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July 24, 2008 |
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Henri "T.S.K." Sattler
February 10, 2005
By Tony Antunovich
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Dutch death metal has a name, and if you don't know it yet, that name is GOD DETHRONED. For over 15 years, the band have been crushing skulls with release after aggressive release, and they're not done yet. After going through some considerable changes, the largest one being the departure of longtime members Beef and Jens van der Valk, GOD DETHRONED are back with a new lineup, a new album, and a whole lot of newfound energy. In this exclusive interview with founding member/vocalist/guitarist Henri "T.S.K." Sattler, we sat down to discuss the band's brand new CD, "The Lair Of The White Worm", and where the inspiration to write the material came from, as well as other topics including the chemistry of the new lineup, Henri's discovery of death metal, and the deeper meaning behind GOD DETHRONED.
What's going on with you guys right now?
Well, we already played a lot of shows promoting the new album and we're going to do a European tour starting March 25th, I think, and then some weeks into April. This European headlining tour is with ANOREXIA NERVOSA from France, and SUMMON, being the support acts. Then we have some summer festivals lined up; we just got an offer to play South America; and actually I'm looking forward to tour the States again.
I was going to ask if you were going to be making it over here before the end of the year.
Yeah, I hope so. It's been a long time since we've been there, so we definitely want to come back because we totally love the U.S. audience. They always go totally berserk in the slamming pit when they see us live, so we want to experience a little bit more of that.
That would be good.
Yeah! But what I hear is that the metalcore scene is totally dominating America at the moment.
Well, I don't know if it's really "dominating", but it certainly has increased in the last couple of years.
I hope there's some death metal freaks left to check us out if we come over.
Oh yeah. There are, trust me. I mean, CANNIBAL CORPSE is a U.S. band and they're huge. There are still a lot of death metal fans here - in the United States and of course Canada as well.
Okay, great!
The new album was just released here in North America on January 25th and I have to tell you, Henri, It's a killer, killer piece of metal!
Great! Thanks a lot!
I loved the last one, but "The Lair Of The White Worm" is even better than "Into The Lungs Of Hell". I didn't think you guys would be able to top it because it was such amazing work and it was very well received in the media and by fans worldwide. From your perspective, how has the overall response of the new album from the press and fans been?
Well, very good! I mean, I myself didn't expect that people would see this album as a much better one than "Into The Lungs Of Hell", but it seems like people do see it that way. So, the overall response is better than with "Into The Lungs Of Hell". Germany's Rock Hard Magazine, which is one of the biggest magazines in the world anyway, gave it album of the month. So that's a good thing. When I look at the people who show up at the live shows, the numbers are increasing every time, so I guess we're doing a good thing.
Rock Hard is one of the biggest magazines in Europe.
Yeah. They're very important, and the fact that we were album of the month is really helping us a lot.
The album's concept is based upon Bram Stoker's book of the same title, "The Lair Of The White Worm". How did you come up with the idea to do this, Henri?
Well, it was just a coincidence. I know only one book by Bram Stoker and that's "Dracula", and I guess everybody knows that. I was one of the people who never heard about any other book from him, but by accident, I ran into it. I read it and I thought it was a cool story, so I decided to write a song about it. And I liked the title so much that I decided to use that as the album title as well because I thought it would be noticed, because it's such an outstanding title. I guess I did the right thing because it really does get noticed. Also, the cover artwork is based around this title. For a change, we did a white cover instead of a black one like we always did and like most of the death metal bands do. But it still fits very well to the atmosphere of the band and the songs, and because this book is not well known at all, that's why it was so fun to do.
You could bring something from a well-known writer, but on the other hand, not so well-known when it comes to his other stories. So, we could bring something very old as if it was something very new.
Jacek (Wisniewski) did the cover artwork.
Yeah. It was the guy who is also doing the VADER artwork all the time.
He's a very good artist.
Yeah. I think so too. He works very fast. He took the ideas for the album cover and he had it finished in two days or something.
In two days??
Yeah.
That's pretty good!
He's really fast.
So you wrote pretty much all the lyrics on the album. Can you describe the writing process? How do you come up with lyrics?
