I’ll admit I kind of freaked out when I found out I’d have the chance to interview Nile when they played at Kingdom in March. I’ve been a fan forever, especially in my high school days when I swore a very heavy allegiance to death metal and listened to almost nothing else. These days, I listen to all manner of punk, metal, and other forms of music, but there is something about the mysticism of Nile’s lyrical concepts and the melodic brutality of their music, juxtaposed with their goofy physical appearances and demeanor, that make me feel like a giggling sixteen-year-old again.
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For those of you who don’t know, Nile are a death metal band from South Carolina that formed in 1993. Their gimmick is that they write about Ancient Egypt and Egyptian mysticism. They also play their instruments like nobody’s business, resulting in brutal, pummeling metal that incorporates world music, real Egyptian instruments, and soaring, amazing guitar solos into the mix. I’m not a classical music scholar, so I tend to get bored with technical death metal bands that don’t care at all about catchy riffs, but Nile have never lost touch with their thrashy, old-school death metal roots, or stopped caring about writing accessible music.
The core of the band is George Kollias, metal drummer extraordinaire and master of the famed “blast beat” technique (think very fast double bass drums and snare at the same time--it basically sounds like a small explosion); Dallas Toller-Wade, lead vocalist and guitarist, who has a killer voice and recently shaved off his famed skullet in favor of a less creepy smooth-head look; and Karl Sanders, the man of the hour and the only person I ended up interviewing, who writes most of the music, sings and plays lead guitar, and also does all the weird additional instrumentation, like keyboards and traditional Egyptian instruments, present on most albums. (He also has a solo project where he plays traditional Egyptian classical music.) Their bass player has fluctuated throughout the years, but the core has remained solid, and it seems that’s all they needed to produce amazing album after amazing album.
Nile have released seven albums since 1998, and in my opinion there are no real duds in the mix. Most notable among these are Black Seeds of Vengeance (2000), In Their Darkened Shrines (2002), and Annihilation of the Wicked (2005). These albums mark the point where they really hit their stride, figuring out how to smoothly incorporate Egyptian elements into thrashy death metal, as well as becoming increasingly brutal and modern sounding. These are followed closely in my estimation by their two most recent albums, Those Whom the Gods Detest (2009) and At the Gate of Sethu (2012). Those Whom the Gods Detest is so angry and unrelenting that I almost expected them to call it quits afterwards. If nothing else, I figured their next album would be weaker. However, I was pleasantly surprised by Gate of Sethu. Instead of trying to out-brutal Those Whom..., they slowed it down and took things in a thrashier, more bare-bones direction. As Karl explains in the interview below, they used less production techniques and just tried to get back to the basics, resulting in an album that sounds a little more like their old stuff--a little less beefed up and angry, but certainly no less unrelentingly catchy and aggressive.
For a fan like myself, sitting down with Karl Sanders was extremely nerve-wracking. Karl was pretty much the way I expected him to be, a little surly and angry but generally good-natured. While we talked, he enjoyed the band's rider of pasta and soda, then noodled away on his guitar like Skwisgaar from Metalocalypse. In general, it was awesome, and despite one of my sarcastic replies in our conversation below, I still can’t believe that doing this is kind of my job.
Alright, so, the first question was, you have a new album....
It was, but it’s not anymore?
[Laughs] No, it still is. The new album, I feel like it’s similar to some of your older, heavier stuff--a little less heavy on the Egyptian stuff, less brutal, and a little thrashier in general. Would you agree with that assessment, and what do you think of the new album?
Sure, I would. I’ve enjoyed the new record. I think it’s sort of stripped down, a little rawer. It’s kind of a naked recording. It’s not huge and artificially fat with a lot of studio tricks, it’s just recorded the old-fashioned, plain and simple way. So many bands today use so many studio production tricks to make things sound huge and fat that even shitty bands that aren’t even heavy can sound heavy. We just wanted to strip everything down and play everything very old school.
You guys have always had the Egyptian imagery, but it seems like over the years since you’ve recorded your solo stuff, you obviously play really good Egyptian music now, and it seems like your lyrics are more in depth as far as actual ancient Egyptian history goes. Is that something that came about because of the band’s theme, or is it something you’ve always been interested in that you’ve just built on?
