Interview : Chrigel Glanzmann & Anna Murphy – Eluveitie (2012)

Interview by Miriam C.

For the second time we give space to one of the last metal sensation of these years : Eluveitie. We asked to the singers and instruments players Chringel Glanzmann & Anna Murphy some news about their recent new album “Helvetios” and his concept behind. Enjoy!

Hi Chrigel and Anna, how are you?? I hope all allright!!! And thanks for reply at our questions!

Anna: Hey there! Fine, thank you. And that’s no problem, thank you for the interview.

Ok, let’s get delve into the brand new album “Helvetios”. How was the genesis of this album, when you have started to compose it?

Chrigel: The idea of doing a concept album about the so-called gaulish wars we had quite a while ago. Somewhen in summer 2010 I started working on the concept for the album. I started composing the single songs somewhen in winter 2010, but most of the songs actually emerged in spring/summer 2011 though. I worked closely together with our guitar player Ivo. He’s an amazing composer of awesome riffs.

First of all what’s means the word “Helvetios” and is related to the lyrics inside the album?

Chrigel: “Helvetios” is basically the name of the celtic tribe that inherited the area of todays Switzerland: The Helvetians. The album tells the story of the gaulish wars – from the Helvetians perspective.

How’s recording an album with a great legend like Tommy Vetterli? Is like a mentor, a friend or a little despotic (XD I’m joking now hahaha) ?

Anna : If somebody would have told me 7 years ago that I’d be talking to Tommy Vetterli on the phone on a regular basis I would have freaked out, haha. I’ve always been a huge Coroner fan so I was thrilled and a little nervous at first to record an album with him. We were quite overwhelmed by his perfectionism, the guy has insanely good ears and you can imagine that that can create quite a problem for him when dealing with tons of folk instruments that simply aren’t perfectly in tune all the time. But soon enough we could work together really well and we got to know him as one of the nicest and funniest guys we’ve ever met. We’re still good friends and spent some fun times on the 70’000 tons of metal cruise together. And more importantly, “Helvetios” is our best sounding album, I’m sure we will be faithful to Tommy for a while!

I really liked the historical in-depth explanation that you have published on Facebook and get me to assumethat “Helvetios” is a concept because I’ve seen quite a connection between the 2 lyrics. Who were the Helvetians and firstly when you have decided to focus on these topic? Also are a lot of historical infos that you have provided, where did you got it? You should have an encyclopaedia at home!

Anna: “Helvetios” tells the harrowing chronic of the Gaulish war. But it’s not just a chronological account of this terrible war, the album tells the story from the viewpoint of the Helvetians, a Celtic tribe. This wasn’t a very simple task, since history is mostly written by those who triumphed in war which in this case was the Roman empire, Gaius Julius Caesar to be exact. Most of what we know about the Gaulish war nowadays stems from Caesar’s transcripts and that these do not convey the full truth is pretty obvious and also confirmed by historians. His scripture “De Bello Gallico” is political propaganda for his benefit to a great extent in which home and family defending Gauls become “belligerent barbarians” and sheer genocide over Gaulish tribes become “glorious battles” that were fought by Roman legions “heroically to protect the Roman people.” So you can see it’s not an easy undertaking to portray the Gaulish war as Helvetians (Gauls) would have. We still tried and cooperated with scientists to question historiography and let historical and archeological findings influence us in writing the album. But we also just let simple emotions and feelings speak by imagining what it really must have been like back then.

I’m getting so really curious about the various goddess and god workshipped by the Helvetians. Excluding Epona, who totally hit me, are you able to give us more cultural insights about this population?

Chrigel: First of all we have to face the fact that we don’t know too much about the Celts religions today. All we can base on are historical literature on one hand (which is partly very vague) and archeological evidence on the other hand. The existence of diverse gods (such as Epona) is documented by the latter. All across Gaul there were small Epona temples found. Regarding this goddess there’s also one note in historical literature, stating that there were usually fresh cut roses or rose petals offered to Epona in those little temples (that’s also where the song title comes from, btw).

According to Facebook – “Helvetios is a concept album about the gaulish war (58-50 B.C.), the story of the war being told in a chronological timeline.” – can you, somehow, explain the chronological timeline referring to the songs titles’?

