Interview by Tarja Virmakari
Just recently, Volcano Records released “Sleeping Sickness”, the debut album of the young stoner rock band WATERCRISIS, that sounds in a way powerful and delicate. The band that just put out a first EP last year and shared stage with LACUNA COIL last summer, comes to this first full length release with an hypnotic impact leaded by an emotional and violent female voice.
Metal Shock Finland had a chance to interview the band’s frontlady Caterina Salzano, talking about the debut album, the band itself and their message to the world.
1. Hi WaterCrisis, welcome to Metal Shock Finland? How are you doing?
– Hi Metal Shock Finland and readers, we’re doin’ pretty well if you think that we’re playing a lot in this period!
2. First of all, please introduce me your band members and their best and worst habits…
– The band is composed by me, Caterina Salzano (vocals), Antonio Castaldo (bass), Francesco Coppeta (guitar) and Roberto Godas (drums). I’m a really sensitive and deep person but too susceptible sometimes. Antonio Castaldo has a great organisations capacities and he is really enterprising but sometimes it is cranky like a desperate housewife. Francesco is deeply empathicand it is always there for those who need some help but he’s actually very anxious. At last, Roberto! He he has a great willpower and a brilliant mind but sometimes he can be so “zen” to be unnerving.
3. Talking about your music, besides the genre, what is your special touch to it which makes it different than the other stoner rock bands?
– I think our music is really particular because we don’t compose thinking about a specific genre, we totally rely on our sensations that become one thanks to the strong empaty that has grown among us through the years. Anyway, all the member of the band are influenced by the music they listen to, so each of them brings his own taste, influences and ideas. Moreover, tha band’s singer is a woman, which is a really rare thing.
4. From where are coming your musical influences?
– We’re influenced by many different styles and kinds of music. Stoner rock bands, prog, metal, blues, jazz, grunge, doom… In particular, however, we refer to bands like Kyuss, 1000Moods, Black Sabbath that are a huge source of inspiration for us.
5. Your debut EP came out only last year, and last summer you played with LACUNA COIL. For a young band like you, it must have been quite an experience…
– We are young but we are very busy. I believe that satisfactions come from hard work and sacrifice. Our debut EP ‘’WaterCrisis’’ was a rough project that allowed us to start proposing ourselves and getting into situations like that of Lacuna Coil one. That one, has been the first experience on a big stage, with lots of people. It certainly allowed us to test ourselves and to test the audiences’ liking. It was wonderful!
6. How have you found your place, as female singer, in this “male-oriented” rock music world?
-I have always been surrounded by male friends in my life with whom I feel very well. We often do concerts with other groups (all made up of boys) they look at me with skepticism, as if they expected me to go there on stage to sing La Vie En Rose like Edith Piaf but, without too many scenes, when I start singing our songs their faces change and that’s the way I make room for myself between this stinking and prevented metalheads. Prejudices hurts, no?
7. Your voice is described to be “emotional and violent”, is it something you’ve studied for, or does it come out naturally?
– I study singing since many years but nobody has ever taught me how to sing this genre. It was a natural process that was born of itself when we started writing a certain type of music. It ‘s the most sincere way I can express myself as well as a real need now.
8. Your debut album “Sleeping Sickness” is coming out on May 18th (via Volcano Records), what can you tell me about the song-writing process and topics?
-Every trace of Sleeping Sickness comes from a riff that is developed by each member and to which, according to the mood and the atmosphere created, a text is added.
9. Why you chose “Sleeping Sickness” to title this album?
-We chose “Sleeping Sickness” as title of the album because it well encloses the concept of the album. Each track speaks and analyzes a ”sickness”, with this term we want to analize an uneasiness that the individual must face if he wants to survive, especially those generated by the monsters of his own mind.
10. Concerning the album coverart, what do you want to tell me about the story behind it?
-The album cover art symbolically represents the meaning of the songs. There are three levels: below, there is a host of corpses, defeated by their sickness. Lying on them, there is a demonic woman, seated on a throne, proud to have survived but with a sad look because she is actually chained by a demon bigger than her.
11. How would you describe the album generally? And what could be the message you want to transmit to your audience?
-Sleeping Sickness is an album characterized by suggestive, tensive and enveloping melodies accompanied by obsessive and distorted riffs, that are characteristic of stoner rock. We have sought and tried to reproduced esert, arid, occult scenarios that are well suited to represent the gloomy abysses of a mind that digs into discomfort and tries to express it. The message we want to convey is a message of the individual’s revenge, a redemption towards himself. Because often, we are our worst enemies.
12. Just recently you unleashed the first single/video “Mortal Lien” from the album, it’s a disturbed blues tune with desert and doom reminiscences. Why this choice (as the first single)?
– We choose Mortal Lien as a single of the album because it is one of the tracks that more explicitly speaks of the sense of imprisonment that the individual self-inflicts. Regarding the sound, I think it represents us a lot. It contains different characteristics that are often found in our music. A mix between stoner, doom, blues. Psychedelic and aggression.
13. As said, “Sleeping Sickness” comes out May 18th, so how will you support the album?
– Our label, Volcano Records and Promotion is very important for us, but we need to stay constantly focused. Making our album listen as much as possible. New places and new ears are the best publicity. In addition to radio promotion, reviews and interviews.
14. What are your future plans, dreams and targets to reach?
-Our wish for the future, after the release of our first album, is to carry around as much as possible. In fact, our creative process has never stopped and is an expressive necessity now. We will continue to write and play our songs, which will be the response of the world of music, for those who believe in our project. Obviously, our ambitions go beyond playing in our rooms and we are very projected towards the international market that best suits our genre. In Italy, rock and metal are always niche.
15. Thanking-you for this interview, what is your message to your fans and Metal Shock Finland readers?
Our message to our fans is just THANK YOU for all the support that permittus to believe in something. To Metal Shock Finlandreaders, we want to tell them to LISTEN TO OUR ALBUM and thank you so much for the attention you gave us and thanks to you, Metal Shock Finland for this opportunity. DO IT SLOWLY! -WaterCrisis
More information at:
https://www.facebook.com/WaterCrisis
http://www.volcanopromotion.com
Watch the video for “Mortal Lien” below:
