Hi! How are you doing right now?
Pretty relaxed, thanks! Album done, tour ahead, smile on my face:)
How would you describe your sound to someone unfamiliar in the ways of The Ocean?
Imagine you're diving in the Red Sea, or in Belize... you're at about 20-30 meters, abundant marine life all around you, lots of beautiful coral fish in amazing colours... there's moray eels hiding under the rocks but they are not really dangerous, you're looking at Parrot Fish and Clown Fish and Sea Fans moving gently in the current... all of a sudden, you're running out of breath. Your regulator fails.
You guys rock some serious shit, new album Heliocentric being no exception. It sounds very distinct and much more mellow than some of your previous albums. Was this a conscious aim? Last time we spoke I got the impression that there was a desire to move away from your more full-on metal roots...
We've always been meandering between heavy and calm moments with our music. It's all about dynamics in the end. The heavy parts are most effective when they are being contrasted with calm moments. My listening habits have evolved over the course of the past few years. I still listen to Behemoth and Goatwhore, but at the same time I have become increasingly interested in clean vocals and a more song-oriented and stripped-down approach to writing music. Precambrian was the epitome of maximalism, if there is any such thing... huge, epic song monsters, 100s of tracks. I still love that approach but it felt like we had already achieved everything that could be achieved in that realm. I was looking for new challenges, and the last song off "Precambrian", a track called "Cryogenian" that consisted only of piano, cello and viola, already hinted in that direction. The addition of Loic all of a sudden made everything possible. There are no limits anymore...
Heliocentric's counterpart Anthropocentric is due out later this year. Take us through the details of this new body of work. What are the themes/ideas? Can we expect more of the same or a totally different style on each album...?
I don't really wanna take too much ahead here. Musically, it will be a bit more technical and heavy maybe, although I do think that Heliocentric is a pretty heavy album, apart from the 3 piano-dominated songs. Lyrically, it will continue the religious theme apparently, from a bit more of a personal angle. We finished "Heliocentric" with Richard Dawkins' main argument regarding the futility of the assumption of a creator and the tautologies involved in clerical explanations of why we need that assumption... and that's where Anthropocentric is going to continue.
Loïc Rossetti is your new vocalist and turns in a great and varied performance on the new album, was it tough finding a replacement for Mike Pilat?
After Mike's departure we were specifially looking for a vocalist who was not only following us in our musical development, but who was one step ahead. We still want to play our older material live, so we had to find someone who is a powerful screamer and a good singer at the same time. This proved to be really difficult... More than a hundred people wrote us and sent in tryout videos / audio for a few of our songs. After 9 months, Loic came along and when we heard his take on our new material, as well a few older tracks, we knew immediately that the search was finally over. It was decided within 5 minutes.
Given the loose collection of musicians the band has collaborated with in the past are we now seeing a more solidified line-up taking shape?
Over the course of the last 2 years, The Ocean has transformed from a loose collective into a sturdy band. It is always better to work with a group of dedicated people who feel like they are part of this strange entity called "band", rather than a bunch of session musicians and temporary players. It took me almost 10 years to find these people that were talented, dedicated and simply good guys... This is the end result of a long odyssee. The current line-up has been consistent for about 2 years now. We have toured around the world together (more than 130 shows in 2008 alone), spent months in a nutshell van infested with the smell of farts, feet and rotten food... this has been really intense, we all know each other very well and we are good friends that stick together. This is the strongest lineup this band has ever had, and I dearly hope it will last... well being aware of the fact that priorities change in everyone's lives as we grow older, and any band constellation usually only works for a limited time. We will try to make the most of what we have now, while we have it...
Over this year you'll be touring a lot throughout Europe, with Coheed and Cambria on one date, what are your hopes and dreams for this year's touring?
We're just really looking forward to hitting the road again. We've toured immensely in 2008, playing more than 150 shows that year, and last year we took it a bit slow to focus on the new album... which was good, it's always good to have these changes, and oscillating between stage and studio is one of the things that makes playing in such a band so interesting...
Will there be plans to come to the UK this year?
Nothing definite yet. We've had some bad experiences in the UK in the past so we wanna do it right this time. I am pretty sure there will be a few UK dates later though as the album has been really well received over there.
What are you going to be doing 5 minutes from now?
I will be going out. It's friday night, 10 past midnight. I will be meeting a few friends for drinks in Kreuzberg and then around 2 or 3 I will be going out to Berghain, Berlin's best electro venue, to see Venetian snares and party with my dudes and dudettes!
