(((O))): Hi Chris, it's a pleasure to talk to you. How’s it going?
Chris: I'm great, thanks. We are glad to be able to talk to you about our latest album.
(((O))): Before talking about it, can you give us a bit of a background? How long has the band been together and how did you all meet?
Chris: Before Collapse Under The Empire we all played in a couple of bands. It's more of a coincidence that we all met. We both moved to Hamburg because of a new job and had to leave our bands due to the distance. We did not like to be without a band so we both went looking for a studio project, founded Collapse Under The Empire and polished our sound ever since. We originally started the project to break out of the usual band mechanisms. That bought us a creative space we never experienced before. In a band with several band members we were very limited in our creativity and could hardly express ourselves.
When we first started, we didn't realize in which direction we wanted to go. But we soon noticed that singing stood in the way of our songs so that we lost the whole flow because the attention immediately went towards the signing instead of being focused on the music. As soon as we knew we worked better without singing it all happened very fast.
(((O))): Where did you get your name from and what does it mean?
Chris: When we decided to make instrumental music in 2008, like most bands we started looking for a band name with a message for several months. Until my girlfriend brought the sweet name „Cute“ into play. We thought the name didn't fit a post rock band. However we both always liked double meanings and started looking for a band name that would fit the abbreviation C.U.T.E. In times of the world wide economic crisis we soon came up with our band name. We made a rather hard band name out of a sweet title. Kind of funny. People started interpreting many things into the name. It definitely states that something is at the brink of the abyss and is supposed to be some kind of premonition.
(((O))): Collapse Under The Empire have been among my favorite post rock bands for some time now. The thing that first struck me when I heard your music was just the perfect combination of electronic and post rock sounds together. What are some of the influences that shaped your sound?
Chris: Thanks for the compliment. We both use the music we grew up with and which helped us find new bands and inspirations for years. Of course you always try to do your own thing to differ from the other bands. That's very important for us: not to sound like a classical post rock band. Of course we are popular as a post rock band since we compose instrumental music but we try to push the boundaries as much as possible. Who knows; maybe we'll completely reinvent ourselves with the album. A dream of us would be to make a step equally as significant as “Talk Talk” with their last two albums. Even today you can draw your hat for this masterpiece. Maybe there is only a handful of bands that achieved to fulfill their perception of honest music.
(((O))): Your music is often classified as electronic post-rock. Do you agree with that? What do you think of genrefication?
Chris: Actually we never played classical post rock, we rather move between genres. Classical post rock normally consists of two guitars, bass and drums and provides the loud/soft break a la Mogwai as well as a song length beyond the 10minute mark. We never quite satisfied all these characteristics because our music is composed differently and we seldom go beyond the 6 minute mark. Even the typical loud/soft breaks are hard to find in our albums. However post rock is the genre we resemble most as we play instrumental music and function in a similar way regarding the melancholy and our melody construction. We see ourselves somewhere between film music, instrumental, rock, post rock, ambient, dark and electronic music. This represents the average listener who often tag us on platforms like Lastfm or Spotify with these key words.
(((O))): Your last work, Sacrifice & Isolation, can be considered your darkest album to date, full of dramatic and unsettling sounds. It is also your most experimental work. Its first part combines electronic and post rock sound; the second part is definitely heavier. How would you say the new album fits in with your overall sound?
Chris: You could say that we refined our sound with our last 5 albums and 4 EPs and tried not to repeat ourselves. This gets harder the longer you are making music. Our albums and EPs often create a threatening and dark atmosphere but when you listen carefully you can find tracks that are optimistic and almost have a pop character to them as well. That's not the case when it comes to our latest album Sacrifice & Islolation but even there it gets a little more hopeful at the end. The preference for the dark is surely a product of our listening habits we cultivated over the years.
(((O))): Can you describe the writing and recording process for Sacrifice & Isolation?
Chris: The second part Sacrifice & Isolation was originally planned to be released one year after the first part. But we realized that we weren't ready yet to dive into the darkest parts of our story. Many tracks we composed after S&G just weren't dark enough to conclude the second part. But we are glad we took our time with it and have released our most successful album Fragments of Prayer as well as the EP The Silent Cry in the meantime.
Composing and fiddling about with new sounds is almost always done together. Martin is playing all of the stringed instruments while I take on the keyboard instruments as well as the drums. Martin is in charge of everything concerning the recordings, mix and mastering. I took over the management and promotional side of our work.
