MotherSloth!
What’s the name! Here in Russia we have a proverb about “mummy
sloth” who makes one postpone their cases and lay back doing
nothing. The Spanish power trio is pretty active indeed.
“Moon
Omen” is their second full-length release and it seen the light of
day on March 3rd
with the help of Argonauta Records. “Shadow Witch”, “Doomsday
Cyborg”, “Moon Omen” are nice names for nice doom songs, isn’t
it? Low and distorted riffs, melodic tunes and mammoth heaviness –
these are the features of new MotherSloth.
They’re
bulky, they’re psychedelic, they’re professionals who naturally
deliver really cogent stuff. I had few questions to the band, and
suddenly guys took a decision to answer as a whole band. Let me
introduce you Oscar (drums), Dani (guitars, vocals) and Moline
(bass)!
Salute MotherSloth!
How are you? What's going on in your camp?
Oscar:
Hello, we're fine, just started promoting our new album with a couple
gigs in Spain, doing alright.
Dani:
Yeah! Moon Omen is on the street fresh out of the oven!
Moline:
Hi, there!
The thing I must ask
you first is the origin of band's name, it sounds very Russian. We
have a kind of proverb here about “mommy sloth”; so how did you
figure out it?
Oscar:
Nothing to do with Russia or proverbs, we just tried to find words
related to the concepts of slow motion, laziness, and try to reflect
that with a sound. Sloths are fun animals to watch by the way!
Dani:
I’m going to look into that “mommy sloth” thing!
I remember how tight
and solid the band did sound on “Moribund Star” debut. How long
did that previous lineup members know each other?
Oscar:
We started in 2008, but I reckon the sound is more a thing related to
the fact that we did not want to add many spices to our recipe, we
wanted it to be raw and heavy.
MotherSloth – Hazy
Blur of Life
What did influence
on your vision of how the band must sound? What are your main
requirements to your own songs?
Oscar:
We basically start from different points every time, not necessarily
with an idea in mind, often we let the song take us somewhere, so
there are not many rules to follow, as long as the result pleases us.
Dani:
Lately, I imagine guitar riffs out of nowhere, and then months down
the road, I start figuring out the indirect influences from where
they might have come from. But I’m happy it’s not a thing about
sounding like a certain band already out there.
Moline:
Freedom. I guess it's better to just follow the song wherever it
takes you.
It seems that you
love distortion and different sound effects. What makes you pay so
much attention to it?
Oscar:
Actually, we started trying those sounds in the studio, our producer
Adrian Hidalgo suggested we use them and we ended up adding those.
The same for the bass guitar, we wanted it to literally blow your
speakers. If we could add distortion to the drums, it would be there!
Dani:
we want to add a gong to the live show, and already have a theremin
going on as well.
Oscar:
Haha, a gong!! That would be fun to play!
MotherSloth started
as an almost absolutely instrumental band, there's just one track
with vocals on “Moribund Star”. Now you have “Moon Omen”, and
there are a lot of vocals! What happened?
Oscar:
Not entirely true, our first studio work, was an EP called Hazy Blur
of Life, check it out.
What happened was, the
singer left us and we really wanted to continue, and not wait until
another singer appeared so we started working on many songs we had
that were instrumental. Luckily Dani joined in time to sing Dry Tears
on our first LP.
Dani: I was a
big fan before joining the band, I remember I went to see MotherSloth
live in Madrid when I came back from living in Berlin and I recalled
the band being so much better when it had a stable formation. I
thought I could help by joining in and giving a stable voice to the
project again, and it seems like it’s working so far!
You recorded this
album with new bass-player Adrian Moline, how did this record session
differ from the one you spent making “Moribund Star”?
Oscar:
It was very different, our previous bass player Alex, was really a
guitar player, so he did what he could. Before him, we had Ivan on
bass, who recorded the song Death Flower for that album, and soon
left the band. Adrian is an awesome bass player with a proper bassist
feel and dexterity so it was an entirely different situation.
Your way to “Moon
Omen” took almost 3 years, how did you spend this period? And do
you have some completed tracks that weren’t included in the album?
Oscar:
We started MotherSloth with the intention of recording one album per
year. Unfortunately, this has not been possible to do in the practice
although we had plenty of material to choose from. It has been
basically a time of personnel changes and plans that had not been
achieved. For this album, we had a couple of songs that were not
completed, written by the previous guitarist, we simply decided not
to use them and moved on from there.
Dani:
MotherSloth has a demo archive larger than the Kilimanjaro, the only
thing in the way of recording was the constant lineup change. But
that’s cleared out of the way for good now, there will soon be a
4th album!
MotherSloth – Wish
for Dawn
What did you want to
express through this material both lyrically and technically?
Oscar:
We wanted to go back to our musical roots. On Moribund Star we were
in the middle of a journey, one that took us to desert sounds, stoner
if you want to use a label. But in the past, we had more of a doom
vibe, and I wanted to recuperate it.
Some of the lyrics are
based on personal experiences, dreams, others are based on fantasy,
we would love to be able create our own mythology with names, places
and things like that. We had a concept for the album but we did not
want it to be a conceptual album with linked songs. But we feel happy
we have been able to express and suggest this concept musically, as
some people had told us.
I just read a couple of
reviews where it says our music has a Dario Argento vibe, you know,
Italian horror films, perhaps all those elements that are present in
your background as an artist start to slip in at a point and then you
have a mix of influences , in our case, sci-fi, horror flicks,
comics, literature. I guess those elements can also be felt in what
we do.
What's the band's
evolution on Moon Omen? How do you feel objective signs of your
growth?
Dani:
Well, a good sign of our growth is that we have Argonauta Records
(Italy), Stone Groove Records (USA) and Voodoo Chamber Records
(Germany) backing us up with our releases. And the album is selling
from the US all the way to Japan and Australia. We’ve gotta keep it
up!
Oscar:
Another thing can be the fact that we now feel very comfortable
working together and are able to take decisions quickly, in this year
and the last one the band has been very active and we are ready to
make a step forward into the next level.
How much of Spain is
in your music?
Dani:
Well, we love Spain, but it is hard to get your music out there over
here, there are a lot of classic heavy metal fans, but for other
metal styles the audience is a minority. In Moribund Star there was a
clear Spanish influence, but I think Moon Omen has gone back to our
American roots (USA, Perú).
Moline:
There’s a growing underground Stoner scene around here. Lots of
bands that make you trip and also shake your booty. That gives me
hope that Doom is next!
Let’s resume –
what are MotherSloth plans for 2017?
Oscar:
Touring, in the summer we will finish writing our next album, we are
already working on some ideas such as artwork and some songs are
ready. Some of them will definitely be played in our upcoming shows.
This year will also see
our first video clip, done also independently with the help of Cow
Army prod, for the song Shadow Witch. We are happy with the results ,
and are thinking of doing another one. Visuals are a great way to
express ideas and concepts too, something to add to our songs . It's
the perfect element to enhance our music and make your trip complete.
Dani:
Yeah! The 4th album in our minds and plans. We have gained a lot of
momentum!
Moline:
We want to play live and enjoy crafting new songs.
Words
by Aleks Evdokimov and MotherSloth
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