The Greek Band Elysion released their debut cd in December, and to be honest, 'Silent Scream' took my breath away. The album appealing to anyone who likes their music melodic and tuneful. With not a filler in sight, the album picked up a 9.5/10 review on this very website, and has also been getting awesome reviews within the UK music press. I have now been given the opportunity to interview their lovely singer Christianna, so without further ado, here goes.
Hi Christianna, to be honest, 'Silent Scream' to my ears is one of the best debut albums that I have heard for quite a time now, from any band. Of course, the type of music on the Elysion album is right up my alleyway, but the musicianship and the production are spot on. Can you tell me a little bit about the background of the band, the other guys in the band and how all you guys came together?
Christianna:
Let me start by thanking you for all your kind words and for taking the time to get interested in Elysion and our debut album, i must say i blushed when reading all you had to say about Silent Scr3am :)...Elysion date back to 2006,when our guitarist and composer Johnny Zero founded the band together with Maxi ,our former singer. FxF, our bass player, and Petros Fatis, our drummer were invited to join the band right away and after a great number of gigs with an awesome feedback and the recording of Elysion’s demo, which again received great critics, the record deal with Massacre was a fact. That was the time when i myself joined the band, completing our line-up as it is today. I think chemistry worked perfectly among us all and Silent Scr3am was our beloved outcome.
Can you explain the name Elysion? It kinda has a mystical feel.
Christianna:
Well, the name Elysion has a kind of mythological reference. In detail, ’’elysian fields’’ in ancient Greek history were supposed to be an island where a sort of ancient Paradise would lie, a place of rest for the virtuous after their death .One of the reasons why we chose it was because we treasure all this dreamy concept behind it, thinking it is a perfect match for our somewhat romantic perspective of things, we love the fact that there is a strong sense of hope and promise behind all this.
And have any members of the band been involved or are still involved in any other musical projects?
Christianna:
I can say that we are all ,and have always been, dead-devoted to music. So as far as i know we have always been involved with musical projects and some of them are still running, but at this point they mostly work as a way of relaxing our minds and having fun, since due to Elysion’s increasing demands of time and energy we have all limited our extra activities down to a minimum. We are addicted, what can i say? Our way to relax ourselves from music is to play more music...
Cool, being you are from Greece, I do understand that there is quite a bubbling underground music scene there. Would I be correct?
Christianna:
Absolutely! We are very proud to see that especially over the last years there has been a great progress when it comes to the steps taken by Greek bands to exceed the boarders, apart from those who have successfully done so , like Cepticflesh, Rotting Christ or Firewind. We are very lucky because being able to perform live a lot, we get to share the stage with amazing upcoming bands who have what it takes to succeed, of course that means that competition is constantly rising but we are happy about it. It is always a great thing to have the standards go up, it helps us evolve and constantly strive to be better.
You to my ears have a totally awesome voice, being able to sing really powerfully or indeed quite softly. Have you undergone any vocal training prior to your musical career, or indeed during your musical career?
Christianna:
...again,i’m blushing...i have studied music for quite a few years but haven’t gone through any vocal training, apart from the one i tried to give myself ,that is. i have always wanted to be able to sing my soul out, and to do so there are endless different techniques that i have always admired and tried to learn from. This ‘’self-coaching’’ of mine has been going on for over 15 years now, but i guess i will never stop learning, it is the nature of music to never be able to say you know it all. Gladly i still am a very patient and enthusiastic student!
Basically, what made you get into music and who also would you class as your influences?
Christianna:
I think i have to thank my father for the musical genes , he was an opera singer so even my very first memories as a child were full of notes and melodies, i couldn’t have escaped all this magic...When growing up all this ‘’female-fronted’’ atmospheric metal burst out had not yet occurred, which apparently was a good thing because i had to struggle to find my own voice without the temptation of unconsciously copying someone existing. Of course i could never deny my obsession towards the ‘’great’’ ones: Bruce Dickinson and Freddie Mercury are two of my dearest male voices ever. Still, I am very open-minded about music so my influences come from opposing backrounds, and since i try to listen to as much music as i can, different things sink in constantly and they are blended with my personality as a singer.
