DESENSITISED
Interviewed by Corix BalucaNB: Hails to you Susan, watching at your video Black Gold, you look very attractive and beautiful lady, I really like when you’re head banging and backing up the grunt vokills, my first question is, who is your first crush? Hehe! I mean, are you still single?
SUSAN: Haha, no, I’m not. I’ve been in a relationship with a lovely man for five years now.
How are you and the rest of the band? And how’s the underground scene in your country?
We are all doing fine. The underground seems to be recovering from some sort of collapse I think. I mean, there are still a lot of bands in our country, but somehow we are getting better bands than a couple of years ago.
We all know that, not all human born metal naturally, when did you first learn to play guitar, who inspires you in playing guitar, and what kind of music you are playing when you first start learning to play guitar?
One of my major influences is definitely Bill Steer. When I started to play the guitar (I was 18 then) their album “Heartwork” had just been released and I really wanted to be able to play on that level which is really hard when you’ve just started! But I took guitar lessons with a friend of mine, Marcel Coenen (who is also an inspiration for me) and gradually learnt to master my instrument. I played all sorts of scales and licks. The first song I learnt was “Innerself” from Sepultura.
Mostly of my friends I’ve known start listening to hard rock, heavy metal, glam rock and punk rock music in their teenage years. When you were in your teenage days, what kind of music you are into? And when was the time you discovered brutal death metal music?
I started listening to metal when I was 11. My sister had dicovered this metal radioshow and said that I really should listen to that one once, so I did. The first bands I listened to were Saxon, Iron Maiden, Metallica, King Diamond and so on. Two years later I discovered bands like Kreator and Slayer and when I was 14 I became absolutely addicted to grindcore and death metal, haha! I discovered these bands also through that same radio station.
What did your parents say when you’re listening brutal music at home, did they think you are into evil music? Because you know, metal music is not for the norms.
Initially they didn’t like it at all, but in the end they realised that they couldn’t do anything to stop me from listening to extreme music. Now they’ve reached a point where they sometimes almost like it, haha. They showed our video to all their friends.
Alright, who’s idea of changing the band name CATAFALQUE to DESENSITISED? And why DESENTISED? Why not some kind of brutal/horror gore name since your band plays death/grind?
We all made that decision before the release of our first MCD, because in Belgium there was another band called Catafalque (Hi Chris!) and the Dutch Katafalk (Hi to the other Chris!) and it would simply look stupid if we released our CD under the same name, although I’d like to point out that we were the first “Catafalque”!
We chose “desensitised” because it really expresses what we feel. A gory name would definitely be out of the question, because if you know what we sing about in our lyrics most stuff is about the harsher sides of live and society.
How did it come up with the split cd with PEACH HER? Could you pls. Share some story behind it?
That was the decision of Grodhaisn productions. We had never heard of this band before. We chose to do a splitCD as we simply didn’t have enough songs for a full length CD and at that time we were on the brink of another change in our line-up, so we thought it was better to release another MCD than nothing at all.
You have just told me a week past that, the band just entered studio and you have just finished your new materials for the next cd release, is this plan to release in a label? Or just a self release?
No, we really hope to get a proper deal with this CD. This month we’ll round off everything (mixing / mastering) and then we’ll send lots of promo CDs to labels.
Is the band already touring in some other countries outside the Europe? And do you guys play in a squat venue and a d.i.y gigs? Is this kind of ethics still exists in your area? Or you prefer playing in big productions.
We have never done a tour so far, as we don’t have a label and it would simply be too expensive if we had to pay for it ourselves. We’ve played in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany so far. In the past we did play in squats but that’s really not something we aim at now, as the sound and other conditions are usually really bad. I mean, we played at a squat once and there wasn’t even a toilet! Come on……
How about touring in the third world country like my country Philippines? With your own expenses like the flight tickets? Do you still believed in the d.i.y ethics?
Why not? As long as we don’t have to pay for it ourselves….
Since you deal a bit of lyrics politically, what can you say about your country’s political situation?
It’s rather fucked up here! Our country is getting worse and worse. Most of our politicians are worthless. The whole system is too soft. Anything goes in this country, but I guess people are starting to realise now that we’ve exceeded some limits.
How about the issue about sexism, because you know lots of metal heads are sexist, since you are a woman that plays guitar in a metal band, what can you say about this?
I couldn’t care less, to be honest. I still don’t know what all the fuss is about. Why shouldn’t a woman be able to play the guitar or play extreme music? I think men who talk crap about females in extreme music are very insecure about themselves. I have to say that I usually get very nice feedback, which is great!
And how about abusing alcohol? Do you drink and smoke? Is any of the band love getting wasted like me? And how about smoking weed?
Haha, another misconception about our country I guess. Only two of us smoke and we all love to drink when we go out, but we do not get completely pissed or stoned if that is what you mean.
Word association time, just reply what ever comes on your mind:
Religion? - Lies
Emo punk? - Crap
Internet? - Great medium!
Death? - Great band ;-)
Occult? - See “Death”
Sex? - Best pastime there is!
Beer? - Horrible
Poverty? - Sometimes unfair
Black metal? - Not my cup of tea
Carcass? - Best band ever! I love them!
Zines? - Interesting to read and even better if they support your band.
Guitar? - Special feeling
Thrash metal? - Nice
Cradle of Filth? - Aaaaaarrrrgggghhhhhh
God? - Who?
Money? - Nice if you have it, but it shouldn’t be too much.
Alright, this questions sounds very tiring, hehe! But I don’t care, what to you is Love? And define Love?
Hehe, this is a weird question, but I’ll try to answer it properly anyway. I’m not a hippie, but I think everybody needs love. There is no doubt about that. I guess the world would be much better off if people put their energy in expressing their love for one another instead of blowing themselves up.
Thank you so much Susan, for answering my wasted questions, this space is all yours and promote your new material now.
Keep your eyes peeled for our new CD “Virus of violence” which is to be released somewhere in 2005!! Anyone interested in DESENSITISED feel free to mail us:
info@desensitised.nl or visit our website: www.desensitised.nl
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