Hey guys! Thank you for the interview and your time. This is my first ever interview of any band so my apologies beforehand for the generic and unremarkable questions. I guess we'll start with a basic introduction. Can you introduce us to the band—who is who and who does what in Chadhel?
How did each of you get into grindcore and how did that lead to the formation of Chadhel?
We all get into grindcore, death metal and hardcore at a pretty young age. We were introduced to grindcore either by friends, because of our curiosity, or by going to shows. We all started listening to metal music at a very young age, either through older cousins or by inheriting old albums from our uncles and parents who found it too extreme for them. In the 90’s there was no internet, not in the way we know it today, so the best way to find new bands was to read a zine and to check out the "thanks list" in the cassettes, vinyls or CD booklets. It was really much like a treasure hunt and it was really a fun thing to do. You had to write all these bands names on a sheet and go to the local music store to see if they had any of these titles in stock. Sometimes you bought something really bad and other times you could find a classic that would stay in your life forever.
That being said, it’s our passion for music and grindcore that lead to the creation of the band. We all played in a lot of different bands. Some of us even had band together before (Fredo and GT in 2003, JR and Fredo played many years together in WhoCares?). We were all really active in our local death metal, grindcore and hardcore scene even before we started the band. GT and JP started the band as a two-man studio project in 2014. After that they asked for people to join the band for one release show (a 3-way split with two other local band, Deadcold and Défaillance) but one thing lead to another and we started to all really have fun playing and creating music together so the guys decided to stay permanently. The band is active under this form since the end of 2016 and we release our first split as a band in 2017 with Inexile, a local ambient/noise project now named Twenty9Kult. I lost count since, hahaha! We work hard and fast and we don’t like to be stagnant and keep playing the same songs for too long. To write new stuff motivates us a lot, trying new things, new riffs, keep it interesting and fresh for us and hopefully for the people who listen our music. That is why we are working so well together. We always look forward, look at new projects, new adventure or new people to work with. It keeps it all alive and creatively nourishing.
What bands played the biggest influence in Chadhel's sound and style?
A lot of band influence us on many levels. Some influenced us by their sound, others by their song writing approach or also by the way they were writing lyrics. We are as much influenced by old bands than new bands. We keep our minds open and don’t try to be, look or sound like anyone. We let our subconscious do the job and never close the door to an idea we like because it is not considered like classic grind or true to the style. We try everything that comes to our mind and if we like it we keep it. If we think it sucks, we trash it and try something else. That’s it.
But, if we really have to drop some names, let’s say that Napalm Death, Discordance Axis, Nasum, Gridlink, Noisear, The Kill, Gadget, Pig Destroyer and Kill The Client are bands that influenced us a lot all over our life and musical evolution.
How did the Return to the House of Grindcore blog come up on your radar?
Destiny, man! Hahaha. When we created our Instagram account we were searching other accounts related to grindcore and one of the first we found and liked was Return to the House of Grindcore. I think luck was on our side and we can’t thank you enough for all the support and the great positive stuff you wrote about us all over the years. It is always well done, smart, constructive and respectful.
From our first conversations prior to the review of Welcome To Your Doom back in 2021, you made it clear that you identified as being from Québec and not Canada. As proud Québécois how do you feel your national and cultural identities shape Chadhel's music?
It gave us a lot of inspiration and determination to stand out and free ourselves from an identity that is not ours. It is not a question of hatred, anger or contempt towards anyone. Our cultural heritage is very rich at the musical, literary and artistic level. People here are usually very creative; most of us were introduced to music at a very young age because it’s a deep part of our cultural identity. It motivated us to do things our way and the way we wanted to do it. Also, the fact of living so far from the big cities likes Québec and Montréal (we are from Chicoutimi, Saguenay, two hours away from Québec City. Straight north directly through the mountains of the Laurentide park) make it hard for local bands like us to get out and be recognized outside of their town even with the internet. But we can’t complain. Quebec is recognized in its history for having seen the birth within it of a great line of excellent grindcore and death metal groups. Bands like Gorguts, Cryptopsy, Dahmer, Inertia Kills, Soil of Ignorance, Deboned (rip), Neuraxis, Quo Vadis, WhoCares? and many others who paved the way for today’s bands. The grindcore/death metal scene is a very important part of all the musical movements here. There are a lot of good active bands right now working hard and producing insanely good music. Bands like Ear Maggot, Faché, Pastoral, Worms Out, Tandemoniak, Nervous Impulse, Anticrisse, Défaillance, Afterpill, Autodafé, Deadcold, Cruel Fate, Spirits of Rebellion, Senseless Strife, RGRSS, Saccage, Apes and Desecrate... I probably forgot many of them but it is a good list to begin with.
How is the grind scene in Québec? Who and what are some of your favorite Québec bands and venues?
