The Ordher, the Brazilian Death Metal machine with former members of Rebaelliun and Nephasth, will release their second full length album called 'Kill The Betrayers' under Unique Leader Records, offering a more punishing, furious and precise Death Metal. The band will be crashing Europe for the first time in late September 2009, presenting their new album at the ‘Funeral Nation Tour 2009’, supporting Vader and Marduk. Let us know what they have to say about the new album and their thoughts about extreme Metal. 

Do you see limitations in how much you can evolve with the musical framework of the band?
Well, Death Metal is an extreme kind of music, so of course you cannot try to just ‘be original’ and add too different elements to the music, but I believe there’s still a lot to create within this genre. I personally listen to every kind of music, so I call ‘limitation’ the fact that I would not use in The Ordher, for instance, some influence that I have from Johnny Cash, it would hardly fit in our music, haha. But in other hand, it’s possible to take some influence I have from Jimi Hendrix to create a non typical guitar lead for The Ordher, or even some riffs…

Musically it appears as if you've approached things a little differently in Brazilian Death Metal. Where do you think the biggest changes in this type music are?
That’s hard to explain… Because I really don’t think too much about the music, we just write the music and play it, if it sounds good for us, it’s ok. We don’t analyze our songs and try to label them to see if they fit on this or that style, you know? If a riff sounds Thrash Metal and it’s nice on a song of The Ordher, we just keep it there, we don’t behave like ‘People will say we’re playing Thrash Metal if we keep this riff, but we’re a Death Metal band, let’s change this…’. I know we’re not sounding typical Brazilian Death Metal, but I could not say why is that…

When you worked on this new material, were there any basics from Weaponize that you wanted to retain or things you were looking to improve?
Well, first thing we have in mind when starting to write new music is evolution, I believe that works for any musician. Of course "Weaponize” was our starting point to write "Kill The Betrayers”. I mean, we knew what elements we should maintain from that album and what other elements we should avoid on new recordings. Although "Kill The Betrayers” is a different album, more extreme and faster, I think a lot of people will find several similarities between the two pieces… 

You've more or less recorded everything by yourselves. I assume this gave the band more freedom to experiment and try out different things. What are the challenges and demands on being your own critic and editor?
Good thing is that you have all control about the recordings, and if you have plenty of time, you can make several tests to check what sounds better, you know? Bad thing is that sometimes you really need the opinion of someone else to reach a higher level, some ‘point’ that you’ll hardly reach all alone. If you’re working with a producer, you can learn new things too, that’s really amazing when working on an album. 

Style-wise I hear some similarities with both Rebaelliun and Nephasth. Though you came up with this distinctive sound in The Ordher, how did you guys accomplished this?
Well, I played in Rebaelliun and was the main writer on that band, so I could not avoid completely the fact that in some moment some riffs or ideas would sound like Rebaelliun. The same happens to Fabio and our ex drummer Mauricio, who were members of Nephasth. They were half of the band, so of course there’s something about Nephasth in The Ordher music in general. But I have the impression, as a listener, that The Ordher sounds more like a new band than just a continuation of Rebaelliun or Nephasth, and that’s a great conclusion for us.

Did you achieve exactly what you were aiming for sound-wise?
Not yet. And I truly believe that I personally will not get satisfied with the albums, because there’s always a lot to improve. It works for the music itself and also for production. I mean, "Kill The Betrayers” is a lot better than "Weaponize” in every sense, but I have in mind already new ideas for the next one, that will make it better than the last one. Concerning production, this time we got a better sound for drums, it sounds louder and clearer on the new album, and that’s a good point. 

Like you said the style in Kill the Betrayers is a little different. How would you label it and what has motivated this change in direction?
It’s Death Metal, that’s what we play, that’s what we know how to play. It’s just that this time the songs are more extreme, they are faster. One would say it’s more sophisticated too, I don’t know, the album is sounding just a lot better than "Weaponize”, the band is sounding heavier and more aggressive, and that’s really great. We just knew that we should do something a bit different for this album, and we did. Hopefully people will like it as much as I do.

It looks and sounds so easy when seeing you play, but I'm sure it takes a lot of practicing to hold on to this level. How much are you guys to improve yourselves as musicians and as a band itself?
Well, first thing to be said is that there are several ways to improve as a musician. When I was younger, I thought that only being more technical and faster I would be a better musician. Nowadays I see that it’s not about skills or speed. I mean, to play Death Metal you gotta have skills, you gotta be fast, but there’s a lot beyond this. In some point you start to learn how to get a better sound from your equipment, how to sound clearer, how to create heavier music. I still practice exercises for speed, not every day, but near from dates when I have some show to play or a recording, but I believe that I have grown as a musician in other terms, not only concerning skills or speed.

Are you happy with Unique Leader Records and how they handle promotion, distribution, marketing and things like that? It seems they don't promote their bands that much in Europe and Latin America!
To be honest, promotion is not a good point in Unique Leader. I don’t know the other bands, but The Ordher did not get a good promotion for our first album, let’s see if "Kill The Betrayers” get a better promotion. And yes, their distribution is not the best one in Latin American… I’d say to people e-mail them asking Unique Leader albums in their cities. That would be good to get a better distribution…

You've been a part of the death metal scene since way back. Are there still new bands that inspire you or do you prefer the older bands?
As a Death Metal fan, I listen to the old stuff, like Morbid Angel, which is just the best band in this kind of music, such as Vader, which is so old as MA. To be honest, these new bands are not really my cup of tea, but acts like Behemoth, which is not so young too, I like a lot. The last bands that appeared that really inspired me were Krisiun, Angelcorpse and Centurian.


Interview by Maria Haguring 


September 2009
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