Interview with Stellar Master Elite

A few weeks back I covered Stellar Master Elite's excellent album "II: Destructive Interference Generator" which you can check out below. Somehow this killer doom/death group was new to me, but after covering their epic album I immediately wanted to know about his group and what made them tick. Now I am pleased to post the interview that I recently had with this very cool German band. I want to thank them for talking with me and sharing more about how they are and how they roll. Enjoy!

Andy-First things first. For those who are not familiar with your band could you give us a brief run-down on how Stellar Master Elite came about?

Marco-Well, we both had our own projects in the past. Then we decided to start a project and here we are. We have a similar musical interest and the same vision on how SME will go on. That´s comfortable, especially for the workflow.

A-I used the term "commercialized blackened doom" to describe your sound. How would you describe it though?

M-"Commercialized blackened doom" isn´t the kind of term I would use. Why commercialized? Because we sell records? I would describe it as black/doom/ambient/synth just to list the main elements. Actually I don´t like descriptions like that though, we do what we want to do. The music which results out of our rehearsals and ideas is what is inside of us. It´s us.

Dave-"Commercialized" would mean we earn money. I would ask why I pay so much to keep this project running rather than getting money for it. "Blackened Doom" sounds good to me but i don´t give too much in phrases like this. (Editor's note-Perhaps "Accessible Blackened Doom" would have worked better as their music isn't mass-produced, but rather it's easy to get into even as it packs a nice and twisted underground vibe!)



A-Even by black metal standards your sound is outside of the norm. Was that a conscious decision?

M-No, it wasn't a conscious decision. It just happened. We listen to a lot of obscure stuff at home, maybe this has some influence on us and the sound. But i´m kind of happy about the fact that we don´t sound like the norm because norm means to be adjusted to something and we are not adjusted to a musical genre or to people that think they know how a specific genre has to sound like. So if we want to add hand claps or synth sounds to our songs we do it. Purist "Black Metal"- people may hate us for that but we don´t give a fuck.

A-Where do you see yourself fitting in when it comes to the black metal scene?

M-We are not part of a scene.

A-Fair enough. Now, you took your name from a Thorns song. Were you big fans of the band?

M-Thorns is one of our favorite bands and their self-titled album is a masterpiece of "modern" black metal. We don´t want to be, we are not and we will never be a "Thorns Tribute Band" though. We chose the name because it fits perfectly to our lyrical and musical concept.

D-The lyrical and musical concept was the main reason for choosing this name. We would never claim to be a coequal to Thorns. It isn't possible. But this band still had a huge impact to me that still resonates.

A-Who are some of your other favorite acts whether "metal" or not?

M-Pink Floyd, Virus, Sonic Reign, Dodheimsgard, Aura Noir, Sunn O))), Sleep, Pentagram, Celtic Frost, Obelyskkh, Darkthrone, Black Shape of Nexus, Voivod, Hexvessel, Beastmilk, Deathspell Omega, The Ruins of Beverast, Blut aus Nord, Absu, High on Fire, Myrkskog, Zyklon, Code. Just to name a few.

D-Just too much to tell . At the moment I mainly listen so sci-fi scores and experimental stuff.

Q) There are quite a few surprises when it comes to your new album. I pointed out songs like "Pattern of Perception" and "Empty Shells of Being" as just two examples of how S.M.E. pushes the envelope sound-wise. Any "experimental" tracks in particular that you were pleased with the end result?

M-?

D-I don´t understand that question, sorry.

A-Alright, sorry that was kind of a vague question. Let me put it another way. Are there any favorite songs on your new album?

M-I can´t tell you specific songs because I see it as a whole. I think every song needs each other to create the whole album in the end. For me, it´s like a circle.

D-"Beyond Light" and "Destructive Interference Generator" are my personal favorites, but I´m really satisfied with the album in general.

A-Does S.M.E. play out live? If so who are some of the acts you've played with?

M-No, we are two band-members. To play live we would need session members but we A) can´t find the right people in our area and B) prefer it to create new music and being creative in our rehearsal room. We will start recording and pre-producing our 3rd album soon.

D-Besides music we are full time workers. As there is not much time to work with more musicians on a concept to bring the same quality to stage. A two man band is much easier to handle than a full band. It would take a lot of time to fit more than 2 egos together. If you have such a limited amount of time, you have to set priorities.

