12.02.2009

   

PURGATORY

interview with René Kögel


 

by dalia "gryphon_spirit" di giacomo ___ 

   

 

organized by Mr. René Kögel  and dalia di giacomo

purgatory       Animate Records

 


"
Cultus Luciferi, the Splendour of Chaos
Luciferianism

 

 

 

 THERE IS ONLY ONE MOTTO: NO PRISONERS!

 

Hails René!  

First off thank you for this opportunity to interview a founding member of Purgatory, the German cult concerning pure uncorrupted Death Metal. By the way cult…  Purgatory has just celebrated 16 years of activity, precisely on January 31. What does it mean for you , after all, 16 years of extreme Metal?  Dippoldiswalde again, isn’ it?

Hailz Dalia and thank you fort he opportunity to hold an interview with you! Yes we’ve celebrated our 16-year-anniversary on this years’ 31th of January. This took place in the course of the Break The Silence IX together with ASPHYX, DARKENED NOCTURN SLAUGHTERCULT, MUCUPURULENT and THRUDVANGAR in Dippoldiswalde. The event was very well visited with 600-700 people and a great success for all parties concerned! We’ve also played some older songs with former bandmembers, which made the whole thing really special for us and represented 16 years of PURGATORY. Altogether it was a great retrospect on the history of the band, although it’s about time now to look forward again.

 

René, could you imagine a life without your guitar?

Well, what’s that supposed to mean, a life without a guitar… music and the band take a big part of my life. Though you’re – when you’re not doing this professionally – pretty limited, because there are some other things in life like our jobs etc, which also have a high priority. But it surely wouldn’t work without, because I would miss too much. I’m too much involved in metal, that I could just let it go and leave it behind.

 

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at PhotobucketWhen did you begin to play and why this choice? Which was your road to metal?

My first contact with metal was pretty early with bands like AC/DC, SCORPIONS, KISS, ACCEPT and MOTÖRHEAD. In the course of time I was more and more interested in harder stuff and finally got to Death Metal. 1987 I started to play the guitar more or less intensely. But it lasted until 1989, when I had my first band with MUSICAL MASSACRE. Honestly, I actually can’t tell you, why I came to the decision of taking the guitarist’s position. It was just the urge to make music and all the other instruments were probably already taken… ha,ha,ha. No, seriously: I came to playing the guitar through a friend, who played in a local Thrash cover band called HELION, which we supported back then. At that time you didn’t have such possibilities in visiting concerts like it’s the case today. It was also pretty difficult to get a hold of sound carriers of any kind in the east of Germany before the unification of the country, but we compensated that by active tape-trading. A hard but intensive time for the scene!

 

When I saw Purgatory live, in the far 2002 (Wärchof-Luzern), I was impressed both by the great technicality of the band and by the incredible authentic force and pressure of the relentless sound put on the stage. Listening to your latest albums and watching the live videos on youtube I don’t get the impression that something in the band’s temperament has changed with the time… Which are the most common comments and feed back you get from the audience today?

The reactions about our concerts are mostly very positive and it’s of course a privilege to hear, that we leave such an impression with our live presence. We ourselves have always seen us primarily as a live band and it has always been the philosophy of PURGATORY to play energetic and intensive gigs. And we don’t care how many people are present, because we will always give 100%  and when the tank rolls, there is only one motto: no prisoners!

 

You may believe it or not, but a picture vinyl of Purgatory, bought after the show at Wärchof,  still hangs on a wall at my home… how many vinyls from Purgatory were released? Which are the less known details about Purgatory’s discography?

Vinyl is and has always been a huge constituent of our history, because we’re all big fans of the good ol’ vinyl. That’s why we’ll also try to release all our releases in this form in the future.

- 1993 LivePerversion tape

- 1994 Psychopathia Sexualis Ep

- 1995 Sadistic Spell Ep

- 1996 Damage Done By Worms Cd/ PicLp 

- 1997 Split Ep with SEIRIM

- 1997 Bestial Cd/ Lp

- 2000 Blessed With Flames Of Hate Cd/ DigiCd/ Lp

- 2003 Split Ep with POLYMORPH

- 2004 Luciferianism Cd/ Lp/ DigiCd+Bonus DVD

- 2008 Cultus Luciferi – The Splendour Of Chaos Cd/ Lp/ Digi Cd

 

 

Among the many concerts you regularly deliver each year, the festivals/open air’s take a large portion, for example Fuck The Commerce, Party_San, Obscene Extreme, Zabbaduschder, Walpurgis Metal Days, just to name few of them. I suppose Purgatory feel at ease in events like Festivals…

As I’ve already told you, we see ourselves as a live band and thus we’re naturally most comfortable on stage. Of course it’s always something special playing on several festivals, since there is a certain atmosphere that pervades festivals and you can reach and get to know a lot of people.

 

 

 

Malta 2006. Why Malta? How is the scene there? Did you visit anything particular in Malta extra-concert? Is it still  possible to order a couple of   Malta Shirts  (they were limited, isn’t it)?