Chrigel: To be honest, I seriously think that this would break the mold of an interview – it would be a bit too much (unless you’re planning to publish an 8 page Eluveitie feature, haha ). But yeah, the story of the gaulish war is actually well documented and publicly accessible. So, just check a good scientifical book on the gaulish wars. If you’re familiar the story of the gaulish wars, the song titles will make a lot of sense.

Talking instead about the cover album is really simple, white and black a badge. What’s stands for? Who representing? And why opt for so simply cover? (You know, that badge remembers me a lot the Aurum from the 1984′s “The Neverending Story” film, never watched it?)

Chrigel: Haha, yeah I’ve seen the movie, when I was a kid. Well, the album cover just shows a traditional helvetic ornament, which has been found through archeological excavations (it was chased in a golden fibula). So, it basically represents the celtic tribe of the Helvetians. The black, simple cover forms kind of a “book cover”, you know. The inside of the (btw quite extended) booklet pretty much elaborated. The idea behind the album artwork was to create something like a volume of art photography. You know, to create pictures as they would have occurred if a gifted art photographer – such as Andre Kertesz or Henri Cartier-Bresson – would have been there, 2000 years ago, and documented the events of the gaulish wars photographically.

Now for Anna only, which are the vocal part that you have enjoyed recording the most on the latest Eluveitie album? Also, not so time ago, you have joined Nucleus Torn, how happened and how you’ll manage it?

Anna: That’s a difficult question, I enjoyed everything of course. But in a different way, maybe. “A Rose for Epona” is probably the most difficult (and high as f***) thing I’ve ever undertaken, so my singing was taken one step further just by recording this song I’d say. “The Siege” is something completely new which was a lot of fun, but made me lose my voice completely for two days, haha. I guess I still enjoyed “Alesia” the most though, because I probably improvised more than half of my parts in the studio and Chrigel and I were still working on arrangements right before recording them… I really like doing things spontaneously. Yeah, Fredy asked me quite a long time ago if I’d like to do some guest vocals on his new album. We noticed that we work together very well and have similar tastes, so it came naturally that I joined as an official member. We’re going to compose new stuff together very soon and I’m looking forward to it! I’ll manage somehow, of course Eluveitie is Nr. 1, but that doesn’t mean I can’t be creative with other projects, I just don’t have all the time in the world.

Chrigel, running down the list of the line-up and the instrument played I notice that you’re playing the gaita too. I’ve never heard of it, can you explain its peculiarities?

Chrigel: Hmmm, check: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galician_gaita The gaita is just a bagpipe. We’re using diverse kinds of bagpipes in our music and among others also the galician gaita. It’s a rather simple bagpipe. But really love it’s sound and also the way it can be played (it allows much more “emotional” expression than a scottish bagpipe for example).

The band started as a merely studio project, Chrigel, when have you “understood” that Eluveitie was evolving into a proper live metal band?

Chrigel: To be honest – the only reason I formed Eluveitie as a mere studio project at first, was because I couldn’t find dedicated fix members for a band back then. You know, back then the combination of folkmusic and metal was not common at all, there was no folk metal scene or something like that. It was new, unknown and most people considered it a pretty weird, crazy and pointless idea. But yeah, actually it has always been my wish and idea of have Eluveitie as a proper live band – which was possible later then, fortunately.

In your opinion(s) where lies the differences between “Everything Remains as It Never Was” and “Helvetios”? What is the step towards a musical evolution that you have accomplished on this last album?

Anna: I don’t know Chrigel’s opinion on this one, but I would never think about differences between albums. We just write music, do what we feel sounds good and if it sounds different from the last album, well so what? We don’t care or think about these things. At least I don’t, haha. I mean, our music has always been very diverse, though still creating a solid entity. That’s what Eluveitie is.

Will be a an “Evocation II” in the near future?

Chrigel: There will be “Evocation II” for sure. But I can’t say if it will come in near future or not (well, regarding the fact that we’re just about to release a full studio album and thus we just started a world tour that will keep us on the road for at least 12 months, it’s actually not very likely that “Evocation II” will happen in NEAR future ).

Anna, can you talk more about ThruByRed and Fräkmündt I must presume that are some other bands beside Eluveitie and Nucleus Torn. And by the way congratulations for being so diverse in your tastes, for being so really young (me and you we have tha same age hahaha) you rock.

