E-ZINE - Raw & Wild - '80 heavy 'zine / Web

:: INTERVIEW TO EVOCATION

PRESENT YOURSELVES TO OUR READERS...
"EVOCATION is a death metal band from Borås (Sweden). Back in -92 we did two demo recordings. One of them is recorded in the nowadays famous Sunlight Studios with the demon producer Tomas Skogsberg behind the wheels. These two recordings has now been released on CD (Digipak) and LP (limited to 500 copies) by BREATH OF NIGHT RECORDS and distributed worldwide by MERCILESS RECORDS."

WHO ARE EVOCATION AS BAND MEMBERS?
"Thomas Josefsson - Vocals Janne Kenttäkumpu - Drums Vesa Kenttäkumpu - Guitars Marko Palmén - Guitars... Besides EVOCATION we all have been involved with other projects and bands. However today we consider EVOCATION to be our main project. Thomas has been working with Cemetary/Sundown (BLACK MARK/CENTURY MEDIA) for a couple of years. Janne has done some hammering with Gripshift (which later became Rentokiller). Vesa has worked a bit with Sundown (CENTURY MEDIA) and Stoneflow. He has also been busy the last years working in studios. I have done some work with the Finnish hardcore act Rajoitus (HARDCORE HOLOCAUST). Christian Saarinen who was our Bass player is no longer with us since he nowadays lives in Stockholm and felt that he had neither time nor energy. However it is not impossible that he will be with us for live gigs in the future."

WHEN DID YOU START THE BAND?
"Me, Thomas and the Kenttäkumpu brothers formed EVOCATION back in the fall of -91. Thomas and me used to play in different death/grind constellations and so were Vesa and Janne to. It was when we all met up together that magic started to happen."

WOULD YOU LIKE TO TALK ABOUT THE VERY FIRST BEGINNING OF BAND...
"It was a truly great period of my life. We rehearsed maybe 4-5 times a week and used to hang out all the time together. EVOCATION was really therapy for us, sometimes when you arrived to the rehearsals you could be angry about something, but after 2-3 hours of practising you just felt totally calm inside. Real aggression ventilating therapy! After having founded EVOCATION we rehearsed for about three months and then we did our first gig in a local place. A couple of months after that we went up to Stockholm and recorded our first demo the 22 - 23 of February -91 in Sunlight Studios. That was a truly great experience, working with the death metal legend Tomas Skogsberg. He was really professional and we came along really great."

WHAT'S ABOUT YOUR PREVIOUS RECORDING-EFFORTS?
"The first time we recorded in a studio was when we recorded in Sunlight Studios back in February -92. It was the best recording experience that i ever have had. Tomas Skogsberg was so professional and fun to work with. The whole recording session just took 16 hours. It was such a great atmosphere being there and know that so many classic death metal albums like Entombeds "Left hand path", "Clandestine" and Dismembers "Like an ever flowing stream" had been recorded there. The second recording session was six months later in studio GMP in Borås and it was actually a really bad studio. The gear was ok but the studio technician was totally lost in space. He didn't know what death metal was so he didn't know how it should sound. Therefor the sound is not really what we had hoped for but after the circumstances it is as ok as possible. Fortunately this studio is closed and i don't think that the studio technician is working any more. If we would get a deal where they offer us to go and record with Tomas Skogsberg again we wouldn't hesitate for a moment. Unfortunately i think that he is´nt working any more but i´m not sure."

WHAT'S ABOUT YOUR FOLLOWING?
"We will start recording our new album this summer and we are all really longing to start recording. We have some old stuff that is leftover from the early nineties. To minimise influences from later eras we will eat, sleep and breathe death metal from the early nineties before we record any new stuff. As a bonus i think we will also be doing covers of some old favourite death metal tunes. I think that we will be doing Entombed "But life goes on", Slayer "Read between the lies" and maybe Dismember "And so is life". We will record it in Borås in the recording/rehearsal studio that we are building together with our friends in Lake Of Tears. The studio is almost finished now and we are really looking forward to start up rehearsing our new riffs."

