Hailing from the misty hills of Guwahati, Rectified Spirit is one of those bands who don’t restrict themselves to be classified in a single sub-genre. Fresh from their self-titled album release, we caught up with the band for a little chit chat about their new album, band line-up changes and more
Eight Octaves: Firstly, describe your sound. What I found after listening to your album is that you have a nice Progressive/Power/Heavy Metal influence in your music. But as a band, what kind of sound do you want to achieve and stick to?
Recitifed Spirit: We guess that’s a kinda leading question…as the question itself is leading to its answer.. the bottom line is that we don’t want to stick to one fixed and particular form, genre or style rigidly… if you really want us to label the sound or genre (although we are somewhat opposed to the idea of a band labelling and describing its style itself)… we would like to call it LIBERO METAL… and it would signify for us the idea of being liberated from all pre-existing forms of style and specific and stereotypical habits of generic consciousness..
While making music, a band is not at all aware what kind of generic label is going to be used to describe its music over the years by the press and by its listeners. Genre is something that evolves throughout a period of time and even debates may ensue between its fans as regards what type of generic description can be given to the band. However, if the band takes upon itself the same exercise even while making its music and adheres to one typical sort of genre that has already existed in the world, then the music stops evolving and it merely revolves around a few reference points in terms of a few pre-existing genres and even bands. This thing limits the finer parameters of music making and also restricts the musical sensitivity of individual musicians which leaves no scope for openness and a free spirited approach towards making music. That is why, now-a- days we constantly hear bands saying “We are a metal core band”, “We are a Technical Death metal band”, ”We are a neo-classical progressive metal band” and all such restricting definitions. This also makes the music that comes out, strained, repetitive, dragged and predictable. Well the bands which have earned these generic labels were not aware of what the band was going to be labelled over a period of time. These bands have earned those generic descriptions on their own. And some bands even dispute the kind of label that the press gives them. Therefore, the idea of deciding a set and fixed genre is something which appears absurd to us and is also artistically restricting, limiting and stagnant. Toni Iommi, the undisputed founder of the roots of heavy metal, when asked once about Heavy Metal by a quite enterprising journalist, had retorted back by saying “ What the fuck is that??“
Eight Octaves: Take us through the new self-titled album, song by song. I found each song to be very unique and I would love to know the inspiration behind them.
Recitifed Spirit:
To Hold a Sabre: Is In the revered memory of Xenapoti (General) Lachit Borphukon,
The Hero of our Race, whose historic resistance of the Mughal Aggression and consequent win at the Battle of Xoraighat in 1671, had failed all attempts by the Mughals to enter South East Asia for all times to come ; whose Soul rages in agonising pain today, to hear the footsteps from the foreign land at the Gate of his Tomb
Bloodrush: Especially deals with guilt. Many times people do despicable things and commit sins under a rush of blood to their heads when they surrender to their more primitive animalistic instincts. But just when it’s done, only then does one realise that the guilt that follows will have to be borne only by the human being inside. That’s what bloodrush does to us. It is the time when the sinner prefers redemption rather than forgiveness and the thing that is common between the sinner and the sinned is that none of their sould can rest in peace. That is the dichotomy or paradox of Bloodrush.
Paradigm Lost: Based on the silent crusade of IROM SHARMILA, “The Iron Lady” of Manipur…..who has been on a fast until death for the last 11 years with her appeal for striking down the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958…..which gives the Men of the Armed Forces absolutely Draconian Powers…an actual license to kill any person, having the authority of Law, merely based on suspicion… The song is inspired by the Award Winning Documentary by Borun Thokchom titled “The Silent Poet”…
The Magician’s Birthday: Is about the loss of innocence and the sense of wonder that we lose when we step into adulthood and the gradual mechanisation of human emotions brought about by the modern concrete world
Rectified Spirit: The song centres around the theme of re-incarnation and sort of tries to convey an idea that the human soul is in the perennial cycle of evolving and rectifying itself and each human birth that it takes, is only a stage in that never-ending process wherein, the soul puts into effect the lessons learnt from all its previous births and becomes a RECTIFIED SPIRIT.
There Is No Tomorrow: Deals with conquering of one’s inner fears
Where The Ashes Fell: Is a take on the failure of the state administration to prevent the October 30th 2008 serial blasts throughout Assam, even though there were repeated and recurring information from all the informers of the police department that certain number of militants had entered the state at a particular time, which had leakages to the press also. But surprisingly, no follow up was taken pursuant to that.
Vengeance: The song deals with the justifiability of the idea of revenge told through the eyes of introspection fears
Until We Expire: Talks about the life on the road for a band which creates a mixed sense of exhaustion and addiction in the mind
Mother: Is about the inherent virtue of sacrifice that motherhood is endowed with, which is also our first lesson in sacrifice that we learn in our lives..
Eight Octaves: You guys broke up as a band in 2009 due to some personal engagements, and then reformed again in 2011. This album marks your second coming, how has it been so far?
Recitifed Spirit: Releasing this album feels like a moment of catharsis… and also feels like letting go of a lot of things… this is specially so because this album contains so much of our deeper pent up emotional areas, which we had been holding within ourselves for such a long time, that releasing of this record feels like releasing ourselves from a lot of those intensely captivating issues…It also makes us wonder whether as individuals, we would be able to remain the same .. as we are also letting go of a lot of our “selves” through these intense lyrical and musical Expressions…
Eight Octaves: Who would be your major influences in music individually?
