Eufobia, a Death metal band from Bulgaria, released till now 2 albums and seem to be known in the underground metal scene. Niki, the vocalist and guitarist of the band, had time to answer me a few questions about the band and a new release which miht be out soon.
Hello Niki, how have you been?
Hi Carla. Well. Honestly I’ve been having some issues recently and by recently I mean in the last few years but I’ve been lucky to have the support of my girlfriend, my friends and my family so I’d rather say that I feel quite fine in spite of all that bullshit.
Tell me a little history when Eufobia was founded.
Everytime I think of the period in which the band was founded a huge smile appears on my face for we were just some brainless youngsters back than making all sorts of crazy things, like drinking the whole night and sleeping in the park for instance. Knowing us you may disagree with me, but I would say though, that we behave a bit more nowadays
and I’m quite proud of the fact that because of our involvement with the band we still manage to keep our spirit restless.
The story of founding Eufobia itself is quite a typical one. I had been playing in another band for some time but I had been rather unhappy because of the endless compromises with my views on the style of that band. Therefore I decided to found my own band in order to be free to play exactly the music I had been imagining in my sick head. After making that decision however, I spent a lot of time looking for the right people until I finally found those bastards and I’m very proud that no bandmember of Eufobia has ever been replaced since than.
You have released the debut album ”Insemination” in 2010. Tell me about it.
Until 2008 we had been just messing around, but than we recieved the chance to go on two real tours with some great bands that I deeply admire and suddenly everything changed. I’m talking about the polish death machines of CARNAL, the glorious veterans of ONSLAUGHT and the rising stars of SUICIDAL ANGELS. We received a huge punch of motivation at once, so we decidet to take our activities more seriously and to create a truly profesional album. We saved up some money and hired the best bulgarian producers Deso Velchev, who became a trusted friend of ours later. While making this album me and my bandmates were listening to a lot of grindcore and influenced by that we wanted it to be swift and punching like a kick in the face. However I find it a little bit weird, as it was meant to be admired by the fans of more brutal metal, but there ware a lot of progressive fans who really liked this album. We filmed some videos as well. Once the record was done, we went straight to Bucharest to speak with Coro of the romanian label Axa Valaha who had booked some shows for Eufobia before that. He liked the music and we cut a deal. The sole thing that he disliked was the layout we had prepared. Therefore he presented us to his friend Costin Chioreanu who was to become one of the most famost eastern european grafic designers. The final result of all this I believe, was something to be proud of. As a local distributor for our homeland Bulgaria was needed, we went straight to the biggest one, a company called Wizard well known for its partnership with almost every single major metal label or distributor in the world.
Later in 2011 the second album was released entitled ”Cup Of Mud”, similar as the demo from 2005. How the recordings were going?
Well. After releasing “Insemination” we received a lot of attention by both the metalheads and the media, not only from Bulgaria and Romania, but from abroad as well. We spent a lot of time tourings over Europe. I’m talking about months on the road. We went to countries that we had never been before and met a lot of interesting people. Of course it was all on underground level and there were some issues every now and then, but thus it was even sweeter. We were living in a dream and we didn’t want the party to be over so right after coming back from the last of those tours we went straight to the studio and started remaking the damned demo. I had wanted for so long to do that and it was exactly the right time. Thus we had enough songs for a new album and could start recording it right away. Moreover in that low quality demo were in fact buried some of our best songs with no real possibility for the people to admire them because of the shitty quality of the record. When we had recorded it we’d had not enough money nor enough experience in order to do it right, and honestly I felt rather relieved and of course quite pleased with the final result when we finished the second recording. In addition to the songs of the demo we decided to include a weird acoustic song as an experiment and I believe that it fitted pretty well. Recording this album we worked once again with the same people. Deso produced it. Costin painted the artwork. The same guys Bojan and Alesto filmed the videos but that time Wizard was not just a local distributor. It relesed it and because of the excelent relations of this company it was distributed worldwide by Twilight Vertrieb, a company than needs no presentation.
Who mainly writes the lyrics?
I do it for the most of the songs. Our drummer Blago also wrote some of them. I have to admit however that the writingof the lyrics has always been a big problem for us because we focus on the music, while the lyrics are something that we just add later. I know it’s wrong and we’ve been working on it, so in the next album I can promise you less stupid lyrics.
Are you preparing for a new album?
Yes we are. We’ve been playing most of the songs in the last few years so those who attended our shows are familiar with them. Compared to the previous ones the style is quite different. It’s no longer death metal and it’s less brutal, but still very kicking and punching. For me until now something has always been missing and I’ve never been fully satisfied with what we had done so far. Now I finally feel that the quest for the right sound is over. For the two previous albums we had to make huge compromises, but not for this one. We have promised ourselves that, and therefore we don’t want to rush it. It’s almost ready but it has to be perfect before releasing it. Soon I hope, for it’s been a long time already since we started recording it.
What are the band’s influences?
I believe that our strength and creativity is due to the fact that everyone of us listens to all sorts of rock and metal music so having a rich musical culture we experience all sorts of influences and therefore the music we create is so weird, but that’s a good thing. Creativity should have no boundaries. I personally listen to rock, grunge, punk, black metal, death metal, hard core, grindcore and basically to everything that has a distorted guitar in it.
You had shows along Europe in the past and are you going to tour this year?
Yes we are, but this time we’re going eastwards. It’s probably early to announce it, but this autumn we’re going to Romania and after that to Russia. It makes me very happy personally because I’ve never been to Russia and I’ve always wanted to visit this country, while to Romania I feel emotionally attached. I often say being asked about it, that I love my homeland Bulgaria as a mother, while I love Romania as a lover. I have spent a lot of time there and I’ve made a lot of friends. I have stolen a little peace of Romania and have brought it home. That’s my girlfriend, which is romanian, but Romania has stolen my heart in return. Fair enough, I would say. Sadly in the last few years we haven’t played enough there, but I hope that it’s about to change with the help of our friend Mihnea of Cavalleria events and his wife Olivia.
How do you see Eufobia fans?
I never call those people fans. I dislike this word and try not to use it in this context. At least in the underground, everybody should be on the same level. Also we’d rather make friends than fans and that’s what we’ve been trying to do so far. I’m proud to know that wherever I go I’ve got someone to call and spend some quality time with.
That’s probably the best part of the underground way of life. Having trusted friends all over the world and having the chance of meeting more and more cool people.
Do you have a message for the fans?
My message is and has always been to support the underground. Also I wish to invite all the open minded metalheads who have an insatiable appetite for fun and destruction to come to our shows and afterparties and help us create disorder.
Thank you Niki, all the best!
Thanks Carla. I hope to see you on our next concert in Bucharest.
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(c) Carla Morton
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