Interview with MATAVITATAU

!!!BLACK METAL FROM BELGIUM!!!

We had a conversation with Θ. (Vocals). Enjoy!

Welcome to the FILTHY DOGS OF METAL Webzine.

Tell us a few things about MATAVITATAU (Members, Starting Year etc).
Matavitatau was formed at the end of 2020 by myself, my old friend Sparakter, and Loimos. Sparakter and I had been black metal adepts since 1993 or 1994, but it was only after we met Loimos, who is quite a bit younger, that the old fantasy of making something of our very own started to materialize. We quickly started delineating the concept of the band and composing our own material. For a long time, we were held back by the lack of a bass player, but in Summer 2024 we were joined by Apovrasma, whom you might know from his solo project under the same name and from his more recent project Bacht’n de Vulle Moane, which released an excellent tape a few months ago (and performed live for the First time ever just yesterday at the time of writing). We managed to record our demo under his guidance before, unfortunately, he had to quit the band again a few weeks ago because he had too much going on at the same time. We are now looking for a new bass player so we can keep working on our other tracks, compose new ones, and in time hopefully desecrate some stages here and there.

You have recently released your EP ''Numen Nescio''. What is the feedback from your audience as well as from the press?
‘Recently’ is right, your request for an interview came less than 24 hours after the demo was published on Bandcamp! So I guess you have the distinct honour of being the first to interview us. We did receive a couple of positive online reviews so far, and we are pleased with the many reactions we’ve been getting from people who paid heed.

Label or DIY and why?
It was always our plan to release digitally on Bandcamp and then see what kind of label interest that would generate. The idea is to release the demo on tape as well, preferably with the backing of a good label. We are talking to a few people about this right now, but nothing is definite yet.

Is there any funny or weird story from the recordings or from your live shows that you would like to share with us?
We have never performed live so that’s got to be a no. As for the recordings, nothing all that weird either. I guess I could mention the fact that I actually had a pretty bad cold during the recording weekend, which to my ears clearly affected my vocal performance in a detrimental way. Fortunately, most people have actually been praising the vocals on the tape, so apparently it wasn’t as bad as that. Now I just hope that they will still enjoy my performance when I’m not sick, haha.

Do you prefer Vinyl, Tape, CD or Digital Format and why is that?
I’m mainly a CD man myself. I speak only for myself when I say I don’t like vinyl. I know a statement like that is not going to win me any cool credits in this scene, but I can’t see it as anything but a hassle in every way, and ridiculously expensive to boot. The whole resurgence also feels very artificial to me, a way to shift the focus away from what really counts, i.e. the music. If I see one more album pre-release hype with the chance to choose from 17 colours of vinyl ‘or why not get them all’, I’m going to be sick. Other members may feel differently about this subject. This is not to say, by the way, that I would be averse to the idea of releasing something on vinyl, because obviously there is a market for it and this is nothing more than my personal opinion.

The nicknames that you use are in Greek. Do you have any connection with Greece?
As you may have noticed, the lyrics to our songs are in Latin. Latin is of course ubiquitous in black metal, but correct Latin is much harder to find, trust me. It’s remarkable really, how keen people are to make use of this language, even if they lack even the most basic knowledge about it (I’m looking at you, Dark Funeral). Being trained as a classical philologist myself and having taught Latin (and to a lesser extent Ancient Greek) for 20 years, I daresay I’m better qualified to work with these languages, and my passion for them leads me to do just that. The core idea of the band from the very beginning was to use Latin quotes, which I collect here and there through my reading of classical, medieval and renaissance Latin texts, and to slightly rearrange or adapt them as the context I choose for them requires. Now, to get to your question, the Greek pseudonym idea came much later, when Apovrasma was our bassist. He already happened to use a Greek nickname and had been doing so for years. At the same time, I had been thinking about our band logo and the inclusion of the letter theta (for θάνατος) in that. Building on that I decided to adopt Θ as my pseudonym and we worked out some Greek nicknames for the guitarist and drummer as well.

