Deliverance is dreaming again.
Following their very dark third album released in 2022, the band signed to Les Acteurs De L’Ombre composed of Pierre Duneau (vocals/keyboards, Memories of a Dead Man), Sacha Février (bass), Etienne Sarthou (guitar/vocals, Freitot, Karras, ex-AqME), and Viken Poulain (drums, Abrahama), unveils The Voyager Golden Banquet*, its fourth album, in a rather different tone.
Hellisual slowly opens the album’s doors with bright, almost soothing tones, gradually introducing dissonance that suddenly erupts, affirming its slow, sticky sludge roots before giving prominence to psychedelic touches that lend a unique rhythm to their haunting slowness. The aggressive nature of the vocals fuels the contrast, corrupting the dreamlike sounds to summon aggressive Black Metal and make the mix chaotic, slowing down to drift into Chasing The Dragon, which offers a more consistent rhythm, adopting epic undertones once again darkened by Pierre’s growls. The track is fairly short, however, and the fact that it takes a while to fade into silence gives us a chance to catch our breath before moving on to Headspace Collapse, the third track, which is much more rooted in an ethereal and mysterious vibe, particularly thanks to the clean vocals and keyboards, though we can feel the sound intensifying, slowly cloaking itself in the long-awaited distortion – even as it remains melancholic. The final is much heavier, contrasting with Turn On, Tune In, and Drop Out, which exploits the atmospheric side of Black Metal and blends it with majestic keyboards to create an impressive hypnotic sound, though there’s a groovy, jerky touch to the bass/drum break, where dissonant harmonics eventually emerge, captivating us all the way through As Above, So Below, a calm, eerie interlude lasting about thirty seconds. The oppressive atmosphere returns with Ground Zero, allowing the vocalist to display plaintive yet aggressive tones, returning to a slow, haunting rhythm that never hesitates to break apart only to resume even stronger, while growls emerge here and there before coming to an abrupt end, leaving us with The Banquet – Part 1. Black Metal once again takes center stage, adopting a much colder sound, at least when the keyboards aren’t there to lend it that almost playful touch, before drifting into The Banquet – Part 2, a more minimalist track where a fairly gentle instrumental accompanies a robotic voice, only for the whole thing to erupt once more, then fade away.
Although it has changed its identity, Deliverance remains firmly rooted in a sticky Black/Sludge sound with rather unexpected influences, making the project a true musical oddity. If you aren’t surprised and impressed by The Voyager Golden Banquet, you’re probably not human.
85/100
A few questions for Etienne Sarthou and Pierre Duneau, respectively guitarist and singer of the band Deliverance, about their new album, The Voyager Golden Banquet.
Hello to both of you, and thank you for taking the time to speak with me. I’m going to ask you a tricky question to start with: without using genre labels like Black, Sludge, Doom, or others, how would you describe the band Deliverance?
Pierre Duneau (vocals): It’s a bit Pore progressive now; it’s… if you want to strip away the words, there’s a bit more electronics.
Etienne Sarthou (guitar): Intense, introspective music.
Pierre: Were you talking about style or descriptive adjectives?
Etienne: Yeah, intense, introspective music, sometimes calm, sometimes turbulent… But often on the edge.
The last time you wrote to me, Étienne, you told me that the name Deliverance was linked to the movie of the same name, which had a slightly unsettling vibe. How do you connect that to the album The Voyager Golden Banquet, which is described as a quest for light with no possible return?
Étienne: Well, I don’t associate it with it at all anymore, because actually, when I came up with that name, which isn’t exactly groundbreaking, let’s be honest, I’d just watched the movie for the umpteenth time, and I thought, “Oh, Deliverance, I don’t know of any band called that, so let’s call ourselves that”. In the meantime, we’ve made four albums and an EP, and it’s true that the connection… I don’t see any connection between the movie today and our album, clearly. Aside from clearly some anxiety-inducing moments. There are moments in our music, uh, that are anxiety-inducing, and they’re anxiety-inducing in the movie too. But no, the reference doesn’t go any further than that today. I feel like we’ve really moved forward with every album, and that in any case, we’re breaking free from those kinds of things, to the point where… Today, we’re closer to movies like, uh, 2001: A Space Odyssey and Interstellar than we are to Deliverance. We should rename ourselves; we should rename ourselves 2001.
That could be an idea—just another marketing ploy!