Bruce and Freddie to my ears are totally awesome too, being myself a Queen and Iron Maiden fan. Anyway, Massacre Records I think have been totally awesome in signing Elysion, how did the record deal come about?
Christianna:
We were totally blessed in all aspects concerning this debut album… the material we had to work with appeared very promising from the beginning, so once our demo was recorded many labels got interested in Elysion, something for which we couldn’t be more grateful . Massacre Records was one of them, and of course signing up with one of the leader labels in this industry was a no-brainer to us. Having all the support such a label can provide was definitely a big advantage to us, but it was also a great responsibility to measure up with their faith in us so we knew we would have to work hell hard to make the best out of everyone’s trust, which I think we did.
And getting the mastering done by Ted Jensen as well, how did that happen? as anything with that guy's name on it is normally top class stuff. And 'Silent Scream' is no exception to that rule.
Christianna:
We consider our sound to be very simple and straightforward, but at the same time strong and alluring, so our goal was to have a production that is perfectly balanced and focuses on the beauty of the songs rather than on the instruments themselves. Working with a mastermind like Ted Jensen was one of the most honouring things to us concerning this album, we had never dreamt that we would have someone of his talent and experience work on our debut album! We have been admiring his amazing work for years so once this collaboration was a fact we totally trusted Jensen to do whatever he though best with Silent Scr3am, which of course he did. When we listened to the final outcome of the album for the first time, we knew it was all we had ever wished for Silent Scr3am to be.
Recording an album that to my ears is near perfect, what was the studio experience like during the recording process?
Christianna:
It was a very creative and magical time for Elysion, because we got to witness all our feelings and ideas forming their final shape day by day. We should definitely give great credit to our producer, Mark Adrian, who did an amazing job with the entire recording and mixing process and therefore ‘’fed’’ Ted Jensen with a great platform to work on and master the album. I think the relationship between the producer and the band when recording is a key ingredient for success, and Elysion couldn’t be luckier! Mark Adrian, besides being a fantastic producer and musician, is also a great psychologist when it comes down to bringing out the best in us all, so the whole recording period was a peaceful, un-stressful time during which we gave birth to all our thoughts and emotions.
Are there any plans to get the album released in the USA, as I have a feeling 'Silent Scream' will go down a storm there?
Christianna:
In fact, i think by this time Silent Scr3am will have been released worldwide, including USA, for which we are more than thrilled! We are also waiting for Silent Scr3am release in Japan on the 7th of April, again a very honouring opportunity we most treasure! i cannot even begin to explain what a great chance all of this is to us, to be able to communicate our music and share our energy with everyone, and we definitely cannot wait for our tour to begin to be able to visit as many countries as possible. Still i should say that we don’t categorize markets because we address our music individually to each listener and not to a so called ’’market’’. We feel the same thrill when performing in front of thousands or in front of very few, it is equally honouring to us to reach out to someone regardless of his location or the ‘’market opportunities’’ his country can provide us with.
Overall, what is your impression of the female fronted rock and metal scene?
Christianna:
It is actually quite funny to my ears to use the term ’’female vocal scene’’, since i think it is weird to categorize and endless list of bands not according to the music they play but according to the gender of the singer .Of course, the term does not bother me in any way, it just says very little about what a band is about. So, this scene is getting very crowded , with competition reaching extreme levels, but personally i see this all as a challenge rather than a threat. After the success of Evanescence or Nightwish (and many other leading bands of this field),the pattern of atmospheric music together with female vocals became a must, to me there is no such thing as a recipe in music and everyone who manages to succeed must have a unique personality ,a distinctive character for which they can be loved. We as Elysion, wish to be embraced for who we are and we are rather romantic thinkers who believe that whatever the difficulties or the competition there will always be room for talented people.
