Affliction Gate

For whatever reason, France has always been overshadowed in the metal scene. England, Sweden, and of course the USA all have extremely well known bands, many of whom have become giants in their respective genres. But France also has a rich tradition of metal, dating back to the likes of SORTILEGE and STRATTSON, and then on to LOUDBLAST, and finally the French Black Metal Legions. So it’s really no surprise that with the recent revival of the old death metal sound, that France too has a new band playing in that style. I present to you, AFFLICTION GATE, and guitarist Grief.

Was the band formed with a love of early 90s death metal in mind, or was that just what came out of you as you started writing?

Yes, our aim with the creation of AFFLICTION GATE was to play this former traditional death metal sound as we knew it and experienced it in 1991. We are not really newcomers as you can see and I actually formed my first local death metal act back in 1993 -- I once composed the song “Our Evil Legacy” that you can find on our album during my time in this band -- so, to play in the old school vein is not something we chose by chance. It’s rather a matter of circumstances that such a band became concrete and a reality in 2006 only. Late 80’s / early 90’s death metal is the only death metal that matters to us and the quintessence of the genre.

Most of your sound comes from the European scenes. But what about the old Florida scene? Any bands from there in particular that you pull a lot of influence from? ... Acheron, perhaps?

Obviously, we can’t deny the old US Death Metal scene with bands like MASSACRE -- we cover the song “Corpsegrinder” on stage, by the way -- MANTAS / DEATH, MASTER, ACHERON or MORBID ANGEL who all had an impact on us. It’s a real honour to have Vincent Crowley to guest on our debut album, as you can imagine. The early stuffs of all those bands are immortal classics that we worship and pay tribute through our music, as we always clearly state.

To me, Herostratos' vocals also sound somewhat like those of Vince Crowley of Acheron. Do you get that comparison a lot?

Yes, some people pointed out that comparison as well and I can agree that their vocals are sounding quite close sometimes but I think there is a little difference between him and Vincent, though. I would rather see Herostratos’ vocals at a crossroad between LG Petrov, Barney and Vincent, depending of the intonations he can use to give some variations to fit the atmospheres of songs.

He's also very understandable... which was also an old school thing. Was this deliberate?

This is the vocal style that came “naturally” for Herostratos the first time we rehearsed together. AFFLICTION GATE is his very first musical experience, actually. Of course, it’s also the kind of vocals we prefer and that suits better to our music anyway. Powerful and brutal yet still audible unlike some bands that should not bother writing lyrics as their vocals are so ultra deep and low that it becomes so ridiculous. Many say that Herostratos is one of the strongest elements of the AFFLICTION GATE sound and there is no doubt that we are lucky to have such a great vocalist.

What led to the decision to be a 3-piece with a session bassist, session studio guitarist and session live guitarist? Why not have the live member also do the studio work, or have the studio guy play live?

It simply appeared to be impossible to find suitable permanent members with the same motivation and inspirations as us. We had several line-up changes and we got tired of wasting our time so, we instead asked some close friends coming from other local bands to help us on recordings and gigs. However, some line-up updates recently occurred again: Wayne -- our session bassist since the EP-- has left the band because he had to move to another part of France relating to his new job. He was replaced by P.N.G. --who is another long time friend of ours -- since we started again to play live in April. By the way, we finally decided to add our session live lead guitarist as an official member of the band now: Bobby, member of old school thrash metal band HUNGRY JOHNNY -- showed a real involvement, interest and dedication to AFFLICTION GATE, so we came to the conclusion that he was the best for this job more than ever.

Did you re-record or just remix the songs from the debut ep for their inclusion on the Aeon of Nox album? If you re-recorded them, did you change the arrangements at all?

The songs from the EP Severance have been completely re-recorded, of course. Those new versions were captured in real professional studio conditions and sound really much heavier and crushing as ever. The EP was a home made recording with limited equipment but I think the sound / result is quite decent for demo type stuff. Concerning new arrangements compared to former versions, there are no major changed, only few details such as solos which have been re-worked and we added a second one on “Mirror Breakdown”.

