(Comrade Aleks brings us another interesting and informative interview, this time with the German band Into Coffin, whose new EP will be released by Terror From Hell digitally and on CD upon the 4th of December.)
For timeless aeons human stared into the night skies and wondered if there were gods or demons living in the eternal depths of the shimmering void. And though humanity reached space – even with just one arm – we’re far from discovering all its secrets.
The German trio Into Coffin proclaimed with their full-length Into A Pyramid Of Doom: only extraterrestrial horror awaits amongst the stars. Their cruel and blackened death doom metal compositions were constructed under the influence of H.P. Lovecraft’s mythology and their own imaginations. The album was released just one year ago (and is on tape from Caligari Records), but Terror From Hell Records are already welcoming you to embrace The Majestic Supremacy Of Chosmic Chaos, the band’s thirty-minute-long EP.
As the label promises, this record “contains slow, heavy bulldozing riffs pairing with the pummelling drumming that create an uncomfortable tension right before the whole thing ruthlessly fall in an abominable ride into the somber blackness”. I’ve tried to puzzled it out with Into Coffin’s collective mind.
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Hi Into Coffin! How are you? What’s going on Into Coffin?
Hails! We are doing fine. Not too much going on right now. We had our last show for 2017 some weeks ago. Currently we are focusing on writing and rehearsing songs for our next full-length release.
There isn’t much information about the band’s lineup, can you introduce Into Coffin members?
Since the foundation of our project we have always worked with one consistent lineup:
G – bass / vocals
S – guitar / vocals
J – drums
The band was founded in 2015. How did your vision of Into Coffin change through these two years? What was your original intention when you started the band?
The original intention was to create a very raw / old-schoolish Doom/Death Metal which you can hear on our demo Black Ascension. Since then our style has evolved quite a bit, as you can hear on our first full-length Into A Pyramid Of Doom. The songs got more complex overall with a deeper approach in terms of songwriting and arrangement. Also, after the demo, we started to include cosmic and occult elements within our music.
Into Coffin has a new EP, The Majestic Supremacy Of Cosmic Chaos, on Terror From Hell. What drove you to record these two songs?
Yes indeed. It will be out on 4th December through the great Terror From Hell Records. What did drive us was of course the intention to continue with writing new songs and exploring more our sound.
How did you persuade Terror From Hell to take Into Coffin on board? And how does your relationship with the label work?
After Into A Pyramid Of Doom was finished we started looking for a label and distribution. So we wrote to a few underground labels which seemed to fit our attitude towards music. One of them was obviously Terror From Hell Records. Stefano answered very positively so we quickly agreed on an alliance.
Since then our relationship has worked out perfectly for us. We are really grateful to be able to work with Stefano & Francesca and for their endless dedication.
Into Coffin – Black Ascension
The debut album Into A Pyramid Of Doom brought the real ruinous, devastating vibe, and it seems that the EP keeps transmitting the same message. How did you work out this combination of death doom and black metal?
Yes, I think it is balanced enough. This combination is just flowing naturally in our songwriting with the wish to create obscure and extreme music.
Does that mean that you’ll try to keep the current sound of Into Coffin for the next full-length as well? You were talking that you have already started to write it. How much finished material do you already have?
We will definitely be looking for a bigger production overall. Besides that, we want to maintain most of our current sound.
Concerning the new material – during the last months we managed to to finish all songs for the next LP and we are planning to start a pre-production in the first months of 2018.
How do you see the features of The Majestic Supremacy Of Cosmic Chaos and how would you describe the main features of the band in general?
To sum it up – The Majestic Supremacy Of Cosmic Chaos contains atmospheric yet relentlessly oppressive Doom/Death Metal, spreading terror and hopelessness. This is what the band stands for and what we want to show with this EP.
Can you name which doom, death, and black metal bands formed Into Coffin’s sound? How would you describe your musical influences?
Like we said before: in the beginning the idea of the project was to do a very raw style of Doom/Death Metal like Winter, Asphyx, Autopsy, Disembowelment, Incantation. After the demo the sound started to change with more occult and Black/Death vibes. Bands that have influenced us during this period were bands such as Grave Miasma, Sonne Adam, Necros Christos, Temple Nightside, Vassafor, Archgoat, Fuoco Fatuo.
Most of these bands are relatively new – still they have had quite an input on our sound.
These two new tracks are almost thirty minutes long. Why didn’t you just add one more song to perform it as an LP? Or is it a herald for the sophomore full-length record?
We think it is not the time yet for a new full-length release. The new songs have changed a little bit from the past album. So one could see it as a preview for our next LP!
Did this recording session differ much from the one you had for Into A Pyramid Of Doom? Do you allow yourself the luxury of improvisation or is everything usually strictly organized?
The recording session was overall pretty similar to our previous one, except we decided to record in a more professional environment, but still with the same recording methods as on Into A Pyramid Of Doom.
And well, of course you need an organized work flow when entering the studio, no time for messing around too much. Nevertheless we allow ourselves to make some last minute changes if needed. For example, some drum patterns were improvised in the studio. But that was just how it naturally came together.
Where did you record these songs? And what kind of equipment do you usually use in the studio?
Both tracks were recorded at Marburg Records Studio. The whole recording process was finished within 2 days: the first for recording drums, bass, and guitars (which were recorded live actually) and the second day for re-amping and voices. We used the same equipment in the studio as we are using in a live situation. What stands behind this decision is simply that we want to articulate the same atmosphere live as on the record.
We don’t like the perfection. What is captured on the EP is just our natural performance.
The debut album’s lyrics were influenced by H.P. Lovecraft’s mythology. Was it a conceptual record or just a collection of images inspired by extraterrestrial horrors?
We would definitely describe IAPOD as a conceptional record. The only track that is not part of this concept would be “Black Ascension”, which was already present on our demo and we made the decision to re-record it for the album.
Really? What is the album’s concept focused on?
Just my personal theory of life after death.
Did you continue exploration of this theme in the lyrics of The Majestic Supremacy Of Cosmic Chaos? What stories do you perform from the new songs?
For this new EP I continued on this way of astronomy and old myths about the cosmos. In detail, the song “Crawling in Chaos” has a more astronomic and paranormal character, whereas the second song “The Evanescence Creature of Nebula´s Dust” is more in the Lovecraft fashion with many horrendous and mysterious creatures and indescribable devourer of space warriors.
How often did you play live in 2017 and how far did you get with the band? Is it easy to find a company to play with for such a young band?
We didn’t do many concerts in 2017. Less is more in our mind. We would rather play 1 great show with killer bands than 10 shows with a shit lineup. So yes it is indeed difficult as a young band to get to play cool shows but nevertheless we had the honor to play with some really great bands during our existence.
Until this point we did not have the opportunity yet to play outside of Germany but there are some things planned for 2018. So stay conscious!
Thanks for your answers. That was almost the last question. How would you like to sum up our conversation?
First of all we would like to thank you for this interview of course. Thanks for all these interesting questions, we had a blast answering them!
Also we would like to invite every fan of old-school Death/Doom/Blackened Metal to listen and support our new EP and we hope to see some of you Occult Space Warriors on the road soon!
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Pre-Order The Majestic Supremacy…
http://www.elektroplasmamusik.eu/shop/en/12-terror-from-hell-releases
Into Coffin:
https://www.facebook.com/IntoCoffin
Terror From Hell:
https://www.tfhrecords.com/terrorfromhell/
Into A Pyramid of Doom on Tape:
https://caligarirecords.bandcamp.com/album/into-a-pyramid-of-doom