André Bighinzoli (Metalmorphose)

English version below

Metalmorphose, começou por volta de 1983, o seu primeiro álbum foi um "split" com Dorsal Atlântica chamado "Ultimatum", em 1985. Após um longo interregno a banda voltou ao activo em 2008 tendo lançado vários álbuns até 2018. Mantivemos uma conversa com o baixista a mentor do projecto André Bighinzoli onde abordámos vários assuntos sobre a banda.

P. - André, fala-nos um pouco do início dos Metalmorphose, como surgiu a ideia de formar uma banda? Conta-nos um pouco da vossa história.

André - Na verdade não houve nada especial, nós todos éramos muito jovens, adolescentes ainda, e o Metalmorphose foi a nossa primeira banda. Eu aos 7 anos comecei a ter aulas de violão, morava em Brasília, depois fui para o Rio de Janeiro, a minha família é do Rio, houve uma fase em que me desinteressei, mas depois comecei a gostar de rock e música em geral. Na chamada “Era da discoteca”, fiquei muito interessado no som do baixo, nas bandas, eu ficava vidrado na figura do baixista, por exemplo, o John Paul Jones do Led Zeppelin. Quando tinha 13 anos os meus avós italianos ofereceram-me um baixo, mas no Brasil era proibido a importação de instrumentos devido à ditadura, havia uma lei que se existisse um produto de fabrico nacional e houvesse um produto similar estrangeiro, o mesmo não poderia ser importado, era um baixo fender jazz americano, custou uma fortuna na época 2000 dólares.

Simultaneamente um amigo disse-me que havia um pessoal ensaiando, uns amigos, perto da rua dele, era na casa do Marcelo Ferreira que viria a ser o guitarrista de Metalmorphose, que estava a tocar com o Celso Suckow, e com um baterista que era o Walter Costa que tocava numa bateria improvisada, eles estavam procurando baixista e fui convidado. Na semana seguinte levei um amplificador para o ensaio, e assim começaram os “Pena de Morte”, que na verdade até foi uma sugestão minha derivado de uma música que tinha escrito, com o mesmo nome, foram os primeiros passos do que viria a ser Metalmorphose, em 1983. Eu tinha 14 anos, e o mais velho era o Tavinho Godoy que tinha 17 anos, eramos uns meninos (uns putos).

O Marcelo e o Celso já tinham musicas, eles já compunham e quando entrei eu também comecei a compor, tocávamos algumas covers, Manowar, Judas Priest, mas eram coisas pontuais, nos Brasil estava a acontecer o fim da ditadura, o Rock e o Metal eram muito irreverentes na nossa sociedade, nós sentíamos muito o Metal e era uma questão de atitude, tínhamos cabelo comprido, não andávamos vestidos à moda, nem íamos à praia, e isso reflectia-se na composição, a irreverencia, e ficávamos muito ligados à temática de grupos como os Black Sabbath aquilo era tudo um barato para nós.

A nossa primeira música chamava-se “Rock 'n' Roll No Inferno”. É engraçado que uma geração, ela tem uma aversão imediata e automática com a geração imediatamente anterior, nessa época tínhamos aversão aos Hippies, que era a geração anterior à nossa, essa era a geração do Rock 'n' Roll de paz e amor, e nós achávamos que era horrível, e queríamos distanciar-nos desse movimento.

P. - Quais as principais dificuldades com que se deparavam nessa altura em que formaram os Metalmorphose?

André - Não houve grandes dificuldades, a dificuldade era comungar com essa coisa do comercial, por exemplo tocar numa radio, no Rio havia a Radio Maldita (a Radio Fluminense FM), o Dorsal Atlântica passava lá uma música, havia o Azul Limão a turma era mais velha, o Marcos era mais velho, eu estou com 51, o Marcos está com 60 anos, o Carlos Vândalo, que era o Carlos Punk na época, eu tinha 14 ele tinha 23, havia uma grande diferença, e a radio Fluminense ela, começava a passar rock, e tenho que dizer o seguinte, houve um movimento, o Rock Brasil com bandas como Barão Vermelho, Kid Abelha, Legião Urbana, Ultraje a Rigor, Herva Doce, Lobão, era uma turma do rock mas era um rock mais moderno, nós metaleiros gostávamos de virtuosismo.

A “media”, os shows, a cena não existia, como nós eramos muito jovens nós conseguimos lugares bizarros para tocar, nós tocamos no bar Opinião que era uma churrascaria, fizemos 2 shows lá, inclusive com Dorsal Atlântica, o Metalmorphose depois conseguiu tocar no Teatro do Planetário que era um sitio que não tinha absolutamente nada a ver com o Metal, eles deram-nos as segundas-feiras e nós conseguíamos lotar o recinto.

P. - E quais as vossas principais influências e grupos favoritos no inicio da banda?

André - As nossas principais influências eram os Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, AC/DC, Motorhead, Black Sabbath, e também os Deep Purple, a fase com Gillan.

Nós vimos bandas como Manowar, Metallica, Anthrax, Slayer surgirem, e lembro-me que o Celso, como tinha dinheiro, comprava os discos das gravadoras americanas, pelo correio, mesmo sem conhecer, ele via o nome das bandas e encomendava às gravadoras independentes como a Music For Nations, discos que não havia no Brasil.

Até que aconteceu o fenómeno Rock In Rio, que foi feito em janeiro de 85, como era um evento comercial, as gravadoras lançaram material antigo de bandas como Queen, Iron Maiden, Van Halen, AC/DC, Whitesnake, Ozzy Osbourne, Black Sabbath, devido ao festival, com essa onda, surgiu essa oportunidade, a editora EMI tinha no brasil um selo chamado Heavy Metal Attack, e editou Iron Maiden, Accept, Wasp, mas era tudo novidade.

P. - Como se deu a vossa estreia com o álbum "Ultimatum", como surgiu a ideia de fazer um "Split" com os Dorsal Atlântica?

André - O que aconteceu foi que nós tivemos contacto com os Dorsal Atlântica, que nós admirávamos muito, porque eram Metal e muito impactante ao vivo, era uma banda que nos admirávamos, mais velhos, o Celso tinha um local para ensaio, e tínhamos uma situação financeira melhor. O Dorsal queria fazer um disco, o Carlos Lopes procurou umas bandas de São Paulo. Segundo o relato do próprio Carlos, no seu livro, “Guerrilha”, onde conta a história da Dorsal Atlântica, ele disse justamente isso, que precisavam de um lugar para ensaiar e uma banda para dividir os custo e nós estávamos disponíveis e assim fizemos com eles.

Gravado em 84 e lançado em janeiro de 85, o Ultimatum foi uma bênção e ao mesmo tempo uma maldição, porque o Metalmorphose não estava pronto, não era maduro, nós eramos uns meninos, gravei o disco com 15 anos de idade, conhece alguma banda com baixista com 15 anos de idade? Pois é! Mas as músicas eram de nossa autoria.

Por outro lado, Dorsal Atlântica já estavam muito mais consolidados como banda, então foi uma coisa assim que houve essa dicotomia de cara, os fãs dividiram-se, a maior parte dos fãs era da Dorsal, e começaram a rejeitar muito Metalmorphose, mas nós imediatamente virámos a página e começámos a compor e trabalhar em material novo que foi gravado em 86, uma demo com Minha Droga é o Metal, Maldição, Ela Tem Sempre Uma Desculpa, Rebeldia, que está na colectânea que o Fernando Roberto editou que é A Nossa Droga é o Heavy Metal, só que essa demo ela nunca chegou a ser disco, ela nunca foi comercializada, mas houve uma difusão, houve uma disseminação enorme, as pessoas copiando as fitas e tal, a demo foi parar longe, e foi a partir daqui que o Metalmorphose digamos teve o seu ponto alto, o seu auge.

Foi neste momento que eu sai do grupo, por coisas de garoto, eu na verdade brigava muito com eles, a gente se desentendia, o Celso era muito autoritário, o sistema era muito rígido, ensaiávamos todos os fins-de-semana, e também discutimos muitas vezes, e houve uma vez depois de uma discussão eu sai da banda e entrou outro baixista e foi assim quase como quem não quer nada!

Nós tínhamos feito todo o material da demo, as musicas os arranjos e tal e quem gravou foi o meu substituto, o Plínio Júnior que entrou na banda e em menos de um mês gravou a demo que tinha sido composta com a minha participação.

P. - O single "Correntes" foi editado de forma independente em 1986, era difícil encontrar uma editora naquele tempo?

André - Essa altura foi crucial para o Celso, Marcelo e André Delacroix, que foi a altura da entrada na faculdade e o grupo passou a ficar em segundo plano, principalmente o Celso e o Marcelo cujos pais tinham empresas. O pai do Celso tinha uma construtora, e ele estava estudando engenharia, para herdar a empresa, e o grupo comercialmente falando começou a ficar em segundo plano.

Eles fizeram o Correntes em 86, mas eles tiveram uma gravadora, um selo chamado CID (Companhia Industrial de Discos), que lançou muita coisa no Brasil, eles fizeram esse acordo na época com a gravadora, mas a história, que eu sei por alto porque já não estava mais no grupo, foi que houve um desacordo no final, depois de se ter gravado e ter prensado o disco, houve um problema contratual não sei o que aconteceu e a CID resolveu não lançar o material e esses discos foram para destruição. Reza a lenda e foi confirmado pelo próprio Carlos da Dorsal, o Carlos estava na Cid vendo os discos serem levados para o lixo e o Carlos pediu ao funcionário que lhe deixasse levar alguns e acabou levando uma quantidade de discos, uns 50, eu não sei exactamente quantos foram que ele pôde levar e foi isso que sobrou do “Correntes”.

P. - O que vos levou a separar a banda em 1989? O que acha que correu mal para que o projecto não tivesse tido continuidade?

André - Depois do “Correntes” ficou então o vácuo, e o Metalmorphose a partir dai tornou-se uma banda que não estava mais no activo, practicamente uma banda de mentira, eles queriam um contrato grande com uma gravadora e foram para o lado do Glam Hair Rock, enquanto que o Dorsal não, ficou cada vez mais radical e o Metalmorphose foi para a fase Hair Band, mas eles não faziam mais shows, tanto é que o André Delacroix saiu da banda em 86 e não gravou o single Correntes, quem entrou na banda foi o Walter, o baterista que tocou lá bem atrás quando eu conheci o grupo e ele disse-me numa entrevista no Canal Metalmorphose que eles nunca fizeram um show com ele ao vivo. Por isso o ultimo show do Metalmorphose foi com o André Delacroix na bateria em 86 e por isso pode-se dizer que o grupo practicamente parou bem antes de 89, fizeram mais algumas músicas, umas demos que eu tenho inclusive, ainda com o Tavinho que também acabou por sair, e eles mudaram de nome tanto é que o Marcelo e o Celso, até hoje eles tocam juntos, mas como amadores, fazendo outro tipo de som e enfim o grupo acabou de facto realmente em 86.

