Armed with little more than a three-track demo (released
in 2002), Melbourne based power metal act Black Majesty have certainly
built up quite a following in their short four years in existence.
After releasing their debut album 'Sands Of Time' in 2003,
the five-piece act (comprising of vocalist John 'Gio' Cavaliere, guitarists
Steve Janevski and Hanny Mohamed, bassist Evan Harris and drummer Pavel
Konvalinka) quickly joined the ranks of Australia's elite in the power
metal genre (alongside Pegazus, Vanishing Point and Dungeon), as well
as making an impact on the overseas market.
Two years on, and the band are back once again with their
sophomore release 'Silent Company', with the strength of the release
promising even greater things in store for the band both nationally
and internationally.
I caught up with guitarists Steve Janevski to find out
how successful the recent promotional trip to Europe was in furthering
the Black Majesty name, Janevski own realisation of a lifelong dream
to metallise Jon English and the reaffirmation of Black Majesty's commitment
to traditional power metal's sound with their new 'Silent Company'.
"It's all been good time for Black Majesty of late.
I've been quite busy with a lot of interviews in the last month for
'Silent Company', and that's been from both the national and international
press. When we first started, there were only a few people that interviewed
us in regards to the original three-track demo CD. It was those same
people that we bugged for interviews when it came time to release 'Sands
Of Time', and things have grown a lot since then. We have done so many
interviews for our new album 'Silent Company', and it's still only early
days. So I'm really happy with the way things are happening for us so
far."
And Janevski (along with the rest of Black Majesty) have
good reason to be happy with things so far. With unanimous praise across
the board for their debut release, Black Majesty looks set to achieve
the same high praise with 'Silent Company', a release that Black Majesty
rely less on their progressive elements, but more on the traditional
side of power metal's strengths.
"To be honest, in some ways I agree with what you
say, because the aim of the band was always to play a certain style
of music, and that's traditional power metal. A lot of bands don't like
to be locked into being genre specific, but we actually do! (Laughs)
It sounds strange, but we play melodic power metal, and we're more than
happy with that label. We're not going to be one of those acts where
we're trying too hard to become cutting edge. That's not what Black
Majesty is about. We're quite happy to stay in our genre, and progress
in that way. We want to progress as a band by writing better songs and
becoming better musicians. And I think that's what our label (Limb Music
Products - L.M.P.) sees in us, and wants from us as well. Black Majesty
dramatically changing style? I really can't see that really happening!
(Laughs)"
Although there's very little that separates 'Sands Of
Time' from 'Silent Company' from the outset, there are some subtle differences
that reveal the album's different characters.
"After we finished 'Sands Of Time', we didn't have
any songs left. By the time the album was actually released, we had
written one song for the new album that we played at the album launch.
In many ways, 'Silent Company' was the next logical step sound wise
for the band. But at the same time, we stayed true to our style, while
further establishing our sound. I think 'Sands Of Time' tends to jump
around a little bit. You've got your progressive parts clashing against
the more traditional power metal parts. I think 'Silent Company' is
stronger and more consistent sounding all round. But then, that's just
my opinion. I'm simply the artist! (Laughs) Perhaps maybe this album
is a little more straight ahead sounding. But then again, you have tracks
such as 'Six Ribbons' and 'Darkened Room', which are a little more melodic
sounding, and help to vary up the sound on the album too."
Even though pleased with the way that 'Silent Company'
has turned out compared to 'Sands Of Time', Janevski believes that their
debut served it's purpose, even if it does have it's flaws.
"The whole recording process for 'Sands Of Time'
was very quick. We were basically signed just after our three-song sampler
CD came out. It's pretty strange to get signed so quickly, because more
often than not, record labels prefer to hear a whole album that's more
or less finished. But we had serious interest from four record labels
as soon as we sent our demo out around the world. We signed to L.M.P.,
and started work on the album pretty much straight away. 'Sands Of Time'
was the best that we could come up with for the short amount of time
that we had. Some of the songs toward the end of the album didn't really
get a fair amount of time as say the first four or five tracks, which
we spent the majority of time on. L.M.P. wanted the album out by a certain
time, so we really had to get a move on to get the last few tracks finished.
