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Zweizz Interview: Svein Egil Hatlevik Scarlet: Greetings Svein, other than this interview what are you up to today? SEH: Today is the day after the last day of the Inferno festival here in Oslo. So today I woke up at three in the afternoon, after having an afterparty with a good friend of mine 'till early morning when we both passed out. We were wakened by another friend ringing the doorbell. Then we had a long meeting, sort of, trying to discuss an article we are supposed to write about Norwegian pro wrestling. And we drank a lot of coffee, and smoked some sigarettes, and listened to music. And then they left, and now I'm sitting in my very comfortable chair. It's pretty nice, I think. Maybe I'll mop the floors later, since it hasn't been cleaned in two weeks. Scarlet: Why did you entitle this release 'The Yawn of the New Age'? and does this somehow relate to the entire release or just the first release-titled track? SEH: I wanted a pompous title, and when I say "pompous" I mean pompous in the way that only black metal bands know how. But I still wanted the title to deflate its own pompousness, and I think that "The Yawn of the New Age" does that quite successfully. Another thing is that I want to make music about boredom, since so many of the people I'd feel comfortable comparing myself to, write lyrics and and choose their visuals seemingly based on the assumption that "death" or "satan" has any relevance. A lot of extreme metal music deals with liberation from fear, and how fear controls your life. A central idea in death metal, at least how I understand it, is to remember people of their fear of death, while still playing very energetic music, and this may be a strategy to liberate yourself from the fear of death. If you are free from fear, you can live your life with more meaning. The same thing also applies to the occurrence of satanic imagery in extreme metal. When I was a kid, I used to be afraid of "satan", but now I don't care about that bullshit. I don't let my fear of death or "satan" control me, or at least, in a lesser extent than before. Of course, I do have people with whom I have meaningful relations, and that makes me fearful of death, but I'm an adult and an atheist, so I don't believe in "satan" - or in the easter bunny. But I do know that I am afraid of boredom, and it seems that I am more afraid of boredom than death. Maybe that's why I won't give away my mp3 player to avoid global warming. Don't know if this reasoning really works, though. Anyway, I think boredom is a more interesting subject to deal with artistically than, for instance, "satan". And maybe even death. Or, more interesting than death, for sure, because so many artists have been dealing with death, but not so many have been dealing with boredom. So maybe dealing with boredom is less ridden with cliches? Scarlet: You refer to Homo Vinter as your "partner in crime", what is his part in Zweizz? SEH: He is my partner in crime, and i do not really think of
him as a part of Zweizz, since Zweizz is just me. So I'll try to be better
at communicating in the future that when I work with Homo Vinter, we're
operating as a duo: "Homo Vinter & Zweizz". I'm not interested in
working with people on a non-egalitarian basis. If I am to cooperate
(which I really love), I want them to take part in the cooperation, and
their say to be as important as mine. If I am to parttake in the
constitution of a new social entity, like a band or a marriage or any kind
of cooperation, I do not want that social entity to be hierachical. This
is a political choice: There are to many societies that are authoritarian
and hierarchical. Zweizz is not hierarchical, since I am a one man band,
and I am only me. I play in a band called Fleurety as well, and we've
essentially been functioning as a duo ever since the band was started in
1991. After a while, we were having problems with a power struggle within
the band, and the band stopped functioning healthily as a band for quite
some years. But now it seems like we are able to work together on an
egalitarian basis, and everything is going so much better. Scarlet: On the track titles of your latest release, there are a few references to sex and/or pornography in the such as 'Thank You in the Face', 'Masturbatory Attention Deficit Disorder' and 'B.B.D.' Is porn a big yawn to you? SEH: I don't know if "Thank You in the Face" is necessarily
pornographic, that's just your assumption - but I see why you interpret it
that way. Porn is in no way a big yawn, I think porn is often a very
interesting cultural phenomenon. There are a lot of things you can say
about the porn industry, one of them being that it is an industry that
systematically exploits a lot of people. But one has to be able to have
two thoughts in one's head at the same time. The reason why the porn
industry explolits people is that it is organised in a capitalist way. The
people who fuck in front of the camera make a certain amount of money by
selling their services to some company. And it is the owners of the
company that make the profits. The question whether or not the porn movie
in itself is good art is not necessarily interlinked with how the industry
is organized, even though it is hard to argue that exploitative art is