THE MOST IMPORTANT FACTS IN YOUR HISTORY?
"The Kenttäkumpu brothers, Thomas and me formed the death metal band EVOCATION in the fall of -91 in Borås (Sweden). After a few months of rehearsing and some gigs we did our first recording 22-23 February -92 in Sunlight Studios (Stockholm) with the demon-producer Tomas Skogsberg behind the wheels. It resulted in a 3-track + intro (A Wind Has Risen, Through The Darkened Peril, The Ancient Gate, Desolated Spirits) demo limited to 500 copies named "The Ancient Gate". The fact that it was recorded in just 16 hours made the sound extremely raw and brutal. Skogsberg also wrote a letter of recommendation and promoted EVOCATION to some of the major death metal labels at that time (CENTURY MEDIA, EARACHE, NUCLEAR BLAST, PEACEVILLE etc.). Some time after the recording Tomas Skogsberg in an interview named EVOCATION as the best demo band that he had worked with. The name, "The Ancient Gate", refers to one of the seven gates to other dimensions described in the most evil of all books, "Necronomicon" written by the "Mad Arab" Abdul Alhazred which was a source of inspiration for us at the time. Vesa and me made all music and lyrics for this demo and Vesa also plays bass on this recording. Six months later in September -92 we recorded 4 tracks (On A Journey, Where The Headstones Shine, Veils Were Blown, Spiritual Affinity) for a promotape at GMP Studios (Borås). Just previous to this, we also had recruited bass player Christian Saarinen from the goth metal band Cemetary (BLACK MARK). After the recording we did a couple of more gigs including a big event in Gothenburg, which featured Dismember as headline. In the autumn of -93 EVOCATION was put on ice for some years despite the fact that several labels (BLACK MARK, NO FASHION, OSMOSE PRODUCTIONS, ROADRUNNER) had shown interest in signing us. The main reason for putting EVOCATION on ice was differences within the band of what musical direction to take. Today we agree upon that EVOCATION is nothing else but pure death metal and shall so remain. In -01, we decided to see if any label was interested in releasing our previously recorded material. BREATH OF NIGHT RECORDS contacted us and in November -04 the self-titled debut album was released on CD (Digipak) and LP (limited to 500 copies) and distributed worldwide by MERCILESS RECORDS. Since the winter of 04/05 we are producing new material and the plan is to start recording next album by this summer where Vesa also will play the bass. Christian will not be with us for this recording since he felt that he neither had time or energy, however it is not impossible that Christian will be featured in live gigs in the future. I think that summons it up!"

WHY DID YOU SIGN FOR MERCILESS RECORDS?
"When we decided to defrost EVOCATION in -01 we sent out promo packages to several labels. Akhenaten at BREATH OF NIGHT RECORDS contacted us and said that he loved this kind of old school Swedish death metal. In November -04 the album finally was released and distributed worldwide by MERCILESS RECORDS. A big thanks to Volker at MERCILESS RECORDS who made it happen and Akhenaten at BREATH OF NIGHT RECORDS for signing us."

WHAT'S ABOUT THE PRODUCTION OF ALBUM?
"The first four tracks (A Wind Has Risen, Through The Darkened Peril, The Ancient Gate, Desolated Spirits) are recorded at Sunlight Studios so the sound quality is really good and the production is a real killer. The last four tracks (On A Journey, Where The Headstones Shine, Veils Were Blown, Spiritual Affinity) are recorded at GMP studios in Borås. The sound quality and the production are after the circumstances on these four last tracks as good as possible but it is not Sunlight quality."

ANY PARTICULAR CONCEPT CONCERNING THE ALBUM?
"Actually there is no particular concept about it except that we only wanted to use stuff from the time era when we played together in the beginning of the nineties."

WHAT'S THE MOOD OF IT?
"I think there is a cold, evil, spiritualistic atmosphere over the album. It really breathes death metal recorded in Sunlight Studios."

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO EVOCATE?
"I think that there is´nt anything special that we want to evocate except maybe make people aware of that there are other ways of seeing on things in our lives."

THE MOST SALIENT ASPECTS OF YOUR NEW ALBUM?
"It is a product of its time. It is authentic, pure Swedish death metal recorded in Sunlight Studios back in the magic year of -92 with Tomas Skogsberg behind the wheels. "

WHAT'S ABOUT THE FEEDBACK?
"Amazingly it has been overall positive with great reviews and lots of interviews. When we decided to defrost EVOCATION in -01 we didn't know that we would step right in to some kind of revival wave for old school Swedish death metal. We all were just astonished that there were so many maniacs like us out there that still loves this kind of death metal."

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO COMMUNICATE WITH YOUR SOUND?
"Raw, pure and fucking brutal death metal!!!"

TOURING PLANS?
"For the moment there are no touring plans, but next year we will probably do some gigs. I don't think that it will be any big tours, just a few gigs at festivals and other special occasions. I think that EVOCATION will mainly be a record releasing band in the future but there will be live gigs as well."

YOUR LIFE'S PHILOSOPHY?
"Why sit home and worry about stuff when you can grab a cold beer and enjoy the situation!!!"

THE FUTURE OF THE BAND?
"For the moment we are building a recording/rehearsal studio together with our friends in Lake Of Tears. It will be finished by this summer and then we will start rehearsing new material for the next album. Hopefully we will be finished with recordings sometime during the fall and then the next album will be out by next year. Probably we will be doing some gigs also next year."

ANY LAST REMARKS?
"Thanks a lot for the interview and keep supporting the underground death metal scene!!!"

For more infos: marko_palmen@hotmail.com or www.merciless-records.de

EMANUELE GENTILE

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