 INTERVIEW WITH GÜNTER
First of all, it's great to have you back! Crimson Cult is a brand new name, but you have a great history behind...
why did you stop Stygma IV and how did you start Crimson Cult?
thanx ;-)
we have been a fine team with STYGMA IV for 16 years, and i never could imagine to exchange one bandmember if trouble is coming along; than the big trouble came along and we had to stop the whole thing.
by the way, we have posted a video regarding this topic on myspace ;-)
half of you come from Stygma IV, but the other half is brand new. can you introduce me the "new" members? What do they bring to the band? What past experience do they have?
the drummer peter"beda"bachmayer we knew for years; he's the leading drummachine in our regions. it's a great pleasure to play with this guy, because he has no technical limitations, really! i didn't know about walter, our singer, at all. alex heard him in a club in germany when he was performing with a coverband.
when we decided to start with CRIMSON CULT, alex told me about a fantastic voice which is living here in austria. we called walter to do a demorecording together and it was amazing. this was the day when CRIMSON CULT was born.
how far do in your opinion Crimson Cult differ from Stygma IV from a music point of view?
and what do they have in common?
there was this "progfactor" around with STYGMA IV, i think this was the point which avoided a bigger acceptance for the band. with CRIMSON CULT everything is brought right to the point from the beginning.
on our current CD we have one longer song with an extented middlesection, but that's it; no reason to let the "big musician" hang out all the time ;-)
how did the new songs get developed? is it a teamwork or is there somebody taking most of the work?
somebody is taking most of the work, you are right! :-))))
again, you move along the path of traditional metal but in a very personal way...
how would you describe the sound of Crimson Cult? which other bands do you think can be compared to you?
the comparison to Bruce Dickinson came out pretty often, maybe for the vocal style of Walter.
what do you think of this comparison?
this is one of the best compliments and comparison i have ever heard.
i think our "young bruce", as we call walter, will be very happy with it. for me, i like the solowork of bruce very much. it was never my intention to copy other bands songwriting wise and i always try to leave my personal note. what makes me happy especially with this CD are the great melodylines on songs as "Undead",
"Lava Machine" or the chorus in "Dirty Demon". i always wanted to create such hooks, and with walter it's so easy, believe me.
what do the lyrics of the album deal with? is there any kind of connection or common background?
some topics are about the squalidness of mankind, about the corrupt acting of our politicians and some are fantasy lyrics.
before the album you circulated a promo, which gained very good reactions, e.g. "demo of the month" in MH Germany. did you expect this? how do you feel about it? did you think reviewers got the right out of your music?
the right on his music belongs to the artist. we have to live with all this reviewers, if we like it or not ;-)
we need this species to spread our music all over the world. if some of the reviewers would see the musicworld a little easier, everything would make more fun...
Stygma IV/Stigmata have always had great reviews but not the same commercial success. why in your opinion? why should things change with Crimson Cult?
it's always hard to describe success.
when i look back on our career with STYGMA IV or STIGMATA i am very happy. we had the chance to release our music worldwide and had very good reactions when playing live. money is NOT everything. CRIMSON CULT is not the subsequent operation of STYGMA IV, CRIMSON CULT is a new band and we will make some things completely different as we did with STYGMA IV.
do you have any regret looking back to your career? apart from having to change name every two albums... :) what is the most significant achievement you reached with Stygma IV in your opinion?
the best things for me with STYGMA IV were our concerts, especially cremona and wacken.
no regrets, i am looking forward to the future with CRIMSON CULT.
what about the live side? can we expect to see you on stage soon?
i hope so!
the Austrian metal scene seems to live pretty much under the shadow of Germany. what do you think about it? is there competition or collaboration among the bands? what kind of room do metal bands have in Austria?
there are some competitions in some cities, but it never bothered me, for i had always higher goals!
PS I have all your stuff, including the Big Heat CDs - all were good, but Crimson Cult is really amazing!!! I wish you all the possible success in this "new" career!
thank you very much and greetz to all italian fans!
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