Celebrating one year of GroundCast we would like to gift you with this awesome interview with Rhiis Lopez from Ana Kefr. He we talked about the band, download and some philosophical things, hope you like so much as me.
First of all, thanks to the interview, to share a part of your time with us. I knew you listening in youtube, a friend of mine send me the link. Is a great band, I have to say.
GroundCast: First of all, tell us how everything begun? And why choose the name “Ana Kefr” for the band?
Rhiis Lopez: I look back on our beginnings as an example of what some people might call synchronicity. I lived in Egypt for a few years, half in Alexandria and the other half either in Cairo or traveling the country, and while I was in Cairo I spent about a year-and-a-half working in the film industry there. I was a casting director. I received news that my mother was having what appeared to be serious health problems, so I decided to take a break and visit her. My goal was to spend 3 months back in California, and then return to Cairo but, once I landed in Los Angeles, it was as if the world was conspiring to keep me here. My mother’s health improved, and I was introduced to Kyle Coughran (rhythm guitarist, and the source of those bat-shriek vocals you hear in our music) and things just really fell into place. He had been playing in a different band then, with a different style and sound, but my brother introduced me to Kyle and we basically just clicked. It felt right. I’d always written music and enjoyed the idea of a band, but never tried it before and honestly had no idea then that it was what would become the one passion that engulfs my life and drives everything now. I feel lucky to have found, at a relatively young age, what I feel is my true ‘calling,’ the one thing that actually makes me happy and fulfilled. Anyway, shortly after I met Kyle, we began writing together and one thing lead to the next. Kyle had the song “Takeover” written (as heard on “Volume 1”), and in the song I wrote the lyrics “ana kefr.” Well, we hadn’t chosen a band name yet, but we were throwing out different ideas (“The Human Burial Project” was actually one misanthropic-tinged idea that I still remember). We didn’t just want something that sounded ‘brutal’ or ‘evil,’ though, we wanted something meaningful and thought-provoking because we knew that we wanted our music to be that way as well. A friend of ours pointed out the part in “Takeover” where I sing “ana kefr,” and told us that he thought that would be a perfect name for us. We hadn’t looked at it that way before but, as soon as he said it, we knew it was the name we were meant to choose. Since we took on that name, it feels as if the name itself has driven us into different musical and ideological territories. It’s not one of those names like “Dark _____,” or “Butchered _______,” or anything typically metal like that. It’s Arabic, and means “I am Infidel,” (obviously inspired by my time living in the Middle East) and the fact that it means that, and that we choose to say it in Arabic, gives the band and its connotations some pretty big balls.
GroundCast: Tell us your influences, what inspires you?
Rhiis Lopez: I feel like we never really have a very satisfying answer for this question because our influences are somewhat vague and weird. Kyle and I, up to this time, have been the primary song-writers, 90% of the music has been from the two of us. Kyle grew up listening to Oingo Boingo and The Cure, not metal. He does enjoy death metal and dub-step and swing and all sorts of weird music as well, but I wouldn’t say that Kyle actually approaches our music with the genre of metal in mind. I grew up listening to Pink Floyd, David Bowie, Peter Gabriel, and now am a big fan of Tom Waits, but also really love the atmosphere and intensity of black metal and death metal. I think we are more in love with the idea and delivery of things like black metal and death metal, and not so much influenced by particular bands. It seems like we go through phases of listening to this or that, some of them being obscure bands and some of them being well-known ones. But rather than be influenced by a band and then start writing music, we actually avoid writing anything under the influence of what we listen to. We don’t want to write music that sounds like what someone else has made, to us that defeats the purpose of making original music. If we want to sound like someone else, we can go start a cover band and play other people’s music, but as long as we’re Ana Kefr then we’re going to push ourselves to find something new and exciting for us, and we hope for our fans as well.
GroundCast: You released last year the album “The Burial Tree (II),” what changed in Ana Kefr, since “Volume 1” till now?