Etienne: We could do that too and change our name with every album!
That’s another marketing idea, but it might confuse people a bit.
Etienne: Don’t tempt us!
So, the album The Voyager Golden Banquet is coming out next month. How are you feeling?
Pierre: The hardest part is done: the album has been written. Everything went well; we got the feedback. It’s always stressful when you get mastering feedback or responses from labels, so all that’s behind us now. Now we’re looking forward to the festivals, and there’s just one thing we’re waiting for: to perform it live! Otherwise, yeah, we’re very calm. We’re really happy with the album and what we’ve done. After that, it’s kind of out of our hands. Whether people like it or not, we’ll be very happy if there are people who do like it, and as for those who don’t… there’s not much we can do about it, really, so at that level, as long as we’re very proud of what we’ve done, that’s enough for us. And then we try to perform it on stage as best we can and have a good time doing it.
Another slightly annoying question: how would you sum up The Voyager Golden Banquet in just three words?
Pierre: That’s not annoying! I’ve already done that in another interview. I said journey, balance, and tension.
Etienne: I’d say “quest for light,” but that’s already three words – though it’s one phrase: “quest for light.” Wandering. And hope. But there are others too! I’d say “crushing,” and I’d throw in a bunch of other stuff!
That’s interesting. So, how did the songwriting process go? Did you notice any changes compared to the previous album?
Pierre: A new drummer!
That’s definitely a noticeable change, all right!
Etienne: That was definitely a factor, it’s a real change because we’d actually already written the album when Fred was still with us, our former drummer. And after a lot of ups and downs, we finally managed to find our drummer in Viken. When we brought him into the band, we first tried to play those finished songs with Viken.
Pierre: He didn’t try, because actually, with Viken, we had one or two drummers, one for sure. We showed him the album; we’d made it with Fred, and with another drummer in the meantime. We played the album for him over two or three months, the future new album, and then he left. So Viken arrived, and we didn’t really feel like showing him the album anymore; I was completely sick of the album.
Etienne: We had gigs, Viken arrived, so we worked on the old songs. And we started with a jam session and it went well; we thought, “maybe we’ll keep jamming,” and the new songs came together. That’s how part of the album came about, anyway, instead of me showing up with finished songs where I’d taken them all the way through and then we’d decide whether to change them or not, when we’re in rehearsal and we see if it works or doesn’t work, because there’s always a re-evaluation. So, I thought to myself, “Hey, I’ve got an idea here,” fifteen minutes before the others showed up for rehearsal. I had a riff running through my head, I just threw it out there, and I told the others… not even the others, actually, I think it was just with Viken… I told him, “Why don’t we work on this? I feel like we can do something with it.” We unravelled the ball of yarn together instead of me doing it all by myself in my corner, and it really gave it a fresher feel, and that’s exactly what we needed to integrate Viken into the band as smoothly as possible.
Did he re-record all his drum parts?
Pierre: Oh, but there wasn’t anything recorded! It was recorded, but with this, you see (the Tascam on the table, ed.), he composed everything, that’s also the goal and the best way to make sure he stands behind the album with us. He composed it. If you bring in a drummer and offer him tour dates, you’re forcing him to play old albums plus a new one he didn’t write, he has to wait for the next album to finally write his own stuff and really be part of the band. It gets complicated for him. It’s not great. So we figured, “This is the best way to integrate him” and for us to get a fresh start, to start from scratch because, yeah, this album, it was starting… I don’t know how long it took on the album that never came out because we did write it with Fred; we were almost done when he left. We’d written an album when Fred left. Then a new drummer came in, and we didn’t show him that album—we already felt like we were just rehashing something that was actually already done. So it’s true that if we’d kept going with Fred, The Voyager Golden Banquet probably wouldn’t have existed.
Etienne: Or it might have been delayed by an album, that’s possible. But it’s very personal; I’m no longer afraid at all to let go of even good ideas or good songs. I’ve been lucky in my life to have already accomplished a lot and made many albums, and in fact, there’s no reason to be afraid of a blank page; I can clearly see that we’re capable of writing songs and making new ones. And ultimately, if we don’t keep that particular good track, we’ll just make others! The reality of the band had really changed. So an album is a bit like a snapshot of a specific moment, a photograph. It’s already not the same thing, since we’re not the same people anymore, and the vibe of the album we were writing was actually very close to the previous one. And finding Viken, I think, brought us some peace of mind too; we wanted that aspect on the album, an aspect that’s sometimes brighter, sometimes more serene, without forgetting the other emotions we always want to keep, which lean more toward the Metal side, you know?
