So if you checked out the Irish mix tape that dropped here earlier this week, you’ll have had your frst taste of Rites from Galway. They’ve mastered the dark art of stomach rattling demonic sludge thuggery with such ease in their brief existence that it’s mildly nauseating. A horror obsessed foursome who’ve knocked the wind out of me on several occasions live, their debut 12″ comes out in June. You’re going to need it very,very badly if you have even the slightest interest in heavy sounds.
Hey guys: First up, you’ve decided to go for a vinyl releases as your debut rather than a demo. How come you decided to come straight out with a 12″ and are you nervous about taking the leap so early on?
Nicola (bass): A little bit nervous alright! More nervous that we’re not going to sell all of them and im going to be using them as dinner place mats for the next year. But, we had intended to do just a demoish, cd release at the start, cheap packaging etc but then the more I thought about it, the cd demo job was just uninteresting and boring, so why not save up the money and come out with something we would be really proud of. Also, if we were to distribute to as far as Europe or the States, in general, vinyl is more desirable.
You’re self releasing this right? Obviously putting time and money into releasing vinyl for a relatively unknown band is a risk, but it seems like a strong statement of intent as well, and shows that you obviously take what you’re doing pretty seriously. Had you considered trying to hook up for a label with the 12″ or was this always something you’d planned to do yourselves?
Nicola:You know what, hooking up with a label hadn’t even crossed my mind. I’ve been spending more time thinking about who might be interested in taking some vinyl for their distribution once its released.
Kieran (guitar/vocals): I think the combination of the recording that never happened and the wait for a new drummer to step in was pretty exhausting, so when Rory joined I think it had us feeling very lucky and with a lot of lost time to make up for. The vinyl side for myself would be for the purpose of trying something new, we had planned to release it ourselves from day one, I guess time will tell whether it’s a bold statement or a shot in the foot!
So going back to the start here briefly, You’ve been around about 18 months/2 years now if I’m right – I know you’ve had a lineup change which stopped you playing live for a while but you and Griff have both said to me you’re keen to tour.With the record about to come out have you looked any further into doing that?
And in terms of playing locally, will you be going for the “less is more” approach or gigging like mad once the record comes out?
Nicola: Very keen to tour, I love going away and gigging, seeing new places, meeting new people and escaping Galway for a few days. We’re at the moment concentrating on a few dates around Ireland. We have family,work and other band commitments to work around then if we were to even think about doing anything abroad. I really really want to though, if the opportunity arose! As for playing locally, I would prefer to take the less is more approach as, you know what, if you play gigs in the same town every 2 weeks, people get bored of you very quickly, no matter how good you are, I would hate that to happen to Rites.
Kieran: We try not to play too much locally, it’s not something I’m mad about, after a while it just begins to feel like a practice with a load of your mates watching. We’ll most likely have the release gig, play a few gigs around Ireland and start working on some new songs.
Higgins (guitar): yeah i’d really like to tour. It’s something i’ve wanted to do for a long time now, but I do agree with the “less is more” approach when gigging locally.
Okay so let’s talk about the tunes. When Rites started did you have a specific sound in mind or was it just a result of jamming?
Nicola: Kieran had mentioned to me that he wanted to start a doomy, metally band and that he had some songs written already, I jumped at the chance to play bass for it, as I really wanted to play in that kind of band. The new songs we have now, would be more of a result of jamming them out and seeing what works and what doesn’t.
Kieran: I had been wanting to start a band like Rites for some time, but I wanted to wait until I was a little less crap at guitar! The idea was to write a whole load of songs in the style of bands I love like Sleep, Cathedral, Bongzilla, Celtic Frost etc but to leave room for experimentation and to try and do something new with it.
It seems like going on your shirts and the (amazing) record sleeve there’s a very definite “old horror movie” vibe to what you’re doing – again, was this something that you specifically had in mind when the band started? And does this extend into the lyrics?
Nicola: Kieran’s probably the biggest horror fan I have ever met. I love the aesthetics of old hammer horror movie posters and in general I really like old horror movies. Growing up, my older brother was occult obsessed, so I find images of the occult intriguing, so yep definitely had that style in mind. I love album artwork and tshirts and design, its really important to me to put out something interesting aesthetically. We were very lucky, thanks to Rorys friend, Paul who runs Hexagon Design in the North, to put us on to the Sandman painting by Santiago Caruso(who kindly let us use it!). The minute I saw it, I was like “thats it, thats definitely the cover”. Me and Kieran live opposite a big cemetery in Galway, it looks absolutely beautiful and creepy, so having a photo of it on the back, was a big deal for me.