Rhiis Lopez: Well, a lot has changed, and, at the same time, the core is the same. Kyle and I are the original founding members of this band. We had a different percussionist and lead guitarist from 2008 to the middle of 2009, but neither of them really wrote much, only two of the 14 songs on “Volume 1” are from their written material. So the core – Kyle and I – remain, and since we are the primary song-writers, the music and the direction we move in remains true to the founding principles of the band and our vision. However, we performed for almost a year without a bassist, and at the end of 2009, we brought in 3 new band members, including a bassist. The bassist is Alphonso Jimenez, he plays a fretless bass and is extremely talented and creative. The new lead guitarist is Brendan Moore, who can shred equally as well on a saxophone as he can on a guitar. Lastly, we brought in Shane Dawson on the drums, and Shane is overall a superior drummer to our first drummer. His timing is better, he can do more extreme things, he’s got a much better attitude and approach to the band, and he’s a very quick learner. So, replacing the members allowed our sound to mature a bit because we now have some really talented instrumentalists in the band. Injecting fresh blood into the band kind of gave a sense of a new beginning, and this was really inspiring for the writing of “The Burial Tree (II).”
GroundCast: How was the acceptance when “The Burial Tree (II)”? And why have the (II) in the title?
Rhiis Lopez: When we were writing and recording “The Burial Tree (II),” there was a mix of confidence and worry about how it would be received. We’re all pretty well aware that the material can be really outside the box and weird, and we understand that there are a lot of metal fans who want one thing, and that one thing needs to always sound a certain way, and if it doesn’t stay that certain way then they’ll hate it. So we knew that we are destined to turn some people off, but the reactions have been almost all positive. We’ve had a few negative reviews, but overall it has been overwhelmingly positive and supportive, which we are extremely thankful and happy about. At the same time, we’re not making this music in hopes of pleasing the world. If we wanted to do that, we could start a traditional death metal or black metal or rock or whatever band, something that is easier to follow. There are thousands and thousands of bands content to create music that is easier to categorize and understand at first listen. I guess we’re fans of an ongoing, real challenge. We’re making this music in hopes of achieving that sense of personal satisfaction that comes when you’ve created something you feel you can stand behind proudly, we have an innate love of originality and creativity and the sense of the pioneer, of inventiveness and the excitement that comes with creating art that stimulates both the musician and the listener. We also love sharing our art with others who do understand and appreciate what we’re doing.
As far as the (II) in the title, this reference goes back to “Volume 1.” At the very end of that album, I say “Please insert Volume II.” The album was meant to run like an audio/musical version of a book of social and philosophical commentary loosely tied together. So the “(II)” in “The Burial Tree (II)” is basically our way of showing that we did continue what we started, and that, though the album is not actually called “Volume II,” it is the follow-up that was promised in those final words on “Volume 1.”
GroundCast: You mix instruments in your songs, as Saxophone, Clarinet, Rattlesnake Rattle and others, how appeared the idea to use this in your songs, seeing that you have a strong death metal vein?
Rhiis Lopez: It took almost no consideration for us to incorporate these elements, actually. There was never a moment when we said, “Hey, let’s
try using a bunch of weird instruments, that could be cool!” Instead, it happened really naturally. When Brendan joined the band, he never told us that he was the lead saxophonist in band back in school (he has years of formal musical training). All we knew was that he could play well on the guitar, but one day Shane (who has known Brendan for years) casually joked about how Brendan could play the saxophone in a song. It was the first we’d heard of him being able to play the sax, and Brendan confirmed that he could. At first he looked surprised, as if he thought we were insane for wanting to use it, but when we wrote “Monody,” I think none of us had any doubts anymore. It’s not that we just happened to want to use that instrument, it is that we had someone in the band who was capable of playing it, and we had a part in the music that felt like no other instrument would have fit more perfectly. The same goes for the clarinet and rattlesnake rattle – it has never been about finding a place to put these instruments, it has always been about us having a part that demands for something like that to be used. If we had used a guitar to play the saxophone melodies in “Monody,” the whole part would have turned out differently. In my opinion, it wouldn’t have been as emotional and effective without the saxophone. For us, the rule isn’t to make heavy music and to try and make it weird or different; for us, we just write whatever comes out of us, and more often than not we find that the music coming out is either epic, weird or heavy. It is almost as if the music writes itself and demands for the unique instruments to come when the parts call for it.
