The following is an interview I had the honour to do some time ago with ELEND's own Alexandre Iskandar Hasnaoui. Read and learn what lies inside the mind of one of the greatest geniuses "Metal" has ever experienced
Here we are Alexandre for another interview… There is surely no need to introduce the other members to those who experienced LECONS DE TENEBRE , but for those who didn't, would you please introduce yourself and the other persons involved in ELEND?
We founded the band in 1993, Renaud and I. Eve Gabrielle joined the group in 1994, just before the recording of our first album. And Nathalie entered the band one year later, just before the recording sessions of Les Ténèbres du Dehors. She sang 90 % of the soprano parts on the album because Eve Gabrielle could not come to the recording sessions due to her studies. Shortly after, we parted from her : she had no more time to devote to her vocal practice and to the band. So Nathalie is now our only soprano singer.
We have all been classically trained. I met Renaud in London where we were playing at the same music stand, I met Eve Gabrielle in a concert where she was singing in the choirs and Nathalie is outside ELEND a professional performer. We would not be capable of composing and write such orchestral parts (even though they are very far from the complexity and finesse of any work of any great composer) if we had no classical qualifications. Renaud and I had to stop our musical studies before the composition courses, which take place during the very last years of the classical courses. So we have to learn the rules by ourselves with treatises on harmony and composition but also, and especially, by studying the scores of the masterpieces of the baroque, classic and romantic periods.
LECONS DE TENEBRE is surely one of the musical highlights of 1994/95 (As far as I'm concerned). What are your views nowadays towards LDT ? and also about LES TENEBRES DE DEHORS ? Did you receive lots of letters from fans?
As for the critical reception, we are very happy, it's been successful. We also received (and we are still receiving) a lot of letters from " our fans ", which surprised us a lot. We did not expect people to write so numerously. As for the album in itself, there is a big problem with the production, though most of the people enjoyed our sound. It could have sounded much more better. But, most of all, the recording is incomplete : we hadn't enough time and synth equipment to record all the orchestral arrangements. But in concert, if we play live, we will play the complete version (and in fact we played a more complete version during our unique live performance in April '95). In fact the main problem with the first album is precisely that you need one.
As for the second album, the problem is not the same. The production is good...but is not the one we wanted. This time we had enough synth equipment but the studio was a too small structure for such a recording. The critical reception have been tremendous and our two albums are the best sellers among the productions of Holy Records.
Both you and Renaud have a classical music background, but yet, you share a mutual interest in bands such as MY DYING BRIDE, DEAD CAN DANCE,AT THE GATES AND BATHORY. Is this a recent interest or is this an old story?
It's been approximately 5 years since Renaud listened to metal, and as for myself it's been about 10 years. So it is pretty old...But I am really fed up with it nowadays and, apart from MY DYING BRIDE, THE GATHERING and THE THIRD AND THE MORTAL (with Kari), I do not listen to metal any more.
What about your deal with Holy Records? It's over now, right?
Holy Records will release a soprano choirs only version of Les Ténèbres du Dehors (as many people ask for it) with 2 new tracks and a cover from DEAD CAN DANCE. It will be out in March '97 and this will be our last release on Holy Records. We have signed a 4 albums deal with MUSIC FOR NATIONS. We will record the third and last part of the Officium Tenebrarum in August-September '97. We will go in a big 48 trax studio here in France. The music is more complex than on LTDD and much more sombre and violent. To be out in January 98.
Alexandre, what I'm about to ask you is about the lyrical inspirations of ELEND. The first album mainly dealt with Milton's PARADISE LOST Epic , partially also the second one but the concept is evolving into something else. Will you please explain?