I mainly did all the lyrics. I think Ariën (Van Weesenbeek) did one song - "The Grey Race". He wrote the music for that song and he also did the lyrics. As for the rest, I did it. You know, sometimes I get inspired by a book like "The Lair Of The White Worm" or sometimes a movie like.... I watched "Kill Bill" right before writing the text for "Last Zip Of Spit". Sometimes it's based on history like "Arch Enemy Spain", which is about the 80-year war between Holland and Spain; sometimes it's just purely fantasy like "Nihilism" or "Sigma Enigma". So it's a bit of everything.
Let's talk a bit about the recording of "The Lair Of The White Worm". Can you tell me about how the recording process was and how long it took to complete the recordings?
We went to the studio for three weeks including the mix, so we worked pretty fast and it was the same procedure as the last time. We went to Berno Studio in Sweden with producer Henrik Larsson. He also did "Into The Lungs Of Hell" for us, and he's a really easy guy to work with. You just sit down with the guitar - you play your part - and when he says it's okay, it's okay - and when he says it's not okay, you have to do it again. It's just as simple as that, you know. I don't even have to be critical about my own way of playing. When he's there and he says it's fine, then it's fine. So you can work really fast with this guy. He's totally relaxed and easy to work with. The reason we went to this studio is because I heard one of the VOMITORY albums that he did and I love that sound totally! I thought to myself, "Okay if we could get a sound like that for a GOD DETHRONED album, it would be really great!"
So that's why we went there for "Into The Lungs Of Hell". The response on that album was very good - also the production - so we decided to do it again.
That must have made it run much more smoothly for you guys when you actually did the recording.
Yeah, exactly - and especially with a guy like him because he's so laid back and so easy to work with. It's really relaxing to record an album. In the past, I always found it very stressful to record an album. But with him, it all of a sudden became so easy. That's always nice - to have a good feeling in the studio instead of being stressed all the time.
The two newest band members, Henk (Zinger) and Isaac (Delahaye) basically came in just before the recording of the new album. Was that somewhat of a stressful situation considering the fact that you hadn't really played together before?
It was really easy actually. Henk came in like a month before the recordings. I knew him for a very long time and knew he was a bass player, but I never saw him play the bass. But he just came to my house, I gave him some songs, and he picked it up really well. So we didn't have an audition or anything. We just played and it was good. So, all of a sudden, we had a bass player. Then we decided to go into the studio as a 3-piece and not care about a new guitar player because there was hardly any time left. But then all of a sudden, I realized that the level of playing for this album was much higher than on "Into The Lungs Of Hell". So I thought, "Okay. If we could find a new guitar player before the studio, maybe it would help me a lot." So we had an audition with two guys and Isaac was by far the best. He already knew a song when he came into the rehearsal room - he already knew one of the new songs.
We decided to take him. We studied another three songs the same night and two days later, he knew all nine songs - and then we still had two weeks left to rehearse. So we rehearsed like maniacs, and by the time we were in the studio, everything felt like we'd been playing together for a year or something.
That must have been a really great feeling.
Yeah. It was an excellent feeling - and we had lots of space in the songs to do guitar solos this time. Isaac is just a guy who can come up with anything on the spot, so he did an excellent job and he played most of the 17 guitar solos that we had this time.
Yeah, you've dramatically increased the amount of solos since "Into The Lungs Of Hell", that's for sure.
Yeah. You know on "Into The Lungs Of Hell", there was not so much space in the songs to do guitar solos, but on this album we had plenty of space. We even decided to skip some of the melody lines and replace them with guitar solos because it would fit much better. So on the last day of mixing, we erased some of the melody lines and put guitar solos in them. It turned out really well, and you know, because of the leads, the album became a lot more melodic, while when you look at the rhythm guitar and drums, it could have been one of our most extreme albums. But the guitar solos make it a very melodic album at the same time.
Beef and Jens (van der Valk) were with the band for eight years. Are you guys still good friends?
Yes we are good friends and we speak every now and then. We didn't have any fight when they left; it was just that they were not so enthusiastic anymore. They didn't have the drive anymore to bring the band to a new level. Actually now when I can compare it to the new lineup, I found out that they were slowing the band down already for years. That's the reason why we didn’t play so much anymore and why we didn't have the motivation to go out anymore. I even thought that the band would end, you know - like at the end of 2003/early 2004 I thought, "Okay, this is it! It's over!" But then when they left and we found the new guys, I found out that the new guys brought in so much energy. That was exactly the feeling that I was missing for so long. Now the feeling is back and we want to play as much as possible because it's going very well and it feels very good.