Recitifed Spirit: Major musical influences would be:
| Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Saxon, Metallica, Megadeth, Pantera, Testament, Annihilator, Dream Theater, Symphony X, Inflames, Lamb of God, Necrophagist, Periphery, Born of Osiris, Slipknot, Protest The Hero, Circus Maximus, Messhuggah, Veil of Maya and still running!! |
Eight Octaves: Take us through the song writing and composing process. Is it a group discussion or is it like a step by step process, like completing a jigsaw puzzle?
Recitifed Spirit: The band’s guitarist Samudragupta Dutta writes the lyrics for the band. The lyrics are generally introspective in nature which tends to bring out the deeper and more pent up emotions felt by a human individual. The lyrics often try to take an inside view of the Human mind in terms of its actions and reflections towards its own emotive existence although few of the songs also deal with different issues, which are more of a reflection towards the outside world. However, majority of the tracks deal with all the intense pent up emotions that a human individual stores within itself and the deeper and more unreachable recesses of the mind .
The majority of the tracks in the Debut Album were composed by Samudragupta Dutta and Rainjong Lepcha in a series of lengthy sittings…However, there are tracks which have the overall compositional contributions from all the band members including earlier guitarists Gitartha Goswami, Imtiyaz Alam and present members Himangshu Borah and Nishant Hagjer
And yeah… the process is very much like that of completing a jigsaw puzzle for some of the tracks.. as if the song is a pre-determined entity.. like the song was destined to be the way it came to be and we just figured out the way it would sound RIGHT and PERFECT and COMPLETE.. tracks like Bloodrush, There is No Tomorrow, the Magician’s Birthday, Where The Ashes Fell, Vengeance, Until We Expire… But for songs like Paradigm Lost, Rectified Spirit, Mother and To Hold A Sabre we were very much consciousness of the Aspect of Experimentation and the Different ways the song can be given shape to…Like a Step by Step Process with numerous Band Meets and Discussions…
Eight Octaves: Did the band line-up change ever make you feel uncomfortable? Every musician has a style of their own, so it’s not easy to adjust every time
Recitifed Spirit: Not at all… well the thing is until 2011, when the band was reformed by Samudragupta Dutta and Himangshu Borah, there were no other composers in the band except its Founder Guitarist Samudragupta… and from 2005 to 2009 he had an array of tracks composed for RS’s Debut Album…Large part of the compositional process had already started and also partly done with for songs like There is No Tomorrow, Until We Expire, Where The Ashes Fell, The Magician’s Birthday, Rectified Spirit and Vengeance which were later worked on with Vocalist Rainjong Lepcha to a great extent during lengthy sittings… all the other Tracks Bloodrush, Paradigm Lost, To Hold a Sabre and Mother were Composed as Brand New Tracks for the album with other band members Himangshu Borah and Nishant Hagjer and a few ex-members Imtiyaz Alam and Gitartha Goswami….
The present Line up is the 1st steady line up of Rectified Spirit… so this is in fact the 1st time we feel that we are finally home on steady ground and we feel absolutely comfortable only now, to be precise…
Eight Octaves: How does it feel to have someone like Nishant handling the drum duties? He is one hell of a drummer no doubt, does having him in the line-up ease you up while composing new material, given his exceptional skills and range of styles?
Recitifed Spirit: It’s an unbelievable pleasure to play with such a gifted musician… and yeah absolutely, he is the invisible composer in the band subconsciously influencing us in every track we have made for the album.. it would be an understatement to say that the songs are lifted a few steps up only due to his exceptional inputs in terms of rhythmic aggression…he totally eases us up as we feel we are totally in safe hands and everything is gonna sound only nice, right and perfect now..his range of styles is what has truly given an unbelievable shape to each and every song on the album… He is actually the Invisible Composer in the band…
Eight Octaves: Which band would you like to play with? International or Indian, doesn’t matter
Recitifed Spirit: Everyone has a different pick for this one!!
Rainjong Lepcha: Queensryche
Samudragupta Dutta: Iron Maiden
Dishankan Barua: Dream Theater
Himangshu Borah: Symphony X
Nishant Hagjer: Periphery
Eight Octaves: Any upcoming shows or tours supporting the album release? Where do you see yourselves after 5 years; now that the Apocalypse theory failed and the planet will exist for some more time?
Recitifed Spirit: After release of the album, the band intends to promote the album by going on a tour and doing a number of shows across the state and also venues outside the state so as to showcase the band’s live performance and expose themselves towards the live audience and to experience people’s response towards the band’s music. The permanent plan of the band is to keep making music on a more prolific basis , getting them out to the outside world by coming up with more and more albums, exploring newer directions, possibilities and crossing all boundaries in metal music, keep on touring throughout their lives to share its music with the live audience and YES!! NEVER TO QUIT ON METAL.
Rectified Spirit – Rectified Spirit Album Review
Rectified Spirit on Reverbnation
Rectified Spirit – Paradigm Lost Jamming video:
