Interview by Miriam Cadoni
What is the fil rouge that connects Roman historiography with our era? On a first instance, any but if we dig deeper the Romans have taught us the basic behavior on how to be in harmony with what surrounds us. However, we processed their lesson and simply, distorted to our pleasure.
Canada’s ambient folk/doom metal band Völur, with their third album “Death Cult” recently released via Prophecy Productions, jumped into the unknown and offered us an interesting piece of thought to reflect on. To know more about it, we have interviewed Völur‘s singer and violinist, Laura C. Bates.
Hi Laura, welcome to Femme Metal Webzine. How are you and how is life treating you in these precarious days?
Hi Miriam, I’m well. I’m writing from my home studio surrounded by my violins who keep me company as I witness this bleak time in history. I’m grateful to have a roof over my head and for the health of my friends and family.
First of all, for those not familiar with Völur would you like to tell us how everything began?
The bassist Lucas Gadke and I were working as side-guys on tour with a folk singer. We’d been working in the same musical circle for years and we even had a stint in a bluegrass band together in the mid-2000s but it was on these long drives across the large province of Ontario where we really bonded in the van listening to Fairport Convention, Earth, Gorguts… etc.
We decided to start an experimental noise duo. Eventually, it became evident that we needed a drummer. Jimmy P. Lightning from DoMakeSayThink was with us for the first five years. Jimmy was understandably less enthusiastic about sleeping on floors on tour as he’d already done a lot of time on the road. In 2018 our buddy Justin Ruppel took over on the drum kit. He was already a regular collaborator and was a natural fit for Völur.
On November 13th, it was released via Prophecy Productions, Völur’s third album “Death Cult”. What would you like to share about its general production? When did you start to collect the first ideas for it?
We were fortunate to be able to tour “Inviolate Grove” and “Freyjan Death Cult” as works in progress. Being able to test-drive these two pieces in front of audiences helped shape them. “Dead Moon” was a completely through-composed piece, Lucas literally showed up one day with a stack of sheet music and I scrambled to put “Reverend Queen” together as the studio time drew near.
We also spent some days rehearsing and writing outside of the city at Justin’s parents’ farm. We managed to completely demo the album ourselves. If you’re reading this you’re and in a band, I can’t stress enough how integral this was to the process of “Death Cult”. We had these literal garage demos that we were able to ruminate on before going into the studio. These demos helped inform how we broke the songs into sections so that we were able to do multiple takes of a passage while doing the live off the floor bedrocks.
Blood Ceremony’s Alia O’Brien, who is our producer, came over and we combed through these demos. Alia listened objectively and helped us eliminate redundancies and distill the compositions. Together we made a color-coded spreadsheet (I love spreadsheets) detailing the sections of the compositions with a meticulous plan including metronome tempos, mixing references and a checklist of overdubs required to achieve our vision and best utilize our studio time.
What’s the main connection between “Death Cult” and Tacitus’s “Germanica” and how this transpires in the lyrics?
I credit Lucas with finding the inspiration for the album and imagery that informed the compositions. He has a tendency to get captivated by a concept in the best and most contagious way. Essentially, the passage from Tacitus’s “Germanica” details a tribe who were said to worship an idol of the earth goddess Nerthus. It said that she rides in on an oxen-drawn chariot and after days of citizens rejoicing she is cleansed in a secluded lake by slaves who drowned afterward.
It’s important to note that the information was received second hand and interpreted by the author and then we took our own liberties to shape it to best inform our vision. The album is an imagining of this night but we turned the worshippers into a frantic death cult, praying and dancing for the end of time and the rebirth of Mother Earth. Each of the four tracks is a reimagining of this endless night…thus “Death Cult” is four lyrical and musical variations on a theme.
There is a silver lining in the overall picture of the concept behind “Death Cult”, however, I was really impressed by what Lukas said in the press release and it’s the following one: “’Death Cult’ probably the closest thing to a political album we will ever come up with”. Why is that and which is your personal interpretation?
I personally don’t feel like it’s a big jump to go from imagining an endless ritualistic ceremony for Mother Earth to thinking about our modern opinions about politics and the environment. In this era of late capitalism, we’re watching public good erode thanks to hyper-individualization and consumerism. People are sacrificing the planet, their health, and their democracy for a twisted notion of freedom. If that’s not a death cult, I don’t know what is.
I think the featured cover art deserves a special mention here. In your opinion, what does it portray and how does it connect to the grand lyrical concept described here?
Firstly, Marie Cherniy is a genius! Her Instagram is @mcher.art. We sent her the following excerpt of the Tacitus passage and a very rough mix of the album, and asked her to make a depiction of Nerthus the earth goddess:
“On an island of the sea stands an inviolate grove, in which, veiled with a cloth, is a chariot that none but the priest may touch. The priest can feel the presence of the goddess in this holy of holies, and attends her with the deepest reverence as her chariot is drawn along by cows.”
We gave her complete freedom to run with the idea and we could not be more pleased with the result.
What the future holds for you and how the pandemic impacted your original plan?
In March before things shut down I was looking forward to a considerable amount of international touring. Primarily for indigenous alternative artist iskwē. I love working in her band and was sad to see the postponed dates and experience a loss of momentum.
Professionally I had to do a 180 and re-prioritize on teaching violin as a means of financial survival. I continue to teach a considerable amount online and I busy myself with a lot of home recording for other artists and film scores. In another version of reality, Völur would be touring “Death Cult” right now.
So, Laura, we’re almost at the end and with this please be free to say hi to your fans and your readers. Thank you so much for this interview.
Thank you Miriam for your time and interest. Thank YOU for reading and I’d like to give a special shout out to “The Doom Hag” which is a global community for women in heavy metal.
https://www.facebook.com/VolurDoom