Speaking of the sound, we obviously hear the Black/Sludge elements from your early albums, and as you mentioned, more Prog influences, even Psychedelic ones. How do you manage to blend all these influences to create your own unique sound?
Etienne: It happens naturally. We just do it and hope we’ll like it. We create, see how it turns out, and if it works for all four of us, that’s a good sign. We build on that, keep things moving, don’t overthink it, and don’t say to ourselves, “Okay, the next song will be cleaner, no more of that stuff.”
Pierre: Our tastes also evolve over time. I listen to less and less Metal, which is kind of silly for a Metal band, but I listen to less and less because I’ve heard it all. You change, you evolve, you move on to something else… I’ll probably come back to it in two years; I don’t know. So, I feel less inspired by that.
And what exactly are the bands that could inspire you?
Pierre: I’ve listened to everything in 70s Progressive Rock. I’ve gone deep into it; I really like it, it has nothing to do with what we’re doing right now. Right now, there are bands that… I don’t know if you’ve heard of Angine de Poitrine, which everyone’s talking about. But back then, all the bands were way more out there than them! The whole scene was like that, and it was pure freedom! There were tons of instruments, it was super Rock’n’Roll!
Yeah, there are plenty of people who criticize that very thing, that it’s already been done 40 times before.
Pierre: Yeah, but that’s kind of the problem with music: we go in circles! But Metal still has this very surgical side to it that’s less in my DNA; I’m more into Rock’n’Roll than Metal and Progressive Rock. Emerson, Lake and Palmer, they have a keyboard virtuoso. He’d end up standing on his keyboard, roughing it up, stomping his mic stand into it, knives popping out of nowhere from the keyboard… That’s Rock’n’Roll! Whereas as time goes on, we talk about Rock and Roll, but I feel like we’re losing something, it’s actually less Rock’nRoll… Well, it’s metal, and that’s not really my thing. But hey, everyone has their own influences. I know that this speaks to me more – I grew up on Grunge more than Metal. I was never really into Metallica; I didn’t grow up with that. Maybe I wasn’t part of that generation.
Etienne: We really feel very free. We listen to a lot of music that people would call “very different,” but I see connections between genres, between different band styles. I really see a connection… I’ll tell you something crazy, between Radiohead and Black Metal. Because when I listen to Oranssi Pazuzu, I feel like I’m listening to Radiohead with guitars that hurt and a voice that’s scary. But deep down, all it takes is tweaking a few elements for your perception of a band to do a complete 180. So I also see a connection between extreme Metal bands like Morbid Angel or Black Metal bands and Pink Floyd; I don’t see how those things are contradictory. To me, they complement each other and together form the whole of rock and roll, which includes metal and so on. Then again, there are tons of little subgenres within metal, and it’s harder to make sense of them all, but I think it’s all connected. What’s being done today is the legacy of 50 years or more of Rock’n’Roll music. So you just have to unravel the thread to find a connection. And I don’t see why… we really enjoy mixing it all up, but we don’t say to ourselves, “We absolutely have to mix all this together.” It happens quite naturally, and it’s true that it’s probably harder to explore Metal if you don’t add something else to it. For us, it’s definitely by bringing in different influences – like ’70s Rock, stuff like that, or Indie Rock, Psychedelic Rock from back then and now – that we can maybe create a different kind of Metal, something a little more personal. That’s what we’re trying to do, anyway. But it’s something that happened naturally as we released more albums. Those elements were already present on Holocaust 26:1-46, our second album; it’s just that we’re pushing them much further as we go along.
I agree with that analysis!
Etienne: I think there’s a common thread running through all our albums, but we’re emphasizing certain aspects more and more as we go along. Because we’re more comfortable with them and feel more capable of bringing them to life. Those kinds of tracks – as un-Psychedelic and atmospheric as the ones on Headspace Collapse, at the beginning or in the second half of Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out, are things we feel more capable of doing today, because we’ve already experimented with that a bit and we feel more capable! Who knows, maybe on the next album, half of it will be instrumental, because we’ll be able to do it or because we’ll feel like it. We gain confidence by putting ourselves out there, by doing things we haven’t necessarily done before and that we love about a lot of the bands we listen to.
