GF93 - Better late then never
Although I send this interview by email in July from this year, I didn’t get a response to it uptill now. The reason? Well, it seems that this band (or the label(*) where it’s signed to), have had quite some problems over the past few months. Actually their still in big trouble I believe, so this interview might be a bit weird due to the questions and/or answers not being fully up-to-date. I would like to apologize for that but I hope you can still enjoy the interview!
Hey, how are you?
Please introduce yourself and your band.
My name is Alvaro and I’m GF93’s drummer since 2000. The other members are Carlo (singer), Mario (Guitar) and Fabio (Bass).
Can you tell us something more about the history of GF 93? Please don’t forget to mention how you came up with the name GF93!
Gf93 was formed back in 1996, after that Carlo left his original band Necromass. We released four albums which gave us supporting tours in England and Italy with international acts as Earthone 9 (RIP) and Misery Loves Company (RIP). After the last tour in England we decided to change our label due to technical problems and in 2004 we released our last effort “OSR” which is now distributed by the mighty Century Media(*).
About the name ...GF93 is an instrument used by doctors to check people’s earrings damages.
(*note: this is not the label mentioned in the introduction to this interview)
Your album has been released for a while now, how are the reactions so far?
The reactions here in Italy and in Europe have been quite cool, they gave us the opportunity to play on a huge festival last November in London with Visible Noise and we had the chance to tour Germany for a while.
Did you expect the reactions to be like that? why (not)?
Since the beginning of the writing process for “OSR”, we were strongly focused to be even more powerful than we were in the past...we, as a band, don’t usually care about peoples reactions we just basically play for ourselves to let the bad things we see nowadays, come out!
The album (OSR) was additionally produced by Kurt Ballou from Converge. How did you come up with Kurt to do that?
Carlo just sent Kurt some songs during the pre-production and he was enthusiastic .... I mean we sound very different from Converge, but he felt our integrity and passion in the work... so after we finished recording the new album, he gave us the final touches in the mix.
There’s quite some different persons on the album who did guest/backing vocals. How did you come up with every one of them?
I’m the first person who’s always trying to sing on some songs even if most of the time, they’re bad (hahaha!). The other guests are basically friends of us: Natascia P. Sings with Ilid, a strong and powerful band that you will hear about in the future. Alessio C. and Giacomo Rossi sing in two Italian underground bands, while P. Wiren used to sing with Misery Loves Company.
What’s your favourite song of the album and why this one?
“25 Times Fire Devastates”, because it really hurts people’s faces when we play it live.
When I listen to your album almost every song sticks in my head the whole day long, but for some reasons “ Enter the Cult” has this special thing to me. What’s the meaning of this song?
“Enter the Cult” talks about Carlo’s nightmare...it’s his own bad dream which is well represented in the video clip we filmed in Berlin last January. Check it out on www.GF93.com and catch the meaning of the song.
Altough I’m really enthusiastic about the album, there’s just one thing I don’t really understand: The remix of “ Eight Years “. Why this choice ?
When we finished “OSR”, our graphic collaborator Syncprodz came up with this remix version...we decided to include it on the album as a sort of tribute to these people, who worked hard for us in the past years.
[img]https://upload.metalrage.com/2gfband (Custom).jpg[/img]
Now that your album has been released I think there will be quite some people who want to see you on the road (including myself). Please tell us about the touring plans, any chance of seeing you touring the rest of Europe (or other parts) as well?
We’re going to play some more festivals here in Italy this summer and in September we’re flying back to Berlin to take place at Dunker Club on the 15th with other bands as AntiProduct ... come on Erik join us and we’ll give you a killer set!
On your website I read that you guys are already working on the new material, which points a bit more to the black metal style. How does a nu-metal/crossover band come to such a decision to make more black metal oriented music?
We’re not going to release a black metal album following all the cliché of this genre...otherwise, we always tend to catch the sinister mood of this kind of music because we, as a band, are into bands that you can consider black and dark...just think about N.I.N., Bauhaus, Cure, Massive Attack, Neurosis.
I also read that you guys are doing quite some work with other artists this summer .Can you tell us a bit more about that?
Carlo is the most involved in other projects, while I’m actually working on the Ilid EP, as I told you before, they’re going to release it in the winter and I’ll promise you you’ll be blown away by their melodies. Check them out at www.AlkemistFanatix.com.
At the moment your band almost exists for 10 years . We’ve gotta be honest here, GF93 still isn’t a very well known band in the scene. Do you feel the need to change this? And do you think will ever be the case?
Why not? Give us the chance to play the Netherlands and you’ll be not disappointed with our musical proposal.
Ok, this was actually my last question. Anything left to say to our readers?
Thank you very much for time and hope to see you soon in the Netherlands! Respect all the fuzzy animals that live in this world and keep on rocking!!!