We didn't get to demo up the last few songs, let alone play them live
either, so that was a little disappointing. But for the minor disappointment,
it let people know about us and the style of music that we play, and
went on to become one of the biggest selling titles for L.M.P. that
year."
Obviously with a little more time in the studio, Black
Majesty has created an album that they believe is indicative of their
true sound (which is traditional power metal), and by all accounts,
it would seem that the press agrees.
"We're extremely happy with the way 'Silent Company'
has been received, and so is L.M.P. In many ways, a lot of bands get
a little upset or disappointed with pigeonholes being put on their music,
but that doesn't bother us too much because we wear our influences on
our sleeves. We love out Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Dio and Queensrÿche.
Some people have gone as far as to say that this album is a continuation
from where Queensrÿche left off with 'Empire' (1990), right before
they started changing their style, and we think that's cool. We dig
everything Queensrÿche did before that. As for reviews, 'Silent
Company' has received everything from seven out of ten and even better.
I tend to take notice more than anyone else in the band of the reviews
we receive because I'm interested in the different point of views about
the album. A lot of people have actually said that this album is more
traditionally influenced, which is a view I generally agree with. In
some ways, we've had some people say that there aren't enough progressive
elements, and they would prefer the debut. But on the other hand, you
have the more traditional listeners who prefer the latest album over
the debut. If that's where the differing opinions lie, then that's cool
with us. It's better than having people come back and say that the singer
can't sing, or the guitarist can't play his instrument. The number one
thing that is easily evident is that the moment you hear the band, we
can obviously play our instruments, and Cavaliere can most certainly
sing. It's easy to identify a good singer from someone who can't sing
at all. On the musicianship, I think everyone feels pretty confident
on their instruments. We're by no means virtuosos. It's more about us
playing for the song. Occasionally we'll show a little more of the technical
prowess in parts. But just like the guitarists in Thin Lizzy and Iron
Maiden, who are/were accomplished musicians in their own right, we only
play for what the song needs. We're not interested in playing a million
miles per hour, even though we like that sort of stuff too. The reason
I really enjoy playing in this band is because you get to solo, but
there's a time and place for that sort of thing. But there's more to
a song that your thirty seconds to a minute solo piece. So it's all
about textures and adding colour to the rest of the song. That's why
there are bands like Iron Maiden, and on the other side you have an
artist like Yngwie J. Malmsteen. But regardless of whether people prefer
our debut or 'Silent Company', we're very happy with the way things
have gone so far. We were also given the opportunity recently to promote
the album overseas for a quick promo tour, which is something we didn't
get to do on the first album. Everything so far has been good. It'll
be interesting to see what the sales are like in a couple of months,
and how this album compares to our debut."
One aspect of 'Silent Company' that has really made a
lot of people sit up and take notice is the involvement of Iron Savior's
Piet Sielck, who helped with the initial recordings in Germany.
"Konvalinka is originally from the Czech republic,
and he came to Australia around five years ago. Around a year and a
half ago, he decided to visit his family again, because he hadn't seen
them for a few years. So he went home for around four months in the
Czech Republic, and it was around the same time that L.M.P. mentioned
that Sielck was interested in working with us on the album. We were
interested, because we knew his stuff from Iron Savior in the past,
and it was as simple as that. Konvalinka was already in Europe, so Mohamed
flew out to Germany to meet the pair, and they recorded the drums there.
We had already recorded demos of every track up to that point, and had
even played some songs live, so Konvalinka knew the songs back to front.
We know that our music is pretty big in Europe, so we knew that working
with a bigger name producer like Sielck would only add to the album.
We tried it out, and it worked out really well. In some ways, it was
a negative because our drummer wasn't here to help record with us, but
it was a positive to start the album in such a way over there. Another
positive was that little trip helped pave the way for us to tour over
there a couple of months ago."
Another important aspect of 'Silent Company' that has
had a lot of people talking was the bands cover of Jon English's 1979
hit 'Six Ribbons'.