Anna: Hey cool that you checked out my other projects, thanks! Well, Fräkmündt is my other band. It’s Swiss traditional folk music, but still has a rather dark, atmospheric and sometimes even modern touch to it. We’re all really good friends and do exactly what our music sounds like, we hike in the mountains for hours or days and then go get wasted somewhere and talk for hours from philosophical debates to complete and utter nonsense. I play the hurdy-gurdy, flute and acoustic bass, do some vocals and composing. ThruByRed started shortly after I joined Fräkmündt. Christoph Ziegler (who is also in Fräkmündt and apart from that the man behind Vinterriket, Atomtrakt, Nebelkorona etc.) and I really hit it off when we got to know each other and pretty much immediately decided to start an electronic project together. The plan was for it to just sound completely weird and have all sorts of musical elements and confusing lyrics in it. I think we managed pretty well, ThruByRed was born!

Well, guys I think we’re at the end do you have any last consideration about your next projects?

Anna: We’re touring our asses off this year to promote “Helvetios”, that’s project Nr. 1! Then, I guess we’ll see what’s next.

Chrigel: Yeah… couldn’t add anything to that.

Just greet as you want your fans and our readers. Thanks so really much for everything! Hugs, Miriam x

Anna: Cheers to our fans and readers! You guys rock! And thank you Miriam for the cool interview and your interest!

Chrigel: Yep! Thanks! And see you on the road! Cheers

Credit Photos

Photos by Manuel Vargas

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Nucleus Torn – “Golden Age” (2011)

Label : Prophecy Productions

Review by Luisa Mercier

Nucleus Torn is a Swiss alternative/metal band that has a lot of influences: from folk to ambient, to prog to post-rock. The present recors is a kind of prequel for the trilogy that the band has released in the previous years formed by the albums “Nihil”, “Knell” and “Andromeda Awaiting”. The main mastermind is Fredy Schnyder and around him there have been many musicians. The line-up has changed a lot in the years. On “Golden Age” Maria D’Alessandro and Anna Murphy from Eluveitie sing. The title-track is also the opener and is an elegant, classy 12-minute acoustic/prog/folk track in which just the piano, the flute, the strings and the acoustic guitars can be heard while female and clean male vocals duet in a melacholic dialogue. Really beautiful, though not an easy song to listen to. “Hunger” is another acoustic song in which Anna Murphy delivers once again a moving vocal performance especially when backed by strings and drums. The song becomes epic and in the end the folk feeling is very apparent. Patrick Schaad is behind the mic on “Silver” together with female vocals. His soothing, warm performance makes this prog track even more fascinating. Just piano and strings, til now there was no hint of rock or metal. Distorted guitars appear on “Against” but there is no violence or harshness, they are 100% prog, somehow this track remembered me a mix of old Opeth and new Opeth, the ones from “Heritage”. “Ash” finally has metal/rock riffs, after an acoustic intro. I would rather call them post-rock riffs which alternate with calm moments and true metal style, you can even hear a solo! Last song is “Death Triumphant”, another very long song which mixes metal, post-rock, folk, prog and even jazz! A real listening experience. “Golden Age” is a complex record, one you want to listen to in the right mind setting, otherwise the risk is that you might find it boring. To tell the truth it is very well crafted and it deserves more than one listening session.

Rating – 80/100

Tracklist

1. Golden Age
2. Hunger
3. Silver
4. Against
5. Ash
6. Death Triumphant 

Line Up

• Maria D’Alessandro – Vocals 
• Anna Murphy – Vocals
• Patrick Schaad  - Vocals 
• Christian Kolf – Throat
• Rebecca Hagmann – Cello 
• Christine Schüpbach-Käser – Violin 
• Anouk Hiedl  - Flute 
• Benedikt Reising – Saxophone
• Bernadette Guenot – Oboe
• Daniel Schläppi – Double Bass
• Fredy Schnyder – Keyboard, Bass, Guitar, Mandolin, Bagpipes, Organ, Dulcimer & Bouzouki
• Christoph Steiner  - Drums & Percussiom

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Interview : Fredy Schnyder – Nucleus Torn

Interview by Roberta Ilaria Rossi

With a new member inside the project, Nucleus Torn comes back with a new album, called “Golden Age”. We’ve met Fredy Schnyder, the main composer, which told us something about this latest album and some revelations about Anna Murphy!

Hi Fredy, welcome to Femme Metal.net. After 15 years of the creation of your own band, what’s new for Nucleus Torn?

