Angra
Winds Of Destination

20.04.2007

The metal invasion from Brazil seemed to be a reality in the early 1990s, but after the flood of raw, yet energetic acts from Latin America drained, only a few survived on the international scene. Angra is definitely one of them. The unique combination of power metal, classical music and Brazilian folk influences they have been providing for 15 years has numerous fans all over the world, and even though the band went through a serious personnel reshuffle six years ago, with outcasts forming their own group Shaaman, Angra are still going strong. In 2006 they celebrated 15 years in the music business with the release of their sixth album called “Aurora Consurgens”, and we got in contact with guitarist and founding member Kiko Loureiro to discuss Angra’s path through the years and the place where they are at the moment…

Your previous album “Temple Of Shadows” (2004) was a concept CD, but the new one, “Aurora Consurgens”, is more like a regular album with separate songs. Why didn’t you go on with another concept CD?

Every album has to have a concept – a musical concept, an idea for the artwork, an idea for the songs, something that links the music, the lyrics, the artwork, everything you’re expressing with your music. In this sense, all our CDs have a concept behind them. But when we speak about a concept album, we’re talking about the story, the characters that bind together all the songs, and this was true about “Temple Of Shadows.” As to “Aurora Consurgens”, the music was more direct, heavier, deeper and maybe more melancholic in a way, and the lyrics we started writing were more depressive. So we decided to address psychological issues and started writing about psychological problems, mind disturbances and things like these. All the lyrics are dealing with human relationships, and the way people handle these mind disorders. This is a kind of concept, but we are not telling a single story of someone who’s suffering, there is nothing like this.

The album cover was once again done by Portuguese artist Isabel de Amorim. What attracts you in her works so much. And what is the meaning of the new cover? These two bodies with three legs look quite strange…

When we wrote these lyrics about mental disorders, we took a look at some of the main professionals in this field, such as Freud or Carl Jung, and Jung based one of his theories on a book called “Aurora Consurgens”. This book was forbidden by the Catholic Church, and it contains 38 strange drawings that show the reflections of St. Thomas Aquines’ mind. The cover is basically one of these drawings. That’s why the album is called “Aurora Consurgens”, the title shows the connection with psychological world and all the psychological themes we are talking about. “Aurora Consurgens” is a very interesting book, it’s one of the first books on alchemy ever, and we thought it would be interesting to link this book and subconscious subjects that this book is talking about with what Jung was talking about, and what we were talking about in the lyrics.

The previous album featured many famous guests, including Kai Hansen (Gamma Ray) and Hansi Kuersch (Blind Guardian). Did you have anybody from the outside working on the new CD?

No, we didn’t have any. On the previous album there were Hansi Kuersch, Kai Hansen and a famous singer from Brazil called Milton Nascimento. He’s probably not so famous in Europe, but he’s a true star here in Brazil, and we are big fans of him. On “Temple Of Shadows” he’s singing on the last track in Portuguese. With that album, we decided to show the Brazilian side of the band with Milton, and the heavy metal side with two most representative power metal singers of era when Angra started, the beginning of 1990s. But I think we cannot do every album asking people to come and sing. They sing with us, because we are fans of them, we like their work, and they like the music of Angra. But this is kind of dangerous if you invite outside people on every album, because then you will have to do it for the rest of your life. Everybody’s gonna ask, “Who’s gonna be the next guest musician?” Thus, this time we didn’t want any guests. Maybe on the next album we will do it again, but it has to happen naturally. Of course, we had a guy playing percussion for us, he’s not from the band, but we needed somebody to help us record the percussion. Apart from him, there was nobody else involved.

The music on “Aurora Consurgens” is quite different from your previous album, it is heavier and much more modern. What made you go in this direction? Did you discover for yourself some new names on the metal scene, or was there a different reason?

I think it’s pretty natural. If you listen to all the albums of Angra – and we have six albums – they sound very different. We try to bring different musical concepts to our music, we leave the door open to all the influences we can have. In this regard, we are a little bit of a progressive band – we’re trying to bring together elements from classical music, Brazilian music, as well as modern music, such as modern rock and modern heavy metal that is happening nowadays. We listen to everything, we love music. I listen to all kind of music – jazz, Brazilian music, classical music, traditional heavy metal. As to the new stuff, I’m not a big fan of it, it’s not that I know all the bands and go to their concepts, but I have my ear on it, and when I listen to it, I think there’s a lot of cool stuff out there. I try to bring it in somehow, I use drop-tuning, seven-string guitars, or some melodies that sound more modern to bring a fresher sound. It’s something different from what we always did. This time we have abandoned orchestra-sounding keyboard playing and replaced it with more modern synthesizers, and guitars are heavier because of the tuning and the way we played them. We always try to search for new directions. The good thing about Angra is that we never try to repeat ourselves.

It’s easy to notice that Angra changes with each album. But how do you determine in which direction you will be going? Do you have a band meeting where you talk about your plans, or do you just write songs, and they turn out to be different?

We just write songs, and some of my songs turned out to have this modern sound. Maybe I can write some songs in the old Angra style, or something that would sound totally like Brazilian music. We try to compose as a habit, and then the band can choose among the songs that each of us brings in and establish a direction. We can say, “Let’s go really modern,” or “Let’s make one or two songs more modern but keep the old Angra vibe and put two or three power metal songs on the album as well.” Everybody takes part in the discussion, because it’s very important that everybody is happy with the direction the band is pursuing.

