Interview with
Erebus

** Interview conducted by Heather of Adrenalin Metal Union - April 2008**

Erebus, a political metal band from the Green Bay/Madison area, is one of most original bands out there. Their incorporation of political issues such as war, government, and religion blended into the hard sounds of thrash, death, and even some punk, got our attention. The music is hard to categorize. The live show is high energy, in-your-face metal, with the vocalist even leaving the stage to come mosh with the fans. To top it off, their cd "Prey For Our Nation" is the bands first album, and has already sold many copies. Here to give us a little insight on this unique band is Dave Frazer, vocalist for the band. Not joining us today, but aiding in making Erebus what it is today is brother Jon Frazer on drums, Gage Trader on guitar, and Zach Fiegel on bass.

ADRENALIN: The name "Erebus" means both the darkness the dead must pass through before they get to Hades in Greek mythology, and an active volcano on Antarctica’s Ross Island. Why was this name chosen for the band?

The name, as I understand it, refers to the son of Chaos, brother of Nyx in Greek mythology. Here the story of Erebus. We originally started off as a two-piece band that wrote songs about medieval war and dwarves and wizards and shit. This was about 5 years ago, back then we were "The Pillaging Villagers." Then we decided to add a bass player, and we wanted a new name to reflect a new direction of seriousness, yet we were still quite caught up in the mysticism of the metal genre, and we remained quasi-Manowar like in our subject manner, so we chose a name that generally sounded metal, had three syllables (so it could

 

be easily chanted by adoring fans) and had to do with death or hell or something. Erebus was that name. After a while, we dropped the Hammerfall stuff and started writing political subject matter, but the name stuck.

ADRENALIN: The first thing we are all thinking when we hear your music is what genre does this band fit in? We had a hard time trying to classify it as well. Was the music meant to be this way when you were writing it, or is that just how it turned out?

DAVE: Well, it was always intended to be different. Personally, I hate the way a lot of metal sounds these days. Its all the same. We strive to use all sorts of influences in our music. We do it this way because it helps inspire us to continue making music, first of all, and second of all because we realize that when audiences hear unique sounds live, the band playing them automatically sticks out in their minds. Throwing a ska ditty directly following some slow doomy metal, and following that up with an industrial-influenced balls crushing riff makes for a very interesting song. Its also a lot of fun to play, which is especially important when you play out as much as we do. Its like a video game you've played over and over again, but you always love it when you get to that


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