would be the case, for example, the forces that keep guitar’s strings tense.
All this flow of events is symbolized by the fire taken by him as a key element in the development of his philosophy. For him, it is the beginning of the universe (arche) and represents the dualism as base of everything (Fire exists only consuming and destroying) while constantly changing form (evolution and creation)
All this chaos creates harmony through the Logos (knowledge) found in all things and, obviously, in human being.
According to Heraclitus the person has to find the logos within and only then you recognize yourself as an individual and you will be able to evolve.

The pentagram is embraced by an ouroboros which is one of the oldest known symbols and it has been adopted by many cultures. The snake is a basic symbol for anarkosatanism (our path of thinking) and it represents the path of knowledge (light) to find your inner self and be free of social and religious ties that will not let you grow as individual. But this knowledge searching is eternal, you must work on it all your life, that’s represented by ouroboros.
To get this knowledge or light it's necessary to break with all, to leave taboos let go of, to break with the past in order to initiateself-improvement. This is symbolized by the snake’s shedding of the skin, this is like a rebirth after your social being’s death .
The two snakes in the interior of the pentagram around a caduceus represent the flow of the universe, its movement and evolution, which are indispensable for the regeneration of the being.
The pentagram represents the universe in its four elements (upper points) drives by the individual or the self (lower end).
All this amounts are saying that an individual, by itself, can be as a person without any protection, either divine or earthly. That means, the path chosen by the person or individual is not transferable, you and only you are responsable of your destiny based on your beliefs and goals.


Have you read something else of Kafka? Like ‘The Castle’, ‘The Trial’ or ‘America’? In case this is true, what effect did these have had on you?

Other Kafka’s works read by me are :

Das Urteil “ The Judgment”
Der Verschollene “The Man Who Disappeared”
In der Strafkolonie “ In the Penal Colony”
Ein Landarzt "A Country Doctor"

Regarding the effect on me it was my reafirmation on my freedom searching and the confirmation that nothing changes with time. We live in a fake freedom controlled by religion, politics and social power.
I think that’s the main message from Kafka’s work, this and hapiness searching

Would you mind explaining your logo a bit? How does one have to understand it?

Akollonizer’s logo was created by Karkassa. He showed it to me during the first rehearsal and I tought it was good.
about why it looks like this, it is simply the result of the creation or imagination of him.
I added the pentagrams which meaning I have explained above

Are you able to rehearse on a constant basis and how does the song-writing take place?

We have had several problems for keeping a line up which hasen’t allowed to rehearse properly, until now.
The new songs have been composed between Iker (guitar and noises) and me, then, these are worked and finished in the rehearsal by the whole band
About the song-writing, I basically, do it. First at all, I propose the concept of the new work and write some ideas, then we agree on how we want the music to express the lyrical concept.
Or some of the the guys bring some ideas for a song and I write the lyrics depending on the feelings that the song transmits to me

What bands and albums would you cite as influences when it comes to your art?

I have been listening to a lot of differents styles of music for years. It’s impossible to avoid being influencedby them.
In “La Transformació” the main design influence is by Corrupted.
About the music, I don’t know. I think the work is conceptual because it comes from the seventies bands that made long and conceptual issues.
But I couldn't give you specific names

Do you have plans for a new release already? Is there a chance to see another novel or text interpreted by you?

We must record after summer the new songs, it’s another conceptual issue focused on monoteisms and how it has evolved since its begining, beeing a pure idea, to the top of its power, dominating and beeing corrupted by this power.

I’d like to work on another Kafka’s novel, in particular In der Strafkolonie “ In the Penal Colony”,
I think it’s an interesting parallelism with the behavior of west democracies in front of dictatorships which are tolerated because of the real politics but when they fell or are in decadence, these “west democracies” forget or leave these “friends”.
Doesn’t it ring a bell to you?? Gadaffi, Mubarak, Pinochet, etc

What releases are available from you and where/how can people acquire these?

We only have one edition, “La Transformació”, you can get it writing to Artilleria Pesada Produccions:
(artilleria(at)voliac(dot)com).

In this link, you’ll find a few distros which have our release in their catalogs.
http://akollonizer.blogspot.com/2010/03/on-trobar-el-nostre-cd-where-you-can.html

Or writing to the band:
Akollonizer(at)voliac(dot)com

What about contacting you? Do you have a homepage or the sort?

Home page address is:
http://akollonizer.blogspot.com

mail address:
akollonizer(at)voliac(dot)com
artilleria(at)voliac(dot)com

Some final words, if you are still interested.

Thank you for the interview and, specially, for your interest and support in our work and concept!!!
I wish you the best for all your projects and this great zine that you are improving issue by issue!!!!

Interview originally did by oneyoudontknow.
Released in the "a dead spot of light magazine (Number 13)
http://www.archive.org/details/ADeadSpotOfLight...Number13
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/3.0/de/


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