We’re getting far darker on you today.
Simple things first – where are you guys from?
We are from Thessaloniki, Greece.
How did you meet?
We have been friends for many years, we knew each other so George Savvage and Konstantinos decided to start a band. Our friend Giorgos Terzitanos was the best man to take the lead guitarist’s place. Now, after some line-up changes, Savvage is not a member of the band, while Marios Arikas has taken over his place as the lead vocalist, our longtime friend Vaggelis Karafotis is our drummer and our second guitarist is Achilleas, as a session member.
How long have you been playing as a band?
We were formed on December 2016 but the band started rehearsals on May 2017. So far we have released a demo and a full length album called Towards the Damned.
Before you get sick of being asked… Where does the band name come from?
The name comes from the ancient Serpent, the snake that persuaded Eve and Adam to eat the fruit from the forbidden tree. Also, people personify the evil with the serpent, so we thought it sounded dark and evil enough, so as to give the listener a hint about our music and lyrics.
What are your influences?
Too many to mention. But our biggest influences are In Solitude, Death, Iced Earth, Candlemass, Judas Priest, Mercyful Fate, Rotting Christ, Black Sabbath, Megadeth and many many more. We listen to a lot of death metal, black metal (Behemoth is a great influence), thrash metal, heavy metal, power metal, even some pop, funky, jazz or latin music. We try to be open-minded even though we are classic metalheads.
Describe your music. What makes you unique?
A piece of our mind is crawling out though our music, setting us free in a sort of way. Our sound could be described as an evil spirit, released within an unholy ritual, creating an eerie atmosphere. We intend to write heavy music and bring our audience to an occult trance. Being unique, we try our best to come up with new ideas and experiment though music, without going overboard and putting together something “noisy”.
Do you have any particular lyrical themes?
Our lyrics are all about God, religion, philosophy, mythology and occult. Divination is an esoteric procedure we try to accomplish, while writing and singing our lyrics. Part of our themes are based on ancient stories combined with symbolism, that way we reach an upper level of meaning. When we write we like to create a ritualistic atmosphere by lighting candles and setting up mystical objects.
What’s your live show like? How many shows have you played?
We are trying to create an atmosphere and make the audience become one piece with the band. Each show is basically a ritual for us. We are an occult band, so we have a table with skulls, candles, books about magic, the Testament, a blade, candelabras and two people dressed as monks like the costumes we have on our video clips. The show is very important to us, we are trying be as more energetic we can, while we accomplish our ritual. We want the audience to be a part of this ritual and so far we do it successfully.
What’s the wildest thing you’ve seen or done at a live show?
To be honest I think that metal as a genre itself is a wild thing. I watched my first live show when I was twelve years old. I watched Rotting Christ playing for the first time of my life and I thought that’s the craziest thing I have ever seen. In my mind the wildness isn’t a specific incident or action. It’s that memory from that show. The ecstasy and the passion about metal. As far as it concerns on my actions. Truly man I cannot tell. Every Serpent Lord show is unique. Maybe some one may consider it wild but for us it’s a normality. It’s a way of expressing ourselves. And trust me the wild stuff comes after the show.
What kit do you use / guitars do you play / etc.?
Our drummer uses Pearl vision vmx red sparkle and Pearl demon drive direct drive pedal, our lead guitarist uses an Ibanez RG550EX and our bassist uses a Warwick Corvette.
What, if anything, are you plugging/promoting at the moment?
At this moment we are promoting our second video clip for our song “Seed of Divine” but in general we are in constantly promotion of our debut album Towards The Damned.
What are your plans for 2019?
We want to play as many shows we can. We have some plans for a Balkan or European tour, but there is nothing sure at that point, yet.
From previous Band of the Day Ruben Hultman: what phase of the creation process do you find most difficult and how do you cope with that?
All stages of the creation process have difficulties, but we enjoy them all the same. There are many different stages when you create something from scratch. At first, composing is the beginning and the end, the next important thing is the lyrics, and after the mixing of those, many times the one follows the other. This next phase includes rehearsals, there must be a huge number of those, in order to have a desired result, we check for perfection details, and at last we hit the studio. As I mentioned above, we like all the stages with their pros and cons, maybe the most difficult stage is the first one, because it’s ruled by the humongous chaos of choices and we get to choose what is best for us and what we try to create. To overcome this obstacle, we are patient and we give the right amount of time to this stage.
From another BotD, Hollowstar: if you could add one extra member to your band, from all of the musicians in the world (dead or alive), who would it be?
Hm, that’s a difficult question. We are all fans of Chuck Schuldiner, so he is the first musician that came to our minds. A great guitarist, great artist, with amazing skills and having the ability to write music that can influence other musicians.
And from Oceans: why?
As I said, he is great guitarist, great artist, with amazing skills and having the ability to write music that can influence other people.
