Interview with NOCTURNAL DIVINITY

By Samael

For everyone who has been reading the interviews over the last past months, I haven't had any up in a while and I apologize, I have been busy. But, some good news is I am going on tour in late July/early August, but back on track now, I did an interview with the band Nocturnal Divinity. The band being compared too Lacuna Coil and Nightwish, and they are also hitting tour this month as well. Their tour kick off is July 18 with us at the Albert. But I sat down and chatted with the band before the interview, I just want to put it this way this band is very disciplined, and don't be shocked if you see them on the cover of Revolver in a less than a year from now.

BSW - . Who are your musical influences? (Artist/band wise)

Matt – Nightwish, Devin Townsend, Steve Vai, Rammstein, Iron Maiden

Frank – A Perfect Circle, Tool, Nine Inch Nails

Carly – Frank Sinatra, Thrice, Tears For Fears, The Gathering, Lacuna Coil, Nightwish

Brian – Geezer Butler, Yes

Mike – Amorphis, The Gathering, Nightwish

All – Nightwish, Lacuna Coil, The Gathering, Amorphis, Type O Negative

BSW - Most musicians have their preferred instruments & equipment (EX: Jackson guitars with EMG pickups or Ibanez with stock) Does your band have their preferences?

Matt – Marshall amps, Ibanez guitars, Boss pedals

Brian – Ibanez basses

Mike – Korg keyboards

BSW - What gives your band the inspiration to write its music?

Matt – Beer; seriously, it gets the job going and the juices flowing!

Carly – A bit of everything, really, from bad days to watching an hour of Metalocalypse before jamming.

Brian – Beer, Derek the sound engineer, green tape & pink dildos.

Mike – Isolation, imagination and creativity

BSW - As a band with a female vocalist, how do you feel it affects the way people perceive you?

Matt – I think that it delivers a certain color, softness and sensitivity that can’t really be done with a guy.

Carly – Being the vocalist, it does bring on a lot of stereotypes and the usual questions of being around 4 guys all the time, but because I don’t flaunt my body in any sort of way by wearing sort skirts or low cut tops, it brings on a higher respect from both sexes and a lot more focus to the music itself. It’s also nice knowing people are actually come to shows for the music and not just stare at my boobs [laughs].

Mike – Automatically, people may assume we sound like a bands such as Lacuna Coil before even listening [laughs].

BSW - What gave you guys the idea to start a band? If this is not your first band, what made you want to be in one in the first place?

Matt – I thought it would be cool, so I started looking. It got really fun and adventurous after a while.

Frank – For the love of music.

Carly – I used to sing all the time when I was young, but I lost a lot of my range in high school when I started smoking. I quit so that I could get that back because I missed it and figured I would go the extra mile and be adventurous. I wanted to do something that could put my creativity to use and bring up my self-esteem.

Brian – I like to play.

Mike – I need to express the dark matter building up inside & in ND I was looking to explore new instruments.

BSW - What made you think of the name Nocturnal Divinity?

Mike – When I was 18 or so I thought of that name. I wanted a name that described many, “The Dark and Light”, and guess it’s how I felt that day… Then it became my email addy [laughs]

Carly – It had a good ring to it and after time we realized that it really reflected our sound and image very well.

Brian – It’s better than Lormfurbistablumber

BSW - What is your favorite remaining location to play show for stage and sound? (If different for both please elaborate)

Matt – The Collective was great until it was recently bought out by a certain unmentionable business of tighty-whitey fruit bowl business men.

Carly – Considering Winnipeg is lacking venues... The Albert for sound and The Zoo for stage. I wouldn’t mind checking out what it’s like at Park Theatre and The Pyramid.

Mike – I like The Albert the best.

BSW - What is the song Heavenly Demon about? What gave the inspiration for this song?

Carly – Heavenly Demon is the only song so far, other than Stratosphere, which is directly about a specific subject or time. Back when Nocturnal first started, I was going through a really rough time with an old friend and he told me to write a song about it, so I did. I’m not going to lie, yes, it was an old boyfriend. I chose the name “Heavenly Demon” because one day we had decided to skip out on work and school to spend a day at the museum to check out an exhibit they had on about Opium, otherwise known as the “Heavenly Demon”.

BSW - With the upcoming release of your new album, what kind of things are you going to do differently for your tour?

Matt – Drink more and eat more ravioli

Carly – After learning some things from our first tour last year, we’re definitely taking more technical and mechanical precautions. As for the album, we’re bringing more merch like buttons & stickers, and having more little giveaways, and obviously selling cd’s. Oh, and no shopping for me [laughs].

Brian – Other than sell the album, not much, maybe more different merch?

Mike – DRINK MORE! Just kidding...