| 2007-12 Audiodrome
The artwork of Descension is amazing. Have you been inspired by Toraja's culture?
A.H. : Thank you. No, we've not been inspired by Toraja's culture for the artwork, not in a direct way.
In both your releases (a 7'' and Descension), you don't sing (better, you don't speak). Do you prefer to speak through music and images?
It is not that we prefer to speak through music and images, it is just that we don't need words. We don't need to explain anything. There's no secret, only mystery and words kill the mystery.
In your artworks we find a letter of the enochian alphabet. You also play in black metal bands. Both black metal and Aluk Todolo's music seems to be simple and immediate and in a certain sense for you "less is more", but the imaginary is often complicated. Is this a contradiction? And is less really more for you?
I do not think that the complexity of the imagery is in contradiction with the minimalism of our music. It is mimetic of the mental landscapes that our music is meant to generate. A simple figure can bring the most complex hallucinations, and one single noise can bring you to many worlds. This is what "less is more" means to me.
As I mentioned, you also play in black metal bands. Why did you decide to create a new project in order to play the particular music of Aluk Todolo?
Early black metal was psychedelic and experimental. There were no rules at the begining. With AT we wanted to go back to the very roots of darkness.
Many people associates you with This Heat, a post-punk trio formed in 1975. Listening to "Burial Ground", I immediately thought about them and about their first eponymous album. Does it have a sense for you?
Yes it makes sense. This Heat is a band that we love, especially their fisrt album. Their radically inventive approach of music is something that we feel close to.
This Heat used also the studio, electronics and musique concrete in order to create their albums. It seems that the sound of Descension comes only from guitar, bass and drums, even if sometimes something can be perceived as electronic and the use of repetitive figures reminds us of early electronic music experimentations and Steve Reich. So, what's your relationship with electronic and experimental music?
Steve reich's music is a bit too conceptual for me. I enjoy early electronics and industrial music tho : Karheinz stockhausen, Mort Garson, Conrad Schnitzler... I guess that the way we create our music is similar their experimentations. it is true, we use rockn'roll instruments, but in an unusal way. we record hours and hours of music and the mixing process is very important.
Sorry if I insist with black metal, but a compatriot of yours, the historian Lucien Febvre, once said that you can only know through comparisons. Probably, some black metallers will give a listen to Descension. Will they consider it as extreme? Are you trying also to demonstrate that there's no need to be fast and loud to be extreme?
No, we do not try to demonstrate anything. Most of black metallers don't understand our music, They even don't understand black metal. I consider our music as more extreme than many of nowadays bm bands. Real black metal is Strum und Drang and I hate both the so-called "true" and the trendies. But luckily, there's still a bunch of good bm bands. For exemple I feel close to Blacklodge for their expermentations and to Nehemah for they understand what really means tradition.
You play ritual music and you also play it live. How does people react to this ritual?
I don't know. What i can tell is that when we play live, we have to deal with the presence of people and their energy. In a way we don't play for them, but with them. |
