interview: Neravendetta (part 1)

Francesco Carboni, the creative force behind the black metal act Neravendetta from the island of Sardinia located in the Mediterranean Sea, took time to explain the ideas and circumstances of the band.

Neravendetta is an extreme metal band from Italy. Years and years ago they had a self-titled demo (2009) and Metal Bulletin was in contact with them. Now, years later, they have an album called Magnum Chaos which accumulates their knowledge, skills and experience in black metal for a work of speed and melody, an album that devoted and diehard black metal supporters might find very interesting and may find themselves coming back to the album to get more and more of it. It's great news that Neravendetta has survived and written its name in the book of heavy metal with a full-length album. Listen to the complete album at the Bandcamp link below and find out more about this melodic black metal of the constellations of the time travel.

Hello. I have enjoyed the melodies of your black metal music. Your 2016 album Magnum Chaos is a good album to which I have been listening a lot. Do you feel excited and proud that Neravendetta has the full-length album completed for the metal world to hear?! I'm sure it was a lot of hard work, correct?

Hello! First of all, I want to thank Metal Bulletin zine for support and interest in Neravendetta; we really appreciate it. Magnum Chaos has been recorded in 13 months with home recording system. It represents the end of a story and the beginning of another. The work has been very hard, because the goal was to put on recording all the ideas of the last 5 years. We are very satisfied about the result. Around the end of 2014 I started to record new songs, alone at home, and after few months we had 5 songs, so I thought, with this rhythm we can make a full album, and I decided to record two songs written in the past, “The Traveller” and “Sailing to Chaos,” we played these songs live, but we never recorded before.

Neravendetta is fast black metal. However, Neravendetta is also melodic. I also hear a bit of other instruments different from the usual rock instruments. Do you use other instruments besides guitar, bass and drums? Did you have guests on the album?

In my / our opinion the album sounds pretty good because it is powerful and melodic in the same time, if you enjoy it, you will finish your listening whistling the riffs, but if you scream the lyrics you feel the power, typical of black metal. Sometimes listening to the album it’s natural to sing the riffs, like supporters sing in unison. Speaking about black metal, I think it could be easy to listen to it.

Actually, we wanted to use more instruments, in the album you can hear the “trunfa” or scacciapensieri, typical Sardinian folk instruments. We played a little bit with midi and plugins to discover new sounds. We wanted also to use the handpan and the karimba, but with home recording it’s difficult to record acoustic instruments! (Maybe you will hear in future). We have no guests, but the singer just recorded the voice, he’s like a session man just for records.

You live on the island of Sardinia, correct? Does traditional music from Sardinia affect your way of thinking about Neravendetta's music? How do you describe the relation: metalmusic-Neravendetta-Sardinia?

In our past, our first influence has been our land and the Sardinian history, especially about nuragic period (1800 a.C.; yes, our land and history is very old!). The original title of “Sailing to Chaos” was “Sailing to Qadesh” and the main theme was the battle of Kadesh in Egypt. But in this album we left it this way, we wanted to be part of something that everybody has in common, the cosmos, stars and myth; it has been something like looking far, more far than our story.

I like typical folk songs at Sardinian feasts, but it’s difficult to put that on black metal music! The main topic of the songwriting are the stars and the legend and myth around them. We like immortal stories, never ending myths, order in chaos and stories of our main culture. Stars are guide in the dark and that’s what we need in our times.

Neravendetta began in 2006. Who are the members of Neravendetta nowadays? Do you play concerts in Italy and also on the island?

Nowadays we are 2. I am Francesco, I write the songs with drums, guitars and keys, then I send a simple mixdown to Marco, he puts the bass on the track and send back to me, then I start with arrangements. After every instrument has been recorded, I wrote the lyrics and the structures and I explained them to the singer, and after a few tries he started to record. This is how it worked. Not so romantic!

We have great memories of the past, we started to play in our bedrooms at 17 years old, then we moved to rehearsal and then to a garage. Beers and friendship: this is our memory, today we are growth, everything is more serious, I record alone in front of my pc. I send the track to Dropbox.

It’s a lesson for life! S## happens.

We played a lot when we were a band with all the components, our concerts were very nice, full of people, a lot of support. Years have passed and there is not a strong black metal scene in our city, we will play live again, but this period it’s too hard.

What kind of problems or obstacles does Neravendetta have in Sardinia? Is life difficult for metal bands in Sardinia? Venues to play, finding an audience, metal music publications, etc.

I don’t know what new generations play or listen, but black metal is not the answer for them! Even if Rihanna got her Sepultura logo, new generation prefers hardcore or metalcore, it’s difficult to find audience and to arrange it. But if you look in the underground, Sardinia has a number of black metal bands very high: Vultur, Accabbadora, Abisso, Simulacro, Drought, Anamnesi, In Solitvdo, VIII and more. It’s impressive how many black metal bands come from this tiny island!

THE END of part 1.

neravendetta.bandcamp.com

facebook.com/neravendetta/