Interviews
Rhapsody
Interview with: Luca Turilli, Rhapsody's Guitarist.
2004-08-25
It was on the 3rd day of the Wacken Festival, at about 17:00 German time, that I got to sit down with one of metal's greatest guitarists, and one of the three writing forces behind legendary Italian band, Rhapsody, Mirko from SPV records led us to the artists area of the festival, we found a shaded spot, and the band's manager split the reporters between the three, Alex, Fabio, and Luca, the other reporters got to sit outside, where the heat was scorching, and we got to sit down with Luca inside a air conditioned trailer, only to find him extremely happy, friendly, and open, and also, evidently, very pleased with the band's latest album, Symphony of Enchanted Lands II: The Dark Secret:
E: Hi Luca! First question is: how did you contact and come to work with legendary British actor, Christopher Lee?
L: At the beginning it was simply a dream, we saw him in the Lord Of The Rings films, and really wanted to work with him, and decided he was the best person to play a character in the album, at first, we contacted his daughter, who is also his manager, and that, surprisingly enough, her husband is a metal fan.
A few months of negotiations started between them and our label, and then we scheduled a meeting in London, in order to do the recording with him, we sent him our material, and he was very keen about it, especially from the classical/theatrical side of the music, Lee was turned into a Rhapsody fan, he liked our more grandiose, opus stuff.
We scheduled 8 hours of recording with him, but the fact was that we finished it all in 20 minutes, and the rest of the studio time we just sat there with him, and talked to him about his life and his movies.
Mr. Lee did narration on the album, but also sang on several operatic vocal parts,
E: Tell us about the process of making the album.
L: Since the end of August until the end of April we worked on the album itself, the budget, from our new label gave us possibilities that weren’t available before, for example, the orchestra that we worked with was recorded in the Czech Republic, and it was our first experience with a real, complete orchestra, during all the production process we had some difficulty fitting all the classical instruments with our usual instruments, so the whole process was extremely slow, yet very precise and meticulous, but Sacha Paeth, as usual, helped us a lot with it.
I feel that we've reached a certain limit to the amount of instruments that can be incorporated into an album, both from a technological point of view, and from the listening side of things.
Apart from that, there were no complications or problems with the process of making the album, just the complexity of it all.
E: All your albums are based solely on the saga that you created; do you feel that limits you when writing lyrics?
L: Rhapsody started out with the idea for a story, a myth, we wanted to further the plot but still to infuse new ideas, we invented the story, so we can take it to any direction we want to.
When we want to write about other subjects and ideas, we use them in our different side projects, Rhapsody is based only on the story and mythology we created.
We tell the saga using music, and we have great belief in it, and so how to write the lyrics and music comes to us naturally, inside the mythology we also infuse realistic subjects, things to do with our lives, we just metaphorize them into the story.
We are all very singular characters in the band, but the thing that we seek in the music is what binds us together, the love for what Rhapsody does, we are very pleased with the final outcome, I feel that we've finally reached a level when we know what we want, and how to reach it, and this time Rhapsody's vision finally met reality.
E: what about working with Sacha Paeth again?
L: The work with Sacha is great, his experience in the genre, in Heaven's gate, and as a producer fits us well, and also as a human being, and as a musician, since he knows what we want, and he knows how to achieve it.
E: What is the origin for the band's name?
L: As we started to use classical instruments and music as an influence, our first producer advised us to take on a name that will express that, and our label then, suggested the name, which is a classical music related term, Rhapsody is an extremely melodic tune, and so it fits us very well.
E: about your video clips from the past, they were…shall we put this gently…not exactly overly professional, what can you tell us about that?
L: (laughs…) the first videos we did were compatible with the budget we had…
The label we had at the time thought that the videos fit the music and the saga, we didn’t exactly agree.
E: are you planning a video for the new album?
L: yes we are, and SPV are also interested in it, our dream is that it'll be something in the vein and class of The Lord Of The Rings, but I doubt we'll have a proper budget for that.
E: What are your plans following Wacken?
L: I first want to come back home to Trieste, and to finish work on my third solo album, and after that, when the Rhapsody album will be officially released, we'll probably start our tour, the release of the album will be…
At this point Luca cant find the right word, we begin an hilarious session where the three of us, Luca, me, and Martin, our German correspondent throw words to the air, trying to find the correct one, all the while laughing, Rhapsody's manager, an American, also enters the place, trying to help us with the word, which we finally find…Compatible.
E: Would you consider doing a show in Israel?
L: I'd love to come over there, but the new label will probably set up shows for the regular countries we visit, such as Germany, we don’t make the decision on where to do the shows…
E: looking back on the time you started out; did you imagine Rhapsody becoming what it is today, a main force in the metal scene?
L: of course not, we didn’t imagine success hitting us this way, and today we are all packed with projects and music, and were are truly living metal in all we do.
Elad Miasnikov and Martin Gravholm
With help by Liran Shiber