GroundCast: Nowadays is so easy to the people download an album from internet, what do you think about it? Do you think that the music industry will end with this and the bands will stop to release CDs?
Rhiis Lopez: Well, nothing is going to stop music piracy unless somehow the entire Internet is shut off. Even if that happened, people would go back to trading CDs and cassette tapes like they did in the 80s and 90s before Napster and file-sharing became so popular. It’s become too large of a movement to stop. If there was a way to stop it, it should have been done right when Napster first emerged, when it was still on a smaller scale. At the level it is at now, it would be like one man standing on the train tracks in the way of a swift-moving train, imagining that by holding his hand out he can stop it from moving forward. It’s just not going to happen. How do we feel about it? Well, it’s good and it is bad. It is good because people all over the world do own our albums and, thanks to torrenting and piracy, we have new fans all the time. So we can’t just say music piracy is bad because it is doing a lot of good for independent bands like us. At the same time, there is a bad side, and the bad can’t be ignored any more than the good.
The negative side is that with every album downloaded for free, we lose money. We don’t have a label behind us, we do what we do entirely out of our own pockets. None of us are rich rock stars, we struggle and stress to afford doing this, and we accept this struggle because it is what we love. So it’s not that we’re rich and don’t want people to download our music because we want even more money to waste on new cars and drugs and expensive hotels. That’s not reality, and I don’t think we want that reality anyway. The fact is that we’re a young band who is struggling, like many other bands, to survive in a world with some serious economic problems at the moment, in a music industry that is also fought with serious financial crises and issues. The less money we make from album sales, the less likely it becomes that we can play shows, tour or even eventually release new albums. It takes a lot of money to do some of the things that I think many fans take for granted and imagine is easy for bands to do, like recording and releasing an album, touring, merchandise, music videos, etc. Most bands that are independent, like us, don’t go on tour and don’t do a lot of these things because they cost a lot of money, and you have to risk losing your job, the place you live, and sometimes the respect of family and friends, simply because you are sacrificing everything to do this, to chase your dreams. From the initial sales of “The Burial Tree (II),” we were actually able to afford to do that first major tour, our sales did pretty well and we are really fortunate and happy that it could happen that way. But each album downloaded for free does affect us directly because it makes us that much less able to bring our music out to those who don’t live close enough to see us at a local show. It makes it take longer to get the financial resources together to record and release an album, whereas bands on major labels have no problem with this because they are backed by big money.
I think that it is just an eventuality that one day bands will not release physical albums anymore, and there will just be digital music. I hope it doesn’t happen in my lifetime, though, because I still enjoy physical albums with their art and the thought put into making them a part of the album experience. I still believe in the power of a real album.
GroundCast: Exist a concept behind the last album [The Burial Tree (II)], in the lyrics, something that you want to tell?
Rhiis Lopez: There are a lot of different concepts behind “The Burial Tree (II),” actually, but I’d say one of the main themes tying everything together is that enlightenment is not always necessarily a happy and light experience. There are truths in the world today that are unpleasant, there are truths that hurt us when we learn of them. It seems like many people imagine that becoming ‘enlightened’ means being filled with bliss and joy and light, that having true knowledge of reality and the world somehow makes you a more balanced and sane individual, but I think that this line of thinking is completely ignoring the darkness and bitterness that is also a part of life. Life is not all good and beauty, there are ugly and painful things in the world, and it is just denial and ignorance to pretend that these things don’t exist, or that they aren’t important. In the second song on the album, “Emago,” a line says – “For if from ignorance hails bliss, then with enlightenment comes the abyss and hopelessness.” This really sums up this idea I’m talking about here. There is a saying that “ignorance is bliss,” meaning that what you don’t know won’t really hurt you. But if we are to truly believe that ignorance equals happiness, logically we are also saying that acquiring knowledge then brings pain and bitterness. “The Burial Tree (II)” is a search for truth and meaning not in the light, not in happiness – not in the places where everyone has been looking all along – but instead looking in the darkness, looking at the pain and loneliness, and finding questions there that still have no answers. Maybe they still have no answers because the answers are so painful that we are not ready to hear or accept them.
GroundCast: I can see in the band’s facebook that you’re close with the fans. It’s a great thing, because some artists seem to be untouchable, how do you find time for it? Or do you live with the music you create?
