interview with Moonkult (Finland)

Moonkult  (Finland)

The history of the raw black metal entity Moonkult is already underway, as the demo “Tears of Seers” is out, and it is available for free at at www.moonkult.bandcamp.com.

The demo is available for anyone who likes to see where things start for Moonkult. It is a free demo, and it is raw black metal, like the early days of the genre.

This interview gives a better idea of Moonkult. Get in touch and let Moonkult know that you are out there.
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Is Moonkult a band or a one-man project? Is the objective to  play concerts in the future or never play live?

For the "Tears of Seers"-demo the lineup was just me (Moonlord Akhkharu). I recorded with drum machine. At this point there has only been conversations with v-KhaoZ (ex-Azaghal, ex-Hin onde, ex-Oath of Cirion, ex-Hellkult) of him recording drum parts for upcoming Moonkult debut album and some other persons have shown interest to play bass for that. Beyond this i have not yet any other plans.

No plans for playing live either, I am not for or not against it. We shall see how i and others have time for that kind of thing and how would this music work out in live concerts.

Moonkult is raw and ugly black metal. In 2012, in Finland, what is going in metal that you decided to avoid the trends and clichés of metal from Finland, like the folk style, symphonic/pop, goth or power metal?

Well, i don't listen to what is going on in metal nowadays too much. I only keep track on what is going on with some more underground Black Metal bands. Besides of what i have heard from other metal styles nowadays in Finland sounds just shit and gay to me. Moonkult's music i create from my "soul" and that is how i see it, it represents my feelings. But i try using dynamics in a sense that it creates complex feelings in the listener, so again i don't feel darkness inside myself all the time, so using several atmospheres and feelings has been my goal.

But nothing gay sounding like blind happiness or anything like that, just embracing a larger picture of this some kind of substance. From this idea i got the idea to make a Black Metal short story as stories have different parts with different moods, so the music could be arranged in the same way and the Moonkult debut album will be done in this way. Yet, i try to keep things unified so the variation between songs is not too strong.

Musically i wish try create immense darkness, something that you don't hear too often anymore in modern days black metal or in any metal. Also, Moonkult has a simplistic approach focusing more on emotions, dark fantasy and making good songs rather thank wanking with some technical gay lead stuff. I devised some formulas for making several riffs and i try using dissonance as a more powerful tool for creating darkness and hate.

Can you explain the feeling in the sound that you wanted in the song “The Great Purge”? Is there bass guitar on this song? Where did you record the song, at home?

That song is an introduction to the story and i wanted to create the feeling of enslavement in a big dark fortress or something like that. Yes, there is a bass guitar! It is just low in the mix and it's sound is very thin. On the CD version you can distinguish it, but maybe mp3 packing has lost it if you can't hear it.

Yes, I recorded it with my own equipment at one basement where we used to rehearse with one other guitarist, but we had already dropped that project we had, anyway i ended up doing recordings in nighttime only, maybe subconsciously trying to get the right feeling in darkness and silence.

What is your guitar tuned to? Is there only guitar on this song? By the way, what type of “purge” do you mean in this song?

Guitar is tuned to E. There are two guitars on every song with bass and drums. What this purge means you can pretty much cipher from the lyrics, like a purge of wisdom and knowledge

of those with gift of foresight and they also lose the ability to see beyond while being captive.

Personally, I hate drum machines. Has it been difficult to find drummers that want to play raw black metal?

It has been, yes. I know few drummers besides v-Khaoz and they are more focused to play punk music. Generally finding musicians with interest to this kind of Black Metal has been difficult, also in my hometown people listening to Black Metal of older days are very few.

When did you start playing music? Do you play bass guitar, too? What other instruments do you play? Do you write other type of music or only metal? Maybe you have recorded black metal versions of a bunch of Judas Priest songs?!

I started playing with synthetisator in 2004, I played mostly classical music and some rock tunes with that. Guitar i started learning in 2006-2007 time and started active playing in 2008 i think. At the same time i started playing bass also and i still play that too, but not so good and basslines for Moonkult just follow lowest notes of the two guitars. I wrote some years ago some classical style music and some punk songs, also i did few songs of thrash/death metal in 80's style, but nowadays i just focus on Moonkult.

Black metal versions of Judas Priest??! Haha, no i haven't done that, but that sounds like a cool idea to do.

Can you tell us the concept about “Behind “Vortex of Lightnings”? The demo has three songs: are there other songs that you have recorded, but not released yet?

“Behind Vortex of Lightnings” is the second last song on the upcoming Moonkult album and is a straight forward expression of that part of the story, which i don't wish to reveal before the album is done. That song was the last song composed for the demo and it was composed in december 2011, originally i wanted to have four songs on the demo. But i couldn't at that point play some 6 string minor chords in my opinion properly, so instead i made "Behind Vortex of Lightnings" to fill the place for those two others.

Four other songs i have composed and i have done just some test recordings for two of those, also an intro i made with synth and a guitar part top of synths is also there.

“Beyond to Infinity” shows a slightly different side of Moonkult, maybe a less chaotic, but a more nihilist approach, maybe? You probably do not agree!

Different it is, yes, and more sides of Moonkult will be shown in the upcoming album, one song in that is halfway more like a darker version of Mercyful Fate! Yet nothing completely different is coming, only in that extent to what  “Beyond to Infinity” shows to the other two songs on the "Tears of Seers" demo.

Nihilism? I don't know about that, maybe somewhat it shows nihilism. In the lyrics i represented something more philosophical, that song being an epilogue to the story.

What are your goals for the rest of 2012 and for 2013? How can people be in contact with you?

I plan on starting recordings for the album during this year, hopefully in summer/autumn time. After that we shall see, i already started planning the story for the second album so maybe in 2013 i make music for that. Thank you for the interview! People can contact Moonkult in myspace and there is also an official Moonkult site in facebook, but the best way is to send mail to moonkult666@gmail.com. Long live the Empire of Night!                                            THE END.