Hi. Please, introduce the band to us and tell us what you think is important about its brief history.
Danilo: The band exists for two years by now and it was formerly named The Lack Of Motivation. After our first demo, Arrival 2.001, we decided to change it [the band name] to Consecration. After some line-up changes (Nemanja, our former rhythm guitarist left and we changed two keyboard players), I took over the rhythm guitar duties (beside the vocal ones) and decided to invite Bane to our band to fill-in the sound we were to achieve. It was february this year (2002) when Bane came in.
Bane: Danilo called me up to ask if I wanted to join in. I already knew him for quite some time and was more than happy to say yes. I liked the atmosphere in the band and the music they created. We’ve done some small shows to get more expirienced on stage and I think we are getting better. We had quite successful gigs on Summer’s festival and our first solo gig in KST.
Who is in the band today and how do you function together?
Danilo: There are Miloš Savić (lead guitar), Milan Šuput (bass), Milan Jejina (drums), Branislav Stanković (keyboards) and me (Danilo Nikodinovski, vocal & rhythm guitar). We get along pretty good, and with time and practice we get more and more sure about what we are doing, the arrangements with time get more complex.
Bane: When I came in, I was very surprised to see how five musicians could get along so well, five musicians with very own distinct taste. We all know what we are to achieve in Consecration and we all share the same vision.
The word ‘consecration’ means ‘osvećenje’, ‘posvećenje’ (in serbian). Why the name and does it have some deeper meaning?
Danilo: Well, you’ll agree it’s much more inspiring than The Lack Of Motivation! The word itself I found in Saturnus’ lyrics, which Leš (the bassist) and I like very much, and one evening we sat and thought about a new band name, and decided ‘consecration’ was the right one. Atmosphere, if I could say so, that the name draws with itself is quite unique, and I think every one of us has his own consecration inside him in these dark times… You ask me about a deeper meaning, I’ll give you one – its meaning is very individual and I think there is nothing deeper than that.
“In silence true consecration comes.”
Bane: Danilo put it so well I couldn’t do better even if I tried, hehe…
How would you label the music you play? Is it gothic metal or…?
Bane: Oh… Well… Honestly, we don’t know what we play.
Danilo: …Music? (Haha…)
Bane: Well, music it is… Sometimes, hehe! Mainly, it’s everything, from gothic, heavy, doom, black, dark, electronica… Whatever comes to us! We don’t wish to corner ourselves with anything. I think that is the reason why Consecration has its own sound, both original and relaxing.
Danilo: We aren’t eccentric or something like “hey, let’s throw in some black metal, then little gothic, then slow it down more with some doom”(though it happens sometimes on rehearsals hehe)… I guess we could make an avantgarde sound of vast noise, because we all draw our own influences – everything we hear actually, and we don’t want to corner ourselves in one angle, that’s why we experiment with the sound, we want some new sounds happen every now and then. I am personally fed up with the riff/verse/chorus/solo cliché that is going on in metal for more than 20 years, and I think that nothing would really change in metal if it weren’t bands such as Arcturus, Opeth, Ulver, Emperor… Evolution in the sound, in the arrangement itself first.
Bane: The closest label would be “prog avantgarde doom/gothic metal”, haha…
What about your favorite bands? In what amount they influence the music you play? Do you play some covers on gigs?
Danilo: The interesting for this band is that everyone brought a specific genre. I listen to everything, but prefer to say I like doom mostly, bands such as Katatonia, Anathema, Opeth, Saturnus, My Dying Bride, Empyrium, In the Woods... Also, it is fair to mention Ulver, The Gathering, Amorphis etc. Savić is into prog a lot, Dream Theater kind of stuff, but Paradise Lost also. Leš is into death/old doom, and Jeki (the drummer) is into everything from jazz to metal (Dimmu Borgir, AC/DC)... There are some bands that we all like, for example finnish Yearning and their excellent (yet unfortunately underrated) Plaintive Scenes... Or Moonspell.... Or Depeche Mode, which we covered... Right now we’re listening to the latest The Third And The Mortal, a great album.
Bane: I like everything from classical music to ambiental and electronic music. There are really far too many bands to mention them all, but let’s say Emperor, Arcturus, Ulver, Peccatum, The Kovenant, Marduk, Limbonic Art, Mayhem, Dimmu Borgir, Dark Funeral, Morbid Angel, Nile, Hate Eternal, Sinister, Cryptopsy are my favorites. Plus I like bands such as Astral Projection, S.U.N. Project, Suicide Commando, Hocico, Nightmare Lodge, Enigma, Vangelis, Depeche Mode , Faith No More...
Danilo: Mike Patton is The King!
Bane: Definitely! I like lots of classical music, such as Bach, Mozart, Wagner, Haydn, Chopin, Borodin... Like I said, I could go on forever like this. Genre doesn’t matter, it’s the atmosphere that counts.
Danilo: Exactly. Depeche Mode are, for example, the band that creates much darker atmosphere than any black metal band. That’s why we have chosen to cover Enjoy The Silence, and Black’s Everything Is Coming Up Roses, which is one of the best goth songs ever written. And it was written in 1987! We also play Alma Mater by Moonspell, which has become some sort of a hymn for an encore, and we’ve been playing Crematory’s Tears Of Time for quite some time.
I’ve noticed that you played Depeche Mode’s Enjoy The Silence. Why that particular song, and how did you get the idea to cover it, considering the style of music you play?