Kieran: I was pretty much raised on old school Horror movies, especially a lot of The Hammer films, I had always wanted to use this kind of imagery on the sleeves and in t shirt designs, I think it works well with the material, the sandman photo was a great find from Paul, and great of Santiago to let us use it for free.
Vessel is the only song on the ep that ties in with the Horror theme, the next batch of songs will basically be a set of Horror stories put to music. I’m not sure whether or not they’ll be connected to a theme or concept, but that’s the plan anyway.
RITES:Vessel
Sticking with the horror theme for a minute (because I’m a a fucking massive horror nerd) – Kieran, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen some short horror fiction written by yourself pop up in a zine a while back ; obviously having seen you now mention the idea of writing horror stories for future lyrics, I have to ask do you still do much writing outside of the band? And if so do you have any interest in putting it out or getting it published?
Kieran: That’s right. I still write, but its become more of a personal hobby now, I’m one of those scrap everything once you start perfectionist nutcases you hear about, so the plan is to try and get work out there through a short story zine and hopefully self publish something once I sort that hurdle out, which has been the plan for quite a while now, but I still think I’m in the practice stage!
Similarly, you both mention an interest in Hammer Horror in the last question – what, if you had to pick one, is your favourite Hammer movie? And how do you feel about the resurrection of the studio via new movies like “Let them In” and “Wake Wood”?
Kieran: If I was forced to pick one it would be “The Devil Rides Out” hands down. I thought “Let Me In” was great, I still don’t think “Let The Right One In” needed an American remake, but if it had to be done (and like most foreign horrors nowadays it did apparently) I’m glad it got handed over to a director like Matt Reeves instead of one of these up and coming music video directors who seem to be mad about fucking up the classics to make a bit of dough.”Wake Wood” was the last film I watched actually, I really enjoyed it, it wasn’t amazing, but definitely had its moments, nice to see the Irish film board taking an interest in a little blood and guts!
Nicola: I thought “Let Me In” was great. The opening scene was amazing and I thought the scenes where the boy is being bullied were more menancing than the Swedish original. I am however, fonder of the Swedish one overall. As for the resurrection of the studio-“The Woman in Black” remake (I haven’t seen the original) looks like it’ll be good, but I think it will interesting to see when they do release something new and original.
The cover as we mentioned is a fantastic piece by Santiago Caruso – I don’t think I’ve encountered his work before, can you tell us a little bit about his work and how you managed to get him to let you use the cover? Will you be working with him again?
Higgins: we found him through Rory’s mate Paul Beattie, who helped us with the layout and had made up a few cover designs for us. The one that stood out with all of us was Santiago Caruso’s “Sandman”. I looked up some of his other work, which included artwork for Spanish versions of books ( H.P Lovecraft’s “The Dunwich Horror” is the only one I can remember at the moment). He’s a fucking amazing artist, which i think we can all agree! One of us got onto him asking how much he’d charge if he would, but he said we could use it for free as long as we credited him for it on the sleeve, which we have.
Okay, so you mentioned a line up change earlier on – tell us a bit about your new drummer Rory ?
Rory (drums): Previous bands – Preacher John, Carnivore 7, The Crayonz … Oh, and the Snakes of Desire
I hadn’t played for a long time when I moved to Galway and had just decided to get back into it. Got to know a few people from going to Dan’s UsVsThem gigs and was just in the process of getting something started when the Rites gig came up – which is just as well ‘cos the other thing didn’t get off the ground.
I’m always curious about this kinda thing: I know some of you are in other bands, but it seems very much like Rites is your “baby” so to speak: how do you prioritise your time in terms of the bands you’re in? Like will Rites be getting preference over your other bands in the future or will it be something you just do whenever you have time?
Kieran: I would think of Rites as my “Baby” seeing as it’s the main band I write material for both musically and lyrically before something like Vagrants which is split, but saying that anything else I’m involved with gets a good look in too, I’m quite flexible at the moment!
Nicola: At the moment Rites would take priority as we’re releasing in a matter of weeks and have a run of gigs coming up. But usually I would split my time evenly between the two. Neifenbach tips along at its own pace so the two balance out very manageably!
Finally you already mentioned new songs: so I know the ep and gigging are the priority for now but are you already looking ahead to the next record?Will you be doing a full length or is it too early to say?
Kieran: There’s no plans for a new record yet, I’d say a full length is definitely far off the radar, I guess the best thing would be to see what happens after we get this one out of the way!
Nicola: As Kieran said, see how this release goes, If it did well enough- then ideally financially the money we would make back would go into recording again. I wouldn’t fancy the idea of doing a full length for another year or so, It would be good to sit on the new songs, gig them and then see how they felt down the line.
Higgins: I’d like to do a split with someone, but not for a long time down the road
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