Blackened Horde: How did the band get started?
Duzl: Hell-o! The history of the band is not so long. The main brain and founder of the band is Dejvy (also SECTESY, ex-DESPISE), who had for a long time an idea to start a pure old school death metal band. Then let’s blame alcohol …because once while drinking beer we touched this theme and I mentioned that I always wanted to play in a band when I was younger, but since I didn’t play any instrument, it never happened, then after few beers…. Dejvy suggested to me that I should start to learn to play on bass and keep this post in the band, at first I consider it just as fun and joke from his side, but Dejvy was quite adamant and I agreed to try it…. and then here we are!
Later Dejvy contacted Martin (SECTESY, ex-DESPISE) if he would make a vocals for demo and then speak to other guests if they will able to record the demo. Štěpán/drums (POPPY SEED GRINDER, ex-DESPISE), ADIS/bass (ELYSIUM), Frank/guitar-solos (ex-GARBAGE DISPOSAL). Now we are currently looking for a permanent second guitarist and drummer who will complete our line-up and we become a regular five-member band.
Blackened Horde: What kind of music do you play?
Duzl: The idea that put the band into action is simple: „ dust off the old practices of the 90‘s and pay tribute to the bands from the same era“. We play old school death metal and “The only commandment is: Use HM:2”!
Blackened Horde: How has the fan response been?
Duzl: The reactions are great, we sold out quite fast both limited editions in America and also in Europe, which makes us very happy and the reviews we received are really great so far.
Blackened Horde: Where did the band name come from?
Dejvy: Well quite … funny. When I founded SECTESY, I didn’t want there to be another band of this name in the world … all the clichés of metal words are 100000 times taken over, so I came up with my own word … without meaning, just a word on which I will create a good logo and which will have the letter “T” in the middle, from which you can beautifully create an inverted cross (I love clichés). Then came the name for the festival … we chose the word SYMBOLIC, which fits perfectly into everything that this festival should be. So taking these two words, I tried to come up with a name for the new band that would be … as I would say … just connected the trio with its symbolism. And that’s why SYMBTOMY. The initials of my band and the means of our festival. SYMBTOMY means nothing, so it’s easy to find us on google 🙂
Blackened Horde: Introduce the band members and what they do in the band.
Dejvy: Lead guitar (SECTESY, ex-DESPISE)
Duzl: Bass, Martin – vocal (SECTESY, ex -)
Jaroslav Šantrůček: Guitar (ex-DESPICE, ex-IMPERIAL FOETICIDE) – Guitar
Blackened Horde: How many albums/CD’s have you released?
Duzl: At the moment we have released just demo – “DEMO#1” on cassettes in a limited edition of 100 pcs for European market through “Immortal Souls Production” and 100 pcs for the American market via “Frozen Screams Imprint” and at the moment we are working on our first full-length album which should by released by the end of this year.
Blackened Horde: Tell me about some of the songs on the latest CD, who writes the music?
Dejvy: My music is not done in any other way than just to feel free in composing. When I am composing, I don’t think about how to make a song as brutal as possible, as fast as possible, as complex as possible, as melodic as possible … etc. I don’t see music as a sport where I should compete with others. For me, my music is the imprint of my soul.
Blackened Horde: Where do the lyric ideas come from?
Dejvy: My lyrics for the first demo of SYMBTOMY are fictional stories (actually only one divided into three parts). Scary and yet (at least for me) kind of perversely beautiful. For many years I wrote to a large Czech magazine and I create there a section – The History of Death (death metal). I enjoy hiding a lot of facts behind gossip and fiction. The lyrics are an important aspect for us and the direction of the band. I think we will again use one of my sick stories for the debut CD. At last, we confirm my words of importance lyrics by fact, that the story will be printed in both Czech and English version on the cover of our first demo.
Blackened Horde: Do you have any side projects?
Duzl: Dejvy and Martin play in SECTESY – “ZOMBEER OLD SCHOOL DEATH METAL” Check them out!
Blackened Horde: Who are some of your musical influences?
