interview with Mass Deception

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In the middle of hundreds of bands that sound almost the same you discover a kick ass album as “Revelations” and then, suddenly and as by magic, you recover the fucking faith in Thrash Metal. Quoting the Bänziger, the guy we interview today, it all has “aggressive riffing, aggressive vocals, pounding drums and bass”. Read on and if you don’t feel the necessity to listen to it then…maybe you are pointing in the wrong direction and you should be seeking some glam metal or Aor thing. Thrash time. According to the guys this is first Mass Deception interview ever, here, on Metalbrothers.es (what else?). Enjoy it!
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Hello Bänziger and congratulations for the best thrash metal album of the year, at least in the opinion of the team on Metalbrothers.es
Thank you very much for this kind compliment. It means a lot to us that our music is appreciated this much in Spain.
Before listening to that thrash bomb that is “Revelations” we haven’t heard about Mass Deception, so please tell us your story
Mass Deception was created last year with the intention of creating music to perform live on a stage. Music that you can play with full intensity and fury. Getting back the fun in playing metal with five guys and rehearsing new songs to create something wicked. We’ve got a nice group together that sounds great when we play. So that was the main drive. Creating a fully functional no-bull shit metal machine to put our creative souls into. I played together with our drummer Søren since 1998. We had a band called Defcon-One and released two demos and three full length cd’s. Our vocalist Janssen also played in Defcon-One on the demos and on the last full length called ‘The Perfection of Slavery’. At the time of recording the three of us were the only ones left in Defcon-One, so it became more of a project then a band that could play live. We asked Van Den Beuken to join Defcon-One to play bass. He’s an excellent bass player that fitted right in. We rehearsed songs of ‘The Perfection of Slavery’ to do some gigs but we played only one last gig in a local venue and decided to pull the plug and start something fresh. New band, new name. To form Mass Deception we needed a second guitar player who can kick ass on a guitar. So Waltmans was perfect for this band. I know him from a band we played in together called Engine of Pain. If we jam together cool riffs and ideas pops up, always. I had written a song called “Weapons of mass deception” and Waltmans had written “Condemned to repeat” so we started jamming on those songs with the five of us. Fun and energy was back and writing songs became a natural process. Most of the songs were written in four months time approximately. Rehearsing these songs took us a bit more, but the decision to record the songs and put it on an album was the right one.
mass deception3It’s almost unbelievable that being a band formed only last year you have been able to release such a great album in 2016, you have imported some songs from previous bands or projects or something like that?
No, all new songs on this album. Most of the songs were written between October 2015 till January 2016. Except for “Weapons of mass Deception”. That is an idea I had worked out, but never used until we started Mass Deception. The same goes for “Condemned to repeat”. This is a song written by Waltmans.
Time to analyze what you offer in “Revelations”. We are talking about Thrash with a dark atmosphere, great riffs and solos and a little taste from cult acts from the past. In other words, almost the CocaCola formula
Songs do have kind of a formula to it. In my opinion a metal song needs bad ass riffing, killer solos, a rolling bass, drums that make your head nod and roaring vocals. As it being our debut album we paid a lot of attention to details you can’t do when you play live. For example the samples and touches of synths to create atmosphere and tie all the songs together. Twin leads, acoustic pieces and stuff like that. Those details make the album nicer to listen to and make the listening experience more intense.
Certainly, they do. How was the composition process of “Revelations”? How does a band compose a masterpiece as “Revelations”?
After we jammed a couple of times on “Weapons of mass deception” and “Condemned to repeat” we had a certain idea in our head of how the songs would sound like when we play them together. Because of the jamming, new ideas formed in my head and I started writing songs. Starting off with a riff from Waltmans or me and a certain drum idea. Writing a lot of lyrics at the same time and fit the words to the riffs and rhythm. All the lyrics were inspired after reading books from Michael Tsarion, George Orwell, Michael Tellinger etc. A lot of quotes from their minds form the lyrics. The song ‘They live’ is based on the movie with the same title. That movie says it all and fits right in with the rest of the Orwellian new world order, Annunaki vibe. After the first two songs were finished, complete with text and vocals on it, the rest was just a matter of inspiration and practicing a lot. Riffing together with Waltmans and working on song structures at home and rehearse those ideas with the five of us in the rehearsal room. After a couple of months we had enough songs ready and were so pleased with how it sounded that we decided to record a full album. We wanted the album to pound so we contacted Erwin Hermsen and booked the Toneshed studio at the beginning of spring and created “Revelations” with the six of us. The studio was intense but fun. Everyone performed at their best and a cool album was the result. Nice times!
Awesome. There are tracks as As Above, So Below where we feel more clearly that dark atmosphere I mentioned before
‘As above, so Below’ was our newest song at the time of recording. It was the first song Waltmans and me wrote together. Waltmans firing a thrash riff and I returned fire with a death/thrash riff. When we wrote this song we knew exactly what we wanted it to sound like. Epic intro and then hit the gas. It turned out heavy and intense. Aggressive riffing, aggressive vocals, pounding drums and bass. It certainly has a dark atmosphere to it. Musicaly and lyricly.
mass deception1Divide and Rule shows one of the stronger points in the band: the rhythmic section, it makes your sound so powerful
I am extremely happy with Søren and Van de Beuken as the band’s rhythm section. These guys have the perfect mix of effectiveness, power and virtuosity. They breath metal.