So now, a quick question about the artwork: we notice that, just like on the previous album, it’s really well done for its genre. What were the guidelines for creating the artwork?
Pierre: Space, outer space.
Etienne: Retro-futuristic?
Pierre: Yeah, I sent you guys quite a few images along those lines, but that was back in the days of Neon Chaos in a Junk-Sick Dawn. So it would tie in a bit with the lyrics’ theme. It’s the last thing we do, we always finish with the artwork. Maybe some people start with the artwork; I don’t know. In any case, we finish with the artwork, it has to be the final touch, so it’s what brings everything together. It’s a difficult process, but this time it was easy.
Etienne: It was honestly the easiest one we’ve ever had. There was no debate at all; it was super easy, whereas the previous one was much more complicated. My wife has been designing the band’s album covers since the band’s inception. But for the previous ones, she relied on photos by a friend named Mathieu Piranda, who’s a photographer in eastern France. And this time, we felt we needed to break away from those photos because they weren’t particularly retro-futuristic, in line with the brief we’d set for ourselves. So Pauline also searched through quite a few retro-futuristic stock photo sites, etc… She put together her own little collage, showed it to us, and we said, “That’s exactly it.” And just in the cover art alone, I think we already see a lot of the emotions on the album – this character alone facing the unknown. It’s at once soothing, beautiful, frightening, almost threatening, with this enormous planet. we don’t know if it’s getting closer, if there’s going to be a collision… There are, several possible paths; there are anomalies in the image. So it really captures what we’ve developed on the album. Almost everything on the album is reflected on the cover.
And what specifically inspired you to write the music and lyrics?
Pierre: The lyrics stem from a desire to break away from the previous album, from my own rules, and from what I’ve been reading. I only read sci-fi these days. Before, I was into the classics and all sorts of things, I read a lot. Since then, I’ve read nothing but sci-fi, and I keep at it to escape a bit. I have some cool concepts; that’s really what inspired me. And of course, I still draw inspiration from everything I’ve read before, which creates a link to the lyrics of the older albums. I needed a change of scenery, at least when it comes to the lyrics, to explore something else, to avoid overthinking things, to write a bit on instinct, let it flow, and then see where it takes me, without overanalyzing the phrasing. At least at first, I’d write a first draft and then rework it, letting the overall idea come together very naturally. All the lyrics were written in a week. After that, I went back over everything for six months, word by word—sometimes you think about it on the subway and say to yourself, “Oh, I’ll change that line.” Sometimes you don’t think about it all day, but it took a long time to finalize everything, though the bulk of it was done in a week and a half. In December 2024, during the holidays.
It went by fast!
Pierre: I knew roughly where I was going; I’d thought about the themes. The music inspired the themes; I already knew where I was going beforehand, so I just went with it.
Etienne: And as for the music, it’s pretty hard to answer that question because personally, and this is true for all of us, we’re the product of 40 years (in my case) of listening to music, from Supertramp to Watain, and all of that really feeds me. So today, there aren’t really any bands that fundamentally transform me. On the other hand, I love putting a lot of little nods into the music! Whether people notice them or not, I love putting in nods that seem obvious to me, but within the context of the band, I think we might completely miss them. I really enjoy doing that. Most of the time when I write a song, I don’t say to myself, “Hey, I’m going to write a song like this.” I feel like I have an idea that wants to come out, I sit down at the guitar, I find a version of that idea in my head that might match what I have in mind, and sometimes what I find on the guitar is different from what I have in mind. But that can be great too, so that’s what I’ll keep or not. And the difference is that instead of doing it completely on my own, this time I did it with the others; I’d say to them, “Oh yeah, but here I’d like us to change it, could we do this, could we do that?”… And in a very spontaneous way, actually. There’s never a moment where I think, “Oh, I listened to this album, it’s going to make me write that song.” Especially since, well, the foundation of the songs, at least on some tracks from Deliverance, is often pretty much the same: a riff, a groove I like, something pretty heavy, and so on… Then I think, “Do I need to play it this way or that way, in this key or not?”… sometimes it’s a reworking I do later, deliberately changing a song’s key. But it’s pretty hard today to say, “I did that at such-and-such a moment because I was listening to that”, it doesn’t work that way for me anymore. Sometimes, it’s even bands I record in my studio, that I work with in the studio, and it just flows into a feeling, and then it feeds into something, that can happen, but it doesn’t mean it sounds exactly like what I was listening to at that exact moment.