P. - Mantiveram o contacto após a separação da banda?

André - Nós sempre mantivemos o contacto, mas muito eventual, muito esporádico, mas nunca ninguém perdeu o contacto na verdade, mas socialmente não tínhamos interacção, mas ficou aquela coisa de agente se conhecer.

P. - Que outros projectos musicais você teve durante o interregno dos Metalmorphose?

André - Eu formei alguns grupos, eu passei por um grupo chamado Segundo Movimento, logo assim que eu sai do Metalmorphose, depois eu conheci um pessoal da Universidade de Santa Úrsula, músicos muito bons, sempre gostei de estar cercado de gente que toca bem e nós fizemos um grupo chamado Heramus, muito bom grupo, muito saudoso, que pode ser ouvido no Soundcloud, depois o Heramus deu lugar ao DNA, que foi um grupo que chegou a ter um certo sucesso, tivemos um contrato com a gravadora Eldorado, lançamos um CD em 98, depois esse grupo meio que se desfez e se transformou no Genoma que era um grupo também com o Darwen Schiavini que é meu amigo e parceiro, inclusive fez uma letra para o Metalmorphose, no tema “Solução” do álbum “Ação & Reação”, é meu amigo desde a fase do Heramus e aqui entrou o Pedro Paulo Cavalcante que eu depois chamei mais tarde para o Metalmorphose.

O Genoma é o que eu considero um grupo excelente, practicamente a banda do coração, onde eu cantava. O Gustavo Andriewiski que é o produtor do Metalmorphose, vai finalizar as gravações, nós começamos em 2003, com o baterista que já faleceu Pedro Ariel (Pedrinho) e enfim, eu quero finalizar esse disco, é o projecto que eu estou retomando, é esse projecto que eu queria ver se encontrava músicos aqui em Portugal para retomar o grupo, por causa das músicas, das composições. Então esse foi o meu hiato, o que aconteceu no meu hiato.

P. - Como surgiu a ideia de voltar a reunir os Metalmorphose em 2008?

André - A volta do Metalmorphose foi um estimulo externo, acho que ninguém achava que a banda um dia ia voltar, muito menos voltar a fazer shows e a fazer sucesso, nós tivemos esse gostinho do sucesso lá trás, com as musicas tocando no radio, o disco Ultimatum, mas eramos muito jovens, então 25 anos depois um amigo me chama para ver um show do Stress e do Azul Limão e eu fui assistir e achei tão legal no palco, bem mais velhos e achei que ninguém se ia lembrar de mim e de repente eu comecei a ser assediado pelo publico que ainda se lembrava do Metalmorphose, conheci um casal que tinha feito uma página de internet de Metalmorphose e fiquei empolgado com aquilo, cheguei em casa e no dia seguinte peguei no caderno de endereços do telefone e liguei para o pessoal, liguei para o Celso que era o dono da banda e disse Celso vamos fazer um show cara, um “comeback”, um show com aquelas musicas, eu falei que havia bandas fazendo covers de musicas do Metalmorphose que esse material já tinha virado pirata e haviam discos do Ultimatum a ser vendidos a 100 dólares no mercado negro.

Aí o pessoal se empolgou com aquela ideia, Também teve um caso do Marcelo Fróes que é produtor no Brasil e estava fazendo um tributo aos Beatles, o Marcelo é muito famoso no meio cultural, ele estava fazendo o tributo aos 40 anos do “White Album” dos Beatles e conversando com ele eu disse-lhe para ele colocar uma música do Metalmorphose e aí nós gravamos o tema “Glass Onion” e foi mais uma coisa que empolgou o pessoal a voltar.

Na verdade eu, o baterista André Delacroix e o Tavinho ficamos muito animados, os dois guitarristas o Celso e o Marcelo foi aquela coisa de sempre, eles se animaram no inicio mas depois começaram a ter pouco interesse, e foi nesse momento que, até para a gente ensaiar e tudo mais, eu chamei um outro guitarrista o Mário Sevciuc, um guitarrista muito bom, que vocês podem ouvir no Odisseia, e o Mário sozinho ele tirou todo o reportório e tocou. Depois eu fui a casa do Celso, a gente ainda não tinha marcado o tal show de regresso, que viria a ser o Odisseia, e eu disse, olha a gente queria continuar com o Mário porque percebi que vocês não vão querer fazer concertos em locais pequenos e não vão querer sair do Rio para tocar ao vivo, ele deu a bênção e isso abriu o caminho para o regresso. Começamos a trabalhar com o Mário, fizemos o show do Odisseia que foi um marco para a banda, e aí eu tive a ideia, de que o André Delacroix foi contra, de fazer um disco novo, porque não? Com o material novo!

A partir de 2009 a história muda, porque esse disco novo acabou sendo o Maquina dos Sentidos e aí sim a banda voltou totalmente ao activo.

P. - Fale-nos um pouco sobre como surgiu a ideia de organizar o festival Super Peso Brasil?

André - Nós Metalmorphose, quando quisemos lançar o Maquina dos Sentidos, lançado em 2012, eu tive a ideia de fazer o lançamento no Rio de Janeiro e em São Paulo, só que eu queria tocar em São Paulo numa casa boa, num lugar bacana, era importante, e eu procurei o Manifesto. O Manifesto era a casa mais importante, não era muito grande mas até artistas internacionais tocavam lá. O dono é argentino e eu conheci o Ricardo Batalha, editor da revista Roadie Crew, que é a maior revista de metal da américa latina, eu fui com o Batalha e ele me apresentou ao Silvano, dono lá da casa e eu fiz uma proposta para ele eu tinha conversado antes com o Bala (Vocalista de Stress) e fiz uma proposta de fazer um show com o Stress, eu seria o produtor e traria o Stress e ele nos daria uma data lá em São Paulo.

A partir daí quando eu consegui a data, por sugestão do Batalha, depois eu coloquei uma banda local que estava voltando que era o Centurias, outra banda dos anos 80 que estava parada, então a gente marcou esse show em São Paulo. Para o Rio eu também queria um lugar especial e consegui a Lona Cultural de Realengo (estilo centro cultural), nos subúrbios, chama-se Lona porque eles usaram as estruturas que serviu a ECO 92, eram lonas provisórias e viraram essas lonas culturais.

Mas nós não eramos oriundos dos subúrbios, eramos da zona sul. Sendo eu novamente o produtor, eu paguei o aluguer da Lona, fiz os ingressos, fiz a divulgação, inclusive aluguei um ónibus (autocarro) para fazer o transporte, que viria a fazer o itinerário saindo de Copacabana, passando na Tijuca e até Realengo que é um lugar longe, eu apelidei de Bonde do Metal, bonde é o nosso nome dos eléctricos antigos.

Então foi um evento grandioso e no Rio eu também consegui levar o grupo Salário Mínimo, eles quiseram participar no show em São Paulo mas não dava, porque era pouco tempo, mas foram para o Rio, foi um evento grande, um coisa que envolveu 4 bandas, envolveu o transporte que foi um dia no Rio e outro em São Paulo, distância de 400km, e foi um sucesso, que nós também filmamos.

P. - Alguma vez pensou em repetir o evento no futuro?

André - Com esse sucesso, todo o mundo se empolgou, criou-se uma união com as bandas, a partir daí, um espirito muito bom, e no ano seguinte eu falei que queria fazer novamente e o Batalha aí nesse ponto, foi ele que me ajudou muito, eu tinha uma ideia mas só empresarial, e ele formatou a ideia, e disse que teríamos de batizar esse show.

O Batalha tinha feito lá no “Manifesto” um festival chamado Peso Brasil, ele mesmo sugeriu porque não Super Peso Brasil? Mas tínhamos de fazer uma coisa maior, eu quis fazer no Carioca Club em São Paulo, que era um lugar onde os Scorpions tinham tocado, um lugar para 3000 pessoas, um lugar onde no dia anterior ao Metalmorphose tocou o Yngwie Malmsteen, eu vi ele passando som lá. Para este evento eu entrei com tudo! Como investidor, como produtor desse show, e eu fiz o seguinte cálculo, se colocarmos 400 pessoas conseguimos passar do prejuízo para o lucro, então o objectivo era esse, pelo menos 400 pessoas. E o show foi muito bom, cada banda teve uma participação especial, ideia do Batalha. Eu contratei uma equipa de produção, tinha que ser tudo muito cronometrado, contratei uma equipa de segurança, catering, tudo! E pensando no futuro eu contratei uma equipa de filmagem e gravação de áudio. O Gustavo Andriewski, que produz todos os discos de Metalmorphose, foi para São Paulo com o equipamento dele e gravou o que depois viria a ser o “Máquina ao Vivo”, eu paguei apenas o registo, e deixei para mais tarde a questão da edição e mixagem, e foi uma coisa fantástica até hoje o pessoal das bandas e os fãs guarda uma lembrança muito querida, não é que a casa estava lotada mas foi muita gente, e foi um evento bem-sucedido, foi em 2013 e ficou esse desejo de repetir, por isso é que estava com a ideia de um dia fazer um evento Super Peso Brasil-Portugal, incluindo bandas portuguesas, seria fantástico imagina fazer Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Lisboa e Porto, ia ser lindo demais! Levando artistas portugueses para lá e brasileiros para cá, mas isso é um sonho, por enquanto.

P. - O Fernando Roberto da Metal Soldiers Records teve um papel importante editando os álbuns dos Metalmorphose em Portugal desde a colectânea "Nossa Droga é o Heavy Metal", como surgiu essa colaboração?

André - O Fernando teve um papel certamente importantíssimo porque Portugal era uma terra muito longínqua! Dificilmente as coisas de Portugal também chegam no Brasil, apesar de termos uma relação comum com a língua, não existe assim um intercâmbio cultural contemporâneo e dinâmico, nada disso, então por exemplo as bandas portuguesas não chegam ao Brasil. Eu ouvi falar no Fernando, que estava lançando bandas brasileiras em Portugal e isso criou um movimento lá dentro entre as bandas, um frisson, ele era conhecido lá no Brasil como "O Português" que estava lançando discos em Portugal, no início lançou o Stress.

