If you really want to piss off a musician, ask them what’s the hold-up with their new album. Before you even think about asking, consider this: Writing music and lyrics takes time. Conceiving and executing the accompanying artwork takes time. Recording takes time. Then there’s post-production work, followed by weeks or even months of pre-release promotion to put in before the album sees the light of day. Add it all up and it’s not unusual to have years go by between records, especially for underground bands doing all of this out of their own pockets. You see, it all costs money — a lot of money if you want to do things right. And unless you’ve got a record label picking up the tab, money equals time. It’s both friend and enemy to the musician, there one day and gone the next. Once it’s gone, there’s no getting it back.
Keelung-based symphonic black metal band Anthelion (幻日) knows all about the travails of time. Active for over a decade, the band’s original members — vocalist Code Tsai (蔡元睿), drummer Troy Liu (劉晏邑) and guitarist Zeist Tseng (曾博揚) — have put everything they have into taking Anthelion as far as it can possibly go. Formed in 2001, it took six years of “cutting through steel,” as Charles Bukowski put it, to get the band’s first full-length album, Bloodshed Rebefallen (沐血再臨), into people’s hands. That was in 2007. It might not seem like all that long ago, but in terms of Taiwan’s nascent metal scene, that’s eons past, especially in terms of studio production.
Seven short years ago, there were only a handful of people who knew how to properly record, mix, and master extreme metal music in Taiwan. The real experts, the guys who had been doing it for years and doing it well, were either in North America or Europe. One of the biggest names in the business, then and still to this day, was Fredrik Nordstrom, owner and operator of Studio Fredman in Goteborg, Sweden. It’s easy to be in a band until the expenses start piling up. The true test comes when “paying your dues” becomes literal rather than figurative. But for Anthelion, there would be no short-changing themselves. With their own bankroll, they booked a flight to Scandinavia, and with their Nordstrom-stamped debut album put not only Taiwan, but the metal world at large on notice that there was a new force to be reckoned with in the Asian scene. Anthelion had arrived.
Photo Courtesy of U Loud Music
What Anthelion had with Bloodshed Rebefallen was a world-beater of an album with production value that stands amongst that of similar-minded bands like Norway’s Dimmu Borgir or England’s Cradle of Filth — bands that have seen many years pass since they last had to punch a clock and do music on the side. What Anthelion had with Bloodshed Rebefallen was a statement, and that statement was that they were serious about taking their music to the next level — taking a run at the world stage.
Now, seven years later, the band is reaffirming that statement with its highly anticipated sophomore release, Obsidian Plume (黑羽), its title track promising a densely layered mix of dark poetry, epic storytelling and haunting, ethereal melodies alongside a framework of crushing, rapid fire black metal alternate pick riffing. Released on June 27, the album was originally supposed to come out last November, with the original release date planned all the way down to the album release party itself. But at the last minute, the band concluded that Obsidian Plume wasn’t all it could be yet, and made the hard decision to postpone the gratification of many years’ hard labor and countless hours slaving over endless recording and mixing sessions.
“In 2013, we finished recording,” Tsai says. “But when we sent the tracks abroad to be mixed, we wasted a lot of time communicating and still did not reach a consensus. After that, we chose our own mix.”
Going their own way is nothing new for Anthelion, a band that has never had to get by on borrowed reason or resolve. Part of having a plan is summoning the will to allow for the requisite amount of time to pass that will let the final product come to full fruition. Anthelion has proven over the last 13 years that it is willing to go into that seeming creative stasis for years on end if need be to unleash something they can be proud of. Another part of having a plan is being willing to cast off any and all outside expectations. Anthelion has managed to do this as well, going so far as to put a black metal spin on tunes such as Abracadabra by K-pop group B.E.G. (Brown Eyed Girls). Call it a way to blow off some steam in the face of mounting years and both external and self-imposed pressure.
“It’s just a form of entertainment for me and also an idea of a little mischief,” Tsai says.
“Some of those suggestions are too over-the-top and they are usually rejected by the other band members,” he adds.
Now that the dreaded sophomore jinx has been effectively nullified, Anthelion looks to the future. Already a veteran of several tours around Asia, the band has its sights set on the major markets of Europe and North America next. What’s more, they hope to take less than the half-decade plus they have set as a precedent for the wait between Anthelion albums. The band with the plan wants to speed up the process for the sake of the fans as well as themselves, says Tsai.
“People always ask when the new album will be released. Actually, I am the one who really can’t stand waiting for it,” he said.
■ Anthelion plays tonight beginning at 8pm at The Wall, B1, 200, Roosevelt Rd Sec 4, Taipei City (台北市羅斯福路四段200號B1). Tickets are NT$600 in advance, NT$800 at the door.
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