Please tell us about the history of your band and its members.
Nihil: Long story short: Jens and i had a metalband several years ago. We started off in 2006 as "Deus Ex" with a drummer, another guitar player and Jens´ brother on bass. Changed our name  to "Godscore", released two CDs without a single live-gig played and broke up in 2011. I was and still am in the band "PaPerCuts", while Jens does his "Chord of souls". Somewhere around 2012 we had the impulse to to something different - something simple and raw. Worked out ideas and wrote them by email only. Recorded our first album in summer 2012 and finally came to the conclusion that the whole thing was fun and entertaining enough for us and our audience to be a full-time band with releases, rehearsals, promo and live-gigs of course. Here we are now....

How would you describe your style? Which bands influenced your music? 
Jens: Godflesh, Ministry, Gary Numan, old Neurosis. I would call our style evil non-danceable Industrial Doom. Or Rubbish, you decide. 
Nihil: You forgot the early Pitchshifter but that´s pretty it, yes.

Why should a metalhead buy your demos/albums?
Nihil: First of all because they love our music. Second because we will never ever get ANY support from the mainstream. We will never get signed by a big metal label. So any money earned from royalties, downloads or fees is directly supporting our band´s activities, productions and so on. There´s still metalheads out there who like to support new bands from the underground and we realy appreciate it!
Jens: Because Metalheads still buy albums. Piracy is for posers ;)

What have you released so far and how were your releases received by the public/media? 
Nihil: Just a week ago, we released our first Remix-single for "Last Stitch". Our first album "Obsidian" came out in May. We had a handful of surprisingly positive reviews from webzines. It´s pretty impossible to get media attention and coverage by tradiotional print magazines. Well and there was this crowdfunding campaign we started to finance physical copies of the album - it failed but was fun to do. Guess we´ll have to wait and try better next time. 

Do you play live as well? How's your live activity so far?
Jens: So far there has been 4 gigs, but we hope to play a little bit more often. 

What should labels/zines/promoters know about your band? Why should they be interested in it?
Nihil: We´re sexy! That´s obvious. I mean, look at us: two aging nerds, rocking out and NOT dressed like metalcore-lookalikes. (laughs) Seriously, we´re all about rocking a stage (or your headphones) in front of a metalcrowd, who would otherwise never watch a band like us - just two guys with guitars, using samples and drumloops - and to succeed! We´re confident enough without solos, speed or technicality. By reducing our music to the most primal and simple basics (technically and emotionally) we´re able to be straight and into-your-face. That´s our niche.
Jens: Because we are not an occult-retro-rock band, to put it simple J I guess our style is pretty unique in these days, with only Godflesh being sole survivors of the 90ties. I don´t know if there is an actual hunger for our kind of music, and honestly I don´t care. 

What plans do you have for the near future as a band?
Nihil: We´re currently working on new songs - this time we´re jamming around in our room. Doing so, we want to write better live-songs and to be able to use them in our setlist. There will be a new release - an album or ep or even just maxi-singles. Another artist, called "Ghostfog" shot a musicvideo for "Monolith", which is still in production and of course we´re practicing a lot and looking for new live-dates. 
Jens: The Plan is to record a new ep as soon as possible.

Where can we listen to your band and where can we buy your stuff?
Jens: Bandcamp. Honestly I think, Spotify is just ripping bands off. Myspace is dead. https://ibyss.bandcamp.com/ and on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/ibyssband
Don´t forget to connect with us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/ibyssband


September 2014

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