1. Introduce us to the band! What are your names and what do you do in the band?
Where do you call home?
Laur: I’m Laur, I write some lyrics and sing the songs. I live in Besançon, France. I’m originally a drummer so I also help with that when needed.
Charles Why: I’m Charles Why, I live in Melbourne, Australia. I compose the music and play the bass, guitar, cigar box, harmonica, various traditional instruments (Shamanic Drums, Shruti Box, Gong, … ), sing a little bit and produce.
In Golem Dance Cult, we are joined by Klaus Karloff, quite a strange fella, kind of a German Shaman, who is co-producing our albums, a process he calls “Sonic Seance”.
2. How long have you been together as a band and how did you find each other?
Charles Why: Laur (singer) and myself actually started our musical journey together when we were teenagers… (we even toured together in our respective band and always stay friends, but eventually we had each followed our musical path…) That is, until 2021, during this strangest of times (pandemic, lockdown), we reunited for this new musical adventure.
3. Do you have a special songwriting recipe you follow?
Charles Why:Not really, except that during composition and recording phase, we try to keep the intention spontaneous and sometimes let mistakes guided us in order to never feel safe with our material. The main approach to our composition is that we favour vibe over perfection.
Laur: Charles usually has an idea, a theme and a song title and I let my imagination and inspiration do the rest.
4. How would members of your family describe your music to someone that hasn’t heard it?
Charles Why: our sound is heavy but danceable, rock based without the formal structure of the genre and with an electronic approach in layering different sounds and rhythm. Experimental but with hooks.
Laur: Gothic hard rock or something like that : )
5. What do you have on your(Spotify) playlists you would be embarrassed for others to see?
Laur: I don’t really use Spotify, I did maybe 2 or 3 playlists on it and contributes to one Charles did but I rarely listen to music on there. I still buy records.
Charles Why: I have a “Madeleine de Proust” playlist which contains songs I used to love as a kid (some French pop, anime soundtrack, Kiss, Gotainer), nothing really to be ashamed of but not something I will share during a party either;-)
6. Do you have any pre-show rituals?
Laur: it’s usually nothing too fancy, just a drink.
Charles Why: same here plus I usually play my bass to prepare for the show.
7. Who have you met that has left you starstruck?
Laur: Maybe people like Sylvain Sylvain, David Johansen, Sam Yaffa, Brian James Dave Tregunna when my old band Sparkling Bombs opened for them. Still with the same band, we had a show in Las Vegas and the promoter was Brent Muscat (Faster Pussycat), a band I’ve been loving for so many years. I still remember when I bought their first album. All these people were really cool to us! I got also quite impressed when a friend introduced me to CC Deville (Poison) and Ginger Fish (Marilyn Manson) at the Rainbow in Los Angeles on the same night.
Charles Why: as a teenager, I won a contest as an Angus Young (AC/DC) “look-alike” . I was invited to meet the band and went on stage with them in Paris for their intro song. The band was super cool, especially Angus who is a teetotal so as a teenager I could totally relate to that. With my previous band, L-DOPA, we opened for No One Is Innocent in Paris, and the singer, Kémar, was really cool, we had a long chat and he offered me some useful advices on life on the road.
8. What do you consider your greatest achievement as far as a band?
Charles Why: Just doing what we do, which is creating music that we enjoy is an achievement in itself. Plus I have to say I’m quite proud to release our latest album “Shamanic Faultlines” on vinyl!
Laur: Our brand new album “Shamanic Faultlines”! Being able to do all of this despite the distance between us is also quite an achievement!
9. What key elements do you believe makes up a successful song?
Laur: I think successful songs are all catchy in a way or another, not necessarily in a “catchy chorus” way though.
Charles Why: something that resonate with you when listening to it.
10. When writing, how do you know when it is finally done?
Charles Why: That is the real tricky part. You can forever work on a song. At one point you have to surrender yourself. This is when having deadlines can be useful as sometimes it helps having your back against the wall.
Laur: When Charles sends me the 12th version of a song saying “This time it’s the good one!” : )
11. What song of yours are you most proud of?
Laur: The ones on the new album for sure but it’s a bit too new to be able to pick one yet. It will be interesting to think about this in 6 months or so.
Charles Why: Agree, I’m real proud of “Shamanic Faultlines” especially since for this album we were able to collaborate with several of our musicians friends such as Inga Liljestrom, who lent us her amazing voice on a few songs, Dick Dens from “The Irradiates” who played guitar on two tracks, Loki Lockwood (from Velatine and founder of Spooky Records) played synth on one, Boris Boublil (Mu and Emilie Loizeau) Moog and organ, Jean-Philippe Feiss played Cello, … Each brought their own sensibility to the song they played on. That being said, I have a soft spot for “Nosferatu Waltz” from our first EP for whatever reason….
12. Is it possible to be on the road and not eat junk food? How do you keep it leveled out?
Laur: I’m vegan and don’t eat that much junk food. The difficult thing to me is more just being able to eat in some places! Haha… France for instance. It’s been better these last years though.
13. Are you able to write while on the road or do you need a calm familiar space like home?
Charles Why: musical ideas, such as riff or melody, can come wherever you are, however to properly record I prefer being in my lair.
Laur: I’ve never really written on the road apart from finding something interesting during soundcheck.
14. What’s the most embarrassing thing to happen on stage or on tour?
Laur: Since I’ve started being on stage as a vocalist, the most embarrassing thing to me is not being able to remember the lyrics. By chance, I usually find something that fits! Haha
Charles Why: during a gig, I missed the ending and continued playing away on the bass. And this was a David Bowie cover (Suffragette City), I would have loved being able to disappear on the spot;-)
15. What can BleachBANGS do to help you in any way?
Charles Why: Help us share the gospel, that our new album, Shamanic Faultlines is now out!
16. How can everyone keep up with everything you have going on? Where can they get albums/merch?
Charles Why: Shamanic Faultlines is available on BandCamp and in some retailers (list on our website www.golemdancecult.com)