Speaking of inspiration, there are two tracks that really intrigued me. They’re the last two parts, the last two tracks on The Banquet. Why did you choose to split them up, and why are they so different from each other?
Pierre: It’s true that the first one is much more epic, and the second one is more of a… conclusion, an album closer.
Etienne: Maybe that’s why it was split into two parts! It’s one song, with pretty much the same key and shared notes. To maintain continuity for a song that’s split in two, even though it probably shouldn’t have been split, since there’s a connection between the two parts. We had the choice of putting it in one or two parts.
Pierre: It’s true that in two parts, it’s more fun; it also allowed us to release it as a single, just part one, and then have part two later. You’re left wanting a little more. I’ve never listened to just part one – only the whole thing.
Etienne: I’ve never listened to it on its own, and even when we rehearse, we don’t play part one, we’ve never tried it. Actually, it’s the same with Ground Zero and the interlude right before it. From the start, it had to be seamless, but I knew they were two different tracks. I really like that in ’70s records, but it’s not a matter of daring to do it, I didn’t feel like it was the right time for that on this album. But I really like it when a song is in two parts, but you find the second part elsewhere on the album. You see, for example, in Pink Floyd’s Shine On You Crazy Diamond, you have part one at the beginning of the album and part two at the end of the album. And the two parts are different but complementary. It’s another way of looking at music. And I love that because it’s a slightly less Pop-oriented way of looking at music, less conventional, and it accentuates the slightly psychedelic side of that kind of thing. And actually, I think what you’re saying is funny, because you think the two parts are very different. But in the second part, the basic chords played by the bass, which I then play on guitar over top when it explodes, are exactly the same chords as the verse in part one. So having the same idea but using it differently means we don’t perceive the thing the same way at all. And I find that fascinating; it fascinates me in the bands I listen to, because quite a few of them do that, but it’s not that common in Metal, and those are really elements of psychedelic rock, and I think it’s awesome because you think it’s very different. I really see a connection. But great, if it’s very different and at the same time coherent, we’ve won it all! And actually, I thought it was pretty funny to imagine that we could keep only part one as a standalone track, and part two as well. And when we put them together, it makes a third thing. So it’s another freedom we allow ourselves, and it means more tracks on the album! It avoids having just six tracks again; I think that brings us to eight. But on the previous album, it had already occurred to me afterward to think, “Maybe we could have split the track into several parts.” And this time, we did it.
Pierre: But you didn’t want to split it up at first. But we had wondered about the fragment. And it’s always after the fact that we say to ourselves, “Hey, maybe we could have done that.” It doesn’t matter, let’s do it this time.
This new album is being released by Les Acteurs De L’Ombre, who also worked with you on your previous release. How’s the collaboration going?
Pierre: It’s going very well. We’ve met several times with Gérald and even other people. There are a lot of people at LADLO, it’s a volunteer-run operation, but there are so many people involved. They’re passionate about what they do and do it for free. there’s that human side to it, so, on a personal level, we really like them. It makes you want to work with people like that; it’s not just about the music or just for profit. So I like it; this concept really speaks to me. I’m very happy, plus it’s a label that still has a certain reputation in France, one that’s helped bring certain bands to light. We’re very happy.
Etienne: They’re truly dedicated people. Truly dedicated to the band, and when they work with a band, it’s really to support them, it’s not just to put out a record. They don’t have any purely commercial interest in any of this; they’re really there to support artists and release records they love. So it’s really great. That’s really why we make music, and that’s the whole point of their label, to support the artists they want to, the ones they love and want to support. So it’s great.
Quick question for you, Pierre: you’ve always had a very distinctive visual style for each release, one that changes, and this time, I get the impression it’s inspired by Brian De Palma’s Phantom of the Paradise. So why did you change your visual identity so drastically?
Pierre: Well, drastically, yes and no. I don’t know if I’ve told you this or not—I’m doing one interview after another… But I needed to go somewhere else, to see something different, and that also comes through visually, through the face. I needed to move forward in terms of my outfit too, and I love that movie—it’s a film that has everything I love! And I’m lucky to have my friend Paul Toupet, who’s an artist and who kindly made this mask for me; I’m very proud to wear it and to showcase this movie that I love. But there’s still a connection, because the makeup is still underneath. I won’t wear the mask for the whole concert; I’ll only wear it for part of the show. I’ll probably take it off a quarter of the way through or halfway through the concert.