None of your songs have lyrics in French? Most of the old heavy metal bands from your country, like KILLERS or SORTILEGE sang in French - in fact I prefer those versions to the English ones!

French lyrics in hard or heavy bands as KILLERS, SORTILEGE, TRUST or ADX sound ok, but it’s not something I’d like to experiment with in AFFLICTION GATE. To be honest, I’m not really fond of “un-English” language in metal in general. I think English is definitely more appropriate, especially for death metal.

Do you feel that the French death metal scene has been overshadowed by that of black metal? Or was the death metal scene in France small to begin with?

The former French Death Metal scene was really active and solid back in the early 90’s with killer leading hordes as AGRESSOR, LOUDBLAST, MASSACRA, NO RETURN, MERCYLESS, SUPURATION, CATACOMB, CRUSHER or MUTILATED / ABYSSALS. Those bands were of a very high quality and they had nothing to envy to international bands. Unfortunately, some of them finally split up while others started to change their musical orientation, sailing away from death metal for the worst. So, everything went down hill or died in 1994… Then, black metal started to get more and more attention and it’s the most popular extreme metal genre in France for over a decade now. The rebirth of death metal happened also in the very late 90’s / early 2000’s through the brutal and technical style which is still strong too here. No wonder that I miss the “good old times”….

Are there any old French death metal bands that you feel were overlooked? Even LOUDBLAST never got much of a push, at least not here in the US.

LOUDBLAST, AGRESSOR, MASSACRA and MUTILATED have a cult status worldwide, yet it’s mainly in the underground related scene. It’s really a shame that, most of the time, those names are nowadays forgotten or ignored by people and sometimes even in France too... LOUDBLAST recorded their two best albums Disincarnate and Sublime Dementia at Morrisound Studios – the same for NO RETURN with their essential Contamination Rise -- but as far as I remember no French bands toured there back at the time. Maybe, it probably explains why they never got exposed nor really became “big” in the US.

What do you find lacking in today's death metal?

Basically, I’d say hooks, atmosphere, soul... over all the technical & blast beats bullshits around in which the present death metal scene is sadly drowned in!

Do you feel that this "retro death metal" thing going on now is the next trend?

Well, we are witnessing an obvious revival but we can hardly speak about a real trend at the moment, if you want my opinion. It’s still an underground thing and minority. France is the best example of my words. By the way, mainstream labels don’t give a shit about this new wave of old school death metal it seems. Maybe, it will be the next trendy music of the 2010’s, who knows? I guess it won’t be a bad thing if it could wipe out all the fake nature of today’s black metal circus and the ultra boring sound of 2000’s death metal! [laughs]

What's your opinion on the return of some of the early bands that never got big like INTERMENT or NIRVANA 2002? Is there anyone you'd like to see return that has not done so yet? How about a band that should have stayed dead and buried?

If those bands are doing it for a real passion for the old death metal style and days and it’s done as a return to their musical roots as Nicke Andersson did with DEATH BREATH, I think that’s great. On another hand, a band like PESTILENCE re-uniting was really not necessary....

What are the plans for the rest of 2010 and maybe early 2011?

We have started again to compose new stuff and we plan to record a couple of tracks, some covers, and a slightly alternate version of “The Worst is Yet to Come,” respectively for a possible EP, bonus material for the LP version of Aeon of Nox, and a promo compilation for Metal Inquisition Records. We might also work on a collaboration track with Rogga Johansson – of PAGANIZER, BONE GNAWER, ex-EDGE OF SANITY -- as it’s an idea we had in mind for some time now. We could do a video clip for the song “Knights of Scorn” too, but it’s not a priority. Of course, if we have some offers to play more live shows, we will go ahead and do that too.

- Final comments belong to you!

Thank you very much for your support and for giving AFFLICTION GATE the possibility to be a part of Bulldozer Mag.