Marienbad Interview

1. Can you tell us a little bit about the band for those that have never
heard of you before?
M. Roth: Marienbad was a little town in Czech which was flooded in the mid-60s, a storage lake occured where the village once was. There were always strange things that had happened within this town - and 12 of the villagers decided to stay in their hometown, theyŽve chosen death instead of beinig relocated to a new home. "Opus 1 - Nightfall" tells their story and some other weird and gloomy ones about what happened there over the years. The whole concept was written by myself, Yantit (my collegue in Eisregen for over one and a half decade) joined in and composed all the music, as guests we decided to ask Alan of THE VISION BLEAK and West of HÄMATOM to execute the drum- & bass parts, they were fascinated by the whole thing and played their parts very well.

2. how would you describe the musical sound of the new album?
M.: Because of the grim background we decided to choose very dark, slow and melodic metal to transfer my ideas into listenable music. You can find many different structures on Nightfall, but the whole concept is very depressive, dark and full of surprises.

3. What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the new release
explores?
M.: The whole lyrical concept is about the strange people that lived in Marienbad and the final drowning of the whole town which is portraied end of the album in "Wallof Water / Wasserwall". "Under Dam Crest / Unter Dammkrone" deals with the weird feelings even nowadays, when you walk around the storage lake there are always some strange feelings you can not really discribe. It is a very unique situation - and know what IŽm talking about, cause Yantit & me visited it End of 2010...
4. What is the meaning and inspirationbehind the bands name?
M.: Please refer to my answer of question no. 1 for the backgrounds.

5. What are some of the best shows that the group has played so far and
how would you describe your stage performance?
6. Do you have any touring plans for the new release?
M.: IŽm sorry to tell you that Marienbad is planned as a studio act only. We are all very busy with our own acts to play shows (Yantit & I with Eisregen, Alan with The Vision Bleak and West with Hämatom) so that we simply donŽt find enough time to go touring with Marienbad. Perhaps in some future it will be possible, but only time will tell.

7. Your album is released in both German and English, what was the
decision behind putting out the album in 2 seperate langauges?
M.: With our main band Eisregen we always have the little problem that outside German-speaking territorites there is a big problem in understanding what all is about. The lyrical concept always is a very important part for me, and so we decided to include a English-vocalized version as part of a 2CD-set, and so everyone interested in has no longer the problem of understanding. It was nice to make this English version, but of course personally I prefer the German one because its my mother language and the whole concept was written in German before translation.

8. Are there any other projects besides this band or is this a full time
level?
M.: Like mentioned before we all have our main acts to handle and Marienbad is kind of a project we really wanted to do. It costed us over a year of hard work to create this album, and that is much more time many other bands spend on their projects.

9. On a worldwide level how has you music been recieved by gothic/doom
metal fans?
M.: We got some very good reactions, both by press and fans. But itŽs a very special recording, defenitly not for all tastes and there are many people that will never find their way to Marienbad, and this is no problem for me. If you are not willing to put some time and effort in understanding what the whole album is all about you may never find the right path to this little sunken town. /div>

10. What diection do you seethe music heading into on future releases?
M.: I really hope that we can create "Opus 2" one day, there are many possibilities for sequelling the whole story. But nowadays I focus work on the forthcoming Eisregen-album entitled "Rostrot", and so maybe some time after finishing it we will concentrate on the next MB-release.

11. What are some bands or musical styles that have influenced your
music and also what are you listening to nowadays?
M.: Today IŽm to busy to really listen to ther bands, but the new Macabre and Autopsy-CDs are real great. Old School stuff like that is what I prefer personally, Yantit is very open-minded and listens to much more different styles.

12. Outside of music what are some of your interests?
M.: I am a real movie maniac! I have a very big collection of dvdŽs/blu-rays and IŽm always in search for some old italian cult films. Fulci, Argento, all that kind of sick stuff really fascinates me.I have a Cannibal Holocaust tattoo on my right arm, this should tell enough... ;-)

13. Any final words or thoughts before we wrap up this interview?
M.: If youŽre into dark, slow metal give us a chance and listen to Nightfall - perhaps this one is exactly for you. Thanks for the interview and sorry for the delay in aswering your questions, IŽm very busy the last weeks. Regards Michael nbsp;