Your music style is Black Metal. Which are your main influences (Favourite Artists / Bands etc.)
Speaking for myself, I came across the classics by Mayhem, Burzum, Darkthrone, Emperor etc. (the usual suspects, in short) when I was 13-14 years old, and they remain very dear to me now, three decades later. I was also into death and doom metal from the start, but black metal had the strongest grip on me, and still does to this day. In my experience, the mid- nineties were a glorious time for black metal, when the true originals of black metal as we understand it (the ‘second wave’ if that’s what you want to call it) popped up in quick succession and at the same time all kinds of weird and wonderful new lifeforms started sprouting from the soil. I was crazy about Ved Buens Ende, Dødheimsgard, Ulver, Arcturus, Fleurety, In the Woods… (NOT the band that has hijacked this name today), Solefald, all those unique pioneers back then. Then came a time of creative drought in metal, at least in my experience, when suddenly everything started to sound the same and breakneck speed was the only criterium. The soul was lost and most of what remained was depressingly dull, so for several years I ventured far and wide to find music of value in a myriad of other genres. Of course I kept revering the old classics in the meantime. In the second half of the noughties my love for contemporary black metal was rekindled by bands like Drudkh and Katharsis, and since then I’ve just been venturing on, seeking out the diamonds in any nook and cranny I stumble across, be they metal or not. But the flame of black metal burns as bright as ever inside.

Which things do you think a band should sacrifice in order to succeed? Have you ever sacrificed anything in your life for a better future for your band?
Tough question, I’m not sure. I have sacrificed some time to the band occasionally at times when my wife would have preferred some more attention coming her way, no doubt – maybe ask her! Nonetheless she is our number one supporter!

Describe your ideal live show as a performance band. Have you already experienced that?
Like I said, we haven’t played live yet, and now the prospect of that is unfortunately pushed back since we must find a new bassist first. I think our personality as a live band will develop naturally when we get to that stage, I can’t say I have very detailed thoughts on that yet. Don’t expect corpse paint or pentagrams everywhere, though, that’s not our game. The lyrical focus in Matavitatau was, is, and always will be on death, transience and decay. Perhaps we can come up with something that’s more aligned with that, we’ll see.

What attributes do you think that a new Black Metal Band should have in order to gain identity and be unique?
It’s a delicate balance to adhere to the core of the genre and yet not be one of thousands of interchangeable clones. In the early days, bands like Master’s Hammer, Tormentor, Mortuary Drape and Sigh all sounded completely different, but there was a clearly discernible element that joined them in one worldwide cult. It was such a shame to see that go to waste when the formulaic big label bands took over the scene and everyone started imitating them in hopes of making it to the big time themselves. I don’t want to blow our horn too much, we do realize of course that what we play is firmly planted in the 90s Norwegian tradition.

Tell us 10 metal (or not) releases that have ''entered'' your blood.
Making lists is a dangerous thing for me, because I take it too seriously and lose all sense of time and my surroundings. So if you want to publish this interview any time this year, the only way to get the job done is quick and painful, and then I’ll just have to live with the results. So here are ten albums that will never leave me, five metal, five non-metal:
- Ved Buens Ende – Written in Waters
- In the Woods… – Omnio
- Ulver – Trolsk Sortmetall 1993-1997 (cheating a bit here, yeah)
- At the Gates – The Red in the Sky Is Ours
- Negative Plane – Stained Glass Revelations
- Current 93 – All the Pretty Little Horses
- Kazuki Tomokawa – Nikusei
- Eleanoora Rosenholm – Hyväile Minua Pimeä Tähti
- Devil Doll – Dies Irae
- Robert Ashley – Private Parts
I love exchanging music recommendations and unearthing hidden gems, so if anyone wants to play that game, talk to me in person when you cross me in the aisle of your local supermarket.