Acredito que tenha sido eu a entrar em contacto com ele, não me lembro ao certo, de qualquer forma desde o primeiro contacto o Fernando foi sempre muito receptivo, muito interessado, muito sério, e a nossa primeira colaboração foi essa do "A Nossa Droga é o Heavy Metal", ele quis lançar o nosso material dos anos 80, ele criou esse formato, ele pegou o material do Ultimatum que era um split com Dorsal Atlântica (um lado só) e a demo que eu acabei por lançar no Brasil como o álbum “Maldição”, e coloquei algumas faixas ao vivo dos anos 80 e o Fernando lançou esse título, tendo também feito a capa. A partir daí ele lançou em Portugal pela Metal Soldiers quase todo o material do Metalmorphose, lançou o Máquina dos Sentidos e lançou o Fúria dos Elementos. O álbum ao vivo não teve nenhuma edição Portuguesa, vai sair agora o Odisseia, pela Metal Soldiers, havendo ainda também planos para o Ação & Reação, que é um disco que talvez futuramente seja editado em Portugal.

Mas o Fernando realmente foi uma coisa extraordinária para todos nós, essa abertura aqui em Portugal, eu fico feliz de ouvir de você e de outros, aqui em Portugal, que conhecem as bandas Brasileiras e o nosso trabalho, através do Fernando, porque inclusive ele lançou materiais raros, coisas que não eram de fácil acesso, nem para os fãs no Brasil, eu apelidei o Fernando imediatamente de embaixador, o Fernando era o embaixador do Brasil em Portugal.

  

P. - André, o que levou você a abandonar os Metalmorphose em 2017, depois de um álbum de grande qualidade como o Ação & Reação?

André - A minha saída do Metalmorphose, foi dura para mim, foi penosa, porque eu considero um projecto filho, um projecto que, naturalmente com a colaboração dos meus companheiros, mas que eu criei, fui eu que pensei em todas as diretrizes, pensei em tudo, na nossa estrada, fui a pessoa que encabeçou, tanto é que eles me deram um apelido de Capitão, chamavam-me de Capitão, e eu quando me mudei para Itália por razões pessoais de família, não só minha, como de minha esposa também eu fisicamente abandonei a banda e fui substituído pelo Marcelo Val, grande baixista que tocou em Imago Mortis entre outras bandas, eu deixei o material pronto e inclusive gravei as partes de baixo, do Ação & Reação, e os backing vocals eu gravei na Itália, para finalizar o disco e em 2017 eu praticamente já não estava no grupo, apesar de eu participar de todas as decisões, tudo continuava passando por mim, e no fundo eu fiquei satisfeito com essa história do grupo ter-se dissolvido, porque eu não estava gostando do caminho que eles estavam tomando, das musicas novas, da maneira que estava sendo conduzido, não nos estávamos entendendo e eu acabei ficando feliz com a noticia que o grupo tinha cessado as actividades.

Na verdade o que aconteceu foi o seguinte, o Pedro Paulo Cavalcante (PP), já vinha mostrando vontade de sair do grupo, e o Marcelo Val, baixista que me substituiu, também. Logo em seguida que eu vim para Itália, o Tavinho também tentou vir para o exterior, tentou mudar de vida, foi para a Irlanda e da Irlanda ele acabou vindo para o Porto, ele veio para Portugal e ficou alguns meses aqui e acabou voltando para o Brasil, não deu certo, o casamento dele também não deu certo, mas o Tavinho tinha saído do grupo então estava só o André Delacroix, o Marcos Dantas e o Trevas, que era o cantor que substituiu o Tavinho, eles resolveram adicionar o baixista que era do Azul Limão, e como o Marcos também era do Azul Limão, então acabaram por retomar o Azul Limão o que eu achei muito bem, fico satisfeito que tenha sido dessa maneira, porque para eles, como Azul Limão é muito mais legitimo do que como Metalmorphose, sem mim, sem o Tavinho e enfim, foi assim que aconteceu, não dá para ter uma banda com você do outro lado do planeta!

Então os últimos shows que eu fiz com Metalmorphose foram justamente o lançamento do Acão & Reação, fizemos um show no Rio e um show em São Paulo que foi muito legal, que foi com o Trevas, há registos disso na internet.

Realmente o Acão & Reação foi um grande álbum, justamente por isso eu não gostaria de ver a banda entrar em decadência, fazendo uma coisa pior.

P. - Você está morando em Portugal desde 2019, a que se deveu essa mudança? Ambientou-se ao país?

André - Na verdade foi um ajuste, que foi muito feliz, a nossa família saiu do Brasil por vários motivos, desde motivos de saúde da minha mulher, que fez um tratamento na Itália e que felizmente ficou totalmente curada, e nos morávamos numa cidade muito bonita, muito pitoresca mas uma cidade pequena, pacata, nos alpes italianos, a capital do Valle d’Aosta, que é uma região autónoma da Itália que faz fronteira com a França e com a Suíça. Da minha casa eu estava a meia hora da Suíça, e a meia hora da França, os dois tuneis, nós resolvemos dar esse passo adiante. Lisboa é uma cidade maravilhosa que nós não conhecíamos uma coisa até curiosa porque como somos de origem italiana, minha mãe é de origem italiana, e os meus avós, nós tínhamos uma relação maior com a Itália, apesar do idioma, do que com Portugal, e quando conheci Portugal em 2017 eu pensei em vir para cá, eu me sinto em casa, me senti muito acolhido também por todos, eu acho eu me sinto à vontade, eu estou em Portugal eu estou em casa, eu me sinto português, e disse ao meu filho, que todos os brasileiros têm origem portuguesa, enfim estamos aqui de caracter definitivo, até quando Deus quiser! Eu estou há 5 anos fora do Brasil não tenho planos para voltar.

  

P . -Que outros projectos você tem? Continua a trabalhar em músicas com vista a editar no futuro?

André - Eu sou tradutor de filmes e séries de TV, programas de televisão, para efeitos de dublagem (dobragem), eu trabalho para estúdios no Brasil, eu continuo mantendo uma empresa no Brasil, e os meus clientes são norte americanos, apesar de eu fazer também traduções do italiano, fiz traduções de filmes e séries do italiano para o português, fora isso os meus projectos musicais tenho muitos, mas eu estou querendo ambientar-me plenamente ainda, eu não tenho pressa, eu gostaria de encontrar músicos, instrumentistas, parceiros, ou compositores, eu tenho um desejo, eu tenho muitas musicas que eu já fiz que eu já gravei, então é uma coisa que eu faria naturalmente se eu estivesse no Brasil, mas eu posso fazer isso aqui em Portugal com músicos portugueses ou até brasileiros, mas eu não faço a menor questão que sejam brasileiros, podem ser estrangeiros também, na Itália era mais difícil porque as minhas musicas são todas em português. Eu inclusive, conheci um cantor na Itália muito talentoso chamado Jeff Vinci, ele era lá da minha cidade e nós fizemos uma versão em italiano de uma musica minha do Metalmorphose, uma musica brasileira, Tudo na Vida Tem Seu Preço, então eu fiz a tradução, o Jeff ajudou na versão, fizemos a letra em italiano, ele cantou em cima da base gravada pelo Metalmorphose, esse vai ser um dos bónus, quando o Fernando lançar o nosso Acão & Reação, terá 5 faixas bónus, especiais para a edição portuguesa, mas isso para o futuro, tudo para dizer que fiz uma colaboração com um italiano que se chama "Nella Vita Tutto Ha Un Prezzo" está no youtube, fiz até um videoclip que inclusive me rendeu uma reportagem num jornal local, La Stampa, que fez uma reportagem sobre mim, sobre a minha carreira minhas musicas e tudo isso lá na Itália, mas começar uma banda lá era muito difícil, mas aqui em Portugal eu já fico muito animado com isso, talvez também adquirir equipamento para começar até a gravar algo por aqui eu posso até começar a fazer colaborações com gente do Brasil, mas isso não é para já, é para o futuro.

P. - Pode-nos dizer qual é o estado actual da banda Metalmorphose?

André - No momento o Metalmorphose está inactivo, mas a obra está muito viva, porque o material está todo oficialmente nas plataformas digitais, no spotity no imusic, no youtube e os discos que estão disponíveis no Brasil e aqui em Portugal, através do Fernando Roberto (Metal Soldiers), e de momento estou organizando uma loja virtual para o Brasil porque esse material está meio parado, então é isso o Metalmorphose está inactivo.

P. - Já considerou a ideia de reagrupar os Metalmorphose no futuro?

André - No momento não há essa ideia, eu acredito que tudo é uma questão de “timing” assim como foi naquele momento que nos reunimos, foi um momento de timing perfeito, no momento actual não estamos no timing certo, mas no futuro nunca se sabe, Metalmorphose é uma coisa que eu tenho no coração, muito querida e as pessoas estão aí inclusive eu falo sempre com o André Delacroix o baterista, estou sempre em contacto com ele, nós começamos a tocar juntos eu tinha 15 anos e ele 17 e até hoje nós temos muito contacto falo com ele quase que diariamente mas no momento não há planos concretos para que tal aconteça. Mas quem sabe talvez até organizemos um concerto aqui, quem sabe não venha a haver uma Odisseia, talvez uma Odisseia portuguesa! Sei lá! Ou que vá eu para o Brasil. Quem sabe! Só Deus sabe!

P. - Algumas considerações finais para terminar a entrevista?

André - Para finalizar eu gostaria de agradecer a tua paciência, obrigado por tudo!

Votos de felicidades para o futuro e muito obrigado pelo tempo dispensado!

English version

Metalmorphose came about in 1983, their first album was a split LP with Dorsal Atlântica called "Ultimatum", in 1985. After a long break, the band returned in 2008, and since then released a good number of albums, until 2018. We talked to the bassist and mentor of the project, André Bighinzoli, about lots of things regarding the band.

Q. - Hello André! Tell us about the beginning of Metalmorphose, how did the idea of the band came up? Tell us a bit about your story!

André – It was nothing special, we were all still teenagers, and Metalmorphose was our first band. When I was 7, I started taking acoustic guitar lessons while I was living in Brasilia. Then my family moved back to Rio de Janeiro and I kind of lost interest until I discovered rock and music in general some time later. It was the seventies, the "disco era", and I was very interested in the sound of the bass. Also, I remember seeing photos of the great bands and finding guitar players too flashy. I liked the coolness of the bass players, for instance, John Paul Jones, from Led Zeppelin. When I was 13, my grandad gave me the present of my life. In Brazil, in the early eighties, a law prohibited the importation of any product that had its similar manufactured in the country, so we didn’t have access to good quality musical instruments at that time. In one of grandad’s trips to Italy, his home country, he brought me an American Fender Jazz Bass. It was crazy! The bass costed a fortune at the time, about 2000 dollars, but that instrument made me took the bass seriously.