A-Where can people find out more about the band and order your new album?

M-From our label (www.exciterrecords.com), from us directly (www.stellarmasterelite.com) and from various distributors worldwide

A-I'll give you the last word. Is there anything you'd like to add?

M-Thank you for the interview and the great review as well as your interest in our band! Watch out for our new album "II: Destructive Interference Generator" to be released on October 4, 2013 through Exciter Records.

D-Thank you so much! We really appreciate it.

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Stellar Master Elite-II: Destructive Interference Generator

Exciter Records
2013

Commercialized blackened doom? Is there really such a thing? Before listening to Stellar Master Elite's new album I would have said no. Or at least I think I would have said no. Maybe I would have just said that yes, it could be possible, but what would be the appeal? As it turns out there is more then enough here to appeal to heavy metal fanatics or, better yet, those who have always thought that what the world needs more then anything right now is a blackened, sample-filled and slowed down to a Black Sabbath-lie crawl, hard as a rock metal album. If that's a need then you just might want to consider this Trier, Rhineland-Palatinate (Germany) based band. Formed in 2010, the band is technically just Dave (Crucifixion, Massacre The Wasteland, Rostnagle) on guitars, bass and synthesizers and Marco (Wintermoon, ex-Necroccult) on drums and vocals. That said, it appears as if more then half of the vocals on this album were provided by Benjamin Borucki of the black metal band Sonic Reign. Stellar Master Elite (or SME for short) released their well-received debut album, "I", back in 2011 and, from all accounts, it also displayed signs that the band was more then willing to paint outside the lines. But that was only one album. To carve out a career of playing music that falls outside of the norm though is something else all together. Even in something as nonconforming as black metal it takes skill and a huge set of balls to stand up and dare to stand out. Avantgarde metal has certainly been creeping about in the black metal scene for sometime now so that might not be so shocking in and of itself. But taking it to such an extreme as this? Yeah, it's a whole new world. But, we need to turn back around and see what exactly it is we have here right? Now, while "I" was a self-released album and all, and reportedly a damn fine sounding one at that, the band is now signed on to Exciter Records which should help break this band into new markets. I do have to admit something funny though before I go on any further with this review. I was all set to criticize the band for their self-absorbed and pompous name (Stellar Master Elite? Really? It's just like how it was pointed out in Robot Chicken where you have the leader of the Autobots, Optimus Prime, who had to have a name that said "Yeah, I'm the boss so I need a name that spells that out in bold letters!!!" Arrogant much?) when I saw that the band was actually named after a song by Thorn. You see, it does pay to read any/all of promo material/information that comes (often times packed in like sardines) with new albums! Anyway, I'm getting off track (yet again) so let's get back to this album and it's (give or take) 45 minutes worth of simply lovely metal. For these guys the bottom line seems to be blackish doom metal although, seeing as the vocals are actually somewhat clear for this sort of genre, it might actually lean closer to death-like doom. The usual, run-of-the-mill, raspy black metal rasps you'd normally expect to hear are not as present here and, when you add to that things like thrash rock ("Pattern of Perception") and even groove-happy, spaced out, Rob Zombie-like rock (about 1:40 into "Empty Shells of Being" things get downright wicked!), then you end up with a near-perfect example of how to keep even the darkest of genres interesting! I'd have never guessed it myself (that an album like this, from it's album artwork to the song titles, would be so adventurous and down-right interesting!), but just when you begin to think that you've seen and heard it all along comes another "new" band like this to shake things up and offer up a freaking cool alternative to the usually humdrum you're exposed to on a daily basis! If I had a dollar for EVERY black metal release that ends up in my email or (physical) mailbox I'd be pretty well-off! What's more, if I went and listed all of the black metal releases that sound spot-on identical (black metal needs a major shake up in my opinion) you would quickly get a sense of how boring it can and often times does get reviewing this form of metal. But, if you go looking for a reason why black metal can and will survive (and along the way natural evolve into something seldom seen but gloriously embraced) then you might end up stumbling across a release like this. Germany's Stellar Master Elite might not be a well-known band yet, but releases like this should open new doors for them and bring in new fans. So, why not get in on the ground floor so you can boldly proclaim how you were a fan before they became huge and famous?