Our aim is to compose an Officium Tenebrarum which is a group of three masses sung during the Holy Week, the matins of the Holy Wednesday, Holy Thursday and Holy Friday before Easter. The three masses are called Leçons de Ténèbres and each one is in its turn a group of three Leçons (lessons or lectures in English). So there are nine Leçons in all. The texts of the three lessons of each day are taken respectively from the first, third and fifth of the five odes that make up the Lamentations of Jeremiah on the destruction of Jerusalem. During the office for each of the three days, the candles were gradually extinguished, in order to symbolise the sufferings of the saviour and the abandon of the disciples. The ultimate darkness lent its name to the ceremony. The tenebrae ritual was treated theatrically. It took place in a church only lit by fifteen candles. These were extinguished one by one with the exception of a single candle left alight and concealed behind the altar. The last set of lessons, the ones sung during the office of the Holy Friday, the day the Christ died, is the darkest. At the ending of the Officium, the celebrant made a noise and was answered by all the audience with taps and screams, and this noise represented the disorder and confusion that appeared at the death of Jesus Christ. The last candle was then shown as evidence of the Saviour's Resurrection. The Lectiones were celebrated in the Roman Catholic liturgy since the 8th century, but their golden age was in the 17th century in France, then the tradition disappeared during the 18th century. What was interesting was that the tenebrae were a very rich compromise between sacred music and theatre, it was even described as " sacred lyrical tragedy ". This is this aspect, as well as the symbolic richness of the Officium who attracted us very much. The Officium is, in ELEND, a descent into utter wretchedness : we found this movement far more dramatic and evocative than the welcoming of light that the Catholic Officium is in fact. And which story could lend more epic and dramatic effects in all the Judaeo-Christian civilisation than the creation, rebellion and Fall of angels such as it is evoked in Milton's Paradise Lost, in Anselm of Canterbury's De Casu Diaboli and in Augustine's De Genesi ad litteram liber imperfectus ? Our great novelty is that we tell this story from a non-Christian point of view, that is strictly from Lucifer's point, and this is the first time it happens in music. There are many points that intrigued us. For example, how the fallen archangel is not named in the Holy Bible, how there progressively was an assimilation between Jesus-Lucifer and Venus- Morningstar-lucifer, the fact that Venus is also the Eveningstar and the Fall of angels. How the figure of Lucifer-archangel was progressively refined to resolve the theologian problem of the creation and existence of evil. What seems very interesting for us was to get the luciferian figure out of the catholic systematicity, that is to give it all its scale and depth, because Lucifer, after having been created archangel and before being named Satan-Emperor of Hell and creator of evil, is, for a moment, the only creature that stands out of Christianity. For the next album, we will follow the thematic structure of the Catholic Officium, but with a totally different outcome. The first album was under the sign of despair, this one is under the sign of violence and revolt, the third and last album is under the sign of death, and the most terrible one, the most violent and the darkest of the trilogy. LTDD begins where inter LTD was interrupted. The main part of the lyrics was taken from Milton's Paradise Lost and was dealing with the rebellion and fall of the luciferian legions. The new lyrics depict the fallen angel lost in the ocean of his dreams just after the construction of Pandaemonium, the capital of Hell. The term " ltdd " (the outer darkness) specifies the region of the infernal abyss in Christian cosmography. There are moments of tender reverie besides nightmares. That's why there is the temporality of dream and remembrance, which is not a linear temporality, and a more metaphorical and less narrative kind of expression. The album is like a suspension point, a moment of calm in the narrative development.
You have also appeared in MISANTHROPE 's 1666 THEATRE DE BIZARRE CD (Ed. A really mind bending , Godly Avantgarde CD). How did you get involved? Were you asked by Philippe?
t all started with the synth-arrangements on Le Roman noir, the French version of Schattengesang, which appeared on a big French compilation. Philippe asked me for it and then, as he was pleased with the result, he asked me if I would agree to play and composed the arrangements on the forthcoming album. I accepted. I composed all the synth parts, chose and created the sounds ; that's what I was asked to. But I am not in MISANTHROPE, I just played the key and synth parts during the recording sessions of their last album. I expected much more from this kind of relation and it proved to be very disappointing, humanly and musically speaking, so I don't want to repeat this kind of " collaboration " in future.
Renaud also appeared on Theatre de bizarre doing some German spoken passages. Some time ago we also saw Renaud on KOROVA's debut master piece A Kiss In The Charnel Fields. You seem to be quite busy…..S
We are very busy, but it is with our own music. The composition and the recording of the synths parts in MISANTHROPE took me 4 days, and Renaud spent only 2 hours on the composition and recording of the violin parts for KOROVA. So, as you can see, it is not really engrossing. I also produced the forthcoming album of Eros Necropsique (on Adipocere) in July '96. I composed some orchestral arrangements and the soprano parts. But I will no be credited on the album for complex contractual reasons. But I think we will stop these kind of things in future...It is not very interesting, apart from the technical aspects (a new recording experience in studio is always interesting, there are so many things to learn about engineering).
I don't know how far does your interest in the underground scene go. Are you in contact with many people involved in the scene ?
We have few contacts within the metal scene, I mean with the bands. Only with some bands and persons we really appreciate. Otherwise, I totally don't care about any scene, it being metal or not. I only listen to a few bands or artists and to " classical " music from Renaissance (especially the French one : Josquin Desprez, Anthoine de Bertrand, Clément Janequin...) to post-romantic music. I also listen to a lot of experimental or industrial music (from atmospheric ambient to heavy electronics) just by curiosity : it is not very satisfactory musically speaking, but there are some things to learn from theses bands. Renaud is much more eclectic, he listens to nearly everything (apart from commercial music of course) Jazz and Celtic music especially.