One afternoon, a friend came to my house asking if I wanted to see a real band rehearsing. Some of his friends were jaming at Marcelo Ferreira's house, who was playing with Celso Suckow and drummer Walter Costa on an improvised drum kit. They were looking for a bass player and Celso invited me to the band he was forming with Marcelo, Tavinho Godoy on vocals and André Delacroix on drums. The following week, I arrived with my amp, and so “Pena de Morte" was formed. The name that means “death penalty” was actually a suggestion of mine derived from a song I had written. After some time, we changed the name to Metalmorphose, in 1983. I was 14, and the oldest member was Tavinho, who was 17, we were just kids.

Marcelo and Celso already had songs, and when I joined the band I also started to write more songs. We included a few covers from bands like Manowar and Judas Priest on the repertoire, but we played mainly our original material. In Brazil, it was the end of the military era, and Rock and Metal were specially irreverent in our society. Metal was all about attitude. We had long hair, we didn’t followed 80’s fashion, we were dark and wouldn’t get a tan at the beach. This irreverence was reflected in our lyrics, our first song was called “Rock 'n' Roll No Inferno” (Rock'n'Roll in Hell). We tried to follow the style of great bands, like Black Sabbath, which we admired very much.

It's funny the automatic aversion that one generation has over its immediate previous one. We hated the Hippies, which was our previous generation at that time, the peace and love generation. We were headbangers, we thought it was horrible, and wanted to be the opposite of that movement.

Q. - What were the main difficulties at the time you formed Metalmorphose?

André - The great difficulty was to break in the commercial sphere, to have our music played on the radio, for instance. In Rio there was Radio Maldita (Radio Fluminense FM), Dorsal Atlântica had a song on the radio playlist, Azul Limão too. They were older than us, Marcos Dantas, who played with Metalmorphose many years later, is nine years older than me, and so is Carlos Vândalo from Dorsal (who was known as Carlos Punk at the time), it was a big difference. Radio Fluminense embraced the Brazilian Rock movement, more softy, with bands like Barão Vermelho, Kid Abelha, Legião Urbana, Ultraje a Rigor, Herva Doce, Lobão, but metal was restricted to one weekly program, Guitarras Para o Povo (Guitars to The People).

The specialized press, the gigs, the whole scene did not exist then, we were very young and we got only bizarre places to play. We played at the "Bar Opinião", located at the Pão de Açúcar cableway station, above a steakhouse, we did 2 gigs there, including one with Dorsal Atlântica. Later, Metalmorphose managed to play at "Teatro Planetário" (planetarium theater), a place that had absolutely nothing to do with Metal, they usually gave us Monday to play and we filled the place everytime.

Q. - Who were your major influences and favourite bands at the beginning of the band?

André - Our main influences were Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, AC/DC, Motorhead, Black Sabbath… and also Deep Purple, MK2.

We saw bands like Manowar, Metallica, Anthrax and Slayer, in their beginning and I remember that Celso, who had more money, used to buy records from American labels, by mail, even without knowing the bands, he ordered the records from independent labels such as Music For Nations just because of their names, those records that did not exist in Brazil.

When the first Rock In Rio happened, in January 1985, as it was a commercial event, all at once the record labels released old material from bands like Queen, Van Halen, AC/DC, Whitesnake, Ozzy Osbourne, Black Sabbath, due to the festival. With this phenomenon, opportunity came up, and EMI launched a sub-label in Brazil called Heavy Metal Attack and released heavier bands like Iron Maiden, Accept, Wasp… it was new and good for us.

Q. - How did your debut with the album "Ultimatum" happen? How did the idea of making a "Split" with Dorsal Atlântica come up?

André – In 1984, we met the people from Dorsal Atlântica, which we admired, because they were older and they were a true Metal band and used to make a big impact live. Celso had a rehearsal room and he offered the space to Dorsal to use it for free. At that time, they wanted to make an album and Carlos Lopes was looking for bands from São Paulo. But, as it turned out, according to Carlos, in his book, “Guerrilha”, where he tells Dorsal Atlântica’s history, as they needed a place to rehearse and a band to share the costs of the album and Metalmorphose was available, it pretty much sorted everything out. Recorded in late 1984 and released in January 1985, Ultimatum was both a blessing and a curse, because Metalmorphose was not ready, we were just kids, I have recorded the album at the age of 15, do you know any record with a 15-year-old bass player? Yeah! But the songs were ours. On the other hand, Dorsal Atlântica was already much more consolidated as a band, so there was a kind of a dichotomy, the fans were divided, most of the fans supported Dorsal, and rejected Metalmorphose. So, we managed to turn that page immediately and started composing and working on new material that was recorded in 1986, a demo with the songs "Minha Droga é Metal", "Maldição", "Ela Tem Sempre Uma Desculpa", "Rebeldia". At the time, this demo never got to be an album, it was never commercialized, but there was a diffusion, there was a huge spread, people copying the tapes and stuff, the demo ended up far away. That demo is Metalmorphose on its best, the high point of the band in the 80’s. In 2009, the material was finally released on CD format in Brazil as “Maldição”, and Metal Soldiers, in Portugal, through Fernando Roberto, released it in Europe in 2010 in the compilation "Nossa Droga é o Heavy Metal" (our drug is heavy metal) along with all the Matalmorphose’s material from “Ultimatum”.

I left the band at the end of 1985, for some silly reason I can’t recall now, but we used to argue a lot. I remember Celso was very bossy and we had to practice every weekend. We argued many times, and one day I simply left the band, they asked bass player to join in, simple as that. All the demo material was ready, music, arrangements, everything… and in the end, it was Plínio Júnior, my substitute, who recorded it. He joined the band on the same month Metalmorphose recorded the demo that had been composed with me.

Q. - The single "Correntes" was released in an independent way in 1986, was it difficult to find a label at that time?

André - That was a crucial time for Celso, Marcelo and André Delacroix, it was time to go to college and that was more important than the band, especially for Celso and Marcelo whose families owned companies. Celso's father owned a building company, and he was studying to be an engineer, and the band itself started to be more on background.

They made "Correntes" in 1986, but they had a record label, CID (Companhia Industrial de Discos - Industrial Company of Records), which launched many artists in Brazil. They made a deal at the time with this record company. I don't know the story very well because I was no longer in the band, but it seems there were some disagreements at the end, after recording and pressing the record, there was some contractual problems and CID decided not to release the material and these records were to be destroyed. The story says, and this was confirmed by Carlos from Dorsal Atlântica himself, that Carlos was at CID and saw the records being taken to the trash and asked the employee to let him take some, and he ended up taking about 50 records. I don't know exactly how many he was able to save and that is all that was left over from “Correntes”.

Q. - What led Metalmorphose to break up in 1989? What do you think went wrong so that the project did not have continuity?

André - After “Correntes” there was a void, Metalmorphose since then became practically an inactive band. They focused on making a great demo to win a contract with a big record company and became influenced by Hard Rock movement. Dorsal, for instance took another path, they became more and more radical, while Metalmorphose went to the Hair Band phase, but they didn't play live anymore. With the lack of concerts, André Delacroix, the drummer, left the band in 1986 and did not record the single "Correntes". Walter Costa joined the band, the same drummer who were jamming when I first met the band, and he told me in an interview on "Canal Metalmorphose" that they never did a live concert with him. So, the last Metalmorphose concert was with André Delacroix on drums in 1986, and so we can say the band stopped way before 1989. In the last period, they had made a few more songs, some demos, still with Tavinho on vocals, until they finally changed the band’s name when he also eventually left. Marcelo and Celso, still play together today, just for fun, doing another kind of sound. So, I think the band really ended in 1986.

Q. - Did you keep in touch after the band split?

André - We kept each other on our addresses book, but our contact was very eventual, very sporadic, socially we did not had interaction, but nobody has really lost contact.

Q. - What other musical projects did you have during the Metalmorphose break?

André - I was involved with some bands. As soon as I left Metalmorphose, I went through a band called Segundo Movimento (second movement), then I met some people from the University of Santa Úrsula, very good musicians, I always liked to be around people who can really play, among them there was Darwen Schiavini who became my friend and musical partner, and we made a band called Heramus, very good band, you can listen to it on Soundcloud. Heramus eventually became DNA, which was a band that had a certain success, we had a deal with the record label Eldorado, from São Paulo, and released a CD in 1998, then this group kind of fell apart and resurfaced as Genoma, when Pedro Paulo Cavalcante joined us (who later I called to reinforce Metalmorphose on the guitar). I still work with Darwen, he wrote the lyrics of Metalmorphose’s “Solução” from the album “Ação & Reação”. Genoma was an excellent band where I sang lead along with Darwen, it has a special place in my heart. For this year, I asked Gustavo Andriewiski, the producer of all Metalmorphose’s records, to finish the recordings Genoma started in 2003, with drummer Pedro Ariel (Pedrinho) who sadly passed away some time ago. I want to finish this album, and I look forward to resume the band’s project here in Portugal with Portuguese musicians.

Q. - How did the idea to bring Metalmorphose back in 2008 came up?

André - The return of Metalmorphose was due to an external factor, I think nobody thought that the band would ever return, or would perform live again and be successful. We had a bit of success back then, with the songs playing on the radio, the album Ultimatum, but we were very young, so 25 years later a friend called me and we went to see a concert of Stress and Azul Limão. I found them still pretty cool on stage, much older. I thought no one would remember me, but people started to talk to me, ask me for autographs, people who still remembered Metalmorphose. I even met a couple who had made a Metalmorphose dedicated page on Orkut and I felt excited about that. The next day I took my old phone address book and called the group, I called Celso who was the leader of the band and proposed a show, a comeback with all our old songs. I learned that there were bands making covers of Metalmorphose songs, that this material had already become bootleged and there were Ultimatum records being sold for 100 dollars on the black market.

Everybody got excited about that idea. Coincidently, Marcelo Fróes was organizing a tribute to the Beatles, Marcelo is a famous producer in Brazil, and he was doing the tribute to the 40 years of the Beatles “White Album" with many famous artists. I recorded “Glass Onion” as a solo artist, and Metalmorphose went to the studio for the first time in decades and recorded “Sexy Sadie”. And that was it. Once we got back together, the fire started all over again.