"As a kid, I always liked Jon English, and he's had
some great songs, such as 'Hollywood Seven'. I always thought 'Six Ribbons'
was a cool song, and it was always in the back of my mind that the song
would be ideal to kind of metal up. I've been toying around with this
idea for about fifteen years. The song also provides the album a ballad,
or slower track. Originally (Limb) Schnoor (L.M.P.'s owner) suggested
doing a cover. We didn't really want to do the full on cliché
of doing another heavy metal song because that's been done a million
times. We sometimes throw one of those songs in at a live show for a
bit of fun and for the crowd to enjoy. But for the album, we wanted
to do something a little bit different, and we also wanted to do something
Australian. So I suggested the English song to the band, and everybody
liked it. Originally, it was more of an acoustic based song, but we
added drums and some distorted guitars, while keeping to the original
arrangement, along with the male and the female vocals throughout the
song. I think it works out really well. It's a little different, but
it's a good song anyway. I also thought that the Celtic feel that it
has. I always thought that the latter day Ritchie Blackmore sound (Blackmore's
Night) would always work well within our sound. We listen to stuff like
that, and we thought it would be cool if we could do our own version
of that sound. It was originally going to be one of the bonus tracks
on the digipak version of 'Silent Company', but when Schnoor heard it,
he insisted it be on the album itself. We didn't even get the choice!
(Laughs) It's interesting, because that song has received a lot of attention,
even in Europe where English isn't a household name."
As mentioned, virtual unknown vocalist Susie Goritchan
was chosen to help add the contrasting vocals of Cavaliere on 'Six Ribbons'.
"I've been teaching guitar for the last couple of
years now, and one day one of my students brought in a demo of his band,
and a girl who he went to school with sang on a lot of those songs.
I thought it was really cool. Her voice sort of stayed with me in the
back of my mind, and I thought if we ever needed a female vocal, she
would be a perfect choice. The opportunity came up, and she decided
to give it a go. She totally blew us away in the studio. She recorded
her tracks basically in one take. She's just a common sense singer who
knows her stuff, and this is her first proper recording. In the past,
all she had done was demos with other acts. She's pretty excited about
the whole thing. I really do hope she pursues music, whether it's metal
or something else altogether. I like to think that she would be an awesome
metal singer though! (Laughs)"
With 'Silent Company' now complete and on the shelves,
Black Majesty now has their sights set on touring, with overseas definitely
high on the priority list.
"We were in Europe in July, and that was essentially
a promo tour. We did a bunch of interviews, and met the people at L.M.P.
face to face for the first time. We went out for dinner, and we really
got to discuss the priority of the band. It's just good to physically
meet the people and put a face to the name, especially when they're
the ones taking charge of your career. It was good to find out that
we were working together, rather than against each other. It was just
a buzz. Aside from the promo side of things, we played the Headbangers
Open Air Festival in Germany. That was really good, both in the crowd
size and reaction and the sheer variety of metal bands on offer. It
was also great to meet people who liked the band outside of Australia
for the first time, and also speak to those that hadn't heard of us
before through the meet and greet after the shows. We also played a
few of our own shows in Germany and the Czech Republic, and finished
things up with a Hammerfall and Edguy support. That was great for us,
because all of us had grown up with those bands. It was exciting enough
just to seeing the bands live onstage, let alone sharing the same bill.
They were such cool people. They watched us from the side of the stage,
and gave us some great bits of advice. That was so cool. So hopefully,
all that has paved the way for us going over again, and hopefully for
a longer amount of time. We were only over there for around three weeks.
It would be good if we could jump onto a long tour. Going over to Europe
is not cheap, and it makes it hard for a band like us to really capitalise
on what we've achieved so far. Japan on the other hand is a little bit
closer, and now with the album actually released there, we hope to play
some shows there soon too. We've had a lot of interest from there already,
and after hearing from the Japanese label spokesperson about the number
of pre-orders for the album, we have our fingers crossed for some shows
soon."
I would like to personally thank Steve Janevski for
his generous time.
For more information on Black Majesty, check out - http://www.blackmajesty.com
