Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Interview with ETERNAL THRONE in Issue#3, 1998

ETERNAL THRONE is a ‘love it or hate it’ affair. Their demo of ‘raw black Metal’ caught glimpses nevertheless, and obviously piqued my interest on them. Short-lived they may seem, here’s one of those interviews, perhaps something to read.
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How’s the debut demo, “Eternal Throne” being received by the scene so far?
To be honest, we are moved by the response. So far, our eternal brothers in Malaysia were our #1 listeners so far, and we had various reviews good, bad, ugly and these are positive signs for our band.
Eternal Throne exists since 1991. But there’s no output from the band until the year 1997. Line-up problem?
Eventhough we’re formed in 1991, the band was in common dilemma like attending to stupid National Service, schooling and most of all our line-up was not really into making any demo at that moment.
Your materials are dark and raw black Metal. Do you consider your musical direction original? That guitars sound reminds me very much of Darkthrone’s “A Blaze In The Northern Sky.”
So far as we are concern we played our own material, about the guitar’s sound similar to Darkthrone’s “A Blaze…” it’s purely coincidental. No intend to copy or whatsoever, afterall I don’t mind what people might label our style, our music sounds like, the bottom line is we believe in our ability and that’s what we got!
The drums pattern, it’s a bit unusual for me. Is it intended to be that way? The double bassdrum parts are a little awkward, I might say so…
Musically we arranged as a band and that is the sort of drum sounding that we want. Eventhough it sounds awkward, its sounds were in line with our way of “Dark Raw” concept. Anyway the double pedal was not in good condition! Fuck the studio!
The demo… how’s the making of it? Is it really easy to get the sound that you warranted? Satisfied?
Frankly we are very happy and satisfied with the whole demo, even time constrain, we managed to get the sound we wanted most.
What about live-shows? You’ve played in the jam-session of a Johor gig not so while ago right?
Ya, Johor’s jamming session was absolutely great experience, it was our first appearance on stage and its kind of thrilling! Anyway we were glad that it goes fine and thanks to our eternal brothers As Sahar, Beast, Knight and Kibosh Sybil Kismet for their support.
And I’ve also heard that you’ll never play live in Singapore, why?
Simple. Fuck Singapore! Hail Malaysia!
Where the hell is Seventh Gates of Hell now? It seems that you guys respect him a lot. Tell us a bit about him, and also Beast.
Ok, Seventh Gates of Hell had changed to be a better person after he had overcome his ‘personal problem’, sorry we can’t elaborate more, he’s doing fine right now. Seventh Gates of Hell were someone we look up to as his contribution to our band in a spiritual way, without him we won’t be into black Metal kind of thing. Hail to our eternal brother Seventh Gates of Hell. Beast is another individual whom we respect as best friend and eternal brother as he was the only survival soul remain. He is around us most of our time even good or bad days! Hail to Beast!
What’s your relationship with the band Netherealm? I’ve got the chance to hear their demo, and it sounds quite like Eternal Throne’s.
OK, Netherealm kind of music is a mix of Norway and Swedish style musically, I am the sessionist drummer of Netherealm and it’s a great experience working with Knight and Sam of Kibosh. Eternal Throne respect Knight as a friend and also Netherealm as a band that could be a force to be reckon with.
The Singapore scene, it seems that the black Metal bands there have their own circle of friends and despise bands that’s not one of them…
Ok, I don’t give a damn about the Singapore circle or what it is called, as we are concern we only support our eternal brothers such as As Sahar, Kibosh, Netherealm, Dicius and of course all Malaysian bands like Langsuir, Sil Khannaz, Hayagriva, Aradia, etc.
Being an eastern black Metal band, how does it feels? It’s pretty different from the Westerns…
It’s true we can’t really copy all Western bands concept and music but we can take them as an inspiration figure and we could do it in our unique Eastern concept. For us we like and hail Norwegian bands like Mayhem, Darkthrone, Dimmu Borgir, Kampfar and Emperor because they came from the same country but still had their own different style! For us we took them as an inspiration but add our own pattern of play.
So, it actually means that Eastern bands should seek for their own sound, isn’t it?
If possible yes, uphold our Eastern mystical roots.
But I could say that Eternal Throne sounds very much like those Europeans and so on, so…
Whatever it is we are an Eastern band and we are happy to be that way, it is up to individuals to decide.
There’s no ‘real’ artworks on your demo cover. Is it not that important?
As you know, it’s our first demo, we don’t really press for the cover but in the future who knows, maybe a better logo for instance, but we are happy with the simple logo cover of our first demo. “Tak kisah cantik atau buruk, asalkan muzik kita faham cukuplah”!
What do you think about the black Metal scene nowadays in general?
In general? Lots of wave change and most of them wanted to be true black Metal head. But we don’t care about all this nonsense.
By playing your own music, you believe that it’s a truly, great eternal quest towards your own throne. Could you tell us a bit about the ‘throne’ that you’re talking about and aiming for?
“THRONE” to us is “Singgahsana yang abadi”. It is verse spiritually of peace… in our souls by playing our music we feel and it’s great to have that divine experience.
A true black Metal band is not justified as one only by the music they play is simply called ‘black Metal’, isn’t it?
It’s not too easy to be true in everything in life, you had to focus yourselves into this avenues and understand it. Eternal Throne believe that ‘black Metal’ is an art of spiritual, mystical, knights.


ETERNAL THRONE c/o Black Emperor, Blk 14, Kampung Arang, #07-33, SINGAPORE 431014

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