LELAHELL interview!

Algerian Death Metal!

You must listen to them if you like crushing death metal riffs, mixed with ethnic guitar tunes! Let’s go –

• Hello to Algeria from Ukraine! How going life over there?

Hail to Ukraine and Antichrist ‘zine readers! Life is pretty cool! thanks

• Lelahell was founded back in 2010, am I right? First of all – what means band title? …hell – is known thing, but what’s “lela” and all together?

Lelahell was formed in the early 2010. Lelahel (with one ‘l’ letter in the end) is An angel of the zodiac exercising dominion over love, art, science and fortune. We appeal to this being of light for good luck and good fortune. We added an ‘l’ because there is already an Italian rock band named Lelahel, and Lelahel is also my nickname. So to make difference between them I added a second ‘l’ in the end of Lelahel.

• If I remember correct, we were in contact time ago, and I know first year Lelahell was one man band, correct?

 Yes , I started the band initially as a one man band with the recording of the first  material. After that I met Ayrod and Nihil from Barbaros and told them that I was looking for band members for my project. Some weeks after Slaveblaster (the drummer of Barbaros) contacted me for joining Lelahell and Nihil (bass) joined the band too.

• Looking to the band’s picture we can see mature men, but not some young metalheads… Can you tell us about each member past musical experience? I.e. did you played other bands before?

I played bass in Neanderthalia from 1993 to 1996, after that I founded Litham (bass and vocals) with 2 band members of the previous band. After that got a gore grind project called Carnavage (from 2004 to 2007), and I joined Devast (vox) in 2008, and finally founded Lelahell in 2010. Nihil (Bass) played in some rock bands after that joined Barbaros in 2008. Slaveblaster founded Djamharouche, played with me in Devast and played with The Kult of Satanachiia and Barbaros.

• Well, let’s speak about your latest (and first) album, called “Al Insane​.​.​. The (Re​)​Birth of Abderrahmane” (sooo long title as for me). How much time you have spent for album composing-recording…? And are you completely satisfied with the finish result? As for me – there is enough good sound!

I started the writing process of guitars album and structures just before the Ep release in spring 2012, after that we spent around 6 month to finalize the album (drums, bass, lyrics, vocals…)

In January 2013 we started to record drums, two month later we started the recording of bass and guitars. The vocals were recorded in august 2013 just before our first tour.

After that I was going to mix and master the album, but it was difficult to find a suitable sound for our music which was the most arduous part of the recording process, so we decided to search for a producer, and the time to find someone for that we were in December 2013.  The album was mixed and mastered by Ivan from Anthropocide studio from Belarus. He did a great job; this guy is very patient and talented! And the album was finalized in March 2014. For a first album we are really 100% satisfied!

• What is the main theme of the album? I see there are both English written lyric, as well as your domestic language. What about the songs written and sung in your native language?

The lyrics are in Classical Arabic, in Algerian and English and a song in French (Hypnose). In general they are about society and all its imperfections.

“Al Intissar” is an hymn to victory and all against those fuckin’ losers who complain all day long without doing anything from their lives. Move your ass fucking assholes! Kalimet essir is a tribute to our Martyrs, Black hands is about the difference between the rich and poor, “Hillal”, has a more philosophical concept and it is about the interaction of the human with the nature and Mizmar talks about the human pleasures!

• Who have composed lyrics for the album and what’s the main inspiration for the lyrics?

I composed the lyrics, I get the inspiration from our daily life, and past experiences nothing more.

• CD was released by US label Horror Pain Gore Death records. How did you get contact with them and were there some proposals from another labels? If so – why did you choose HPGD?

We choose HPGD productions from USA because 2 years ago, this label was interested to release our first Ep “Al Intihar” (but we choose Goressimo Records for that). So we (re)contacted Mike Juliano the label owner, he was really interested and excited to release this album. He done a great job, this label is perfect for a first album.

• Album was released about 3 months ago. Do you have an info how going distribution for this CD? Also did you get some feedback from fans etc?

We got an amazing feedback from all around the world, more than 50 reviews in webzines and magazines and all of them are positive. For distribution don’t have too much information, but the label is doing his job!

• What about gigs-tours for album support?

For December we have a European tour planned in Germany, Switzerland, Poland and France. It is called Al Insane Tour.

• I know you played abroad some time ago, weren’t there some troubles with Visa and etc to cross the borders of Algeria?

We played many times in Europe. our First gig was in march 2013  at le klub (Paris, France) in the Skullkrusher Deathfest II. we also made a tour in the summer of same year Al Intihar Tour, we played in Toulouse (France), Czech republic (Prague), and Slovakia (Bratislava, Trencin and Liptovsky Mikolas).Two months before we played in Malta Death Fest III one of the most important metal event of the island. For visas and all stuffs everything went fine!

• What about local gigs? How often metal gigs take place there in your country?

In Algeria nowadays it becomes really difficult to play a metal show (only 3 or 4 metal shows organized per year!), because there are no suitable venue for this music genre. Most of them are cinema theatre with chairs so imagine a metal concert with people sitting on chairs!

In Algiers, there is a venue called Sierra Maestra and they still accept to do some metal shows there.

• I have found there many native tunes in your music, as for me – this sounds really interesting! Do you think this underline your music better?

The ethnic component in your sound is present but it isn’t too massive. In the future we think to increase those parts. We don’t want to sound too original or too different. The ideas and riffs comes naturally like that!

• If you use some native tunes, maybe you like history of your country? What is the most important thing there in the Algeria’s history (from your personal point of view)?

We have talked two times about our history in the intro of the Album Mazaghran, it is a battle with Spanish in the 15th century, the song is written by a poet named Sidi Lakhdar Benkhlouf. The second time in Kalimet Essir is a tribute to our martyrs of the war revolution against France and for us it is the most important thing in the Algeria’s story!

• And how could you describe life there in Algeria? Wouldn’t you like to move to another country?

Life is quiet but become difficult nowadays, everything is expensive! I don’t think to move to another country for the moment maybe in the future maybe not!

• Algeria is near Morocco, are you able to visit this country without any troubles like Visas and etc?

The borders are closed we can’t enter by car or bus, but with plane is ok without Visa. I already played there with my band Litham in 2004 (Boulevard des Jeunes Musiciens) and it was our best gig! Really amazing!

• Well, return to the musick! Do you remember the first metal band you have ever heard? And why you decided to play music at all? What would you like to achieve with Lelahell?

When I was a teenager I took 3 hard rock albums from my big brother’s collection and listened to them carefully (blackout of scorpions, flick of the switch from AC/DC and No Sleep ’til Hammersmith from Motorhead) I was totally fascinated! The addiction has begun!

Our main goals are to make music, play all around the world and of course having fun!

• What do you know about Ukraine? And what’s your personal opinion on what’s going on here now (Russian aggression and etc etc)?

I don’t know too much about the situation in Ukraine, but I really respect your attitude because you have moved to another side of the country and you are still doing your underground activity! Total respect!! We know that there is a festival called Carpathian Alliance open air, we had a possibility to play there for 2015 but still no answer!

• That’s all I’d like to ask right now. I like your first album, so I hope I’ll hear new one near future! Thx for your time and stay metal!

Thanks for your great support and stay brutalz!

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27-11-14 Aleksandr