Shaxul

Interview by Inquisitor

Black Metal has brought forth many a larger than life personality over the years. If you think about it, strong willed individuals like Varg Vikernes, Attila Csihar, Necrobutcher, Nocturno Culto and the countless musicians and bands that followed in their wake, would have found it very difficult to exist in any other genre of metal. Only Black Metal could ever be extreme and violent enough to permit musical and lyrical outpourings so extreme as to have caused shock and controversy across the entire ‘civilised’ world. And only Black Metal has creative boundaries expansive and limitless enough as to allow their ideas to grow and flourish over the course of three decades, and without artistic limit or restriction.

Certainly, there can be no doubt whatsoever that in 2010 Black Metal as a musical force is as alive and powerful as it’s ever been. A simple glance at its global demographic shows that Black Metal is a truly worldwide phenomenon, with artists even operating clandestinely in highly repressive, terror driven societies like fundamentalist Iran and a post totalitarian China. One man who has devoted his entire life to spreading the kvlt far and wide, whether via his multiple bands or his record label, Legion of Death (which only signs acts from the more obscure corners of our world) is Frenchman Shaxul. The mastermind behind early French Black Metal pioneers Hirlion and founder member of the very highly regarded Deathspell Omega, Shaxul is the very opposite of mysterious and retiring. If anything, this deeply passionate and incredibly honest practitioner of the Black Art is so much more upfront than his former band mates, who, to his eternal derision, hide behind the cloak of  ‘mystery’ and anonymity. Shaxul is not one for holding back – or hiding away in remote areas of the French countryside….

I begin by asking Shaxul how he first became interested in Black Metal. What first attracted him to this way of life, and did he have an immediate connection with the music?

Shaxul: Infernal hails! No problem about answering your questions. I discovered Metal around 20 years ago, mainly with Iron Maiden and other heavy metal bands. Then I discovered faster and rawer genres, thrash metal, then death metal. One day I discovered Venom, the creators of black metal! Of course I immediately felt so close to the spirit. Nowadays people discover metal mainly with black metal on the internet, it’s a pity because most of these kids have no knowledge at all about metal in general, and they misunderstand black metal totally. But there are exceptions of course… It’s just that the “new” generation is so different!

Inquisitor: Were you into Venom, Bathory, Celtic Frost and were you subsequently automatically drawn towards the Norwegian scene, and bands like Darkthrone, Mayhem, Burzum etc? Did the lyrical content inspire you as much as the groundbreaking music created by these guys?

S: Yes, I began to listen to the roots of black metal. Samael was one of the first I discovered as well. I learnt about the Scandinavian scene some years later. I mean, the one from the early 90′s. It was pretty underground back then. But I also discovered very obscure scenes like the ones in South America and Asia and it became a passion of mine. As for the second part of your question: all good bands can be an inspiration, this is pretty obvious… And as black metal is music and lyrics, both can be inspiring, of course.

I: Given the perennial controversies surrounding early Norwegian Black Metal circles, I ask Shaxul for his views on the whole Varg Vikernes saga. Where does he stand on all of this? Have he heard Belus, if so what are his views of it?

S: I couldn’t care less. One must have a lot of time to lose to be interested in this story. I was really into it when Varg Vikernes killed Euronymous, I must admit. But it was such a long time ago, 17 years. Early Burzum is pretty good but that’s all, I’ve never been a die-hard fan of this band, and to say the least it became complete shit when he went to jail. There are tons of killer underground bands with integrity so I can’t see why I would care about the new Burzum album. People seem to wait for this as a messiah or something, and I’m not such an ignorant sheep.

I: I wonder how Shaxul came to be more directly involved in black metal? What was the state of black metal in France at that time?

S: The concept was so close to my thoughts that I felt the need to create a black metal band. That’s how Hirilorn came to life in 1994, we all wanted to do one. At that time the underground was not that bad, and some bands were supporting each other out. But it slowly but surely became a circus.

I: Inevitably, I turn briefly to the question of Shaxul’s time with black metal legends Deathspell Omega. What was the experience of being a member of Deathspell Omega like? They’re very highly regarded nowadays, if a little elusive, but a lot of people still prefer them with Shaxul on vox….

S: It was a great experience, as all the experiences I had and have with bands. I don’t regret anything. It’s an honour for me if people prefer the “first era” of the band. I also played the drums and wrote most of the lyrics back then. But I left in 2002 so it belongs to the past. I’m active with several bands since then.

I: Plainly Shaxul does not want to dwell at length on his former band, preferring instead to talk about his many current projects. I don’t labour it and move on to ask him if he felt that he had a lot to live up to musically and reputation wise after leaving them. What were his first moves after leaving them?

S: I haven’t really cared about Deathspell Omega since 2002 (that’s 8 years, which is quite a lot) and I already had the idea of forming Svest, Parabellum, Barathrum, Necromantia… Some are very different from others but at least each one has something inspiring for how we want Arphaxat to be. As for the concept, my other band Annthennath is much more about anti-humanity and death. Arphaxat is about Pictavian stories but treated under our satanic vision. We hate all religions, no exception.