Yeah, it seems that there's a renewed energy there in GOD DETHRONED for sure.
Yeah. People also say that they can hear it when they listen to the album. Also live - people come to us after the show and say "Hey man, this new band is so much better than the old lineup because there's so much more energy coming off the stage now." So I guess we did the right thing by replacing them.
Yeah, I could tell that right away when I first heard the album. Excellent work!
Yeah, it's so funny. You don't realize those things until they're there, you know. All of a sudden, you realize, "Hey! This is the thing I've been missing for so long." I could never tell what the reason was, but now I know that it's just the feeling you have among each other and the energy the people put into the band. When it's not there, you cannot do anything anymore - and when it's there, it seems like you can do everything.
Well, the result is phenomenal. As I said before, it's a really great piece of work and I congratulate you guys on that.
Well, thank you very much. Luckily, many people see it that way and notice that there's a renewed energy, and that the result is a lot better because of that.
In the early days of GOD DETHRONED, after the release of "The Christhunt", you dismantled the band because of problems with other members and the record label. Then you formed MINISTRY OF TERROR and released "Fall Of Life" in '94, but then Reformed GOD DETHRONED after the European tour. What made you decide to get GOD DETHRONED back on the map, Henri?
Well, first of all because I had a feeling that GOD DETHRONED was not finished yet. I basically put the band on ice because of all the problems. I couldn't find proper band members; we had problems with the record company who didn't do anything for us. So I was basically forced to do something else because the music that I wanted to play back then - nobody could play it or was willing to play it. So, I joined MINISTRY OF TERROR, and while we did the European tour with IMPALED NAZARENE, so many people came up to me and said, "Hey! You're the guy from GOD DETHRONED! Why are you not playing in that band anymore?.... because it's so much better than this band!" So when you hear that for weeks in a row, it does something to you. By the time I got back, I knew I had to go on with GOD DETHRONED.
And that's exactly what I did. I was looking for new band members and I asked the guys that I had seen play before in the past because I thought they were really great musicians. I asked them and they all said yes. So I was fortunate enough to record "The Grand Grimoire" with my favorite musicians, and back then, it was a great feeling. For me, "The Grand Grimoire" is still one of the best albums we ever did.
Yeah, for sure - and that was your Metal Blade debut as well - back in '97.
Yeah, exactly.
Can you tell me how it's been working with Metal Blade over the years?
It's been going very well. They do a lot of promotion for us; they arrange a lot of interviews; they put out advertisements; they've put us on some great tours over here; they put us on tour with CANNIBAL CORPSE in the States. You know, we just signed a new contract. "The Lair Of The White Worm" is the first album of the new contract, and we would never have signed a new contract if we were not happy with them or if they would not have been happy with us. So I guess we have reason enough to be happy with them and I guess it's the other way around too.
That's really great to hear that both of you have such a great working relationship.
Yeah. I think it's very important.
Well, it is. It has to be because there is the business aspect to it as well. It's really great when a band and their label can work so well together.
Yeah. That's true.
How are you able to sing and play the guitar at the same time, especially with the intensity of GOD DETHRONED's music?
It's not so difficult. There are two things that you have to have: I have to know my guitar parts 100%, and also my lyrics. When I would make a mistake with the lyrics while playing live, I would also fuck up on the guitar. So I have to be sure to memorize everything in detail and then it's no problem to do two things at the same time - and I've done it for so many years now. I mean, I've been playing in this band for 15 years now - singing and playing guitar. For me, it's something natural and the reason I do this is because I always looked up to guys like Dave Mustaine and Chuck Schuldiner. They were my biggest examples, so I wanted to do that myself and that's why I did it.
Have you ever had any formal vocal training?
No, never. I just saw PESTILENCE for the "Consuming Impulse" album. It was the first time that I really saw a guy who could sing like that live, and the moment I saw him, I though "Oh, that's the way you do it." - and I just tried it that evening and I managed to do it myself. So that's how I learned to do death grunts. It's very easy to do actually. I was a very little kid when I saw them live. I always wondered how people do it and just by looking at them, I got the clue and I started to do it myself from that moment on.