Actually, the drummer André Delacroix, Tavinho and I, were really excited, but the two guitar players, Celso and Marcelo, got excited in the beginning, but then they started to lose interest. At that moment, I asked Mario Sevciuc to join in. He’s a very good guitar player, you can hear him on Odisseia recordings. Mario assumed alone the role of the two guitarists and we could rehearse properly for the comeback show we were planning. I went to see Celso and explained we’d like to continue with Mario because he and Marcelo wouldn’t agree to play small gigs, and certainly would not want to play outside Rio de Janeiro. He gave us his blessing and that was it. We started working with Mario, we did Odisseia which was a milestone for the band, and then I had the idea, which André Delacroix was not fond in the beginning, of making a new album with new material.

So, since 2009, the history of the band changed forever, because this new album ended up being "Máquina dos Sentidos" and this marked a whole new phase for the band... 25 years later.

Q. - Tell us a bit about how the idea of organizing the "Super Peso Brasil" festival came up?

André - In 2012, when Metalmorphose released "Máquina dos Sentidos", I wanted to do concerts in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo. But I wanted to play a nice venue in São Paulo, in a cool place, it was important because people there didn’t know Metalmorphose live. I went to São Paulo, called my friend Ricardo Batalha, editor of the magazine Roadie Crew, which is the biggest metal magazine in Latin America, and we went to Manifesto Rock Bar. Manifesto was an important place, it wasn't very big but even famous international artists had played there. Batalha introduced me to the owner and I proposed to make a concert there with Metalmorphose and Stress. I would bring Stress from Pará state (3000 km away) and be the producer of two concerts, in Rio and São Paulo, and he agreed to book us a date. Batalha suggested me to put a local band that also was coming back from the 80’s, and so I put Centurias on the bill. For the Rio concert, I also wanted a special place to play and we got "Lona Cultural de Realengo". As Lona is located a little far in the suburbs, I hired a bus for the fans, people bought the ticket for the concert plus the round trip bus that left from Copacabana to Realengo. As the producer, I also paid the rent of the place, made the tickets, made the promotion and everything, and the effort was worth it.

For the concert in Rio I also managed to put Salário Mínimo, another band from São Paulo. It was a big event, something that involved 4 bands, involved transportation from Rio to the concert the next day in São Paulo, 400km away, and it was a success. Everything was also filmed and recorded.

Q. - Have you ever thought about repeating the event in the future?

André - With all the success, everyone was excited, a bond was created between the bands with a very good spirit, and the following year I said I wanted to do it again, and Batalha at that point helped me out a lot. I had the business idea, and he shaped that idea. The first thing he said was that we needed a name for this event. As he produced a little event at Manifesto called "Peso Brasil", he suggested it could be "Super Peso Brasil". But we had to do something bigger than last year, I wanted to do it at the Carioca Club, in São Paulo, which was a place bands like Accept and Scorpions had played, a place for 3000 people. (I saw Yngwie Malmsteen making his soundcheck there the day before I played there with Metalmorphose) For this event I entered with everything, as investor and producer of this show. I made the calculations, if we put 400 people we could move from loss to profit, so the objective was that, at least 400 people. And the show was very good, each band had a special guest, another idea from Batalha. I hired a production team, everything had to be on the clock, I hired a security team, catering, everything… And thinking about the future, I hired a film and audio recording team too. Gustavo Andriewski, who produced all Metalmorphose records, went to São Paulo with his equipment and recorded what would later become “Super Peso Brasil”, I've paid for the recording, and left editing and mixing for later, and it was a fantastic thing until this day, the bands and fans still keep a very dear memory, the bill was not sold out but there were a lot of people, and it was a successful event, it was in 2013 and we never made anything like that again. Maybe one day we can do a Super Peso Brasil-Portugal, including Portuguese bands, that would be awesome, imagine doing Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Lisbon and Porto, it would be amazing! Getting Portuguese and Brazilians artists together, but this is just a dream for now.

Q. - Fernando Roberto from Metal Soldiers Records had an important role editing Metalmorphose albums in Portugal, since the collection "Nossa Droga é o Heavy Metal", how did this collaboration come up?

André - Fernando certainly had a very important role because Portugal was very distant from us. Things from Portugal don’t arrive often in Brazil, although we have a common language, there is not such a thing as a contemporary and dynamic cultural exchange, nothing like that, so Portuguese bands do not arrive in Brazil. I heard Fernando was launching Brazilian bands in Portugal, and that created a kind of frisson within the bands, he was known in Brazil as "The Portuguese" that was launching the Stress records in Portugal.

I believe that it was me who got in contact with him, I'm not sure, anyway, since the first contact Fernando was always very receptive, very interested, very serious. Our first collaboration was "A Nossa Droga é o Heavy Metal" (our drug is heavy metal), he wanted to release our material from the 80’s, so he took the material from Ultimatum which was a split with Dorsal Atlântica (one side only) and put together with the demo that I ended up releasing in Brazil as the CD “Maldição”, he also added some live tracks from the 80's, and Fernando released that album, having also made its cover. From then on he released in Portugal by his label Metal Soldiers, almost all the material of Metalmorphose, like "Máquina dos Sentidos" and "Fúria dos Elementos". The live album “Máquina ao Vivo” has no Portuguese edition, but Odisseia is coming out now and there are also plans for “Ação & Reação” to be released in Portugal in the future.

Fernando really was extraordinary for all of us, this opening here in Portugal, I am happy to hear from you and other people, here in Portugal, that know the Brazilian bands and our work through Fernando, because he released rare materials, things that were not easy to find, not even for Brazilian fans, I call Fernando our “ambassador in Portugal”.

Q. - André, what led you to leave Metalmorphose in 2017, after a high quality album like "Ação & Reação"?

André - My departure from Metalmorphose was hard for me because I see it as my project, naturally with the collaboration of my colleagues, but something I have created. It was my vision, I thought of everything, they even gave me the nickname of Captain. In 2016, I moved to Italy for personal and family reasons but left all the material recorded, all the bass parts of our next album Ação & Reação. I had to physically left the band and was replaced by Marcelo Val, a great bass player who played with Imago Mortis and other great bands. I've recorded the backing vocals for Ação & Reação in Italy. When the album was released in 2017 I was no longer with them, but I took part of all the decisions. After that, it was starting to be difficult for me with the distance, and, honestly, I was happy when the band finally broke up, because I didn't like the path they were taking, the new songs, the way everything was being conducted, we were not getting along. Pedro Paulo Cavalcante (PP), was already showing signs he would leave the band, and Marcelo Val, the bassist who replaced me, too. Right after I came to Italy, Tavinho also left Brazil, he tried to change his life, he went first to Ireland and then to Porto, he stayed a few months Portugal and ended up going back to Brazil, as things didn't work out for him. I was happy when they told me the band would stop. The group ended up with only André Delacroix (the only original member of Metalmorphose), Marcos Dantas and Trevas, the singer who replaced Tavinho, so they decided to call the bass player from the old Marcos’ band, Azul Limão, and resumed the work with the name Azul Limão, which I thought was a very good decision, because it made more sense than an empty Metalmorphose without me and Tavinho. Unfortunatelly, it’s impossible to have a band on the other side of the planet.

So, the last shows I did with Metalmorphose were the launch of "Ação & Reação", we did one concert in Rio and one concert in São Paulo that were really cool, with Trevas on vocals, there are videos of that on youtube. Actually, "Ação & Reação" was a great album, and precisely for that reason I wouldn't like to see the band in a downfall.

Q. - You are living in Portugal since 2019, what was the reason for this change? Did you get used to the country?

André - In fact it was an adjustment, a very happy adjustment, I moved with my wife and kid from Brazil to Italy in 2016. We lived in a very beautiful small and quiet town in the Italian Alps, in Valle d'Aosta, which is an autonomous region of Italy bordering France and Switzerland. Lisbon is a wonderful city that I didn’t know, something curious because as I have Italian origins, my mother was born in Italy, we had a bigger proximity with Italy, despite the language, than with Portugal, and when I first visited Lisbon in 2017 I thought of coming to live here, I really feel at home, I felt very welcomed by everyone, I'm feeling very well, I'm feeling Portuguese, I told my son that all Brazilians have Portuguese origins. We are here indefinitely, but only God knows! I have been out of Brazil for 5 years and I have no plans to go back living there for now.

Q. - What other projects do you have? Are you still working on musics thinking about releasing them in the future?

André - I am a film and TV series translator for dubbing purposes. I work for studios in Brazil, I still have a company in Brazil, and my clients are from the United States and other countries. I also translate from Italian to Portuguese. Apart from that, I have many musical projects, but I'm still adapting my life here in Portugal. I'm not in a hurry, but I’d like to meet musicians, music partners and composers. I have many songs and many haven’t yet being recorded, which is something I would do naturally if I were in Brazil, but I can do it here in Portugal with Portuguese musicians. In Italy it was more difficult because my songs are all in Portuguese. I met a very talented singer in Italy called Jeff Vinci, we did an Italian version of a Metalmorphose song, "Tudo na Vida Tem Seu Preço" (everything in life has its price), I did the translation and Jeff helped with the version, we wrote the lyrics in Italian, he sang over the base recorded by Metalmorphose, "Nella Vita Tutto Ha Un Prezzo" it’s on YouTube, I even made a video clip that yielded a story in the local newspaper, La Stampa, about my life and music career. This will be one of the 5 bonus tracks for the Portuguese edition of "Ação & Reação" in the future, maybe in the future I’ll also acquire equipment to start recording something here in collaboration with people from Brazil.

Q. - Can you tell us the current status of the band Metalmorphose?

André - At the moment Metalmorphose is inactive, but the work is very much alive, because the material is all officially on digital platforms and the records are available in Brazil and worldwide, through Fernando Roberto (Metal Soldiers).

Q. - Have you ever considered the idea of reforming Metalmorphose in the future?

André - At the moment there is no such idea. I believe that everything is a matter of timing, as it was at that moment when we got together in 2009, it was a moment of perfect timing, at the moment we are not in the right timing, but in the future you never know. Metalmorphose is something that I keep very dearly in my heart, and the people are still around, I often talk to André Delacroix the drummer, I'm always in touch with him, when we started playing together I was 15 and he was 17 and even today we talk almost daily, but at the moment there are no concrete plans for this to happen. But who knows, maybe we will organize a gig here, maybe there will be a new Odyssey, maybe a Portuguese Odyssey! I do not know.

Q. - Anything more you want to say, to end up this interview?

André - Finally, I would like to thank you for your patience, thanks for everything!

Thank you for your time, and wish you all the best for the future!