I: What about Satan and Satanism? Does this play a big part in your life personally and does it underpin what Arphaxat do?

S: Of course it’s very important. If you play Black Metal there should be a link with Satanism. But I don’t mean religious satanism of course. Satan is a concept and a tool we use. A strong symbol, to show we oppose everything established by stupid humans (like religions and politics). I don’t believe in a supernatural entity, nor I believe in fucking Santa Claus, you see… We just walk our own path as much as possible without caring about the rest. We don’t believe in magic, occultism or whatever. We’re interested in this on a literary point of view, nothing more. We’re very down-to-earth actually! All our songs are obviously linked with our own Satanic ideology, using metaphors and so on.

I: I can relate to that personally. Would you say that you regard Satan, then, as the force within Nature? And Nature, being the overall Master/Mistress of all sentient beings, is the real ‘spiritual’ force that governs everything? In other words, there is no ‘God’ in the conventional sense of the term?

S: Nature? No, that’s not what I meant at all. I don’t care about nature, I don’t care about this dying planet, let the world burn. I like to travel and discover great places, but one day I won’t be there anymore to witness this so why bothering about nature. Though it’s true that the power of nature is huge as I believe in the theory of evolution, but one day this planet will disappear, and we will be dead for a long time already haha… I meant that Satan is myself actually. I am my own Satan. I follow my path and I won’t join any fucking sect (religion, political party…).  So yes, there is no god. Gods are just weak human creations to explain what they can’t understand. People like to be enslaved, they need this as they are weak, so they feel better believing in something else than themselves. One could say I am weak too as I will die like all other stupid humans, but at least I did my best during this short life to not live like a slave like them.

I: OK, let’s move on a little. Tell me about Legion of Death which you started up in 2001? What’s the philosophy behind that and its offshoot Armee de la Mort? I can see that you release a really international roster of black metal artists, are demos coming in from across the world now?

S: I created Legion Of Death Records because I really wanted to support bands from obscure and unknown places. There are great scenes everywhere in the world but most people concentrate on the European trends. Of course trends are everywhere but in some places you can find more sincere bands, respecting the traditions of metal. At first I searched a lot for bands and I came up with releasing unknown hordes, many of them are acclaimed as “cult” ones today. Now as you said, more and more bands contact me directly because they know I am dead serious with my label. I just release vinyl records with exclusive tracks so each release is a collector item. Armee De La Mort Records has been created last year mainly to support bands from the French regions, as I’m fed up to see the same French trendy bands glorified all the time. So the idea is very similar to Legion Of Death but on a French scale. I need something special, respecting the eternal roots of metal. The other difference is that I release CD’s with Armee De La Mort.

I: Legion of Death and Armee de la Mort are unique in their approach that’s for sure. Is that uniqueness the reason for their success; I mean so many good labels struggle these days. Do you look for a certain ‘type’ of band, if that’s the right word?

S: It’s true that my concepts are quite special, so it may be an explanation. Also people know that integrity is very important for me and that I’m not a traitor so I can be trusted in all my choices! But I have to struggle as well, you know… It’s never easy to run an underground label. As for bands, I don’t look for a certain type. The band must fit my concept, it must be great metal (whatever the genre is), and their attitude and ideas must be valuable as well.

I: Let’s talk about your current music, ok? Three excellent bands: Manzer, Arphaxat and Annthennath all at the same time when most musicians struggle to get even a half assed outfit going creatively. What’s the secret, Shaxul? Chemistry between the musicians?

S: The secret? We’re geniuses. Hahaha, just kidding! Well, I think that with these bands I am involved with great metal brothers, not only good musicians. So yes, you can talk about a chemistry because in each band we believe in our concept 666%ly[sic] and we give everything we have for the band.

I: Arphaxat have a particularly evil, mean and diabolic sound, in my view partly because there are no guitars. I mean it’s fucking effective, but was this your intention? Were you influenced by other bass only acts like Cop Shoot Cop or Om?

S: Thanks, and of course it was our intention to create such a fucked up sound. We wanted something a bit disturbing. As for influences, as I’ve said the main ones are Bathory, Von, Svest, Parabellum, Barathrum, Necromantia… I don’t know the bands you mentioned. Nowadays the best band without guitar is Defuntos if you ask me, a band from Portugal. Their style is different from Arphaxat, but I am really into them. Different approach but very morbid tunes.

I: I assume Arphaxat is largely a studio project, but do you think you’ll ever gig as a unit? It would be quite something I think….

S: Knowing that I play all instruments and Draken sings, it is impossible to do gigs indeed. And rehearsing with session musicians just for gigs would be a lot of work, we don’t have the time to do that and we are not interested anyway. Arphaxat was destined to be a studio band since day one. You have to listen to it at home, drinking some Cognac hehe… I created Manzer to play gigs (well, it’s just one of the numerous reasons).

I: You joined Annthenath after they’d been formed for quite some time (2002). What’s the story behind that? How did you come to be involved with them?

