Please tell us about the history of your band and its members.
Hi and thanks for having us! We are a hard ‘n’ heavy rock trio from Livadia city, Greece. It all started at the end of 2013, when we decided that playing in a cover band was just not enough for us and formed a “vessel” in which we could be ourselves as musicians and lyricist, as well as enjoy creating something from scratch! So, Valantis Dafkos (lead, backing vocals & bass), Panos Karkanas (guitars & keys) and Paris Gatsios (drums) became the “peculiar three”!
How would you describe your style? Which bands influenced your music?
Our sound has a vintage vibe and our music is in the array of hard ‘n’ heavy rock with classic prog elements and some metal touches. The lyrics are inspired by anything, but usually go to strange places, folklore, myths and divinities... They’re often based on certain thoughts or inspired by literature and end up being their own entities.
About the influences themselves, you can understand that, as three different personalities, there’s a lot of diversity here! Surely a lot of good old prog rock, but all the classics of the metal world are there, too!
Why should a metalhead buy your demos/albums?
A metalhead should come for the artwork and stay for the music and lyrics!
What have you released so far and how were your releases received by the public/media?
In 2014 we released ‘P3culiar’, an EP, which is our first recording as a band. It was a handful of ideas, driven by our romantic view of how a recording should be, which led to an oldschool type of doing it! The whole procedure (composing, rehearsals, writing lyrics and studio recordings) took place in a tight time schedule, so we could retain the raw and live feeling of our ideas throughout the tracks. We were (and still are) very happy with the outcome, since it mirrors our efforts and viewpoints at the time! In 2019 we released the EP’s remastered version.
In 2020 we released ‘Leap of Faith’ which is the band’s first LP and it’s a whole other story as distinct from our previous release - the whole approach here was different, especially time wise and in ways of recording. After all, it’s been a six year gap between them and we are ‘different’ people now, something that affected every aspect of our LP! It’s heavier, more diverse musically and more interesting lyrically.
There were many positive reviews for both our releases from people and webzines, but there were also a few negative ones, which, of course, is only natural! You can’t possibly write music that everyone likes!
Do you play live as well? How's your live activity so far?
Although “peculiar three” is a studio project so far, the band’s members are active in live and gigging since we all play on more bands with discography: “Redeye Caravan” (dark country), “Beyond this Earth” (metal / stoner) and “The Magic Bus” (rock, lyrics in greek). Of course, these days with the covid outbreak, there’s not really any chance to play live, thus we found time to compose new tunes!
What should labels/zines/promoters know about your band? Why should they be interested in it?
What we think makes us unique is the fact that we combine what makes us whole as musicians and play it from the heart. We value every detail musically and lyrically, use our own equipment and sound. We’re not going to rewrite the book of music or reinvent the wheel, but we put our souls in our efforts, we maintain our character and share our passion with the world… in the end this is what makes us happy! If all these eventually make our band unique, well, it’s on you to discover and decide!
What plans do you have for the near future as a band?
We have just finished a video shooting and we work on a lyric video as well, so stay tuned!
Where can we listen to your band and where can we buy your stuff?
You’re welcome to find, hear and purchase both our albums digitally on Bandcamp (https://peculiarthree.bandcamp.com/) and also on most digital distributing platforms, such as Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCX8fw1uaRazcX_8DyOdkTbg), Discogs, Spotify, Soundcloud, Amazon Music, iTunes, Deezer etc. Of course, as romantics ourselves, we could not but release ‘Leap of Faith’ in physical format too, as a sweet digipak cd, limited to three hundred copies, so send us a message on our Facebook’s like page (https://www.facebook.com/peculiarthree) for details!
October 2020