Not bad, not bad at all. There are a lot of shows and a lot of bands actively playing and recording stuff so the feeling is good right now. Like almost everywhere the problem is always to find a good venue at a good price. My favorites places right now are the Plaza Bar (Ville de la Baie), the Tubro Haus in Montréal and we also like to play at the Scanner Bar in Québec city, the owner doesn’t charge anything and there is always a lot of crazy peoples. But it’s for those who love late shows.
For the readers who didn't put it together, Chadhel has a deep H.P. Lovecraft influence, especially evident on the Welcome To Your Doom EP. Thus the two House Of Grindcore Chadhel reviews were done in the style of Call Of The Cthulhu and Pickman's Model, respectively. So how did that come about? Who's the Lovecraft fan? How much Lovecraft made it into Failure//Downfall?
GT and JP are the Lovecraft fans in the band, like huge fan. At the beginning the main theme of the songs and artworks was the myth of Cthulhu. In fact we started to leave behind that concept on the 10 inch split EP, Welcome To Your Doom. Even if the titles of the songs does not let it appear, the lyrics are more personal and based on our own experiences with illness, tragedy, depression and death. The lyrics still have these small Lovecraftian references in it because the basic inspiration is still human consciousness, the loss of control of one's mind and thoughts. We just have left the science fiction behind us in order to focus on texts more anchored in our reality and which could serve us as a catharsis. So since Welcome To Your Doom we started to write more about things we have experienced or witnessed that have affected us in some way. Our lyrics are a conduit that helps us get rid of all the rage that poisons our mind and conscience. We're actually talking about things that most people are going to experience one day or another that generally affects our lives in a pretty negative way. This transition is a need that ended up being felt over time and which imposed itself naturally. It happened one song at a time; we ended up realizing that a page in our history had been turned and that it was the start of a new chapter for us.
When writing for Failure//Downfall what were your goals for the album? Did you have a certain sound or style of grindcore or any other genres that you were wanting to incorporate or emphasize?
No, as usual we let our subconscious and our creativity do the work. We kept what we liked and threw overboard anything that seemed boring to us. Of course we had the desire to push the level of brutality to a whole new level while remaining unpredictable and original. The only two valid questions were, "do we like it?" and "do we have fun playing this song?"
Many ideas and even complete songs have been thrown in the trash throughout the process. Sometimes with hindsight some ideas lose a bit of their charm. This is why it is important not to be afraid to review your creations and, if you have to, start from scratch or erase certain parts of it. The ego is a bad adviser. When you feel that something is wrong, usually it is because something is wrong.
We tried at least once all the ideas that came to mind just to be sure not to miss something great without realizing it. It often happens that what you imagine in your head doesn't sound quite the same in reality. It is often worth checking.
That was the state of mind of all the team during this whole operation and it was quite liberating and fun.
Chadhel seemed to have weathered the pandemic pretty well. You guys certainly took advantage of the time by recording and even appearing on the online Global Grindcore Alliance Fest. How does it feel to being playing live shows again in 2023?
We were able to obtain an authorization from the Ministry of Public Health giving us the right to practice in our music room under certain conditions. It helped a lot and probably saved many hours of therapy for many of us.
This allowed us to be part of the Grindcore Alliance but also to keep the group in good shape, to record and to compose a lot of songs. Sadly, we've only done three shows since. One in Chicoutimi that was epic. One in Quebec and the last in Sherbrooke for the Halloween Murdoch fest with many other groups who were all really happy to finally be able to put on a show. On the other hand, we have a lot of shows planned all over Quebec for 2023. We are also going to play for the first time in the United States. The show is at New York City, it’s the OSU Extreme Festival presented by GCBT Media (January 22). We are really looking forward to this concert especially since we are going to play with bands that we love and respect a lot. It will be very invigorating. It's only when you're deprived of what you took for granted that you realize how much you care about it so being able to perform again is very positive and helps everyone to let go of the pressure built up during the pandemic.
The human condition means that we need to socialize, even the loneliest among us need to talk to someone at one time or another. To say that being able to do shows again feels good is an understatement. Playing music and being in a band is, by definition, a social activity.
I got wind of a new Chadhel noise/sludgecore side project, Autodafé, which has a release on the horizon and I think most Chadhel listeners will be familiar with the powerviolence side project, Afterpill. What were the impetuses of these projects and how are these projects going? Are there any other projects in the works?
Autodafé is more like a grindcore/sludge/90's meta/hardcore/electronic/noise kind of band with a drum machine. GT and Alex (Twenty9Kult) recorded all the tracks during the pandemic and now are finishing the mixing and the mastering. It sounds like a weirder version of Agoraphobic Nosebleed, this project is a really strange beast.