We also find some power thrash approach in Condemned to Repeat and a pure exercise of divine brutality in They Live
Condemned to Repeat is a ‘pedal to the metal’ song, we love it. They Live was and still is a great movie so if you call a song “They live” you must do the movie honor. The twin lead in the middle gets me on my toes every time I hear or play it.
Hahaha, it also turns me on, a beast of a song. Another proof of your classic base is that you include an instrumental song, Ancient of Days, where you show all your skills and good taste
The melody in this song is the same as the melody in the intro of “As above so below”, and the same melody is played again at the ending of “Unslaved”. Though it has no lyrics, it fits perfectly on the album due to the melody and it’s title. Richard Brunelle did a similar thing on “Blessed are the sick” with a brilliant acoustic piece. In between all brutality it is an acoustic resting point. The intro for “Unslaved” has the same effect. And after a more subtle song or piece, the songs with drums in it have much more impact.
Defiant to the End is the top moment for us. A psychodelic solo and a brutal pace, with a slow down end and a complete show time by Søren
What can I say? Søren is one of the best talented metal drummers in The Netherlands, period. Playing live with Søren on stage is like standing in the centre of a battlefield and have the feeling that here is no way out.
mass deception 1What has been the reaction to your album in The Netherlands, a country with long tradition in Metal?
Great. We have good reviews like from the biggest Dutch metal magazine Aardschok and a couple of other magazines. We also got great honest responses from friends and family which are most important for us.
Bänzigeri, in our review we have named several bands that seems to have an influence in your sound, but we would like to know by your own words what are really those bands?
For me my biggest influences are the more underground bands like Coroner. I always liked the viciousness in Tommy T. Barons riffing. Mike Davis and Sean McNenney kicked ass in Nocturnus. Nasty Savage, Sadus, Dark Angel, but also the bigger bands like Megadeth, Iron Maiden, Testament, Forbidden all left a bit of a mark. Death metal bands like Pestilence, Death, Obituary, Devastation, Demolition Hammer had excellent riffing and solos in it. All great bands with excellent musicians. But through the years of listening to metal you master your instrument, develop your own style and you just make music that feels good to you. In this case vicious thrash.
And you do it very right, for all Thrash maniacs to enjoy it. This is your first step, if there was justice in the Metal world (I doubt it) you should have many doors opened right now, to gigs around many countries, a big label, etc
If we had money to spend or were good at kissing ass we could play everywhere. You have to know people in metal world. Metal became an industry, like an image you can buy, like Rock star bull shit. It is nice that we have some good reviews and reactions on what we created. Things like this interview keeps the spirit up. It is better to keep the mind focused on creating new songs than on a scene that is rotting. To me it is all about the music not the image or money. Some nice gigs or festivals would be nice though. So if there is any concert tour promoter reading this: if you have a nice proposal, just contact us!
Amen. To finish up this almost perfect work you have got a great cover, it has some connection with the lyrics?
The cover, layout and lyrics are all connected. The two individuals on the cover are two Annunaki who are stationed on the moon Iapatus from Saturn. They alter the vibration of the earth which effects all mankind and keeps us in a slave like trance. A long time ago they visited earth and mixed their DNA with ape like beings and created mankind to mine gold for their stargate and healing. Later on they started breeding with the women who came from these experiments and successfully created the first fertile woman, Eve. Adam was created from the DNA of Eve’s rib. Then the creation of slaves could begin. That’s how the story goes. You can read this in the old testament, the Indian Mahabartha, the Norse Edda and in many stories that are written in the old days. All different books, all the same story! Nowadays, the elite know these stories and who our original ancestors are. The bloodline of the first line of successful sons of gods is still intact. The people who descent from this bloodline are the people in power…..at least some of them. The cult of Aton, the Brotherhood of the Snake, New world order, Royal blue blood…..all the same!..Same club… They know something we don’t and use that info to herd us like sheep and destroy this planet in an Orwellian way. They always ruled, and still do! A lot of books were written about this subject. It is an interest of me for a long time now and these books are a huge source for lyrics. No religious, satanic or political bullshit lyrics, just a history lesson and a warning for the future.
mass deception2Actually, it’s very interesting. The Thrash scene, as others, is full of many good bands but doing too many similar things or just replicating sounds from the past. It’s not easy to surprise or at least not sound the same as so many hundreds of bands…
I think most of the bands sound like copies of other bands because nobody does their own thing. Just sound like another band and you can’t go wrong. Wear the same clothes as they did in the 80’s and you are in the safe zone. We try to be different and we try to let our musical influences do the talking instead of a pre-created image.
How can any guy in the world buy “Revelations”?
Easy man. Just go to RVPrecords.com or visit our website www.massdeception.nl There you can find all the details!
Gigs… Are you touring? Any dates around for the next months?
No there are no gigs our touring planned yet. We are busy creating a second album and we play gigs along the way.
Well, if you are creating another monster then we can wait for gigs a little 🙂 But…, if this is the first thing we get from Mass Deception, I don’t dare to imagine what we can get in the future… any vision or forecast about it?
We are already writing songs for a second album. I think it is going to be more like the “As above so below” song. That song was written by Waltmans and me together, and that is the vibe we were looking for.
Nothing to add. Thank you very much Bänziger! And keep this level please, if you wanna add something…
Thanks for the interview! All you Spanish metalheads be sure to like us on the goddamn Facebook so we can stay in touch with you!