Rhiis Lopez: It basically takes a sense of time management and balance, but I think it is really important that we stay connected with our fans. I understand that, at a certain point, it becomes unrealistic for a band to be able to respond to everyone who writes them, but I believe that a band should at least acknowledge and interact with their fans in any way they reasonably can. The fans are the support and foundation of a band’s career, without them a band remains in the garage with no one to appreciate what they do. Fans are literally equally as important as bands because a band without fans is just a group of musicians entertaining themselves alone, and fans without a band are those who appreciate something that have nothing around them to appreciate. We all need each other to survive. It is a circle.
GroundCast: Ana Kefr has something unique in the sound. What do you think that make Ana Kefr different from the other bands of the genre?
Rhiis Lopez: There are a few things that separate us, in my opinion, but right now I think one thing that does make us different from other bands is that we aren’t actually trying to write metal or heavy music, we’re not trying to be epic or dark or weird. Nothing we do is contrived, it is completely natural. We don’t need an image like corpsepaint or leather boots and spikes, we don’t need long hair, we don’t need skulls and blood and Satan and corpses on our album art or merchandise. Let everyone else do that. We’re real, and we stand for something real, and that is pretty unique in this day and age where almost every band I can think of is basically pre-packaged like a McDonalds happy meal. They have their image, their sound, their lyrical content, and it’s all been done a thousand times before, there is nothing really different about them except maybe their music has a slightly different sound than the bands they are influenced by. By looking and sounding like everyone else, they have made themselves disposable, they have contributed nothing of value to art itself, but are instead another imitation in a long line of imitators. We don’t care about looking like the stereotypical metal band, we don’t really care if our music fits into any specific genre label. We write what we write, it ends up sounding like it does, and we never consciously aim to make it heavier or darker or softer. We don’t want to write metal, we want to write quality music and make high quality art. By making real music and art our ideals, instead of specifically metal and all of the associations that may bring, I feel that we’re pursuing something more refined and meaningful, and I believe it is this aim for high art and culture that does shine through our music. It gives it an atmosphere and emotion that not all modern music contains and, I hope, also gives it a stamp of authenticity.
GroundCast: What are the plans for Ana Kefr’s future, a new album coming or a long tour?
Rhiis Lopez: It is hard to believe that it has already been about a year and a half since we released “The Burial Tree (II)”! Our current plans include another national tour for the Fall of this year (2012) in the United States, after which I am not sure exactly what will come. We have all sorts of plans we’ve been discussing, but only the tour is the plan we know is coming for sure.
GroundCast: I think that you can do a great success in Brazil, do you had some requests to have your CD release in other countries by some label?
Rhiis Lopez: We have actually been approached by both Century Media and Metal Blade records, both very well-known metal labels, well-respected. Only the future can really tell what will happen, and of course we are hopeful for greater distribution and reach, to be able to touch new lives and reach new eyes and ears. We would love to come to Brazil, actually, and not long ago I was speaking with a tour booking agent in South America about possibly arranging a tour for us. Nothing is definite, but the possibility is real!
GroundCast: Do you have other projects that you would like to share?
Rhiis Lopez: There are no projects tied directly to Ana Kefr at the moment, however I would like to take this moment to recommend two bands 
we love dearly – first, because we’ve known them for a while now, is a “goblin metal” band from Santa Barbara and Los Angeles, they are called Nekrogoblikon. Their music is a mix of melodic death metal with some folk elements, some electronica and some pure weirdness. Very catchy, very memorable and funny, and the guys in the band are all really great people. Their latest album, “Stench,” comes highly recommended from all of us in Ana Kefr. Secondly, and lastly, not long ago we met another band that plays what is probably the most epic, classically-oriented black metal I’ve ever heard, with a slight Opeth twist to the music. Insanely talented musicians, the band is called Xanthochroid. They are currently recording their first full-length album, but they have an EP called “Incultus” which is free for download.
GroundCast: Thanks for all, now the space is yours to say something to the GroundCast’s readers and for the fans from Brazil. Hope see you here in the stage.
Rhiis Lopez: Thanks for your thoughtful questions and for taking the time do write the interview, I appreciate it!