Interview with Angelstrife

Angelstrife is a band from Hannover, germany. they're around for five years now and played shows like f.e. "Viva La Horror". Now, the trio is about to release their thirs album: the ep "Ashes To Ashes". Bassist and vocalist Shamy Shameless took some time to talk with us about the upcoming ep, the band and some plans for the future...

Graveyard Greaser Gang: first of, could you please introduce yourselves to the people who don't know you already?
Shamy Shameless: I'm the bass player of a band named Angelstrife. We do play horrorpunk and other types of modern punk and rock'n roll music. Besides me we have Mr. Chris Blood on all guitars and vokills and Taz I.M. on drums. We're a three piece power trio from hell.

GGG: where do you see the main diffrence between Angelstrife and other horrorpunk-bands?
SS: The main difference between us and other horrorpunk bands from germany is the fact that we combine horrorpunk music with other types of music. On the Sounds Of Dementia record a lot of people said, that there is something more in our music than just only that typical scene "Woho" background screams and scary sounds and horrorpunk attitude. When you listen to a song like "Lies" we felt more inspiriet by a band like The Turbo A.C.'s.

GGG: your favorite bands to listen to in private?

SS: So many bands i listen to. Not only horrorpunk related, but when you ask me what horrorpunk i'm listening to these days its absolutly a band named PAIN! and my "altime favourite" Phantom 13. Besides these bands i listen to the new The Other record Fear Itself.

GGG: three years after you last release, you are about to release a new ep called "Ashes To Ashes". what took you so long to record a new ep?
SS: We did release Sounds Of Dementia in the late summer of 2012. After some shows Mr. Stardust did left the band and Taz I.M. came in. We wanted to go into studio since summer of 2013 but in early fall that year Taz I.M. did had a very terrible left hand violation and had to go into hospital and couldn't play drums for months. In 2014 Chris had some problems with his voice and his doctor said that he shall not sing for a few month. After he was ready we did definitly decide to go into studio. Besides that fact of health reasons no one in the band is rich and nobody has rich parents. So we always have to choose very differentiated which studio we're able to book. With the record of Ashes To Ashes we're really proud to let all that behind.

Shamy Shamless live on stage

GGG: what can we expect from "Ashes To Ashes"? and why is it not a full-lenght album
SS:  It's a really tough record! We tried to be exactly "on the point" in writing the songs. No boring gimmicks or stuff like that. It's really "in your face". Most of the songs we tried live, and it always worked. So we're looking forward. We wanted to make a real full length but we just didn't had the studio time. So we decided to make an ep.

GGG: who made the artwork for the ep and whats the idea behind it?
SS: There is not special meaning or story behind it. We just wanted to make a simple artwork which everybody can understand. We did on our own pc, with simple programmes.

GGG: what was the main inspiration for the upcoming ep?
SS: The main inspiration was that we absolutely wanted to make new music people can listen to. Some day Chris came up we the raw idea of a song named My Sweet Death. After i heared the guitar riff it really blown away. So we decided to take that song on the ep. All songs are written by myself or Chris. Mostly we write together.

GGG: will there be a show/tour to promote the new ep?
SS: Currently there are no fix tour dates and no fix date when this little piece of music is definitly coming out. We're all into vinyl and cd, so we definitly didn't wanna wanna release it digitally only. Currently we're watching the music market and negotiate with labels. Promotern and supporters can send us a email to get the songs directly by the band.

the upcoming ep "ashes to ashes"

GGG: are there plans for shows or a tour in 2015 in general?
SS:  We're always looking for shows and tourdates, but to me it doesn't make sense to me to be on a long tour without a label or other support for a record you know.

GGG: talking about shows: what was your best as show so far and why?
SS: To me its always fun to be on stage. I really love playing with my brothers from Angelstrife. Best show? Hmm.. hard to say. One of our very first shows we did in Angelstrifetime was a Blitzkid show we did as a supporting band in 2011. That was really fun. I remember Chris and me being really nervous just hours before the show started. I mean Blitzkid are one of our all time inspirating in the band. So that was really on special moment/event. Besides that, i really do enjoy all shows Angelstrife did. Last show we had was a show with a band named Rezurex here in our hometown on a late thursday event. That was also an "killer moment" i really like Daniel and his band.

GGG: back to albums: if you could choose any band, with who would you like to make a split ep?
SS: Hard to say. I would prefere a corporation with one of our partners from hell Jamey Rottencorpse And The Rising Dead. We did a lot of shows together, its always fun meeting up and having a drink with them.

GGG: Angelstrife exists for 5 years now - where do you see the band in 5 years?
SS: One of my definitly wishes is to have a constant band line up over to next years were we can work together and making more records and playing more shows. Time doesn't matter to me, when things are right!

GGG: anything you wanna add?
SS: We definitly love playing live and making music together! Thank you for the interview. We really apprecciate it!