Dejvy: The inspiration is clear and as I always mention it – it’s DEATH METAL as such – the whole genre and the lifestyle associated with it. I love it, and I’m happy I found the meaning of my life. It all started with HEAVY METAL – when I first heard IRON MAIDEN in 1984 and their “Powerslave” it was clear to me where my life path would lead. Even before the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia, I had recordings from MANOWAR, KREATOR or DEATH. I don’t divide Death Metal into European or American, this has always been weird to me. The music has to appeal to me or not and it can be old recordings from ABBA or news from young bands. In terms of influence, the patterns for my first band DESPISE were clear – I was captivated by the second wave of American death metal – bands like SUFFOCATION, PYREXIA, INTERNAL BLEEDING, TORTURE KRYPT, UNCREATION, PROPHECY, DEPRECATED, SCATTERD REMNANTS, DISGORGE, CLEAN FLESH, DEAD DEVOURMET, FLESHGRIND, DEEDS OF FLESH and thousands of others … as a listener, however, I did not forget the old school death metal roots. As a tribute to this style, I founded SECTESY after the break-up of DESPISE. This band was a pure tribute to melodic OSDM. However, I always wanted to try more and more the “Swedish sound” and therefore I founded SYMBTOMY. I think the patterns here are also absolutely clear – UNANIMATED, GOREMENT, DISMEMBER, ENTOMBED, INTERMENT, GRAVE etc…
Blackened Horde: What is the band like when you play live?
Duzl: This is quite interesting question to which we ourselves do not know the answer. Symbtomy have not played any live show yet, for few reasons. As I mentioned, the band was formed in the autumn of 2019, the material for demo (not for full show) was ready in spring of 2020 and at that time we did not have a stable line-up, but this looks like it could change soon. And the another reason is, of course, the corona pandemic and I think we don’t have to mention impact of this situation on music culture generally. However our debut show will be on 28.8. 2021 within the festival “Back to the Symbolic” in Czech Republic.
Blackened Horde: Have you guys ever played in another country?
Duzl: Not yet, but we are discussing some offers to play in United Kingdom, Hungary and Poland and German at the moment.
Blackened Horde: What do you think about the underground scene?
Duzl: It will be interesting to see how the pandemic has affected the underground scene about live gigs, but nowadays new bands, new zines are still being formed, fans are still buying physical media and merchandise, there are a lot of new labels that release extreme music and it goes back to cassettes and vinyl, so I believe the underground is doing well.
Blackened Horde: What are some of your new favorite black metal/death metal bands?
Duzl: Due to my work in zines, a lot of new recordings go through my ears, but lately I’ve been looking for old demos of unknown or, on the contrary, long-forgotten death metal bands from the nineties, which probably wouldn’t interest many people nowadays haha..
Blackened Horde: Since the Covid Pandemic has that hurt the band in making music at all?
Duzl: In fact, Covid influenced our plans a lot, the demo was supposed to be released in April 2020, so half a year earlier, everything was already recorded (Dejvy‘s Hell and HollySound studio), but because Dejvy and I agreed that we wanted to have guests on the demo for each song so it take extra time, because one of the guests was supposed to be John Walker (CANCER), but due to a long lockdown and subsequent restriction in Madrid, he was not able to get into the studio to record his parts. With an uncertain vision of when these restrictions will pass or lift, we finally agreed that he would be a guest on our full-length album. His vocals on the demo were taken over by Johnny Pettersson (WOMBBATH) and other guests were Johan Jansson (INTERMENT), Ralf Hauber (REVEL IN FLESH). Then after everything went pretty fast.
Blackened Horde: What advice would you as a musician give to a fellow musician just starting out?
Duzl: Simply do what you enjoy and what you consider meaningful, then just persevere…
Blackened Horde: When do you guys plan on writing any new material?
Duzl: We are just preparing our debut full-length album which should be released by the end of this year and we also have confirmed few great names as a guests. One of them is already mentioned John Walker (CANCER).
Blackened Horde: What does the future hold for the band??
Duzl: Our current goal is to get our record distributed worldwide, get SYMBTOMY into the subconscious of fans, find a band-mates to complete the line-up, record our debut full-length album and start to play live shows and also plan a tour, simply – we want to be part of the scene with everything that goes with it…
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Duzl: Thank you for your time, support and opportunity to present us in your zine, we really appreciate it!
Contact them at:
https://www.facebook.com/symbtomy/
https://symbtomy.bandcamp.com/releases
https://www.instagram.com/symbtomy/
