(Next month Hammerheart Records will release a new album by the Finnish death-doom metal band Asphodelus, and that impending event led Comrade Aleks to contact the band for the interview that we now present.)
It’s an interesting coincidence – the last interview I completed was the interview with Temple of Dread, whose new album Beyond the Acheron (which will be out on August 11th via Testimony Records) touches themes of Ancient Greek mythology. And the new album of Asphodelus, Sculpting from Time (out on August 25th through Hammerheart Records) deals with similar topics as well. But this is the only similarity between the bands, as Temple of Dread performs their own original death metal and Asphodelus are into very obscure death-doom with gothic flavours and the taste of the early ’90s.
So Asphodelus was born from Cemetery Fog, founded in 2012 in Finnish Hamina. Sculpting from Time is Asphodelus’ second full-length work, and naturally it’s the most mature material they have ever released. The main feature of these songs is a true sense of old school death-doom with an authentic vibe of “cloudy” Tiamat and a mix of a straight-in-your-face approach with atmospheric melodies.
Sculpting from Time sounds like a tape lost in 1993 and found nowadays, mastered, mixed anew, and served a bit raw. Here you’ll find out more about the band and their forthcoming release.
(Thanks to Marianne Aarts, Hammerheart Records, for organizing the interview.) Continue reading »