For us photographers, we have to start with it! (laughs)
Pierre: Yeah, maybe, but you know what: I’ve been thinking about it some more! I want to make the stage a little more theatrical, because I can get bored quickly on stage, so I think I need to do things to make it a bit more theatrical, changing outfits… do stuff, wear a mask, take the mask off… have props, I don’t know, thinking about it, it’s coming together! I need to rein myself in because I can really go off the rails!
Actually, you are a kid, should we give you some Legos on stage?
Pierre: That’s it. It’s true that I’d been thinking about that mask for a long time.
Etienne: Even before this new album, he’d been talking to us about it for a long time.
Pierre: Yeah. I had your “moderate support,” so I said to myself, “Alright then, I’m going to make my mask, and anyway, I don’t care, I’ll make my mask.”
I like the concept of “moderate support,” meaning, “we see what you want to do, but we’re not really sold on it”…
Pierre: No, we’re not really into it, but on the other hand, it actually worked well with this new album. It seemed more obvious on this album than on the previous one. And I tell myself, anyway, I don’t care, I make a bit of music on my own too, but the problem is that it stays on my own, I won’t do anything with it. And then, worst-case scenario, I tell myself, “Yeah, I’ll take photos of myself in my room, keep them at home, and display them there,” and that’s it. This time, I really wanted to do it because I love that movie so much. I have a friend who’s a visual artist, he makes sculptures… I went all the way with it, and I’m really happy I did. But yeah, I’m a little too childish, I think, and I can quickly do a bunch of stuff because I’m bored, don’t have much of a budget, and I can’t… But I have a hard time when it’s too serious—I’m more Rock and Roll, and if I could just go wild on the drums…
I’m not sure Viken’s very happy about that!
Pierre: It’s not his, it’s Etienne’s one! Viken, that cracks him up!
Listen, I’ll let you guys figure this out among yourselves; I’ll be back in two minutes! (laughs)
Pierre: But yeah, we can’t just do whatever we want either; it’s going to look ridiculous after a while. We have to rein it in, which is hard.
Etienne: And then it’s good that we have: I’ve always thought that Pierre should embody something, which he already is naturally, the outside had to reflect the quirks he might have, the peculiarities; he’s a bit of a special character because I think he is a character. And the fact that he dares to be someone different on stage, I always think that’s great, so you have to be bold like that, make bold choices; it’s cool.
Pierre: But on the contrary, I think… and I’m on stage that I’d be even less of a different person, even though I’m wearing more and more makeup, strangely enough. I was more myself when I was bare-faced, which is weird. Hidden behind makeup, more like a mask… I’m more normal at home, just like every day.
I see the concept.
Pierre: Thanks, it’s strange, but… maybe shyness, the fact of being exposed…
So, you’re a bit hidden, you’re going to be yourself, and then at worst people will see a character?
Pierre: Maybe, totally.
Etienne: It’s a character in its own right, and it really touched people. So is Ziggy Stardust really David Bowie? We don’t actually know!
I couldn’t ask him!
Etienne: But that’s what really left a mark on people and touched them. Now, he wasn’t entirely himself at that moment, but maybe he was anyway – that’s what he wanted, he didn’t care. And that’s fun, we like that – it’s Rock’n’Roll!
Speaking of which, there’s been a lot of talk about live shows, and I’ve never actually seen you perform live, so how does a Deliverance concert go for you guys?
Etienne: Great! And we hope the audience enjoys it too. Things are going well, we’re playing at the end of May, a week after our album release, at Petit Bain… with Nature Morte and Aetheria Consciencia.
Pierre: It’s going really well. Sure, we’d love to offer something even more immersive, but we don’t quite have the means yet… But now we’re starting to work with a lighting engineer who’s already going to add an extra dimension to our shows. So before, we were just playing, those were the last shows we did, we were only using our own lights, no other lighting besides our own, so it was super minimalist. And that really speaks to us too, but now we want to show an extra dimension because it’s also supposed to reflect the album and the variety of emotions on the record. So we’re going to try to reflect that as best we can and go beyond minimalism, even going overboard at times, and offer, as much as possible despite our somewhat limited resources, a visual experience as powerful as we hope the music is, because we travel in a small van. Because of the costs, because of all that, we don’t have trucks following us. We need something that works for every venue, from Hellfest, which is massive, to a small venue, it has to work everywhere, and that’s not easy.
