ORIENTALISM REDEFINED

Back in April 2004, the Evilution staff went on an alcohol-soaked excursion to the Loppen venue at Christiania in Copenhagen in order to see Mayhem perform live on tour with their latest album Chimera. While Bo Black scrutinised the grotesque archives of The True Mayhem with the chainsaw gutsfuckers Maniac, Blasphemer, Necrobutcher and Hellhammer (read the full interview in Evilution Magazine #1), I shot the breeze with kamikaze six-stringer Yukute Sumita from the Japanese death/grind battlewagon Defiled, scheduled to animate the venue multitudes together with the Czech black-metal outfit Manatark. Even with language difficulties, sound-check feedback and spur-of-the-moment queries, Yusuke put across a few interesting facts about their third full-length release Divination and the current tour activities. Banzai!

# What are your expectations for the show tonight?

“Well, in fact this is our first European show after releasing our new album Divination. We are very excited and very happy; basically we’re just looking forward to meeting a lot of metal heads. This is actually our first appearance in Denmark ever, and hopefully it will be killer.”

# And what do you expect to have accomplished when the whole tour is finished?

“Of course, we expect to spread our name and our music in Europe, but we also hope to have fun and make a lot of good friends. Basically, we look forward to having some great days with a lot of European metal heads.”

# Decapitated were initially scheduled to play with Mayhem on this tour. Do you know whatever went wrong with those arrangements?

“Actually, we don’t know what happened either. My guess is that it was probably business-related in some way. You would be better off by asking their management, because we really don’t know.”

# Whatever the reason, it has left you as the only death metal band on this tour alongside Mayhem and the Czech black-metal band Manatark. What role do you expect Defiled to fill out on the tour?

“Well, I look at it as a big chance for us to reach those people that primarily listen to black metal. You know, make this specific crowd aware of our existence. If people think our music is cool, they will perhaps become interested in the band and eventually buy our CD. As it is, we have to show people our live show, and the only thing for us is to do our very best.”

# Your latest album Divination from 2003 was a positive surprise for me in the death/grind department, as I consider it to be a substantial change for the better compared to your previous effort. Which musical direction did you choose to pursue after the release of Ugliness Revealed in 2001?

“Uh, it’s a very good question... Basically, we didn’t change our direction but rather just progressed further with our established style. We put other and new elements to the music, and that is what has brought us to where we are now musically. Following trends is plainly boring and our primary objective is to create something original. We have already made three full-length albums, and to go out and do another one in the same vein would simply not make any sense.”

# What is the title of the album meant to signify or refer to more specifically?

“Really, our intention is to let people interpret or read into it what they want. We put our own meaning into the title, of course, but if you listen to our music and read the lyrics you will create your own image or interpretation of it.”

# The album artwork was created by the much-admired visual artist Wes Benscoter. What was he assigned to bring out for the cover to complement the musical and lyrical content?

“Wes Benscoter is our friend and a very nice person. Actually, he lived in Tokyo five or six years ago, and we attended one of his exhibitions there. We met and talked with him at that show and became friends. Later on, we asked him if we could use some of his art on our album, and that was perfectly fine with him.”

# The production on Divination was done by Jim Morris, and as far as I’m informed you’ve recorded your other albums in Morrisound Studios as well...?

“No, we have never recorded there, but three of our albums have been mixed in Morrisound Studios. Our first album Erupted Wrath was done by Jim Morris, while his brother Tom Morris took care of our second album Ugliness Revealed, and then we decided to work together with Jim Morris again for the latest album.”

# Has it been your intention to bring out a certain trademark sound by having the albums mixed in Morrisound?

“Some people have criticised us for using that studio because they consider it to be nothing but downright name-dropping. But we feel that the producers at Morrisound are some of the finest engineers for this kind of music, and that they really understand what death metal is about. Simply speaking, they are very professional people and very easy to work with.”

# You have a rather extraordinary instrumental track on the album entitled “Floating Sediment”; could you tell me a little bit about how it was conceived?

“Our bassist [Norihisa Fukuda] has many non-metal roots and influences. When he started playing the bass, he listened to a lot of fusion jazz as well as a range of other music styles. He basically wanted to show people some of his influences and musical background with that track.”

# There is also a weird vocal piece on the album called “Eciov Errazib”, which if read backwards gives a certain suggestion to what the track is all about. How did that come about when you recorded?

“To tell you the truth, it was something we recorded to fulfil the contract because the album was not quite long enough. It’s actually just a reverse recording of some vocal tracks, which was an idea that just came up when we were in the process of putting the album down on tape.”

...And at that fateful moment the batteries on my dictaphone died out, as I discovered the next morning, with the eldritch notes of “Freezing Moon” still reverberating in my vestibular system. Without much ado, I emailed the unrecorded questions (as well as a few additional ones) to Sumita, who kindly obliged to rearticulate his answers in written form. Until that may happen, however, the above one-to-one transcription will have to suffice as our online feature on this rising extreme-metal outfit from the + 3000-fold island kingdom of Japan. Arigado!

Conducted and written by Misereion.