It’s just kind of an interest that I’ve built upon over the years. Certainly, when I’m researching the Nile lyrics, it’s an opportunity to look deeper into that aspect, and usually, although it is an interest of mine, I’m not in it as deep as when I am researching the Nile lyrics, if you know what I mean. I spend a lot of time playing guitar. It’s definitely my first calling.
You guys have undergone several lineup changes over the years, which is to be expected since you’ve been around for a while, but it seems like you’ve especially had trouble with bass players...
[Karl laughs]
...and I know you just lost Chris Lollis. What happened with that, and how are things going with the new bass player?
Well, Todd [Ellis] seems to be working out great, he’s a really stable, solid individual who doesn’t cause a lot of chaos, and that’s very appreciated.
It said online you guys just kind of lost contact with Chris. So there was no bitterness, and he just kind of stopped being a part of the band?
Well, he disappeared for four months and didn’t bother to call nobody, so.....
Totally understandable. [laughs] So, you’ve got a lot of deep concepts going on in your music, and obviously you’re also very technical musicians, so there’s a lot going on lyrically and musically. But you also make very catchy and brutal music, and a lot of people like it. How important is it that people actually understand the lyrics or the music, and how important is it to you and the band that they just like it and have a good time?
Every artist wants to be understood, hopes to be understood, but really, is that possible, to have every last person that listens to your music completely understand it? Who knows. If enough people enjoy it, then we can play music and hopefully play it for the people who do get it.
Fair enough. Have you ever gotten attention from scholars or professors because you focus so much on Ancient Egypt?
Quite a bit, actually. I get a couple letters a year from different professors. One year I was asked to speak at Flinders Petrie Museum of Art In England.
Cool! Did you do it?
No, we were on tour at the time.
Oh. Well, that’s still cool. [laughs] So, out of all the albums you’ve recorded, what is your favorite to date, and are there any you wish you could do over, or change?
I would do all of them over, if I could. I listen to a Nile record, I hear stuff we could’ve done better. We know every tiny thing about those records and what went into them, because we made ‘em. So it’s very difficult to listen to your work and not be hyper-critical.
I definitely get that, I’m the same way. So you don’t have a favorite?
No, I like ‘em all. [laughs]
OK. So what are you listening to these days? Classic stuff, new stuff, or stuff that’s not really death metal at all?
A lot of un-death metal stuff. I’ve been listening to a lot of Dio lately--Heaven and Hell, Rainbow, Sabbath. That kind of thing.
There are a lot of electronic music elements showing up in death metal lately--death metal remixes, stuff like that. Do you feel like all this is cool, since you guys incorporate Egyptian elements into your music, or do you feel like it’s cheesy and not really brutal at all?
Well, I suppose you’d have to examine that on a case-by-case basis. I prefer leaning towards music made my actual humans playing actual instruments.
Fair enough. I know Morbid Angel were kind of a big influence of yours. As I’m sure you know, their latest album hasn’t really been received the way most of their albums are. It’s really different than most of their stuff, and a lot of people don’t like it. How do you personally feel about it, and how much of that do you feel has to do with the influence they had on you?
I’m probably just like everyone else. I had.... hoped for something different from Morbid Angel for that last record. So it wasn’t what I wanted. But it’s not my band, so if I want to hear Altars of Madness or Blessed Are The Sick, that’s what I’ll put on.
Last question: the music industry has undergone a lot of changes since you guys started. I know I found most of your music on Spotify, so you guys are kind of in the cloud, but how do you feel about the fact that everything is available online these days? Do you think it’s good, or is it hurting?
Well, it certainly makes it harder to have a music career. I think we are in a transitional period in music. We haven't yet figured out how to adequately compensate the people who make the music when people download it. Until we figure that out, things are kind of going to be really sucky. I think things have really harshly, negatively impacted a lot of metal bands who are on the lower end of the spectrum. We don’t get a lot of money to begin with, and when you cut that into a tenth of what it was, you know, that’s even less.
Yep. It’s the same with journalism, so I totally understand.
I have noticed that there’s a parallel between the death of the music business and the death of music journalism.
It’s true. All my life, especially in high school, that’s what I wanted to do. And now I am a music journalist, but I also work in a coffee shop. [laughs]