Kadavar
Twinmusix chat to Lupus from Kadavar to chat about their new Album and more
What can fans expect from Kadavar’s new album ‘Rough Times’ that’s comes out on September 29th with Nuclear Blast?
It’s definitely harder than any album before, it’s wider and has a big spectrum of different sounds like heavy electric wizard sounds to doom, Neil Young, Harvest, Southern rock sounds. The last song on the record is sounds without percussion and drums and French lyrics, and there are songs you would never expect to be together on one album.
Out of the Fourth Full length Albums that you have brought out which is your favourite and why?
This album is the best album. The last album was the most fun to record we wrote it and recorded it in two months, so it was pretty quick. First of all we had to build a new studio because we had no studio anymore, we rented an empty room in the beginning of January and we were building a studio for four months. Building walls, wiring things, and getting everything together. That was part of the whole concept and the process of the album, it was a lot of fun to build a new studio and record, something growing out of nothing, it was a lot of fun and really intense.
If you could have any band perform one of your songs which band and song would you choose and would it be in your style or there’s?
I’m a huge Nick Cave fan so if he played one of my songs I’d be really happy. On our first record there’s a song called living in your head. He would play his song in my style.
How did you come up with your band name and logo?
We were sitting together for three nights drinking really heavily, we had a piece of paper in the middle of the table and were writing names we came up with, we wanted to have something that was German that everyone understands. Something that was easier to remember and after three nights there was Kadavar left. When you write it in German it has a ‘er’ at the end ‘Kadaver’, but a friend of ours came up with a logo with the triangles and he said it would look better with an ‘ar’ at the end. “Kadavar” because it has three triangles at the end, so we thought, ‘OK that looks good.’ At that time we didn’t think about it much, just a small band having fun in a rehearsal space, playing from time to time a show in Berlin just local shows so we didn’t really think about it, but I think it’s a good name. The meaning of Kadavar is a dead corpse.
How did you come up with your music video for Last Living Dinosaur?
The same guy who did our logo, he’s a good friend of ours. We were sitting together and were thinking of something we could do for that album. He was there and said he would like to try saying it’s already in my mind and I have people. I could do your work, he wrote the script and got people together and we filmed it in one day in Berlin.
Who writes the music in your band or do you all write it together?
Its different, sometimes one of us only has a little idea and brings it to the studio and we continue it together and try to get everyone involved in writing. But its sometimes pretty stressful, three people, different minds, everyone wants to lead the songs into different directions and no one knows what’s the right way. So for this song we tried to write a whole song at home. Each of us was writing songs, then we brought it to the studio and played it for the other guys to see if they liked it. Then you change details or see if everyone is comfortable with their instrument, but that makes it much easier because three minds are sometimes too much.
Do you prefer playing festivals or small shows?
It depends on how the energy is between us and the audience. The festivals are amazing and work really well and you get this type of feeling. Sometimes you play a club show in front of 50 people and get the same feeling, it’s about the energy so I wouldn’t say one is better than the other it’s all about the audience and us anything can happen. I feel more secure and comfortable when I have a pub show and have a sound check, get used to the venue and have people coming in, it’s more like a process and you get more into that kind of thing then a massive festival, where you set up behind a stage. When someone else is playing you assume they are done and move your stuff on stage, in twenty minutes and you go with whatever happens. It’s a bit of a rush and you have to get use to it, sometimes it works sometimes it doesn’t.
What’s your Favourite Concert Memory?
The first time we played in Mexico city three years ago with Wolf Mother, we played five shows before that in the United States together and then went to Mexico city. There were four thousand Mexican kids going really nuts. It was crazy, I’ve never seen anything or heard anything like it before, they were screaming so loud, we couldn’t hear our amps anymore. We didn’t know if we were playing anymore because they were screaming like animals, they were bouncing the whole hall was shaking. It’s never happened before where such a big crowd was reacting to our music, that was a really intense night and every night since then we have gone back to Mexico, it’s always been really amazing.
What’s your craziest memory with Wolfmother?
They are really relaxed people, really chilled. On their last album there is a bonus track on their album a song called Wedding, you have to check it out. Me and my drummer wrote that song, Andrew Stockdale came to our studio in Berlin about three years ago and we wrote and recorded that song in one day. The area in Berlin where our studio was is called Wedding that’s why we named the song after, where the studio was, but we never heard back from him. Then some people wrote to us saying your songs on the record and we didn’t know that’s the first time we heard the song finished.
What is your Musical Influence?
The Stooges, the Damned, MC5, Grand Funk Rail Road, Jimmy Hendrix. I like the darker stuff and psychedelic bands like Halkwind, where Lemmy was playing before Motorhead and music like that. Late 60’s early 70’s.
What’s your Favourite Festival you have played at?
Cherry Fest in Melbourne last year. That was really Impressive it was a really cool small festival, really special location, special sound Cherry Bar is known everywhere around the world. That was really cool, I really like it because the atmosphere was really special. And I also like Austin Psych Fest in Texas we played four years ago that was pretty cool.
When you go on tour, how often do you change your set list?
Quite often, we try to do it every night, now we have started rehearsing our new album, so we will start doing six or seven songs off the new album. So we have between 25 and 30 songs we can play, we have to play 15 a night so we can switch as much as we want. Sometimes we switch songs on stage we go OK there’s a lot of power tonight, it’s a Sunday night people want to hear the slower stuff, if people want to relax we change it on stage. But we also don’t play in the same order every night and try to change it before we go on stage.
Has anyone ever asked up for a song while you are on stage?
All the time and they always ask for the songs that are never played and we cannot play. Almost every night.
What was your experience like playing at Download Festival?
It was a really short experience we got there played and left, it was raining which was good for us because we played in the tent and everyone wanted to get away from the rain. I think we had a really decent crowd; it was fun, the first festival we have ever played in England. It’s hard for a German band to play in England.
Do you ever change your lyrics in a live set?
Sometimes I’m totally into it and forget what song I’m playing and then I just sing something, or I sing the first again and again, I forget the other words, that can happen. If you play in countries in Spain or southern America it doesn’t really matter. In English speaking countries I always do pretty badly. If I’m so much into it I’m so over whelmed I can’t think anymore. It happened a couple of weeks ago we played at a festival and we went off stage and we had played a song for the first time in seven years and I was like dudes sorry I couldn’t remember any of the lyrics. The next day we had a festival and I played it like nothing happened the day before but for that day everything was completely gone, I made up some lyrics and I think everyone was alright, no one said anything so it worked out.
Check out kadavar's new album link here - Kadavar