On “Golden Age”, we’ve significantly expanded our line-up. Whereas we had seven musicians on the first three “real” albums, we now have thirteen. Some instruments have been forced a little bit into the background, others come to the fore more often than before. Most importantly, the album focuses on the vocals, we’ve worked a lot on that part of our sound. In the past, we treated vocals as another instrument, on “Golden Age”, they clearly lead the songs.

What are the main influences of the band? Did you take inspiration from any band in particular?

Nucleus Torn has many influences; so many, that it is impossible to single out any of these. We are fascinated by all kinds of music, and you can obviously find traces of all of them on our records. Progressive rock, jazz, metal, folk, pop, classical music (from the Medieval ages to the present) – you name it. On “Golden Age”, the focus is primarily on progressive rock, I decided to explore this area of interest to a further degree.

Between the creation of the band and the release of the very first album, “Nihil”, released in 2006, many years have gone. What was the reason of this long wait?

We (I) did a couple of EPs, I also worked with other groups at that time. When I’d finally figured out that I couldn’t work with other bands, I decided to focus on Nucleus Torn for good and accepted that I needed (and wanted) to do the majority of the work myself – songwriting, performance, recording/engineering, layout, packaging, releasing, advertising. That’s when things started to work out and NT could attract other talented musicians willing to share in my adventure.

You’re the main person who most works on this project. How do you manage the entire work you have to do in the studio?

I like to work.

Before the release of “Golden Age”, Nucleus Torn released the last chapter of the trilogy who ends up in “Andromeda Awaiting”. Why have you choosen to complete with this album?

Interestingly enough, “Golden Age” is part of that collection of albums, too. “Golden Age” is a prequel to the other three albums, that makes it a tetralogy. I needed to find the roots to the story we told on “Nihil”, “Knell” and “Andromeda Awaiting” in the present, in our own society and culture, and deal with them on an artistic level.

Recently, you’ve taken part as guest musician in the forthcoming Eluveitie album: how was working with those guys? If I’m not mistaken, you had already worked for some instrumental track in “Evocation – part I”…

Yes, you’re right. It’s always a pleasure working with them. First, Chrigel engineered my sessions for “Evocation I”, then I engineered Meri‘s violin recordings for “Everything Remains”, now Anna engineered my session for “Helvetios”, which was pure joy. Ivo was kind enough to give me a lot of advice on how to record metal guitars… Last but not least, I joined the band to perform “Meet the Enemy” live in Zurich a few weeks ago. So I got to know the band pretty well, we get along on a personal and professional level. As I said, it’s always a pleasure.

How many musicians/artists/bands you’ve worked with so far? Which is the artist/which is the band that gave you the most at a personal and artistic level?

Oh God, so many I’ve lost count (but certainly not track). It’s not possible for me to decide on one particular person/performance. It’s a big puzzle and everyone I’ve worked with has contributed a share to it.

What have you learned from them?

New sounds, new ways to work, new ways to arrange, new ways to record/mix/master, sometimes new ways to look at music/art and its place in life.

Recently, Anna Murphy joined the band. What could you tell us about it? What were the reasons about this choice?

I like her voice, her songwriting skills, her wonderful vocal lines, she plays several instruments, she’s going to be an amazing engineer one day… Well, she’s got an exceptional talent. Plus: we seem to understand one another pretty well. She’s one of the very few people that I will be able to write with.

What are the goals that you’re going to ask yourself a few years from now? What, however, will be the future projects?

We’ll find out. “Golden Age” was the end of the first professional phase of Nucleus Torn. I spent more or less every single musical idea I’d had and absolutely had to take a break from writing, which lasted for almost two years, in which I completed “Andromeda Awaiting”, the compilation “Travellers” and “Golden Age”. I needed to shut down and restart. As for the present, all I can say is that we are working. As usual.

Are you going to tour Europe very soon?

We’ll see. Having a new singer and multi-instrumentalist on board, there are new options. Time will tell.

Is there any artist or band you would like to cooperate with in a nearest future?

I’m quite sure that there will be fascinating things in store for me, there always have been. I don’t think that this will necessarily mean that I’m going to work with/for some of my “idols”, after all, there’s no guarantee that we would actually enjoy this and create something of exceptional value.

Thanks so much for the time you’ve given us. Is there something you would like to tell to Nucleus fans?

Thank you for your continuing support, enjoy our music.

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