S: True, Annthennath began as a duo : N°6 (Sael) and Lyshd Mordrak (Funeraille). They handled all the instruments by themselves. But they were not totally satisfied and they felt that a full line-up would be better to fulfil the potential of their ideas. They asked Thyr (Diskarial, Withdrawn) to play the drums, and Welkin (Angmar) to play the bass. Then they needed a vocalist that could also write the lyrics and concepts. Back then I just began to be involved in the local and French underground, because I really had no hope in this before and had almost no contact there, living like a hermit hehe… They knew my previous works and they asked me to do the job. I accepted because I liked the new songs a lot. I felt something so intense and frozen. That’s how I joined Annthennath in early 2008.

I: How does working within the Annthennath set up compare to other bands you’ve been in/are in? I imagine it’s a very creative unit?

S: I am lucky to work with four very creative people, yes. Each member brings something special. It is a studio band and we don’t live so close to each other so we mainly work on our own. But we work our ass off on our parts so when all parts are joined, then the result is totally satisfying to us. It may seem like a strange way to work, as we don’t rehearse all together or anything. But it works perfectly for Annthennath and I’m pretty sure it adds something to the “dehumanized” concept we want to create.

I: The Annthennath sound is quite intense, it reminds me a little of Antaeus, while the more ‘ambient’ passages work really well with the more intense sounds capes. Could this work live? It would be amazing to see you perform these tracks…

S: None of us is inspired by Antaeus at all. But it’s true we want to mix blasting parts with mid-tempo and slow parts, with radical changes to surprise the listener. Of course it would work live, I’m sure of that, but we really can’t. We live far away from each other and some members don’t like to play live. So it seems that Annthennath will remain a studio band forever. Sorry man!

I: I love the Manzer release. It’s pure Motorhead/Venom approach with an almost punk style built in. Was this a deliberate sound that you created, or did it just happen?

S: Yeah, when I created Manzer, I definitely wanted to play this ancient and primitive style of black metal. Especially Venom, the originators of black metal! But we are also inspired by Abigail, Sabbat, Atomizer, Impailed Nazarene, Jan Do Fiao, Bathory, Bulldozer… We’re not really inspired by punk bands but more by the punk influences that had some of the bands that influence us, if you see what I mean! Personally I have nothing against some punk bands though, but they are more like an indirect influence so to speak. Manzer is a power-trio and we can rehearse and play gigs for real, contrary to my other bands! Though when it comes to gig the situation is pretty fucked up and it’s so hard to get serious proposals. Up till now we never played live argh… So this interview is the opportunity to send a message in a bottle hehe!

I: When can we expect a full album from Manzer? Are you lining up any shows in Europe? I would have thought other BM bands would jump at the chance to share the bill with you…

S: A full length album is not our priority. We want to do one and we even got a label proposal already but first we prefer to concentrate on some 7″EP’s. As I said before, it’s very hard to get serious proposals when it comes to gigs so no, we have nothing planned but we hope to play live soon. Though we also want to play outside Europe because there are countries who are much more supportive to metal contrary to Europe which is dominated by commercial rules and trends. We should play in Bangkok (Thailand) and Vientiane (Laos) in November 2010, a huge dream for us! But you see, we have no proposals closer than that haha!

I: What do you think of the current state of black metal globally? Do you think the older bands like Mayhem and Darkthrone have fared well? And have you heard the new Burzum yet?

S: Black metal is still alive and going strong. It’s just that one must search for great bands instead of listening to the same old bands that wimped out a long time ago. I don’t listen to what the older Norwegian bands release today as it is very shitty, but I listen to the early stuffs from time to time with pleasure. I couldn’t care less about useless crap like Burzum. Black metal was not born in Norway, you know… Some scenes in South America and Asia are older than the Norwegian one and much more extreme, but once again people tend to stick to the same well known bands so they prefer to listen to the new Emperor or Burzum and such living insults to metal thinking it is real black metal, instead of getting knowledge about valuable bands of the past or today which truly deserve the “cult” term one billion more times than some wimps and traitors.

I: And what about metal in general? Personally I see a heck of a lot of crap around, what about you?

S: Of course, there’s a lot of crap, maybe more and more than in the past by the way. Maybe because of the internet, everything is so easy now, like “I’ve recorded 3 notes in my bedroom for my band and I uploaded them on my gayspace”, you know… But the most important is to support the valuable bands, simple as that. We will have to deal with trends forever, and it’s the same since several decades, so the best is to ignore and boycott them.

I: What is Shaxul’s prediction for the future of the world?

S: Oh, here’s an important question, let me think… Well… OK, I found the answer : I don’t give a fuck! Hahaha really man, I couldn’t care less. This world is already rotten and it won’t get better, and life is short so let’s make the best out of this shitty situation, that’s all. We’re all gonna die, you know? Hehe! I’m not a clairvoyant, I’m totally down-to-earth!

Shaxul’s commitment to black metal, or better still, pure metal in general is beyond question.  Few, if any artists, can claim to have had the level of influence and conviction that he now has, and few can claim to be as driven to create more evil sounding, diabolical music as him. If you haven’t checked out Annthennath, Arphaxat or Manzer yet, then what the hell are you waiting for? Because watch out, Shaxul is looking to play on these shores – soon…..

www.legionofdeathrecords.com

by Inquisitor