good. Scarlet: During my first listen of this release, it seemed like witnessing events of someone else's life flash before my eyes and into my ears- only perhaps not with the events being in chronological order. Do the tracks tell a story? or are they separate vignettes? SEH: They do tell a story, because I've arranged the songs in a certain sequence. I am very much influenced by an artist like Hans Appelqvist, for instance. Probably a bad example, since he works in swedish, so you english speaking fellas won't really get it, but I couldn't think of anyone better. Anyway, he uses music as a medium to tell stories. Ah, now I have an example that most of the people reading this can relate to: Ulver's "Perdition City". In the album cover, they explicitly tell you that this is "music to an interior film". I'm not really so much inspired by Ulver, but they are doing kind of the same thing as I want to do, they have a lot of different ambiences and styles represented on that album, and it's not for the sake of "being original" or "mixing genres", it is for the sake of narration. But I won't tell you what the storyline of "The Yawn of the New Age" is. I don't want to impede other people's imagination. Scarlet: Do you have any favorite classical composers and if so which one(s)? SEH: Hmmm. György Ligeti is one of my favourites, for instance one of his works is called "Continuum". It's written for harpsichord, and I've actually sampled it somewhere on my album - but I won't tell you exactly where. It has a really good, crisp sound, and it's played in a way that the tempo constantly changes, it really sounds very organic, like water running in a stream or something. But not quite. There was a time when I spent a lot of effort learning to play the piano, and at that time I listened a lot to Chopin's "Preludes", and I even played some of them, or at least I tried. His music is made at a time in history just before the system of tonality was about to collapse. It is usual to think of Wagners "Tristan und Isolde" (1865) as the end of tonality, and a lot of the music composed before that has a really interesting approach to tonality, and Chopin's "Preludes" are a body of work that is accessible to a rogue scholar of music such as myself, at the same time difficult enough for me to find it challenging again and again. Scarlet: Would you care to describe a bit about the project Umoral? SEH: One of things that happened today was that Teloch, the guitarist and songsmith of Umoral, sent me a couple of mp3s of mixes from a 7" we've been working on for a while, and now it sounds like pretty chaotic black metal, not chaotic in the sense of "The Oath of Black Blood" by Beherit, but I'm surprised to hear that my vocals ended up as sounding so chaotic - and I think they sound really good. So, basic information: Teloch is a member of Nidingr as well, a really good black metal band in my opinion. He does all the guitars and bass and writes the songs. Hellhammer joined us for the drums on the recording we've been working on, and I think that he will continue to be a part of the band in the future as well. I hope so, at least, because, as most people know, he is a great drummer. And I write the lyrics and do the vocals. We'll be releasing the 7" in the summer or autumn on Vendlus Records. Scarlet: With all of the projects you're presently involved in, I would imagine you spend a great deal of time in front of your computer (on cubase). What do you do to clear your head and ears in between working on each project? SEH: I go out to meet other people and have too many beers and too much scotch. I recently finished watching the fifth season of Sopranos. I wish I had more time to sit in front of the computer actually doing music, since I spend my days working as a journalist, writing, googling, editing text, sending emails and talking on the phone with people. But the only thing that really helps clearing my head and ears is traveling. The last year I've been going to Berlin, Rome and Sicily. Scarlet: Many metal musicians today claim to not want feedback or interaction with listeners, and that their creating music is purely an outlet for/of self expression. During an email conversation we had recently, you claimed otherwise. Would you please explain why you like to read/hear about other's perceptions of your works? SEH: Because that is very often the starting point for something more, something meaningful. The vast majority of my friends are people I met because of a similar interest or taste in music. Also, music does not exist without someone listening to it, and the people who listen to the music I make are just as important in making my music exist as I am, perhaps even more important, but I'm not really sure. I guess it's like a wheel, if you take away one half of it, it stops being a wheel. Scarlet: Has there been any backlash, hate mail or death threats from traditionalists for referring to this release as "black metal"? SEH: Not that I know of. Scarlet: What are some of the other projects you have in the works? SEH: More Zweizz stuff (nothing specific), some more Homo Vinter & Zweizz concerts, cooperation projects with Abigor, Joey Hopkins' Midget Factory, Vomit Orchestra, and probably more that I can't remember right now. A Fleurety 7" is coming up in the autumn, and after that we want to make a new album. I also have a duo with Kim Sølve (known from the Trine & Kim design company) which is called Pronounced "sex". We have an album coming up, we just need to find a label that suits our interests. Scarlet: Would you describe your present philosophy of life as nihilist, necro-spiritualist or how? SEH: All the ideologies I sympathize with are secular, for instance non-authoritarian socialism, LaVeyian satanism, chaos magick and scientific materialism. I don't like spiritual mumbo jumbo. Scarlet: Knowing how busy you are, I thank you for your time. With regard to your future works, I will expect the unexpected. SEH: Thank you for your time as well, and thanks to everyone who actually reads this. Mp3's of Svein Egil Hatlevik's projects:
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