Do you believe that Digital Platforms help the new Black Metal Bands? Which, do you think, is the ideal way for a band to promote its work?
I grew up in the CD era so I’m weary of streaming services in general, and I don’t really see our music appearing on Spotify and the likes any time soon (they are the devil, and not in a good way), but Bandcamp seems like a pretty good platform. At least there you can tell your own story, sell your own releases and merch etc. The days when we could just go to a tried and trusted music store and be entranced by mysterious album covers by bands we couldn’t find any information about whatsoever or get recommendations from a wizened old lore-master are long gone I’m afraid – for most of us anyway. At least here in Ghent we still have the ConSouling store, and a couple of distros at concerts here and there, but generally speaking the glory days of record shopping are way back in the past.

Tell us a few things about the New Underground Metal Scene in Belgium (Bands, Fanzines, Webzines, Metal Clubs etc.)
There is a pretty healthy metal (black or otherwise) scene in Belgium. Some current bands/projects that you might want to check out are Oerheks, Bokkerijders, Moenen of Xezbeth, Forbidden Temple, Ish Kerioth, Phlegethon’s Majesty, Bütcher and the ones I mentioned earlier (Apovrasma and Bacht’n de Vulle Moane). And of course there’s local scene mainstays Lugubrum and Alkerdeel who have been around for a long time but are still most worthy of your attention. As for underground labels, there’s lots to discover on Haunted by Ill Angels and Medieval Prophecy for instance, and there’s a couple of things festering beneath the surface, ready to sprout (notably De Pankraker and Forbidden Frequencies). Of course there has always been great Belgian music outside of black metal as well, from The Black Heart Rebellion and Oathbreaker to Neptunian Maximalism, Wolvennest and Déhà’s many projects, and so on to Wim Mertens, Jacques Brel, Frederik Croene, Moniek Darge, you name it… There are often good metal shows to be enjoyed here in Ghent (at Asgaard and elsewhere), and also in Antwerp (Music City etc.), Kortrijk (The Pit’s), Brussels (Magasin 4, Le Lac etc.), and recently also in Namur (Belvédère)… So yeah, I guess we can’t complain. As for webzines, I would be remiss not to mention Addergebroed (in Dutch), who have turned me on to many fine new bands.

Do you know anything about the Hellenic Metal Scene?
Of course, the Hellenic scene has always held much of interest from the very earliest days, even if sometimes unfortunately overshadowed by the narrow focus on the North. One of my very first metal albums was Thy Mighty Contract, so the interest in the legendary Greek bands was there from my stripling days. Necromantia, Varathron and early Nightfall and Septic Flesh weren’t far behind; I still adore all that stuff. In more recent memory, I have enjoyed both albums and shows by Acherontas, Zemial and Serpent Noir. Necromantical Invocation was a pleasant recent discovery. Anything else you would recommend?

What are your future plans?
Simply put, release the demo on tape, and in the meantime find a new bass player; and as soon as we do, we would like to perform live a couple of times and see how that works out for us. In the meantime I will keep trawling through the ancient tomes for timeless reflections on death and decay!

Thank you very much for your time & keep up the good work! The closure is yours.
Οἵη περ φύλλων γενεή, τοίη δὲ καὶ ἀνδρῶν. φύλλα τὰ μέν τ᾽ ἄνεμος χαμάδις χέει, ἄλλα δέ θ᾽ ὕλη τηλεθόωσα φύει, ἔαρος δ᾽ ἐπιγίνεται ὥρῃ· ὣς ἀνδρῶν γενεὴ ἣ μὲν φύει, ἣ δ᾽ ἀπολήγει. (Homer, Ζ 146-149) Thank you for your interest!

By Steve the Filthy Dog.

Photo credit: Philip The Hunter

MATAVITATAU CONTACT:

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61573076224379

https://www.instagram.com/matavitatau_official/

https://matavitatau.bandcamp.com/album/numen-nescio