And regards you yourself, are you a full time musician?, or do you have a dreaded day job to pay those dreaded bills :)?
Christianna:
..Dreaded bills are every musician’s worst nightmare i guess! Well, in Elysion we are all quite lucky about this because even our day jobs are music-oriented, most of us have music engineering degrees or other sort of music studies so we are more than happy to be able to make a living out of what we love the most! Still, we are all 100% devoted to Elysion and we ll be glad to give everything else up to follow our dream!
And when you are relaxing, what type of music do you chill out to?
Christianna:
I like a whole lot of different kinds of music, i love all fields of metal and rock but also folk music, so i get to listen to something according to the mood i am in. I prefer anything that can take me away, make me lose myself in the music and then takes me back home, safely and magically.
Do you have any hobbies outside of the music industry?
Christianna:
I used to be involved in many different tasks and activities; lately i don’t have a lot of free time so a lot is given up. i love writing, i guess a writer is what i would be if i were not to be a singer. I also love to paint, so all hobbies i ever had are involved with arts but music is the one to definitely own my soul, i think it is humanity’s greatest achievement.
Are there any plans to tour the UK? I ask as there has been some awesome reviews here of 'Silent Scream', and I think Elysion live would go down very well.
Christianna:
...Visiting the UK is one of our greatest wishes for 2010! It does not have anything to do with the reviews, which of course have been most rewarding to us, this is something we have always wanted to do for several reasons, one of them being our huge amount of respect towards the scene and the people there ! We truly hope we ‘ll be able to make this happen, we will do all in our power to be able to make a live date with you the soonest possible and God knows we want this! Our European tour is bound to start in the second half of the year, as we have planned to do some touring in our homeland for the next months to come. Our full schedule will be announced soon and there is nothing we would love more than to have some live performances in the UK included ,it would be the number one reason for us to be excited!
And if you had a choice to tour with another band or artist, who would that be?
Christianna:
I guess this list could go on forever, considering there are so many bands and artists we have been looking up to for so many years...other than that, it would be a privilege for Elysion to tour with any band, as long as we have our common passion for music to share!(...i simply cannot resist the never ending, everlasting, indescribable temptation to say that if we are ever blessed to share the same stage with Iron Maiden, the date of this event will be forever marked on our skin as a tattoo, the very next day..:) Old loves die hard...)
Lovely stuff :) I have to ask if there will be plans to release a follow up album? If so, I will be first in the queue for a copy :)
Christianna:
...in that case i ll make sure to reserve the very first copy for you :) !Ok, Silent Scr3am has only been released for a few months now so it is quite early to talk about the next album, but music is what we live for and our inspiration never stops, so i can say there is already a great material existing to work on our second album...i can not say much about it but all i know is that we are working on something even stronger and more emotional, and we have many interesting new approaches and ideas ...so i guess we will just have to wait and see. Another thing we would most treasure would be to make a live album, maybe putting together some material gathered after our tour, that would definitely be amazing for us so we just keep our fingers crossed...
Christianna, I want to say thank you for sparing me your time. I wish you all the very best with this release, and with your band in general. Take my word for it, you and the album are awesome and I have fallen in love with it. Finally, is there anything you would like to say to visitors to this website?
Christianna:
The pleasure was all mine, to be able to share my thoughts with you and i feel most honoured! I would like to thank everyone, on behalf of all Elysion, for all your amazing support and the chance to have our silent scream be heard all the way to you...We hope to soon be able to see you all in a show and get to give something back to you for making us feel so special! Instead of another closure, we usually quote something from our opening track as a reminder and a wish to everyone to never let go of what we stand for..: ’’always a dreamer..always fighting for more than i can have’’
Thank you for helping us make our dreams come true guys!
Dave Smith (Apr 6, 2010)