It was something really special for us, when we got the first opportunity to play a show in Malta in 2006. Most of all it was interesting to get to know the domestic scene there. We have a lot of fans there and the scene is actually very distinctive. There are rather many pretty good bands like for instance THY LEGION, BEHEADED, SLIT, ABYSMAL TORMENT, ANGEL CRYPT and MARTYRIUM to name a few. Because of the very positive feedback, which we got in 2006, we gave another show in Malta in July 2008. In cooperation with our label ANIMATE REC. we also created the limited Malta shirt you mentioned for this event, especially to thank our fans there. And yes, we still have a very few number of these left.

 

After many years of collaboration, Purgatory left  the label Perverted Taste changing to Animate Records (that has  released the band’s 2 latest albums “Luciferianism” and “Cultus Luciferi - The Splendour Of Chaos”). Why this change?

We had several reasons for our label change to ANIMATE RECORDS. There were some changes on the premises of PERVERTED TASTE, which made a further cooperation in the usual way not possible anymore. They were still interested in us, but they also felt, that a change would be the best for the band. And so we agreed on a break-up. But we still have their support in various things. We’ve decided for ANIMATE RECORDS, because we already knew the guys for a long time and Andy the label boss held the position of the bass in our band at that time.

 

We have many readers in America: how could you invite an American metalhead to listen to Purgatory’s music? Which are the main differences , in your opinion, between Purgatory’s Pure Fuc*ing Deth Metal and the American Death schools?

I think PURGATORY feature some influences of the American old school Death Metal scene, whereas bands like IMMOLATION, INCANTATION, SADISTIC INTENT, MALEVOLENT CREATION or VITAL REMAINS are to name here most of all. But still we see ourselves more deeply rooted in European old school Death Metal than in American Brutal Death. Since taste in music is of course always differing everybody has to decide for themselves, which kind of music he or she prefers.

 

2004: Luciferianism, 2008 “Cultus Luciferi”…are maybe these  albums the very first 2 parts of a possible trilogy?

It could be possible that we will let those two albums follow another one with a similar lyrical concept. But we will see, what is going to develop in the future, since we’re already intent upon writing some new songs. What we can say is that our next album will be by all means also very dark and filled with hatred. “Cultus Luciferi” is thematically a seamless continuation of “Luciferianism” and the idea of a trilogy does actually sound pretty interesting to tell the truth.

 

Although I am more for Melodic expressions of Death Metals, I find these albums brilliant. Brutal yet enjoyable and appealing, Rare things for bands who make pure death as their flag.  Which is your key of success?

We are of course proud to get such a feedback on our records, but I can’t tell you any reason for that. I suppose our fans appreciate our long-lasting and honest work. We are always working hard on our songs and we trust our gut feeling for that matter. We attach great importance to a very dark feeling, which the songs should convey. I think, that nowadays a lot of bands lack this old school character because of extremely high technical ambitions. But basically the listener should rate our records for himself.

 

Which  songs of Cultus Luciferi, once born,  truly impressed their creator itself: Purgatory ? and why?

Every band member has probably his own faves on „Cultus Luciferi“, but seen as a whole we are very pleased with the final result of the record. We have to some extent worked differently on this album and put more emphasis on details than on the preceeding ones during its developing process. Finally a song will only land on the record, when every member of the band is totally satisfied with it.

 

In which extension Purgatory mix fast palm muting with fast picking, if ever?

The degree and the types of several techniques are dependent of the particular overall picture of every song, which it shall have at the end. The two mentioned techniques take of course a huge part in the song writing process, because PURGATORY stand for fast and brutal Death Metal. But the atmosphere and the feeling is always above technical ambitions.

 

How do you perceive the evolution of metal during these 16 years?

If you yourself take a part in metal, then you automatically follow its evolution independently from seeing it negatively or positively. The German Death Metal scene e.g. has improved qualitatively in the last years and can seriously compete internationally. Since we’re also supporting several organizers and bands outside of our band, we get to know its’ development very closely (e.g. new bands in all of the differing genres of metal)

 

What do you think about  samples?

It depends on how the samples are used. The Polish HATE work really well with it and use this method to create a cold and dark atmosphere. We’ve also used some samples on “Cultus Luciferi”, which were created by an artist called REIREA from Canada.

 

How is a typical Purgatory backstage?

Huge amounts of beer, blood, leather, spikes and lightly clothed women… ha,ha,ha. No, we think that a backstage must be most of all a quiet place for the respective band to absolutely concentrate on their following concert. So it’s not really important how it looks as long as it’s clean and dry.

 

Our last question is the Game: for the bands we interview for the first time we propose the Game of the Tower. On the top of a very high tower 3 bands wait for you. You can kick down 2 of them , saving only one.

The 3 bands for you are  DISTURBED   -  MORBID ANGEL  -   CANNIBAL  CORPSE

 

MORBID ANGEL would definitely be left on the tower, because “Altars of Madness” was a groundbreaking album, which fundamentally coined the Death Metal scene.

 

PURGATORY:  UPCOMING SHOWS 
Apr 4 2009 8:00P
Rock It Aalen, 73431, Baden-Württemberg
May 21 2009 4:00P
Legacy Fest Dessau, 06846, Sachsen-Anhalt
Jun 12 2009 8:00P
Death Feast Open Air 2009 Hünxe, 46569, Nordrhein-Westfalen
Jun 19 2009 8:00P
XII. Protzen Open Air Protzen, 16833, Brandenburg
Jun 27 2009 8:00P
Metal Open Air Fest Einhausen/ Meiningen, 98617, Thüringen

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