(((O))): Do you have any favorite songs from the new album?
Chris: On every one of our albums are a couple of favorites we are especially proud of and are glad that we came up with it during the composition. 'Cause even today nothing is composed when we are recording in our studio. Many parts come up spontaneously and you never know how one of our tracks is going to unfold. Our current single 'Stairs to the Redemption' is a good example. The track started out as a purely ambient until the conclusion turned out as one of our hardest and rawest works. That was never planned and happened purely coincidentally. When we listened to the guitar recording after the first session we were really stunned what came out of the speakers and decided to leave it as it was.
(((O))): Shoulder & Giants and Sacrifice & Isolation, the two-part concept album, deal with the themes of human existence, freedom, isolation and death. How come you had the feeling to write music about these strong themes?
Chris: The movie Into the wild by Sean Penn inspired us to compose this conceptual work. We wanted to convey who we are and what me make of our lives. Our goal was to express these emotions musically. It is about using ones lives for ones ideals and to fight for it.
We wanted to create something big consisting of two parts. So we had the idea to use this theme in a new concept. We wanted to build the first part Shoulders & Giants a little more hopeful and euphoric in order to unfold the dark side of the story in the second part. I think that went pretty well with Sacrifice & Isolation. It was supposed to be an album that does not become accessible too easily and where you need a little endurance to stomach the clunky sounds in some of the tracks. The concept is open to interpretation. That's exactly what we were trying to achieve to help every listener find his own story.
(((O))): Thinking about Sacrifice & Isolation, Shoulder & Giants and The Silent Cry EP, that are all connected, what if I ask you to pick a song for each of the theme of human existence, freedom, isolation and death? And why you choose them?
Chris: This question is hard to answer 'cause it's conceptional work and the tracks are interconnected like some kind of story. We wanted to take the audience on a journey where each listener can find his own interpretation.
(((O))): I see.... 'Light In The Distance' is the example of that electronic post-rock that distinguishes your style. What do you do to create that particular sound?
Chris: We like to work with analogue synthesizers we place between the guitars and the drums. They provide a good substance and fill the whole track. 'Light In The Distance' is a very electronical track with slight dub step nuances.
(((O))): To present Sacrifice & Isolation you released the 'Stairs To The Redemption' with an accompanying video directed by London-based Dan Tassell that gives the perfect images to the music. How important is the combination of music and video representation?
Chris: People often say our music sounds like the soundtrack of a movie; mainly because we completely abstain from using any vocals. That's why the connection to the motion picture is very important to us. Music videos are our first priority. With every release we try to publish at least one video. This is the second time we work with Daniel Tassell. He was the director of the 'Disclosure', a song of the album Shoulders & Giants.
(((O))): I appreciate the fact that for downloading the track 'Lost' via Bandcamp, all the profits go 100% towards the organization Rainforest Rescue. This is the way you choose to support that organization in its continuous work of preserving the rain-forest and saving the animals, plants and people living there. How did you come to this idea? Are you going to do that again?
Chris: The idea started to form in our minds after we became aware of the theme in a documentary. We started our first charity event at which we fought against the pointless slaughter of sharks three years ago. To us these campaigns are part of the life as a musician. It's a great feeling when you manage to reach some of the fans who are made aware of the topic or maybe even donate for a good cause.
(((O))): Who are your favorite musicians? Would you want to collaborate with any of them in the future?
Chris: We love to listen to independent rock, post rock and synthpop bands. We especially like the cooperation with other artists 'cause their influence makes you come up with new ideas and styles. The result often sounds completely different. We already worked with the Russian post rock band Mooncake and published a split EP with a music video. We composed the track 'Black Moon Empire' together. Our next plan is the collaboration with successful movie composers.
(((O))): Any bands/albums out right now that you guys are really digging that we need to know about?
Chris: Yesterday we watched the live concert of The Naked & Famous and were really impressed by their performance. The band is just awesome! Many tracks truly rock and really take off. It's a great mixture of synthesizers, guitars, solid drums and an incredible vocalist.
(((O))): What are your plans for the near future?
Chris: We are going to expand our record label Finaltune Records and concentrate on the production of movie/TV and game music. We already work with 8 professional composers. We're just starting but we already have successful partners to cooperate with who will make it easier for us to set foot in the movie soundtrack business.
(((O))): Thanks for talking to us and good luck with your projects!