Danilo: First we decided to cover Black’s Everything Is Coming Up Roses because it is so old (it was my favorite song in my early childhood days) and it sounds totally good in goth metal way. And then came Enjoy The Silence, which is popular even more. Bane called me up one day and suggested to cover it and I said “why the hell not?” The rest of the band agreed and… Here we are! The most thrilling part is that we practiced it only once before our show in KST June 11th, and already got great critics about it…
Bane: I think we did a nice pick with those songs. Depeche Mode is indeed a very sombre band and have those atmospheres that are adaptable to metal music. Black maybe not that much, but we realized that this Roses song could fit in so well with our style. And that’s why it was so exciting! Now I realize it is more interesting to cover a song that is from a non-metal territory… Maybe this will help the audience to pay attention to some bands that are not metal, but still have something in their music that is close to metal in some way…
Speaking about concerts, how much attention you pay to them and how important are they for you? Can you pick the most important gigs for you?
Bane: We haven’t had so many gigs yet, but strive to change that. Our shows are very important to us and we want to give the people the atmosphere that our music carries.
Danilo: The most important shows were in SKC on March 24th last year (my first show with The Lack Of Motivation), our first solo gig on Gothic Festival in KST (June 11th) and Metal Festival in KST two weeks later (June 25th 2002).
Do you like to perform live and how do you cope with it, considering all the problems that bands here have to struggle with?
Danilo: We like to play whenever and wherever they call us and we cope with it very well (thanx for noticing!), but the problems with the equipment are inevitable. We have 3 vocals, 2 guitars and 2 keyboards and it can be really a mess on stage. Fortunately we got ourselves our own sound engineer, Bleq (keyboard player of Block Out), who did a very good sound in KST June 11th. We are more than happy to have him with us in the future.
Bane: Bleq has definitely made our live sound better. The only problem that follows all bands in Serbia is the equipment that waits for us on stage...
Danilo: Hi Srećko, how do you do? (Haha...)
Bane: We are trying to collect the money for our own equipment, but, considering the fact how much the bands are paid here, that will happen in, like, xyz years...
About the demo/promo stuff, have you entered the studio yet and recorded something? If you do have a demo, could you please give us more info about it?
Danilo: Our first demo is entitled Arrival 2.001. We made it June last year and we aren’t satisfied with the result at all. It turned out more into some kind of putting those ideas on tape instead of something more serious. The production is ok, but it would’ve been better if the production was bad and the songs were played better. So, we didn’t care so much to promote it, it was played on the radio just to let the people know we exist. Consecration now sounds much more better than that demo. Actually, the only song that turned out good on it was the closing instrumental Gone. The rest of the recorded tracks are Arrival, While Taking A Breath and Way Past Bedtime.
Bane: We’ve begun re-doing those songs and making some new ones, so all of those old tracks sound entirely different now. We will enter the studio soon to record Emotion and maybe another song, and we’ll let that circle around as a promo. Our goal right now is to finish all the songs for the full-length.
Who writes lyrics and who does the music? Is it one person only, or all the members participate?
Danilo: I write all the lyrics, and for the music, it is usually one of the three of us (Savić, Bane and me) who gets some idea, riff or a melody and brings it to rehearsal and then we all work on it further on. This song Emotion we begin our gigs with, was written by Savić and myself, and the arrangement was done by the whole band, including Bane. Emotion is the first song he participated with his work.
Bane: Danilo said it all again... (Hehe)
Where does the inspiration come from? Is there any line that binds the songs into the whole, some global attitude you have as a band?
Danilo: The inspiration comes from an everyday life, everything around us. There is a specific mood crawling through all the songs... Atittude? No particular ideology, as long as there is sex and beer, hehe! True, Grim, Necro!!!
Bane: Mostly I do this because of art itself. But, of course, sex & beer first!!! True, Grim, Necro!!!
What are your lyrics about?
Danilo: About people, desolation, emotions, misunderstanding of them... Some verses are pretty much depressive, remind of those of Katatonia, Yearning, My Dying Bride...
Are the lyrics in English or Serbian? What’s your opinion towards making songs in mature tongue?
Danilo: The lyrics are in English, because it is much easier to sing them that way (and to remember them). All the lyrics I ever wrote are in English (except some very few which will probably never get any musical embodiment). The lyrics in Serbian can have sense, but not in metal. Maybe it would be interesting to hear Serbian sung in type of songs such as Ulver’s first and third albums (Bergtatt and Nattens Madrigal), because of the authentic Serbian voices, otherwise it is the lack of professionalism (not knowing the world’s famous language).
How and when are you planning to reach the international scene? Will you involve the internet promotion? What is your opinion about the internet as the source of media?
Bane: Well, soon I hope. We plan to record our first full-length till the end of the year, or during the next one, and then look for a foreign label to release it. We’ll see…
Danilo: Internet is the most powerful medium and today the music travels fastest by the internet. So, I consider it as the most important promotion source.
That would be all. Good luck in the future and say hello to the other members from Scissors. Stay in FULL METAL!
Bane: Thank you very much for this interview!
Danilo: Yeah, we enjoyed it very much! Greetings to you and to all readers of your zine!
Interview was done by Boris Todorović, august 2002
KST
11.06.2002.
setlist
1. Emotion
2. Tears Of Time (Crematory)
3. Enjoy The Silence (Depeche Mode)
4. Arrival
5. While Taking A Breath
6. Everything's Coming Up Roses (Black)
7. Way Past Bedtime
8. Alma Mater (Moonspell)
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