Pierre: That’s the challenge: making it work everywhere, keeping it true to who we are, and having something happening at the same time. You have to be imaginative; you have to think it through. So the mask was pretty simple: it doesn’t take up much space, it adds something different, you take it off, you put it back on. And for me, it really spoke to me, so it’s actually the little details like that where you can make an impact and do something. Right now, we’re lucky to have someone handling the lighting for us, but when you have someone handling the lighting, it’s an extra spot in the van, an extra room at the hotel… so without even realizing it, it adds up. So the bulbs, it was also about using our own bulbs, at least we know it’s going to look good because the lighting engineer asks, “What should I do?” and we say, “Nothing!” At least we know what our show is going to be like; we’re in control of it. That was great; it keeps you from having a green-yellow-red light behind you when you’re playing a concert and you’re doing Reggae! And that’s what’s not easy to manage for bands of our size. It’s a tricky middle ground; you have to be creative!
Do you guys have any little rituals before or after shows?
Pierre: Yeah, I’m talking about makeup, it takes forever, it’s a real pain. Half an hour is a long time. And I need to warm up for a good half hour too, so an hour before the show, I disappear because I have too much to do, so that’s about it.
Etienne: Yeah, we each warm up with our instruments; there’s no particular ritual.
So no goat sacrifices, even though we’re still in the Black Metal scene?
Pierre: Not yet; we don’t have the budget for goats, that’s one more person in the van, in the hotel.
If one is sacrificed, in theory, does no one sleep with it?
Pierre: But if it’s the night before, we have the goat the night before: if we’re doing two shows in a row, what do we do with that goat? Do we need two goats?
Etienne: You’ve sacrificed a dead goat a second time…
All that stuff, you have to think about it beforehand, it’s logistics, I get it… And so we had actually talked about the show in Paris, how did you put together the lineup with Sanit Mils and the bands?
Etienne: Well, it was when I ran into Vangelis at a concert, he’s the head of Sanit Mils, whom I knew, and who had already had us play with Karras. We know him well, and when I ran into him, I said, “Deliverance’s album is coming out around then,” and he said, “We should throw a release party.” We’d been talking about a release party for our albums for a while, we’d never actually done one. And we naturally asked Nature Morte, who are friends and with whom we also share the rehearsal space! And, they told us, “Let’s just invite that other band that’s on the Frozen Records label with us,” who are also touring a bit beforehand. And it all came together very simply: a co-release party, even though Nature Morte’s album will have already been out for a little while. It might not really be much of a release party for them, but for us, it’s definitely a release party! We’re going to play the whole album. They’re from Paris, so it’s also their Paris show. So it’s important for a Parisian band to have a Paris show and for it to be a good one.
And it’s still a pretty big venue compared to…
Pierre: *hides*
No, it’s fine, there won’t be anyone in front of you!
Etienne: It’s a bit of a gamble, honestly, let’s not lie to ourselves: we’re not sure we’ll sell out that night.
But we can still buy tickets!
Etienne: But it’s also by getting on stage, on a great stage, that you can put on a show that’ll leave a lasting impression on people and make others want to come see us next time!
Pierre: Whatever happens, it’s all about the love. A half-full venue makes for a great concert to celebrate a great release and to make the people who came happy! They paid, so we have to give them a good time. A great album release, a good, relaxed moment, suspended in time, that’s what’s important.
So what are your next plans after this release party?
Etienne: Playing shows, there are already two music videos set to drop before the album. We’ve finally been able to get started on some music video projects! The first one is coming out next week, on Wednesday, April 22. And another one will drop the week the album comes out—it’s practically a short film because it’s eight minutes long. Pierre is the main character in it.
Pierre: Sébastien, the guitarist/singer from Abraham, is directing the video for us. We went to Normandy for a day of filming, and now he’s having fun editing it, he’s spending his weeks with me because of it!
Etienne: And next week’s music video is by Mathieu Ezan, you might know him; he’s directed tons of videos. He just released Tagada Jones’ latest video, for example. He’s one of my good friends, and we made one together—that’s the one coming out next week. We’re booked for Tyrant Fest at the end of the year, and yeah, it’s all about playing shows.
