Ierofania Interview

 

1. For those that have never heard of you before, can you tell us a little bit about the musical project?

C: The musical project Ierofania was born in 2003 in Trieste, a city in the far north east of Italy and represents our desire to create after years of confrontation with the falsity of people. I don't think I want to add anything else.

D: If we would think that the black metal scene would not need this album we would not be here. This music is old of this time, it belongs to 15 years ago. Due to our misanthropy it remained with us, for us. It was made because we needed to do it for ourselves. At that time where the scene was quite in a bad state was meant to exist but not to be shared. Today is different, the scene who was sick is dying. Honor to you that you are holding well. This music is made by myself Demonion vocal and lead guitars, and Christian rhythmic guitars and drums.

2. Recently you have released your first full length, can you tell us a little bit more about the musical style that you went for on the recording?

D: The style and sound is unique although classic in the genre. We used only guitars, vocals and drums to create black metal that has a different atmosphere that could express what we were looking for. Two lead guitars like trumpets and two rhythmic  guitars like huge falling columns at the sides.

The dissonance of the power chords is what gives the atmosphere of Ierofania. The vocal changes during every piece and is the fruit of a long technical research. There is also a special “attitude” in the vocals.

We needed a unique sound to express our blend of wrath, desperation and majesty.

3. What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band has explored so far with the music?

D: The work is itself an exploration, a research, like digging in the deep darkness. The composition of the pieces took several years and they show a progression of darkness: true, lived and experienced. Most of what we were seeing around at that time was not true. People where playing this style 

where just making a kind of game, like playing a horror movie and then getting joyful speaking about girls and beers. This is not the case. Our motto was “Nero e Vero” which means “Black and True”. I went inside darkness, till the end, that can’t be expressed. Its final destination was silence or noise and a melting of life and death.

The first lyrics are about our land, hills of rocks sharp to the sky and blown by a very strong wind… how much we love that wind, howling in the night. How much blood and limbs on those rocks during the first world war. Still you feel the ghosts of the limbs attached to the rusty barbed wire.

Another influence is ineptitude, the dust that covers everything. There are some mistakes in shy arpeggio of guitar that are there to express this concept, and this is first expressed through poetry in the lyrics and then, with the proceeding of the listening with meaningless lyrics like a beast who lost his language. A pure scream of existential pain. The funeral of the meaning. This leads to a performing style that pays a tribute to Abruptum. Performances were held in isolation for days, in a very special state. And also part of the general style of singing, which is wrath, leaves the space to something else.

Every song has a different style in vocal performance. Some of those I couldn’t listen to for years after recovery. Some I can’t listen to even now.

4. What is the meaning and inspiration behind the name 'Ierofania'?

D: Christian came up with this name and I felt it immediately right. Because it shows the inner soul of  black metal, the discrimination between what for me is good black metal and other things, which is a manifestation of the sacred. You can prove Divine light in two ways. With a strong saintly light, and with a strong manifestation of darkness. Each one proves the opposite.

5. Can you tell us a little bit more about the artwork that is presented on the new album cover?

C: Even in the darkness, light can shine and bring life.

D: The cover is an Eclipse of the tail of the head of the dragon Rahu that devours the Sun. Ierofania composition started in the period of one eclipse and was released this year with a new one at the end of the cycle of 18 years.

6. Currently there are only 2 members in the band, are you open to expanding the line up or do you prefer to remain a duo?

C: I honestly don't consider Ierofania as a duo but as two very distinct people who collaborated to create music that could reflect our concept of Black Metal. It’s our vision and there is no room for anyone else in this project. We have taken very different paths in life but both, in different ways, are searching for the Supreme Light.

D: The character of Ierofania is us. Can’t be one less or one more. It would not be Ierofania anymore.

7. So far very little is known about the band, do you prefer to keep a lower profile?

C: Absolutely. My personality is not as important as art, which is something sacred. I don't seek direct gratification from my work but aim to create and spread energy. Nowadays form is more important than substance. Everyone wants to appear and I have no interest in being assimilated into this model of behavior. I hate social networks and I despise the damn society I live in.

