Please tell us about the history of your band and its members.
Jan, Ivan and me played in Dead Serious (thrashmetalband 1987-1993). Before that, Ivan and Jan were in Explorer (speedmetalband 1982-1987), and I played with Trial (heavy-metalband 1984-1987, mini-LP ‘Scream for Mercy’ released by Colour Records in 1985). In 1991 West Virginia Records released Dead Serious’ full CD ‘It’s a nice day’. It had a good distribution in Germany and it sold quite well. But we never saw a penny of it, by the way. It was a complete rip-off. After the split in 1993 we asked Jeannot, the former drummer of Mindruin, to start a completely new band with us, Die Sinner Die. DSD was much more experimental, more industrial. We released a demo with 4 songs, we did a few gigs and that was it. We were not that successful, but we had a lot of fun (laughs).
Filip, our singer, was with Innerface, a melodic punk-rock band from the 90’s. They made some demos and EP’s and a couple of their songs appeared on English punk label compilations. Eddy played guitar with powermetal band Battering Ram in the 80’s (comeback EP ‘Atlantis : Remembrance of a Lost Future’ in 2008). In between he did some keyboards for Ramses in the 90’s (EP ‘Secrets’ in 1998) and after that founded the symphonic metalband ‘In Darkness I Dwell’ (EP released in 2007). They split up in 2013. Nico played at metalcore band ‘Tears of Colossus’ before he came to us, and before that, he was with a band called ‘Shogun’.
The original idea was to do some jam sessions with the former members of Die Sinner Die, just for fun. I guess it was 2017 or something. We played the old DSD songs like there had never been a twenty year break, and we decided to make some new songs. That went very well, and the new songs were completely different from the old ones. It was a natural process, I guess you can say we became twenty years older, and in the meantime our musical influences changed. As a result, the new music sounded more mature, but slower and more threatening. We got ourselves a new vocalist (Filip) and added a keyboard player (Eddy) to make the new sound complete.  And of course, we changed the band name. Because after all, we are a completely new band.

How would you describe your style ? Which bands influenced your music ?
Some may call it doom metal, we call just it dark metal. There’s some influence of psychedelic rock, as well. We took all our influences and experiences with us to the new band and this music was the result. Is it genuine doom metal ? I don’t think so, but maybe the dark and doomy lyrics give it a little extra push in that direction. We have a story to tell, and we need the time to do it. That’s why we make such long songs, it can’t be told in three or four minutes. Our message is not optimistic, and we want the music to be the perfect canvas. So it’s threatening and slow, maybe even inconvenient. It’s like you’ve just seen a scary movie, it makes you slightly uncomfortable.
We keep being influenced by the old founders of metal : Sabbath, Purple, Zeppelin, etc. Alice in Chains, too. Even after all these decades, these bands and their songs remain immortal. In our way, we pay tribute to them.

Why should a metalhead buy your album/demos ?
Well, he doesn’t have to buy it, as far as we’re concerned. Almost every piece of recorded music can be found for free, these days. We don’t want to get rich making music, that’s not  our aim. As long as the fans have the opportunity to listen to our music and they enjoy it, we are very much honored. We will surely meet them at one of our gigs, get some beers together, enjoy the music of other bands too. Simple. That’s what Cult of Scarecrow stands for. We don’t want to be the best, although we are, of course(laughs).

What have your released so far and how were your releases received by the public/media ?
We recently released our debut EP with four songs, more than thirty minutes long. There was no record company involved, we did it ourselves. We really wanted an international sound, and we heard some of the recordings that Ace Zec did in his Oceanside Studio (Ostend, Belgium). We were immediately convinced that this was the man and the place. We got ourselves a nice budget and started recording in april 2018. It took some time for the mixing to become perfect, but Ace did a very good job. The mastering was done in Germany (Hamburg), and the result was even better then we’ve hoped for. We’re very proud of the end product. Now we want the world to hear it. You can stream it everywhere. And we chose to release a physical CD, too. Lots of metalheads prefer to see a cover, the lyrics, bandpics, info, … while listening.
Till now the reviews and reactions were all very good. People are curious to hear more of us.  Of course there are a lot of bands nowadays, and it’s difficult to get your CD reviewed. But we can’t complain, the reactions were unanimously positive.

Do you play live as well ? How’s your live activity so far ?
Yes, we play live. But we’re a relatively new band and we’re still writing our repertoire. We’ve played some small gigs till now, mostly tryouts. But we’re working on a full set. This should be ready in a few weeks or months. We’re writing very interesting new songs right now. I’m sure the audience will love them.

What should labels/zines/promoters know about your band ? Why should they be interested in it ?
That this EP is just the start of a magnificent adventure, with lots to come. We still have a lot of songs to write and a lot of stories to tell. We want to record a whole lot of albums and do a great bunch of gigs. People that want to hear or see us, will never be disappointed. We’re genuine, what you see is what you get. We’re all metalheads since we were young, and we have the experience. That’s what the Cult is all about.

What plans do you have for the near future as a band ?
As I said before, we’re writing new material. We’re putting our show together, and we want to play all the gigs and festivals we can get into. Maybe next year or so, we will record our first full CD. It will be great stuff, I’m sure.

Where can we listen to your band and where can we buy your stuff ?
Our EP can be streamed on the big channels such as iTunes or Spotify. Or you can listen and download it on Bandcamp, too. And we have a physical CD and merchandise like T-shirts. Just send us an email at cultofscarecrow@gmail.com or visit our Facebook page facebook.com/thecultofscarecrow if you’re interested. Spread the word and support the Cult ! Our regards and our respect to the fans in Romania !

March 2019