Pierre: Mainly festivals, because there are a lot of them in France and that’s kind of the bread and butter of it, let’s not kid ourselves. It’s a way for people to discover us, you have folks who didn’t necessarily come for us, but for a headliner or another band, etc… they’re wandering around, they stumble upon a band, they discover us, they actually stop for a moment, they’re not scrolling on their phones, they take five minutes… Then they leave, they don’t like where they are, and that’s where it is, I think you make great discoveries and you have the time. So it’s important for people and for us too, everything about festivals.
And if you had to put together your dream lineup that would best reflect your entire discography, with you as the opener and three other bands. Who would the other bands be?
Etienne: Can we each give an answer?
Pierre: Can we include bands that are no longer active?
Etienne: I’d say Pink Floyd, but from the ’70s, when they were still able to get along. Watain. And Yob or Oranssi Pazuzu, one of the two. That makes four, but I cheated! It’s no big deal!
Pierre: I’d put Nirvana, obviously The Doors, I’d put Emerson, Lake and Palmer, they make me laugh, and Jimi Hendrix. Actually, they’re all dead. Actually, they’re all dead. My concert is going to be intense. It’s not going to be wild…
Etienne: Pink Floyd, it’s kind of like they’re dead too!
So that’s what “death metal” is… (laughs)
Pierre: My lineup is very Metal! I’ll throw you a Woodstock… (laughs)
Don’t you want to use holograms? It’ll go faster. (laughs)
Pierre: Yeah, I’ll do that…
Etienne: It works now, some people are doing it!
Let’s move on to the last two questions, which are going to be a lot more fun. First, what’s on our playlist right now?
Etienne: Well, I’ve been listening to a band called Altin Gün, that’s how you spell it, a lot. They’re a Dutch band, if I understand correctly, since I don’t really pay much attention to that anymore; I don’t read band bios these days, I don’t have the time… I think it’s a Dutch band, but made up of members of Turkish origin. In any case, they sing in Turkish; it’s an Eastern Psychedelic Rock band. I saw them live recently too, and it was really great. So I’m listening to them a lot, I discovered them a few months ago. I’m also listening to the latest Converge a lot among recent releases. I think it’s really well done. My latest favorite in Black Metal was last year, it’s Oranssi Pazuzu’s latest album. I’ve always liked the band a lot, but I think their latest album is truly incredible, fantastic, to mention some more contemporary stuff. Otherwise, as for the classics, I still listen to the classics, Pink Floyd, I still listen to them. But it’s those periods, it’s… The Doors, Pink Floyd…
Pierre: (he went to get his phone, ed.) I’m not going to cheat, okay. Can, I have Van der Graaf Generator, King Crimson, Gentle Giant, Emerson, Lake and Palmer, Yes, Grateful Dead. And then other stuff… It’s a current playlist of what I’ve been listening to lately on Spotify.
Last question: you’re going to have to think a little harder on this one. Last time, you told me it wasn’t possible to illustrate Deliverance’s music with food. So do you have a theme that’s neither food nor cinema to describe your music?
Etienne: Ah, that’s complicated, damn it… Maybe, maybe painting! It would have to be, complex like Leonardo da Vinci and take the form of a Warhol.
Pierre: What’s the question? (laughs)
My last question every time is to illustrate your band’s music with a dish, but in the last interview, Etienne told me that wasn’t possible!
Etienne: I was in a bind (laughs).
So we’ve already talked about cinema a lot, so I thought: without mentioning food or cinema, find another field!
Etienne: From da Vinci to Warhol, it’s super pretentious, I’m well aware of that, but…
Pierre: Theater, yeah, theater. I don’t know anything about it… All that stuff with Dadaism, you know the Dada movement? Tzara, he’d go on stage, get beaten up, take a beating… he’d give people tomatoes so they could throw them in his face…
Is that a call for the release party? (laughs)
Pierre: The guy was just doing whatever he wanted, Tristan Tzara would show up dressed like some crappy tin-can robot, he’d make a mess, that’s what he did! And the Velvet Underground did that too, they’d come on stage totally high, and they’d get trashed; it’s shitty music and people were yelling… Can’t wait for Petit Bain (laughs)
So we’re bringing tomatoes, not goats, I got it!
Etienne: Let’s go!
That was my last question. The final word is yours, and thank you!
Pierre: Thanks to you! For your time, your passion, the time you spend editing, writing, all that, keeping up with the local scene! Keep it up!
Etienne: Thanks to all the fans!