How did “Zygnema” happen? Can you tell us a little more about your band name?
Sidharth used to take guitar lessons from Teemeer and thats where he met Ravi and Jimmy. Sachin used to play drums for us but he had to part ways with us as he was way older than all of us and he had to sort out his career, so yeah that left us without a drummer for a couple of months. Later on we got introduced to mayank through our close buddy. I guess 2006 was the year when we actually started seriously.
Zygnema is a fresh water algae that gives rise to various other species. Sidharth was a Biology student and gave us this name right off his text book.
What do you think makes heavy metal separate from punk hard-core, death metal and speed metal?
Well they all are different styles of music. Every genre / sub genre is unique and stands out in its own way. Right from Guitar tones, style of drumming, lyrics, band image, everything counts.
According to you, what distinguishes great music from bad? Can it be distilled into technique, or is it something less easily defined?
There is nothing as bad music or good music. Its just a matter of perception and choice. Some dig hip-hop while some love Grindcore and we can go on and on about this however, no matter what genre, the music that is fresh, understandable, hooky and unique spreads and stays for a longer time.
What kind of ideas do you usually try to bring in your lyrics when you pen a song? I personally love the lyrics of “Scarface”.
It depends on whats happening around us at that time. We write interpersonal and socio-political words or stuff related to other bullshit that happens to us or others. Not thats its mandatory, but we generally have a strong positive message in the songs we write.
Heavy metal seems to share many values with Romantic art and literature from two centuries ago, right before Nietzsche began writing: reverence for nature, belief in a transcendental but not dualistic life, independence from humanist morality, desire to create the beautiful and eternal, searching for truth with the self as the lens but not the focus. Do you feel any of these in your own creation?
We haven’t thought of our music in the harrowing depth of the above terms. We write simple words that have a simple message. We belong to a modern era and write modern age songs based on the current situations life subjects us to.
What do you think are your most significant contributions to heavy metal? Why is it close to your heart?
Well, we haven’t contributed significantly towards heavy metal in general yet but if Indian Metal is considered, we’ve taken our flag to Germany, Thailand, and Dubai and shown the people out there that India has Metal in it too.
Zygnema has always said – “We are an intense crash of reality on your fragile face that will make you grind your teeth and contemplate ” . How successful do you think you have been in making the audience grind their teeth?
This successful: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dI1oPCOLhqg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLRhvGH9dmM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUzCE8I6JF0