D: I don’t know how it is now, but times ago when we were composing, we were calling high profiles “poser”, and it was the worst comment in black metal together with “professional musician”. I think we still agree. We make art for ourselves, because we intimately need it to live. But we can now understand that it is good to share.

8. The album was released through 'II Grido - Incisioni Sonore', can you tell us a little bit more about this label?

C: “Il Grido” is my creation but I don’t like to describe it as a label but as an artistic container that I created to help spread a certain type of philosophy of art and life. I’m not interested in having a wide distribution or many followers but only in interfacing with people who want to express their internal anxiety through music. I take care of the production and experience the project together with its creator as I did with the “Apatia” project that I produced a few years ago.

D: It’s the misanthropic self publishing of Christian. Imagine a label held by one that has 2 friends, no vocation for writing to anyone, quite allergic to advertisement. Is the perfect place for Ierofania.

9. On a worldwide level how has the reaction been to your music by fans of black metal?

C: The work has had only positive feedback so far but I’m always embarrassed when dealing with these rankings. I would like to have a nice negative review that gives me the opportunity to confront a criticism. I don’t have a broad vision of the Black Metal scene, I don’t even know if it exists anymore as it has already been dead in my city for many years and I have never been interested in relating to other Italian realities.

10. Where do you see the band heading into musically during the future?

C: I'm currently working on some other material that wasn't included in the first album but I don't know if this will become a new work or if we'll end everything with this album. I don't want to plan anything, if the supreme light wants it and I feel the need we will release a second album.

D: We are artists before being a band. Our lives are very full of art.

11. What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?

C: Surely the primary source of inspiration was the darkness and frustration that I had inside me and with which I have been fighting for more than 20 years. I've been at the bottom of the abyss and kept going down until I almost reached the point of no return.

During the composition of the songs I was inspired by the classic bands of the second wave of black metal such as Mayhem, Darkthrone, Gorgoroth, Emperor and others. Ondskapt's album Draco Sit Mihi Dux was a source of inspiration for the overall atmosphere. Currently I listen to everything that arouses my interest, without distinction of genre.

D: Of the old good ones Black Sabbath must be cited. There is a mild influence from the American death scene in some vocal tracks. Would be difficult to say one band, let me say Morbid Angels only because I like their creativity. Panzerfaust of Darkthrone which is one of my favorites together with Filosofem of Burzum and Freezing Moon track of Mayhem.

As I said Abruptum had a certain influence for attitude and the creative path shown in the compilation made by Euronymous published DSP.

From the gothic scene Anna Varney of Sopor Aeternus till Songs From The Inverted Womb.

At the time of the end of composition of Ieorofania there were a few band that where emerging or came to my ears which I appreciated, beside my obsession for Diamanda Galas and an appreciation for some Cold Meat releases and Italian industrial and power electronic scene, those where: Odskapt, Blut aus Nord and Sunn o)))

I would also tell you what I never liked: Metallica, Iron Maiden, all abyss studio production, synthy neoclassic black metal.

Since 15 years I don’t listen to modern nor western music. I’m a performer of ottoman classic music and I love traditional, deep, classic and sacred music from different traditions. The core of black metal has thousands of years, epic music has thousands of years, and dissonance, tension, sacredness of sound, atmosphere are here since far before electricity. Real power is in the Tradition.

12. Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?

 C: Always experience art with intensity and passion and sacrifice yourself for it. Creation feeds on the tears and blood of fallen artists. Search within yourself for the primordial energy that can create or destroy everything and sanctify it to your cause. May the Supreme Light of the Sun shine upon you and illuminate your path.

D: I hope that this music will bring you to see where we are going. Where our thoughts and deeds are going. To fly to the end faster. There is no meaning in compromising, in playing. Go to the darkness. Go… it has no end. The end is you. What you can hold. After that you will be broken. Some of you will suicide like my friend Marco Corbelli “Atrax Morgue” pioneer of power electronics, and many others. Some will be paralyzed by darkness during sleep, and go insane. If you like to play with the fire of Hell, play well. Be serious. And look… is really Hell on Earth. Now think of Paradise.

Might the One aid us and you with a Spirit of His

https://ierofania.bandcamp.com/album/ierofania