Afterpill is slowly writing new material right now. The 7 inch split with Double Me from Italy will be released on Here And Now Records this year. The band also appear on the Fats//Violence #4 tape compilation, Punchline Vol. 1 by The Hills Are Dead Records, the Hit Mania Violence #3 7 inch compilation and will have three songs on the upcoming compilations Product of Six Cents produced by Justin Abare of the legendary East Coast powerviolence band, No Comply. Let’s say some of us are really busy right now.
I really enjoyed the continuity between the Blood Of The Hybrids and the new Theory Of Obscurity music videos on your ChadhelTV YouTube channel. These are apparently the first two parts of a video trilogy. What was the inspiration for these videos? Was the entirety of the trilogy a preconceived plot? On what future release can we expect the final installment?
Thank you. Yes it was a preconceived plot that GT was really dreaming to do for a long time. It is based on simple concept which is death, awakening and revenge. This idea comes from an old socio-philosophical book that GT read some time ago and was also inspired by the book Necropolis: City of the Dead by Herbert Lieberman. Of course, the full idea won't really make sense until the end of the third chapter and can most certainly be interpreted differently by people who will see it. Our friend and producer Bruno Martel is the technical mastermind behind all this whole amazing project. His help and his involvement in the creation of the visual universe of the group is of an impossible value to describe in the same way as that of Remy Verreault who works magic with our music in the studio. Bruno helps us a lot and takes all his experience and ideas with him which greatly enriches the final result. We also shot another studio video like the one we did last spring to promote the release of the album Modern Methods of Aggression. This time it will be for the song "Coldcases" which will be found on the split 5 inch with the French/German group Eastwood. The song "Mindless", which will serve as the soundtrack for the third part of the trilogy which will be found on the 7 inch split with the group Faché from Trois-Rivières, Québec, which is produced by SO2 Records.
What grindcore/powerviolence bands are you currently listening to?
Ok let’s try to cut it short because there’s a huge amount of awesome active grindcore and powerviolence bands right now. Daggra, Chepang, Ixias, Retortion Terror, Gridlink, Hatred Surge, Expression of Pain, Gets Worse, Jack, Feastem, Massive Charge, Ear Maggot, Ape Unit, Merked, Knoll, Antigama, Warfuck, The Kill, Eastwood, Faché, Tandemoniak, Soil of Ignorance, BruceXCampbell, Gendo Ikari, Fractured, Double Me, They Live, No Comply, Mescaline Maniacs, Campana Del Terror, Hello Bastard, Herida Profunda, Throwe, Convince, Internal Rot, Human Cull, Chiens, SixBrewBantha, Pugnale, Suffering Quota, RGRSS, Sayyadina, Soiled Hate, Sidetracked, Cloud Rat, Backslidder, Cruel Fate, Naka’y, Deterioration, To Dust, World Peace, P.O.A.C, Peace Test, Manipulator, Triac, Sanctioned, Shitbrains, Harm, Suffering Mind, Entrails Massacre... and many others but we must stop at some point or it will never end. Hahaha!
What grindcore/powerviolence bands or albums would you consider essential listening?
Interesting question. There’s the old classic nobody can avoid if they really want to know where it come from and how it evolved to become the beast it is today. Classics like Napalm Death (Scum), Repulsion (Horrified), Terrorizer (World Downfall), Heresy, No Comment, Spazz and Crossed Out. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg and not a complete historical list of the bands that created grindcore and powerviolence. This is just in my opinion, a good starting point. The 90’s and early 2000’s saw a number of great bands emerge that helped take its two styles to another level. Pig Destroyer's Prowler in the Yard is a good example of it. Bands like Excruciating Terror, Blockheads, Discordance Axis and Rotten Sound are a good example of bands that have pushed the boundaries of this kind of music. Again this is just a list of a few names out of hundreds. The goal is not to write a complete anthropological study on grindcore but to help those who seek to understand or learn about the style. These two small lists are a very good starting point in this case. Some are more learned on the subject and could easily provide you with more concrete and historical information, but the fact remains that you have something to start learning here.
Do any of you collect vinyl or music gear? If so, how detrimental has that been to your life and standard of living? Hahaha.
But seriously, all the members of the band are all big music consumers. We are all passionate and addicted to music in all its forms and this shows in our projects, our equipment and our album collections.
What's next for Chadhel?
We have a lot of shows and festivals schedule for 2023 and others will probably be added during the year. We also already have a 7 inch split confirmed for 2024 and are trying to find another band for another one. The idea is to release two splits in 2024 or one split and one EP. But it would be much cooler to release two splits, honestly. We are already writing new material. We don't want to slow down the pace; on the contrary, the new compositions are even faster, more brutal and more complex than ever.
Any last words?
Thank you very much for all the support everybody. I mean everybody. Live fast, die old. Blast beat all day, every day and fucks those who tell you otherwise. Be proud of who you are and grind.
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