Buzz Elliott (Hammerhead)

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By Paulo Rodrigues

Q. Hello Buzz, tell us a bit about the origins of Hammerhead, how and when did it all start? Who were the first members of the band?

Buzz – Hammerhead started off as a three piece power trio under the name ‘Destroyer’ in the late 70s, founding member Brian Hodgson on guitar & vocals, Steve Archer on bass, & Maurice Reay on drums, Brian & Steve had been playing together in a club band called Flight who eventually changed their name to Hot Property, but as well as playing covers in this band they were very keen to start to write their own material which was to prove far heavier & louder than what they had been doing in the band Hot Property.

Brian & Steve tried out a couple of drummers to test the water and eventually invited a friend called Maurice Reay into the embryonic band, with this line-up the lads began playing a few local gigs and eventually made the very first studio recordings of the songs that Brian & Steve had been writing together, I did see them live at this point several times before eventually joining them, they sounded great to me & just the type of thing that I wanted to do myself, their style of song writing appealed to me as it reminded me of many of the early 70s rock bands that I grew up listening to.

     

        Steve Archer – Bass    Maurice Reay – Drums    Brian Hodgson – Guitar/Vocals

Q. Who would you cite as your major influences at that time?

Buzz – Brian was always into Free & Paul Kossoff and this influenced the way that he plays; slow & melodic, using feeling rather than speed, he also liked Jimi Hendrix and all the popular melodic rock bands of the 70s such as Deep Purple, Budgie, UFO, Wishbone Ash etc. Steve was also into the same kind of things as Brian at that time, as for myself, guitarists such as; Rory Gallagher, Ritchie Blackmore, Mick Ronson, Andy Powell, & of course the riff master himself Tony Iommi are all sources of inspiration for me, but as well as all those typical 70s classic rock bands, I have always had a much wider taste in music than the others, I’ve always listened to all kinds of musical styles; classical, krautrock, folk, psych’, indie etc.

As well as listening to all the classic UK Prog bands from the late 60s to the mid 70s, I especially liked checking out unusual progressive bands from around the World, places like, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Germany, Italy, Poland, Ukraine, USA & Canada, and, some of the stuff that I listened to back then such as German bands Neu & Can, & Magma from France, were so weird that the others would think I was a bit crazy to listen to it, but I still love all that unusual stuff to this day, & I also now follow many modern prog bands such as Norwegian bands Ring Van Mobius & Arabs in Aspic who are both super cool and very retro in style.

But there is one band that unites us all, we collectively love Black Sabbath, and have done since the very beginning, their power and style has had a very big influence on all of us as players, especially in a live situation, like them we are also incredibly loud live, we hate turning the backline down to allow the mixer to control our live sound, we like playing at full tilt, even in small venues, it is so exhilarating compared to the modern way of doing things, a few years ago we had a gig supporting Paul Raymond from UFO in The Borderline club in London and the mixer crew made us play so quite that we may as well have left the amps switched off all together !!

It was ridiculous how far they made us turn down to, I think my amp’ volume ended up on less than one (and as you know they are supposed to go up to eleven!), gig-wise that night was definitely one of the worst experiences of my entire playing career.       

Q. In the late 70s did you feel that the NWOBHM was reaching to a higher point, in the whole UK?

Buzz – Most of the UK media of the day would have you believe that rock (&  especially prog) was dead and Punk had taken over, but despite what was in the music press & the daily papers there seemed to be so many bands around all over the Country playing fresh & exciting rock music, people like Iron Maiden, Saxon, Motorhead, & Diamond Head to name just a few of the front runners.

But as you now know there were many other underground bands in the NWOBHM scene, I went to lots gigs back in the early 80s & it did sometimes feel as though something special was going on & that you maybe had a chance of some success if you persevered, Kerrang magazine also came along in the early 80s, (initially as a one-off edition with the music newspaper Sounds) and this gave the growing scene a much needed boost & a great platform to help promote the bands in the scene, unfortunately we never got much of a look in ourselves. 

Being very much a prog head myself I was also into what is now being called the Neo Prog scene, bands such as Marillion, Pendragon, & Pallas, those bands deserve a medal for bucking the trends of the day and sticking to their guns despite being out of fashion, & they all still exist to this day, that shows a genuine determination & I really respect them for their commitment to their beliefs, the same could be said of lots of NWOBHM bands, many of them endlessly forging on regardless of the lack of any commercial success, many of these bands (just like us) were doing it because they loved it and not for any financial gain, for many of these bands recording sessions & releases might often be self financed or even home-made, but at least working that way does give you the total freedom to do whatever you want, you certainly have no record company pressure to make a hit single, or play in a certain style, or dress a certain way, you can literally do whatever you want, you can hear that freedom in a lot of the NWOBHM music which is what helps make it so exciting, even when the production is sometimes not as good as it might have been, you can still hear a genuine band with spirit making great music their own way.                

Q. - Where did you record the 78 demo? Was it a self-produced or did you work with a professional producer? Were these songs recorded in order to record an LP?

Buzz – Firstly, I need to say that I may have made a mistake with that date, the tapes that I have do not have the dates written on them & it was so long ago that it’s hard to remember everything accurately, the chances are that this studio session was a touch later than 78, not that it matters, some of the songs were actually written well before that, ‘Lochinvar’ for example was a song that Brian originally played in a previous band called Bitter Harvest as far back as the early 70s although our version is very different to the original so Brian tells me.

We live in the North of England & the recording studio that was used is about 30 miles away in a city called Carlisle, the studio was owned by a musician called Jimmy Henshaw who had been the guitarist in a local band called The VIPs back in the late 60s, at one point The VIPs even had Keith Emerson from ELP on keyboards for a short while (just before he left to form The Nice), and even more amazingly they backed up Jimi Hendrix on some of his earliest appearances at a club in London when Jimi first came to England.

                                      Jimmy Henshaw – Musician & producer.

After Jimmy Henshaw left the VIPs the band changed their name first to ART and then Spooky Tooth, they were a superb band, bass player Greg Ridley eventually left to become part of Humble Pie with Steve Marriott, and their guitarist Luther Grosvenor (aka Ariel Bender) left to join Mott the Hoople and also form Widowmaker, so as you can see they were all well connected and very well respected musicians of the day, their singer Mike Harrison was one of the finest vocalists in the UK ever as far as I’m concerned.

Jimmy Henshaw remained in Carlisle & eventually set up a small recording facility, this is where the 3 piece version of Hammerhead went to record, the studio technology was a bit limited & the band were very inexperienced in this environment, so the results were nowhere near as good as they should have been, the tracks on the tape were done in no particular order and although they are interesting to hear, the lads quickly realised that through being a bit naive in the studio & rushing things, the recordings were simply not as good as they had hoped for, despite what Brian and Steve think of these early studio recordings I always enjoyed listening to them myself, & it’s also where I learned to play the songs.

Q. - Did you sell this demo at shows or send it to labels and fanzines to try to find a record deal?

Buzz – I don’t think too many of these studio tapes were handed out due to the limited quality, but Brian did hand out various compilation tapes back then which might have included a few of these studio tracks, sometimes at gigs, and also to fanzines & small record labels, he would also send them out to fans that got in touch by mail, but they were never deemed good enough by the band to be released officially at the time, although despite this, about a year ago I was approached by our record label in Germany (High Roller Records) to see if we would consider allowing them to finally release them officially.

Initially Brian & Steve were concerned about this & not too happy about the idea, I had to really twist their arms to get them to even think about it, but eventually they did see where I was coming from, certain people are very interested to hear how a band evolves from quite humble beginnings, for example; I have heard early rare recordings of some quite famous bands (and this includes Black Sabbath), where the sound quality & the playing is a bit limited, but I still enjoy hearing them because I want to listen to hear how things began and how things developed & improved over time, ultimately it doesn’t matter who you are, there is nothing to be ashamed of by the fact that you were simply not as good back then.  

Once the decision was made to go ahead with this project, I sourced the best possible copies I could find on tape from my own collection and sent them off to HRR in Germany, along with some live photographs of the original band and also a few rare live recordings, some of which sound better than the studio tapes to be fair, High Roller Records are working on this project right now & hopefully it will be available some time soon, possibly this year or maybe early next year? I do not have any release dates yet but it is in progress, inevitably the original plans have all been delayed by the Corona Virus pandemic.              

Q. - Did Hammerhead get support in the media from the legendary BBC dj Tommy Vance, or from Neal Kay in the Soundhouse?

Buzz – We were always well supported by the local press in our own area, but only a few brief mentions in any national music papers, regarding Neal Kay I’m not sure if he played any of our stuff, maybe he simply wasn’t aware of us?

Tommy Vance certainly did play them on his Friday Rock Show and seemed to like our style, especially the B-side of our single; ‘Lonely Man’ which he played on a few occasions, the guy is a legend and it was so thrilling to hear him playing your own stuff on his show, he had the perfect voice for a rock DJ.

We also got a nice boost from some rock DJs called The Bailey Brothers who used to play a lot of cool underground rock music on vinyl & tape, sometimes they would go on tour supporting a band, that is how we met them, before our first single was actually released on vinyl we had just come back from the recording studio & happened to have a spare tape with us from the recording session a few days earlier, because they liked our live set we gave them the tape to listen to and just a couple of weeks later we ended up in the Sounds heavy metal chart because of that, the Bailey Brothers had been invited to compile the heavy metal chart for their forthcoming publication of Sounds, which was one of the more popular music newspapers back in the day.

The Bailey Brothers were very cool dudes and if I remember correctly their record decks were fitted into a coffin which I though was hilarious! & they used to dance about to the music with fake flying Vs, they were very entertaining. 

Geoff Barton, the journalist who was responsible for coining the acronym NWOBHM didn’t actually like us at all and gave us a bad review, as did Bernie Marsden who was a guest reviewer in a fanzine I was reading once, but that doesn’t bother me you can’t please everyone, we actually ended up supporting Bernie at one of his M3 Whitesnake gigs, and I’ve also supported him myself with my solo acoustic show, he is actually a nice guy when you get some time to talk with him.

Music press journalist and critic Malcolm Dome gave us a good review in Classic Rock magazine when we finally got round to releasing our 1^st album, he gave ‘Will to Survive’ 8/10 along with a positive review which was nice of him.

