Cursus Bellum
Swedish Cursus Bellum represents that deathcult like, darker and mystic side of Death Metal. Formed by seasoned musicians, Cursus Bellum is definitely something to keep an eye on.
Who are you and what do you do in your band?
Hi, this is Jocke. I play drums and handle the vocals in Cursus Bellum, at least on the recording of the EP. In a live situation we would need a couple of more musicians. I´m not Chris Reifert, so we would need someone to handle the vokills…
When/where was your band formed?
Around 2012-2013 something. Me and Anders (who play all the guitars) have been playing together for a long time, mainly in Sgt. Carnage. After that line-up partly dissolved after releasing the first album, we have kept making songs in various constellations together, but people move, get kids, work etc. so we decided to form Cursus Bellum as a duo and to record our material, with the ambition to recruit new members along the way.
Why did you choose to play Death Metal?
I would say it´s because we have grown up with death metal. Both Anders and me have been playing in death metal bands since the early nineties, as teenagers. Both of us also have long admiration for thrash and heavy metal as well. Anders released some records with Non Serviam in the end of the nineties, and I recorded one Ep and a full-length with Immersed in Blood in the early 2000´s. We have been pretty consistent in our death metal musicianship, although we have been involved in other stuff like grindcore, hardcore, black metal, stoner etc.
How do you compose your music? Does only one guy do everything or does everyone contribute?
Usually Anders or me have some ideas, a sort of sketch to a song. Certain moods, rythmics, riffs and stuff that we later arrange when we rehearse. We like to have a creative thing going on when we play together. You always have good riffs that you can fuse with others ideas, but sometimes you couldn´t find a way to use the riff yourself.
Tell us about your lyrics, writing, inspiration etc.
We tend to take a subject that interest us and twist that subject to a certain degree. We have a lot of inspiration from history, religion, pilosophy and the politics of man, often with an apocalyptical approach. There also some inspiration from other literature, as well as homage and references to lyrics from bands/artists that we are inspired by. Then we may add some dark humor.
Tell us about your debut EP – Accusing The Dead.
It´s a five song Ep, in digital form you can get four of the songs, you can get all five by getting the cassette or the cd. It´s released by Downfall records! The five songs is dark death metal with a lot of blast beats. It´s recorded and produced by ourselves, and mastering is done by Mattias Persson (Sceleris), and we are pleased with the result. No pro tools or triggering, and it sounds powerful!
How do you see the state of Death Metal music these days in your country and in general?
I think it´s pretty great, a lot of new great bands, and the old bands seem to tour all the time and releasing good albums. It´s fantastic to see a subculture which stand such a long way from the mainstream and commercial success still strive and produce new bands. Old farts like me also can complain about plastic production, to much technicality – so few songs, the whole –core thing and so on, but I don´t want to be a whiny old geezer. But I just whined, did n´t I… I like a lot of the technical stuff, but I also prefer some of the more dark and chaotic death metal.
What are your long term plans as a band? What do you want to achieve?
We want to release more music, we are working on new material right now – doing some pre-production right now. We also would like to play live shows, but then we have to find some more musicians.
Name another Death Metal band from your country that everyone should hear?
Though one… There a lot of Swedish death metal that people are already listening to, of course. But I have to mention Verminous, with guys who we played with in Sgt Carnage. Total evil and raw death metal. Necrovation, Crawl and Deranged are bands from the same town as we. There is so much death…
Free word.
Thanx for the interview, and take care!