You have a distinct voice. I mean, there are a lot of different death metal bands out there today, but your voice really stands out. It's really crisp and clear when you actually growl/grunt/scream.
Yeah. The reason that I sing in such a clear way is because when I sing, people can actually hear what I'm singing, and then it makes more sense. If you're singing something brutal and people can hear it, you've got a much bigger impact than when somebody's singing something brutal and you cannot hear it, you know.... like with many death metal bands. It's the same with SLAYER, you know. Tom Araya's lyrics are pretty extreme, in my opinion, but when you hear exactly what he's singing, I think the impact is much higher than when it would be impossible to hear what he's singing.
Speaking of death metal, on your official website you state that you heard death metal and it changed your life forever. I'm curious about that. What changed for you and what appeals to you about this style of metal music so much?
That's a good question. You know, I was a fan of bands like NUCLEAR ASSAULT, D.R.I. and bands like that before I came to know death metal. Then all of a sudden we had a Dutch radio station called (something) Vuurwerk. It's something like "fireworks" in English. It was a national station and they played some music from DEATH. I heard it and I thought, "Wow! This is great!" I got a kick from it right from the start and then I knew I wanted to play that type of music. So in that way, I can say it changed my life because then I started to play death metal myself and it's something I've been doing for such a long time. I can't deny that it was a big impact on my life.
As we discussed earlier, you guys are going to be playing some tour dates in Europe for the better-half of a month starting at the Killer Fest in France at the end of March. Do you know if you have any plans to head over to North America?
Yeah, we want to. At the moment I'm contacting some festivals in the States like the New England Metal and Hardcore Fest and the Milwaukee Metalfest and stuff like that. If we can play there, we have the opportunity to play for a lot of people at the same location, and that would be good. Apart from that, we really want to tour the states, but it depends on Metal Blade if we can come over or not. They just want to see how things are developing because the album has been out for just two weeks. American seems to be under the metalcore "grip", so they are probably a bit careful because it takes a lot of money to bring a band from Europe over to the States. You know - flight tickets, work visas, hotels and the tour bus. It's quite expensive for them. But if they say, "Yes, we want to have you guys over", we will definitely do it. And the sooner the better, I think.
I would agree. I've never seen you guys live. That would be great to have you over here. I live in Canada - about 2 hours from Seattle, Washington.
Yeah. Well, we have a German booking agent now and he also has a lot of contacts in Canada, so maybe it's possible to do that too, you know. Sometimes, Canada is included in a U.S. tour, but not always because it seems to be very hard to get across the border or to get work permits for Canada for just a couple of shows.
Yeah.
But I know that our German booking agent has contacts in Canada, so maybe we can do that separately from a U.S. tour or something.
I'll tell you, if I had the money, I'd bring you guys over here for sure (laughs)!
That would be great, man!
As you said, you've toured with CANNIBAL CORPSE, and you've also toured with bands like MARDUK and IMMORTAL. Are there any bands that you have not yet toured with but would like to in the future?
Yeah - SLAYER!
I knew you would say that (laughs).
(Laughs) Yeah. You know, we've toured with so many death metal bands and black metal bands. It was really great. By now we've reached the status where we should do headlining tours. It's about time! So that's what we're doing now in Europe - headlining tours. For the States we will probably need to find a bigger band to support on tour. But as far as death metal bands go, we've played with so many of them. To climb a step higher, we should play with a band like SLAYER or something, but I guess that's pretty difficult.
Henri, I don't know if you've ever been asked this, but how did you come up with the name "GOD DETHRONED" for the band?
That's a good question. It was a long time ago that I came up with that name. For me, it stands for the fact that I'm against religion. I'm not against people who believe, but I'm against organized religion, whether it is Christianity or Islam. I think organized religion has only brought bad things to the world. When you look at the innocent people who were burned on stakes, like in the middle ages in Europe, and now all the bullshit that's going on in the world - terrorist attacks for Islam and other things - all the wars going on because of Christianity and other religions - I'm against that. It's just as simple as that. A band name like GOD DETHRONED fits to that vision.