  

Q. - How about shows? Did you play regularly in the UK back then? Did you share stage with other well-known bands?

Buzz - In the early days we did most of our gigs in our own County where we have always had a faithful following, there would be the occasional trek up to Scotland or the North East, and occasionally travelling South we would venture into the next County (Lancashire) but we never really travelled much further South than this, we never got to play in London until we re-formed many years later, & for whatever reason we never managed to get onto a tour either with another band or by ourselves, if we had got the chance to support another band on tour, a band like Budgie for example, that would have been ideal for us, but it just didn’t happen for us, so we continued to mainly play home County gigs most of the time.

Because of our status locally (and also because I knew most of the local theatre managers very well, hehehee), we often got the chance to support more well known bands that were passing through our area on their tours, this is how we came to support many bigger bands such as Budgie, Uriah Heep, Michael Schenker, Bernie Marsden, Diamond Head, Graham Bonnet (Rainbow), Paul Raymond (MSG/UFO), Magnum & more.

Since reforming Hammerhead we have played at several festivals getting early slots on the same stages as acts such as; Status Quo, Ian Anderson (Jethro Tull), Von Hertzen Brothers, The Enid, Caravan, Curved Air.

Q. - How was the single "Time Will Tell" received by the fans? Did it have airplay on radio stations?

Buzz – Time will Tell has always been popular in our live set, within our repertoire of songs it was possibly the obvious choice for a single being short & snappy, prior to releasing it we had no luck getting a record deal from anyone despite sending off many tapes to various labels (including NEAT Records) who I was sure would have picked up on us, but all we ever got in reply from everyone was “Sorry Lads etc etc.”, so in the end the single was only possible because Brians Dad offered to fund it for us, there were 1000 copies made at the time & it sold fairly well to local fans at our gigs, like many bands around the time of the NWOBHM era there was still a very homemade element to it in that I put the basic sleeve design together myself with a few pics’ of the band and some basic info’, then I got them printed at the firm that I worked for at that time (CN Print), I had to fold and glue everyone of those single sleeves by hand myself, some of the earliest ones we sold came with a Hammerhead Skull poster (until the posters ran out) I have 1 copy of that poster left & about 5 singles, Tommy Vance would play both sides of the single on the Friday Rock Show and this coupled with reviews in Sounds & Melody Maker led on to us getting enquiries by mail from rock fans all over the place, some of them were even on the continent and further afield, there was no internet back then but dedicated rock fans around the World would get hold of these rarities and then presumably copy & share them with their friends, so year upon year bands such as ours would eventually pick up an ever growing network of fans from further afield, & even when the internet did come along we were still unaware of the situation at first, that is until I advertised ‘Will to Survive’ on eBay, it was only then that I suddenly realised that we had somehow acquired a fan base around the World, so this was the catalyst that triggered much more activity for the band in this second life, & I have noticed that it’s not just us, the same thing has happened for other previously underground bands, I suppose that it is all down to the internet for making it so easy for information to be past around the globe.

           

  

Q. - Billy Branch did the vocals on the song "Lochinvar", back in 84, the compilation "It's Unheard Of", how did that happen? Did you think of him to be a permanent singer for Hammerhead?

Buzz – Back in the early 70s Billy Branch had been the singer in another local band called Necromandus, they were an outstanding band featuring some of the areas most talented musicians & he was an excellent rock singer with a very distinctive voice, if he had been willing to join Hammerhead as a full time member it would have made a massive difference for us, he was asked but he simply wasn’t interested in joining the band, fortunately though he did agree to go into the studio with the band to sing on a couple of tracks, these tracks demonstrate a small taste of what the band would have been like back then with a more confident skilled singer & front-man like Billy was.

             Necromandus = Dennis McCarten, Frank Hall, Baz Dunnery, Billy Branch

In a just World Necromandus really should have made it big as they were way ahead of many bands that did become successful, Black Sabbaths Tony Iommi saw them whilst Sabbath were playing here in West Cumbria in the late 1960s, Necromandus supported them & Tony recognised their talent immediately, he took them under his wing and helped them, Tony was managing them, paying for recording sessions, organising gigs, even contributing guitar work on to some of their recorded songs, & importantly getting them to tour the UK with Black Sabbath in 1973.

Black Sabbath were getting ever more popular & with little or no notice Tony Iommi had to suddenly go off to America to tour with Sabbath, with Tonys commitments understandably changed, Necromandus found themselves stuck in Birmingham living in squalid conditions with no manager, no gigs, no money, & partly due to these circumstances the release of their 1^st album on Vertigo became delayed, eventually things came to a head & Baz Dunnery who in my opinion was one of the most skilled guitarists in the whole country at that time decided he’d had enough, the lack of momentum for the band combined with the harsh living conditions & lack of money pushed him over the edge to the point where he was to quit the band and travel back home to West Cumbria to go back to living a more ‘normal’ life, he once told me that if he hadn’t come home he would have died! such were the harsh conditions they were having to deal with, Baz was a uniquely skilled guitarist so this represented the death knell for the band as he was totally irreplaceable, the record label shelved the release of their only album and it remained that way until eventually it leaked out into the World many years later, that album has now been released by at least three record labels that I know of, and so as time has gone on more & more people have come to learn just how good these boys were, sadly Billy passed away before ever seeing how well respected they eventually became.

        

                                             Billy Branch & Baz Dunnery

Q. - The 1984 demo tape had 8 tracks, some of it live, what do you recall from these recording seasons?

Buzz – I do not have a copy of the actual demo tape that you mention, any tapes such as this one were not handed out in any great quantity, just a few copies to those people who got in touch with us to ask for something, I assume that this would just be another compilation of the best studio recordings that we had available at that point in time, the live tracks would be there to make up for the lack of studio recordings, we did have many more songs but we couldn’t afford the studio time to record them, It is also possible that fans of the band put these type of compilations together, I’ve seen a few examples of that happening.  

Q. - What do you think that lacked to "Hammerhead" to have a successful career?

Buzz – A number of reasons spring to mind; I guess that people who don’t like us would say we were never good enough, simple as that.

We never had a manager to sort anything out so we always ended up having to do everything for ourselves and being honest, none of us are experts with that side of the business.

Despite trying many times we couldn’t get any record label interest from anyone, not even the small independent labels who specialised in bands like ours, without a manager or any close relationships with booking agencies etc. we could never get any suitable gigs away from home, or the chance to go on tour with any more successful bands, doing something like that would have been a major boost for us if it could have been organised.

Another big factor is that most of the lads were in full time jobs, and everyone had family commitments which would have made it very difficult to commit to a multi-date tour, even if we had been offered the chance.

If you really want to make it in a band you have to be so committed to it that it becomes your life and comes before everything else, as much as I have always loved playing in the band, I don’t think it would appeal to me to live that way, and how can anyone give up a full time secure job with decent money to take a chance on something that may come to nothing.        

Q. - Were you still active in the music business during the Hammerhead hiatus?

Buzz – As well as playing in Hammerhead I have always played guitar and sang in ‘covers’ bands purely for a bit of fun, it’s just something that I enjoy & it gives me the chance to play the music that I like to listen to, bands such as Budgie, Black Sabbath, UFO etc. so there has never been a time when I wasn’t playing in a band, for many years I played as part of a band called; ‘The Bullfrogs’, we played a mixture of rock, pop, and blues, it was good fun and the band are all really great musicians but eventually I moved on and joined another band because I wanted to play louder heavier material than the direction The Bullfrogs were going in, what I initially had in mind was a very loud power trio, something in the style of Budgie (you may have noticed by now that I like Budgie very much, hehehehhe), anyway, I mean no disrespect to the lads in The Bullfrogs but they are simply not those types of players with the exception of Tony Steel who is a really solid powerhouse drummer.        

Q. - Back in 2005 what made the band reunite again?  Some kind of unfinished business?

Buzz – We did not reform the band with the intention of continuing to play any more than one gig, in 2004 a close friend of mine asked me if I would consider playing one gig with Hammerhead for a friends 40^th Birthday party, I said that I would if everyone else would, but I honestly didn’t think that the rest of the band would be interested, surprisingly everyone said yes, except ‘Tol’ (our previous drummer), he was already committed to another event on the same date that he couldn’t get out of, so I had to ask Tony Steel (the drummer from my covers band) if he would be willing to learn all the songs so that we could do the gig, that is basically how come Tony became our drummer, remember that at this point it was meant to be for one night only, Tony had a lot to learn but he did an amazing job in doing so.

      

                                                         Tony Steel

Q. - How did the idea of compiling "Will to Survive" came up? Do you think this compilation was important in the revival of Hammerhead?

Buzz – Without the release of the original batch of home made ‘Will to Survive’ CDs none of the band activity in the last 15 years would have occurred at all so yes it was an important development, all be it an accidental one, back in 2004 when we were asked to play that one-off gig, for whatever reason I decided to put together all the best studio recordings of the band that I had and burn them on to a CD, I also made a very basic sleeve design to go with it, I was hoping that people at the gig would maybe buy one, I made 100 of them but only 16 of them actually sold, so a few days later I decide to try selling some of them on eBay, I wasn’t really expecting anyone to remember us, but as soon as it was available I started selling them all around the World with the very first one going to America, then all over Europe and even Japan, it began to dawn on me what had been happening on the underground, and very quickly I had sold all the remaining copies, it was also at this point that Sonic Age Records in Greece got in touch to say that they would like to release it officially on their Cult Metal Classics label, which I immediately agreed to.

Q. - Headonizm came up a little bit later the same year, was 2005 a very active year for Hammerhead?

Buzz - With the money that was raised from selling the ‘Will to Survive’ Cds I suggested to the rest of the band that we could use this to fund a recording session to get more of our old songs recorded properly, everyone agreed and so we went back into the studio, the results of this became our ‘Headonizm’ album which was released on vinyl only by High Roller Records in Germany, songs mostly written in the 70s but recorded in the 00s.

        

Fortunately I have always been very good friends with a local Theatre manager who would often book top classic rock bands of the 70s, so each time one of these bands would pass through our Town I would jump at the chance to get the support slot, as long as the main bands didn’t mind he was happy to give us the support slots, we still have a very faithful local following so it would also help to bring people in to the gigs, through doing this we have got to support many of the bands that we really admired; Budgie, Uriah Heep, Wishbone Ash, Michael Schenker, Bernie Marsden, Diamond Head, Paul Raymond (UFO), to name but a few, so not only have we had more activity in this ‘afterlife’, the quality of the gigs was also raised by some degree, plus we didn’t have to travel for these prestige gigs, they were right on our doorstep, to be fair part of the deal was that we don’t get paid anything & this has caused friction in the band but personally I was happy with that arrangement, it seemed fair to me & as well as enjoying the gigs I have got to meet quite a few of my heroes in the process so I’m not complaining.

