Blackened Horde: How did the band get started?
Angelus: The Malperdy Military Metal Ensemble pretty much started when our two main concepts took some kind of solid form. On the one hand, there’s the musical concept of attempting to bring militaristic elements into our Metal music and then make that the music’s backbone, complemented on the other hand by our ideological concept of attempting to bring people closer to the glorious ideals of spiritual strength, purity and fulfillment. These are being mutilated every single day in this world, which is what the Malperdy Military Metal Ensemble opposes. These two concepts took form some five years ago. However, the Malperdy Military Metal Ensemble was founded officially on the 19th of December 2011.
Blackened Horde: What kind of music do you play?
Angelus: Well, we’re working towards bringing our music to a point where we can safely use the term ‘Military Metal’ for it. You could call it that already, I guess, even though there’s still quite a way to go in strengthening the militaristic musical elements. So calling the music simply Metal is also fine, for now.
Blackened Horde: How has the fan response been?
Angelus: Quite good. Most people are somewhat surprised at first when hearing about the whole concept and the music, but there’s been lots of positive feedback. Of course, it can’t be denied that it’s impossible to please everyone, but that’s not the ambition anyway.
Blackened Horde: Where did the band name come from?
Angelus: The name ‘Malperdy’ is from a medieval fable called ‘Van den Vos Reynaerde’. It’s well known in Western Europe, especially in this region of Belgium. Malperdy is the citadel of the story’s main antagonist, the fox Reynaerde. I found the story itself very fitting. At first it seems like a children’s tale with talking animals living in a forest and such fairy tale stuff, but the story is in fact an allegory of humankind and its nature. Each animal in the story represents a certain aspect of humanity, which the fox Reynaerde masterfully exploits and manipulates to his own benefit. The point of the story was basically to present the society of medieval times with a confronting mirror of its own wickedness and barbarism. This mirror is today as confronting as it was back then. To name the band after the castle of Reynaerde the fox, whose ruthless actions throughout the story reveal the nature of humanity and confront it with its own nature, is very appropriate. The word ‘Malperdy’ represents the bands ideological concept while the ‘Military Metal Ensemble’ simply indicates the band’s whole ‘Military Metal’ concept.
Blackened Horde: Introduce the band members and what they do in the band.
Angelus: I am Angelus and at the moment I am the only permanent member. I write the music and lyrics, and I play the guitars and sing. There have been multiple temporary semi-members, with whom I have rehearsed and played music, but none of those people were or are permanent members. The main reason is simply that I prefer to maintain complete control over the band. In addition to that, people who understand the band’s musical and ideological component are very thinly sown around here. Most people I come across here play music for the decadent reason of having fun, getting free alcohol and impressing some girls. It’s already a miracle of some sorts that there’s some people who qualify for rehearsing and some session work.
Blackened Horde: Who writes the music? Lyrics?
Angelus: I have so far written all music and lyrics, though I considered allowing some others to write a lyric or design some of the artwork. However, that didn’t really turn out as it should. So I decided it’s better to keep control of writing music and lyrics myself.
Blackened Horde: And where do the lyric ideas come from?
Angelus: Generally, all lyrics express the ideals of spiritual strength, purity and the fulfillment this may bring, which is the only real fulfillment in this world. This is what’s expressed in every lyric, though the stories they tell are all different. Inspiration for that can be drawn from countless things, too many to name.
Blackened Horde: What is your view in Satanism and Occultism?
Angelus: Overall both of these are way too cartoonish, and I have therefore little interest in either of them. Satanism is mostly a silly synonym for plain atheism, some kind of masked social-Darwinism or else a childish attempt at an outright reversal of Christian doctrines. I have no interest for such cartoon-philosophy. For the truly evil, complete annihilation of their corrupted souls awaits them in death. For the cartoonish evil, adulthood and common sense hopefully awaits.
Blackened Horde: How many albums/CD’s have you released?
Angelus: The Malperdy MME has released one full-length thus far, entitled ‘Endeavour’, which attempts to lay a basis for further development of the militaristic elements in the music. The album was released on the 27th of February this year by the New-Zealand based label Satanica Productions.
Blackened Horde: Tell me about some of the songs on the latest CD?
Angelus: There’s both Black Metal and militaristic elements in the songs, sometimes noticeably separated, sometimes subtly merged together and sometimes clearly merged together. The idea was to bring some songs in each of these departments. Songs like ‘Seven Thrones’ and ‘Odyssea’ are meant to be Black Metal songs, while songs like ‘Coliseum’ and ‘Crowns of Oblivion’ merge Black Metal with clear militaristic elements. Lastly, songs like ‘Hymne der Stalen Zielen’ are meant to be clearly militaristic, with the Metal element in a supporting role.
Blackened Horde: Do you have any side projects?
Angelus: Nope.
Blackened Horde: Who are some of your musical influences?
Angelus: On the Metal front, the most significant influences are definitely the old Swedish and Norwegian bands who paved the way for Black and Death Metal. But I should add that the influences on the Military front are equally strong or even stronger. Great inspiration is found in the military music of many empires and dynasties throughout history. From the Habsburg Empire and Napoleonic France to the Prussian-German military music to the music of the Soviet Union and North Korea – all of those are very valuable musical jewels.
Blackened Horde: Which current bands?
Angelus: I suppose mostly the Black and Death bands that are still around from the 80’s and 90’s, although I don’t like most of their new work in the least. Most of it is chewed meat by now, unfortunately, but that’s just my opinion.
Blackened Horde: What is the band like when you play live?
Angelus: Even though it would probably be possible to do some live shows around here, we do not play live because I simply prefer not to entangle the Malperdy MME in the decadent, proletarian party-spirit that rules concerts around here. The Malperdy MME should be seen as a serene citadel, almost some kind of religious order. That thought clashes head-first with the popular perception of live-shows and the atmosphere people think they should invoke. Therefore, the Malperdy MME is presently irreconcilable with live-shows.
Blackened Horde: What do you think of the US Black Metal/Death Metal scene?
Angelus: I stopped following it actively a few years back, but I definitely consider Black and Death Metal to be one of the better things coming out of the US these days.
Blackened Horde: What do you think of the Overseas scenes?
Angelus: For Europeans like me, ‘overseas’ means America, so I assume you mean the European scenes here. Like with the US scene, I stopped following it actively some years ago. I only stumble across bands now, you could say; I don’t really seek out new Black and Death Metal music around here anymore. If I accidentally come across an inspirational band here, that’s of course a great thing. If I don’t, I don’t really care, actually. However, Black and Death Metal are pretty much a European creation so I have a lot of respect for the bands that first embodied it.
Blackened Horde: What are some of new favorite black metal/death metal bands?
Angelus: No idea, really. ‘New’ is a relative term, isn’t it?
Blackened Horde: When do you guys plan on writing any new material?
Angelus: We are in the progress of working on a grand opus. However, this is going to be a work of considerable magnitude, taking a lot of time, energy and resources to accomplish. So the Malperdy MME is working on that but also on some other inspirational music to be released in the meantime. There’s a lot of ideas!
Blackened Horde: What does the future hold for the band??
Angelus: Well, most of all I hope the future includes finishing our grand militaristic metal opus some time near the end of this year and getting it released. That’s the main goal. As for other things, who knows, we shall see what happens and seize opportunities as and if they come.
Contact them at:
http://www.facebook.com/satanica.org
malperdy_mme@hotmail.com
