1. How was the style of music you make decided?
All of us listen to a lot of different genres. Vinz and myself are good friends and met regularly to attend concerts (mostly extreme metal). One day we discussed our love for Doom Metal and decided to start a blackened doom band. Besides Metal, he is a huge prog fan and the slow doomy riffs were perfect for his crazy time signatures as well as his tendency to create dark atmospheres. As for myself, I had a very clear idea of the lyrical concept (diseases) and a natural ability to create harsh vocals without too much effort. Daniel plays with Vinz in their other band Dolorosa. He has a very good feeling for clever arrangements and brings in strange instruments like saxophone, EWI or theremin. So our sound is a combination of our different abilities.
2. How are disagreements handled?
Everybody plays a very precise part in our working process. Vinz writes all the music, handling bass, guitars and drums. I write all lyrics and perform the vocals. Daniel adds arrangements as well as special instruments and is responsible for mixing and mastering. We have strong concepts within THOD: Lyrically, the first album Asklepios only handles diseases. Musically, each song is based on a single evolving riff. So we have a precise idea of where we want to go with the band and within that frame each of us can bring his ideas to the table. If disagreements still come up, we just talk them out.
3. Best concert or performance you've seen?
For me, it probably was Amenra in Paris in 2019, on their tour for Mass VI. This was intense.
4. What goes into making a good song?
The riffs. When you play metal, you need good riffs. Also, there must be good dynamics. And when you play doom, your songs shouldn't be all too long. I do like funeral doom, but sometimes, you have over 15 minutes of ultra slow brooding riffs with super low growls. It takes special talent not to let your audience get distracted. A shorter song format with a little mid-tempo part helps to get your musical point across. The slow parts will be even more enjoyable.
5. How has your experience with Wormholedeath been?
Wormholedeath have been nothing but supportive. They are very efficient and easy to work with. It's hard to promote a band such as ours with such an extreme sound and concept. Especially as we do not play live for the time being. They do their very best to spread our gospel. We are very happy with them.
6. What was the inspiration behind your latest release?
As mentioned before, lyrically, our album Asklepios only deals with diseases. We have songs about the plague, leprosy, rabies, cholera, tetanus, smallpox... We also have a song about the old humoral theory and one about contagion. When COVID came about we had to add a "bonus" song about that. Each song is from a different point of view: the sick person, his family, the authorities or the disease itself... All lyrics are in German as this is my first language (even though we're French). Musically each song is based on one riff, that evolves depending on what needs to be expressed. They all have crazy time signatures. This stems from Vinz' and Daniel's prog background.
7. What drew you to the music industry?
I suppose we're part of the music industry, aren't we? We had no other projects but to create the kind of music we'd want to listen to as fans. We self-released the album before signing with Wormholedeath and getting a proper professional release. But that was sheer luck. We're just happy to be able to make a lot of noise together. The rest is just bonus.
8. What's your day to day routine?
We're not professional musicians, except for Daniel who works for a very renowned French music school. So our lives look a lot like those of anybody else. We get up in the morning, go to work come back home exhausted and in all the gaps allowing for some free time, we try to make music. Vinz and Daniel are currently working on the new album of their other band Dolorosa. You could qualify their sound as "dark prog rock" (even though this description hardly scratches the surface) and it's going to be crazy. As for myself I'm working on the lyrical and visual concept of the next THOD album. We're quite eager to come up with something new.
9. Tell us about your release " Wunde, Kieferkrampf und Tod "
This was the second single released by Wormholedeath before our album Asklepios came out in February. It's the fourth track. It has a Sabbath inspired riff that we love. It deals with tetanus and is from the point of view of the sick person's wife, sitting at his bedside while he dies. As for all the songs, quite a lot of research went into the lyrics, to get the description of the symptoms right. The atmosphere is quite sad and the repetitive riff really gives the idea of fate's inexorability.