Q. - What's the biggest difficulties you have faced all over the years to keep Hammerhead alive?

Buzz – The biggest problem Hammerhead has always faced is not being able to fully commit enough time to the band because of work & family commitments, and if I’m being honest I am probably the worst culprit of this, and yet at the same time I am also the main motivator behind much of the activity that’s happened since we reformed such as dealing with record labels, organising studio sessions, festival appearances, support slots etc. it always seems as if I don’t make the effort to sort something out nothing happens.

There is also friction in the band caused by the type of gigs that we try to get, Steve has always been keen to get gigs away from home whenever possible & to be fair I would also like to do that as well if it worked for us, but it doesn’t, it would be great to travel all over the place playing to good sized crowds and having a fantastic gig with like-minded rockers, but the reality is that almost every time we try to do a gig away from home hardly anyone goes and it is a disaster which usually ends up costing us money, I have found out the hard way that if we are going to travel away from home the most suitable gigs for us to do are as part of an established festival, things like; ‘Brofest’ in the UK, or any of the HRH rock festivals, we have won many new fans this way, and at least you know you are going to have an audience when you get there, the amount of times we have travelled all over the place and ended up playing to an almost empty room is depressing, and also one of the reasons I gave up doing it in the mid 80s, sadly it’s still the same now, a couple of years ago we made the effort to go up to Edinburgh in Scotland to do a gig in the well known venue ‘Bannermans’ and most of the people in the audience that night were our own fans from back home who had travelled up to see us, it was well advertised but sadly there were hardly any local people in, the same happened twice at The Riverside in Selby, twice at The Snooty Fox in Wakefield, and also when we tried a gig at The Diamond in Mansfield, all these gigs cost us money! & it’s just not worth it, it is for this reason that most of our gigs tend to be either at home or at a festival, I know it’s not ideal but being realistic they are the only gigs that are really worth doing.              

Another problem that keeps raising it’s head is that on a number of occasions the older lads have expressed a wish to call it a day and bring it all to an end, after all the founder member of the band Brian is now heading towards 70 years old so I know there is a point where you have to stop doing this, but for now I have managed to persuade them to keep it going for a bit longer even though I do know we will have to stop eventually, rather than actually split up I would be happy even we just continued with just occasional studio work as I love messing about in the recording studio.

                                           Buzz - Guy Forresters studio

Q. - Besides Hammerhead, you have a side project called ‘Slagbank’, what can you tell us about this band? What kind of music do you play?

Buzz – For the story on how this band came into existence we have to go back to 2008 when Hammerhead were playing at a festival in London called ‘The Last Weekend’ at a legendary venue called The Ruskin Arms, it was a fund raising event in aid of ‘CliveAid’ a charity originally set up to help drummer Clive Burr who was originally with the band Samson, he left them to become the drummer for Iron Maiden on their first 3 albums.

Sadly Clive was diagnosed with MS (multiple sclerosis) and became to ill to continue playing, hence the fund raising event that we were invited to perform at, a Cumbrian friend of mine who was living in London called Mark Coles came to watch the gig, Mark is a superb bass player & on more than one occasion has been headhunted by UFO, anyway, he told me that he was planning on moving back home to Cumbria very soon, and when he did he wanted to form a band with me on guitar & Tony Steel on drums, with the intention of playing as a power trio, we all talked about this and agreed to select some songs that we each wanted to play, when Mark eventually moved back to live in the North we got together in my small rehearsal room and tried a few things out, it became clear immediately that this would work, it sounded very exciting and powerful.

The easiest way to answer your enquiry as to what type of stuff we play is to show you the bands repertoire, starting with the shortest song title and finishing with the longest title we call this set list our Mountain our Rock:-

 N.I.B

STEALIN

ROSALIE

KASHMIR

EMERALD

WAR PIGS

BLACK DOG

THE SEEKER

PROUD MARY

ROCK & ROLL

MR CROWLEY

WISHING WELL

SHADOW PLAY

HIGHWAY STAR

SILVER MACHINE

ZIGGY STARDUST

DOCTOR DOCTOR

LIKE A HURRICANE

I TURNED TO STONE

SUMMERTIME BLUES

PERFECT STRANGERS

STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN

SMOKE ON THE WATER

ROCKY MOUNTAIN WAY

ALL THE YOUNG DUDES

DON’T BELIEVE A WORD

ONLY YOU CAN ROCK ME

NANTUCKET SLEIGHRIDE

ROCKIN IN THE FREE WORLD

NAPOLEON BONAPARTS 1 & 2

A NEW DAY YESTERDAY~STARSHIP TROOPER~WURM

       

Since first forming Slagbank we have expanded to a four piece with the addition of a brilliant guitarist from the North East called Dave Burn, with the exception of myself this band actually became the touring band for Paul Raymond out of UFO for a couple of years, obviously everyone was devastated to hear of Pauls untimely passing last year, we had all been watching him play with UFO in Newcastle just two days earlier and he had never looked healthier, so you never know what is around the corner.

Personally I do not like the name of the band at all but the others picked it & thought it was funny, the reasoning behind it is due to fact that we live in a ‘steel town’, for many years the local Steelworks made steel rails for the railway industry all over the World, during the process of making the steel rails a waste product known as slag is separated off, this waste was dumped along the shoreline beside the steelworks and over many years it eventually formed into a huge bank of Slag, hence the band name, Slagbank.    

Q. - In your opinion what are the main differences between the eighties and the reality of today? Do you keep an eye to the metal scene of today?

Buzz – Back in the 80s Global Pandemics were only ever found in the scripts of imaginative script writers, but the harsh reality of the situation today is that the music scene has totally ground to a halt, everything I had tickets for has been cancelled & all my own gigs are also cancelled, eventually things should get back to normal but it will take a long time to fully recover from this awful situation, fortunately for me I have another source of income, but it will be much worse for any professional musicians who rely on gigs and selling merchandise to survive, turning to the internet is probably the only way to continue for them right now, using sites such as ‘Patreon’ perhaps?

Even before the Corona situation another big problem in modern times is that many bars and venues had already been closing because of poor business, there are a number of reasons for this and the government don’t help the situation by continually adding tax on to beer etc. lots of people stay at home to drink rather than go out as it is much cheaper to do this, also high business rates, and even the smoking ban all played their part in a shift of trends from how it used to be, if this trend does continue without being addressed I really fear for the future of live music as we have always known it!

Regarding the current Metal scene I really struggle with the death metal style of singing/growling, I can take it in small doses especially live where you also get the energy of the performance, but I can’t listen to it at home, also overuse of the double kick pedal by drummers does my head in, once again in small doses it can enhance a song but overused it ruins everything, I went to the Graspop festival in Belgium a few years ago and I felt as though I was at a double kick pedal demonstration event for most of the weekend!

Over the last 10 years my love of the Prog scene has been rekindled, & there are so many superb bands experimenting again, especially in Scandinavia, I would say that the modern prog scene is divided into two main areas, there are those bands who go for the retro sound as if it is still 1970 and the last 50 years never happened, and then there are bands who are still trying to push the boundaries of what is possible and keep moving things forward, fortunately for me I love both styles.     

Q. - In 2004 you did some solo recordings, "Monsters From The ID", did you try to release it?

Buzz – You may be aware that ‘Monsters from the ID’ is a line out of an old sci-fi film called ‘The forbidden planet’ from 1958, I saw this when I was a kid in the late 60s and I loved it, through watching that film I learned that the ‘ID’ is another term for the subconscious, in 2004 purely for fun I made some solo recordings in my home studio using a variety of backing tracks, all the guitar work was done spontaneously over these pre-recorded backing tracks, and when I listened back to what I had played there were quite a few things that I had done that would be hard for me to replicate again, little happy accidents if you know what I mean, so it occurred to me that this stuff seemed to have come out of my mind and rolled off the end of my guitar neck from nowhere, none of it was rehearsed & some of it I can’t actually play again, so that is the reasoning behind the title, I didn’t have any intention of releasing it, although I may have passed a few copies out at the time, I do remember putting one track from it called ‘Tuesday Blues’ on to Youtube.      

Q. - How do you want to end up this interview? Anything more you want to say?   Thank you for your time, and wish you all the best for the future!

Buzz – Firstly I would like to thank you for continued interest in our band & for taking the time to send the questions, I have enjoyed answering them for you.

I will end by telling you the up to date situation with the band as it stands, over the last few years we have only played a handful of gigs, once again mostly local ones.

The current line up with Steven Woods (Pecker) as our singer/frontman & Tony as the drummer is probably the strongest in the bands history so it would be a shame to not continue, Pecker was instrumental in bringing more showmanship and fun into the band so hopefully if you were to see us live now you would feel like you are watching a show rather than a bunch of serious metal heads working sternly through the songs.

Bass player Steve & I have been writing material together for some time now in an attempt to make one more album which will feature a long concept piece called ‘Lords of the Sun’ it is 22 minutes in duration, this will either be one full side of a vinyl album, or possibly split into two parts in a similar way to how Pink Floyd did their ‘Wish you were here’ album, we haven’t decided on that yet, and it may be determined by what else we write for the rest of the album.

We have already had one failed attempt to record this in the studio with our producer Guy Forrester, it was probably my fault for trying to speed things up but I think that I may have booked the studio session before we were fully ready to take on the task.

We also made the mistake of trying to record it without trying it out live a few times first, I think that it’s always best to try something new out live first before recording it, since that initial recording session was done the song has now evolved into something quite different from how it started out so when we go back to the studio we will have to scrap what we have already recorded and start all over again, unfortunately the revised dates for recording studio sessions have been delayed by the Corona situation, Steve was out in Spain when the lockdown came into force, he has been stuck there for 3 months now.

If the bands days with the original 3 core members playing together are numbered, I have already told the others that if possible I would still like to keep playing our songs live in some shape or form but any form of playing activity is really tough for me right now, I don’t really like to dwell on any negative stuff but I’m afraid that I have to end on a very sad note, on February 6th 2020 I lost one of my sons (Lee) in tragic circumstances, this has had a very traumatic effect on me and my whole family, I am still struggling to come to terms with the situation & I am still on sick from work indefinitely, I haven’t been able to touch a guitar since it happened, I hope that one day I can come to terms with the situation and feel well enough to play again, whatever else happens I want to make sure that eventually we will finish that one last album as I would like to dedicate it to my son Lee, he loved rock music and was a fan of Hammerhead himself, I really miss having him around.

    

     

                                                Lee Elliott – RIP son.

                     Lee, Buzz, & Alex, my other son Glenn is not in this picture.