That's interesting to hear. It's unfortunate that all the crap going on in the world is fueled by hatred. It's really too bad. I have to be honest - when I first heard the name "GOD DETHRONED", it sounded kind of funny mainly because of the "dethroning" element.
You know, probably for the American or Canadian guys, "GOD DETHRONED" maybe sounds a bit funny because it's your language. When I came up with that name, you have to see that I was a Dutch guy - like 17/18 years old coming up with that name, and of course, English is not a strange language for us; it's a very common language for us as well. But it's still far away from your mother language, and when you’re that young, as I was back then, "GOD DETHRONED" didn't sound funny for me at all. For me, it was a very serious name, and I still think it's a cool name. There is no other band on the whole planet that has the same name. You have so many bands with the same name, like PESTILENCE from Holland, for example.
There was also an American band called PESTILENCE, and they were fighting over the name and bullshit like that. But you know, we never had another band in the world saying, "Hey! Our name is GOD DETHRONED! Fuckoff!" But I can understand that for English-speaking people, maybe the name is a bit funny.
Well, it may be because to "dethrone" means to take away their throne, their kinghood. So that itself just sounds funny, that's all.
You know, for Christian people, God is still on the throne - like ruling the planet or something like that. That's how I see it at least. For me, it was like, "Okay. When everybody thinks he's dead, we will dethrone him." There were also people who said to me, "Okay, when you have a band name like GOD DETHRONED, you accept that there is a God." But I thought, "Okay, whatever. I don't care." - as long as my point of view came across.
So where is GOD DETHRONED going from here? What are your plans for the future?
Well, first of all, to play as many shows as possible all across the world. I know that Metal Blade is going to release the album in Japan soon and it will also be released in Australia. We toured Japan before and I would like to do that again. I also would like to play Australia because we've never been there before. We now have an offer to play South America for like 10-12 shows. We haven't been there before either so that would also be a big challenge. Of course, the States and Canada, and then after that - start to work on the new album. I think with the new lineup, we should be able to make an album that is at least as good as, or maybe even better than this one. That's my goal.
Do you have anything that you'd like to say to our readers?
Well, for sure. They should definitely check out the new album. I mean, it's worthwhile listening to. You know that; I know that - but I think there are many people who don't know it yet. And for the rest, they should send e-mails to Metal Blade saying that they want to see us over there, so then Metal Blade know how many people are interested in it so they can do something to make it happen.
We're going to promote the new album, and if we can help you get even 10 more fans, that would make me happy.
Yeah, me too, and I really appreciate your help.
It's our pleasure. METALEATER supports GOD DETHRONED and we're going to keep promoting you.
That is really cool, man. We really appreciate help like that.
Just one last question - looking back on the last 15 years, did you ever expect the band to evolve into what it has become today from the time you founded it back in 1990?
No. To be honest, if somebody would have said that I would be playing in the same band after 15 years, I probably wouldn't have even believed them. You never know where you go with a band. I mean, we always try to make albums as good as possible, but it doesn't mean that it will be picked up and that so many people really like your music, and that you can build up a name where you are well-known around the globe. That we achieved that is something that makes me really happy - something that I look back on as a great achievement. But to come back to your question - no, I never thought this would happen - not like this. But I'm glad it did.
Yeah, I was just going to say that it's good that it did because I think you guys are a really important part of the metal scene. You're a solid band that stands tight to metal. In today's music scene, I love seeing a band that upholds the metal flag and you guys are holding it high, as far as I'm concerned. I applaud you for that.
Thank you very much. I really appreciate it.
On behalf of all of us at METALEATER, I wish you great success with the new album, the tour, and your future and hopefully we'll see you here on these shores in North America soon. I definitely look forward to hearing more great stuff from you guys in the future and seeing you play live. I wish you nothing but the best, Henri!
Thank you very much. Hopefully we can meet sometime in the future on a tour or something.
That would be great. I'll look forward to it.
Okay, man. That's cool.
I want to thank you very much for taking time to speak with METALEATER today.
You're welcome. It was nice talking to you and it was a nice interview. Good luck with METALEATER.COM and see you soon hopefully! [FIN]
» Official GOD DETHRONED Website
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