GloriaN

September 2002

Interview with GloriaN done by email in September 2002

I always liked to listen to new bands and so I often search on mp3.com for new bands. One night I stumbled over the Turkish band GloriaN. I visited their website and thought that it's worth to give more people the chance to learn about that band. I reviewed their demo and then we arranged the interview... Hope that you will find this interesting!

The band was founded back in 1995 in Istanbul. Please tell us about the early day when you were still PROPHECY!

In our early days, we played cover songs. After a couple of years, we started to produce and play our songs. The name was still PROPHECY, and it was renamed to GLORIAN just before we released our demo.

Why do you choose that name in the beginning? Why you renamed the band to GLORIAN?

We observed that there are lots of bands named PROPHECY and we decided to produce the demo with the new name GLORIAN.

In the early years you have some line-up changes, but now you have a stable line-up. Was it hard to find new band members for your kind of music?

Yes, it was hard to find new members for us like almost all the young bands. We played with many musicians on different instruments like drums and keyboards for four years. In 1999, Ahmet Gultekin joined to the band as drummer and Hakan started to play bass guitar, so the team playing right now was formed up.

How would you describe your music?

Actually, we don't want to categorize our music, but "epic progressive power & heavy metal" could describe it.

What inspires you musically? Lyrically?

We like rhythm... We like screaming guitars... We like fantasy world... That's the way we produce our songs :)

Please tell us something about the tracks on the demo?

There are five tracks on the demo. First three tracks are fast ones. Fourth track is slower than the first three tracks. And the final one is a ballad.

What song presents the demo best in your opinion?

Heart of Darkness presents the demo best we think, but we should say that the tracks on the demo do not describe our exact sound. After releasing the demo, there are lots of changes we made on our songs (tracks on the demo included). Furthermore a new member joined to the band as second lead vocal who is a female! Now the songs have more melodical parts, two screaming lead vocals, faster rhythms, briefly everything that true power metal listeners expect from the songs! :)

Where do you recorded the demo? And why do you decided to do everything on your own?

Because we didn't have money :)) The real story is, we produced the demo for our listening at our home studio! Someone listened our demo suggested us to release the records as a demo! That's why we produced everthing!

Have you already written new material?

Lots of new material we have! We have a new member, new songs etc. We are totally focused on our first album!

From the information for the demo I got, that the songs are written by Serhat Hasanoglu, your keyboarder. How much influence can the rest of the band take on the songs?

Almost all lyrics are written by Serhat. Preliminary studies of the musics are also done by Serhat, but the final versions of the tracks are influenced by all the members!

Have you already tried to get a record deal? A distribution deal?

Actually, album producing will take place after getting convinced that we produced the best songs we can!

You played a lot live. How are the reactions when you play live?

We had many live performances and all the feedbacks were the ones we want to get!

As far as I know there are many metal fans in Turkey and also many bands. Actually I know just PENTAGRAM / MEZARKABUL... What do you think why no other bands make it outside Turkey?

If you take a look at the most famous bands in the world, you see that most of them are from the economicaly and socially developed countries. In the developing countries like Turkey, top priority for the people is having a good life! For those reasons, lifetimes of the bands are not so long.

There is a scene, but it's still hard for metal fans / bands in Turkey. Do you have the same problems as all the others? Or have your website and the downloadable demo changed something for you?

Yes, our web site and the downloadable demo let us reach the people from other countries. We are getting many feedbacks from many countries and they make us develop...

How much influence can the bands take on changing the scene? As far as I know the authorities are against metal....

We couldn't understand what you mean by authorities (government ??), but we can simply say that authorities are not against metal. There is no any restriction for the bands to play. For the last years metal scene is in a big development.

Also not that much international bands come over to play in Turkey. Do you think that it would be a positive impulse for scene, if some big names would play?

Many international bands have come over here to play so far and concerts are still going on (e.g. BLIND GUARDIAN will play in Istanbul this week). And these live performances are definitely positive impulses for the scene as you said. In last 3-4 years, so many metal bands were founded.

Do you see a change in the political situation in Turkey which might have a positive influence on the metal scene in future?

We think that metal scene does not influenced by the political situation directly. As we stated before, metal scene is influenced by the economical and social conditions. But of course economical and social conditions are directly depend on the government. We should say that Turkish scene is in a big development.

Famous last words.... Anything you want to say to the fans?

Keep listening us!!

 

 

Claudia Ehrhardt