An ELEND live concert is a highly dramatic experience, this raises the question if any of you ever attended any drama/theatre lessons..
None of us ever attended a drama lesson. But, as our concept is very dramatic and as our music is based on a dramatic time and not on a tragic and ecstatic time, the dramatic treatment on stage is rather easy and natural. And this is our music, so it is rather simple to feel it very deeply. As for myself I am nearly possessed by the character. The breathing is partly responsible for this, because for the screams I have to take very quick and violent breaths. It is exhausting, and, honestly, I don't know if I would ever be able to tour as long as we are using screams.
Describe to us the stages through which you pass, from early writing to the final stages of recording. I mean to which extent do you get involved ?
It can be described with the image of increasing concentric circles. At first, I am alone. I decide the general concept of the album, the scenario, and write a first version of the lyrics. Once it is done, I define the musical direction of the album as a whole and then song by song. I then define an abstract structure of each song. Then there is the second circle : Renaud and I, we compose some themes and fill up the abstract structures of the songs. Once we have all the themes for a song, I define the orchestration and the vocal sharing and then we compose the arrangements and the vocal parts. To the extent I have come to a more mature version of the lyrics. The third circle is the interpretation, with Nathalie. We change a few things in the lyrics and in the arrangements. And then there is the last circle with the engineers and the producer for the recording to which everyone participate.
Apart from Milton, which other authors, poets are among your favourites ?
I don' t really like Milton in fact, I don't like the epic (a strong paradox if you think of our music), I prefer more intimate styles. My favourite English writing authors are John Donne, Nathaniel Hawthorne, William Shakespeare, William Blake, Jane Austeen, Emily Brontë, William Faulkner, Vladimir Nabokov, Malcom Lowry, William Styron.
Back to music now, in LDT you praise Monteverdi, Couperin, Bach, Haendel, Dowland, Purcell, Vivaldi and Mozart. To which extent do you feel that these musical geniuses have influenced the music of ELEND ? What other musical styles do you like listening to ?
Well, you have to distinguish two types of influences. At first, there is direct influence : sometimes a melody of one work is so strong that it asserts itself and we cannot do anything against it, we have to use it. And then, little by little we manage to transform it into one personal melody, we make it ours and change it from a Bachian or Mozartian melody to an Elendian melody. But had it not been there at the beginning, thanks to its irresistible effect on us, we would not have found our melody. Secondly there is the indirect influence, which is in fact the way every composer learn his art, that is the studying of the music of your predecessors or of the ones you chose to be your own master and teacher, by doing this you learn how to render in music a feeling, an atmosphere, how to create such and such effect on your audience. Then the more you study, the more you are able to create your own music, your own effects, your own world. Take ELEND for example (that is the only one I am really in a position to give) we start off with a neo-classical basis and we finally come out with something unheard before. As for my personal musical tastes, my favourite composers are Purcell, Dowland, Bach and Mahler. I also listen to great pop acts such as Leonard Cohen, The Beatles, plus the above mentioned metal bands. But my absolute favourite, the only band whose music I can listen to at any time of the year is DEAD CAN DANCE.
May I dare ask you to pen a verse or two of your own poetry for us ?
I
Fire is my world of burning desires.
The thousand sunsets are flaming
Through the red of the rainbows
And the darkness of my eyes.
Kiss my lips forlorn and dwell in me
As I lie departed in the cathedral of your tears.
And let all my people know that Hope died this night
For all your sins and fears and grieves and pains.
II
Happy they that in Hell feel not Heaven's despair
For all the pearls have vanished that shone before
As I wandered within the ark of colours.
I am looking eager to see each drop of pain reflected in your eyes.
And I do beseech thee to hear my ceaseless crying.
Cast down with sin oppressed I am longing for your embrace
As I sacrifice my sanity
During every weeping nights...
OK Alexandre, the torture is finished...You must really be exhausted. Excuse my long questions. Was the interview too boring, what did you like/hate most of this interview. Is there anything that I didn't ask you that perhaps you wanted to talk about ?
Everything was fine, Godwin, don't worry.
I am really grateful for your patience and for being such a true honest friend. Thank you very much. Eternal friendship and support from me/ OMEGA. Last words are yours !
Thank you for the interview, your patience (!!!) and your support, Godwin.
- F I N -