But I think it comes really natural. When an idea for the song is born, it’s really what you feel, it’s based on what you’re listening. This time we are tuning guitars differently and going more modern because we didn’t do it on the previous five albums, and there’s something that was missing. We can’t go more classical than we did on the previous albums, we can’t go more progressive or play faster than we did, we already did a lot of percussion stuff on “Holy Land” (1996). So where can we go? We’re never losing the Angra, we’re not losing other influences such as Brazilian folk, classical music or traditional heavy metal, we have everything there, but we tried to find a new way to show this with a different sound.

The press release for the new CD mentions the so-called Internet single with the song “The Course Of Nature”. But it is one of the most modern songs on the CD, why did you choose this one as a single?

The situation with singles is different in Europe and in Brazil. In this country the single is usually a ballad or something you can play on the radio. From all the other albums we always chose a ballad, but this time we decided to show that we’re a heavy metal band. “The Course Of Nature” shows that the sound of the band is a bit different than the previous album. In a way the song is very direct, and the chorus comes very fast. Some other songs on the album have a two-minute introduction, there are guitar solos and stuff, and these more progressive songs are kind of complicated to have as a single. It takes one minute for the voice to come, and then two more minutes for the chorus to come, and this is not so good for the people who listen to the song for the first time, who don’t know the band or who are not familiar with this style of music. “The Course Of Nature” is quite an opposite case – the voice and chorus come very soon, the song is very heavy, it showcases a bit of the new direction we’re taking, and it has the Brazilian vibe that we always want to preserve.

And what kind of response did you get for this single from fans and critics?

For the song or for the album?

It might be a bit too early to talk about the response for the album…

Well, we have done interviews for the album, so we already have some response from journalists. We were in Japan last week, and people gave us their point of view. Some people say it’s very different from the previous albums, some people think it’s very direct, while others, on the contrary, say it’s very progressive. Some people say the songs are very catchy, while others think they’re not catchy at all. There are all kinds of different opinions, but it’s easy to understand, because people look at it from different prospectives. If you’re a Slayer fan, you will never think our album is heavy, but if you’re an AC/DC fan and you listen to bands like AC/DC every day, you’re gonna consider our album really heavy. If you listen to Dream Theater every day, you’re not gonna say that our album is progressive, but once again, if you’re an AC/DC fan, you’re gonna say that our album is indeed progressive and that it has a lot of crazy guitar stuff. In some European countries, they pay a lot of attention to the Latin stuff that we do, they talk a lot about the percussion and ethnic elements, but in other European countries, in Germany, for instance, they like heavy songs. The Japanese have their own perspective, and the Brazilians have their own perspective as well.

In general, people like the new album, they think it’s good that Angra chooses a different direction for each album, that we bring out an album they don’t expect. And that’s what I like, too. We’re celebrating 15 years of Angra at the present time, we’ve been playing this kind of music for 15 years. I really don’t want to have a band that is too bureaucratic, too professional. We have to be professional, but not too technical. I want our music to remain fresh, I want to do it because I love to do it, and that’s why I have to keep moving and changing. People feel this, and that’s why we’ve been working for 15 years, and our music is still fresh.

“Salvation: Suicide” is a very strong song title. Can you explain the meaning of this song?

In general, the album deals with mind disturbances, relations between a father and a son, different things from sub-conscience, and one of the weird aspects of a human being is suicide. The man is the only animal that commits suicide, this goes against the nature. All the animals want to survive, they want to keep their species alive, and the human being is the only one that goes and commits suicide. It’s an interesting subject. It’s not that we want to commit suicide or that we suggest this to others, but when we talk about mind disturbances and problems, about what’s going on in our minds, the higher level of problems you can have is when you just don’t want to be alive anymore.

The press release describes “Aurora Consurgens” as the main event in the band’s 15th anniversary celebrations. What other events do you plan to celebrate this anniversary?

During the previous tour in the support of “Temple Of Shadows”, we did more than 120 concerts, it was a long tour for us. We’re probably gonna do the same this time. During the tour we want to play the songs from all the 15 years of our career, it’s very important for us, we want to show the fans and people in general what Angra is about. As we have done six albums that sound pretty much different, we want our concert to show the difference. If course, it’s impossible to play all the songs at a concert, so we will always change the setlist on the tour. That’s a lot of work, to be honest. The second idea is to do a live DVD from this celebration tour, representing all the facets of Angra. We have a lot of other ideas, but these are the main ones for now.

What do you consider your biggest achievement over these 15 years? And what would you like to change in the band’s history if you had the chance?

The biggest achievement is being able to do a tour of over 120 concerts after playing as a band for 15 years. We come from Brazil, and we still live in Brazil, it’s not that we moved to the United States or Europe to gain recognition. We still live in our reality that is not easy, and the band has been playing for 15 years! We’ve just come back from Japan, we regularly play in Europe, we record albums of good quality, and we are still alive, showcasing our music, doing what we wanna do. It’s something every important. With every album we change a little bit, we bring in songs that are different, and that’s not so easy. When you deal with record companies, people are always afraid that you will change your music. But we are still going our way.

It’s hard to say what I would like to change. The bad things that happen to the band – for instance, the split we had six years ago, or maybe the concerts that were not so good, or little things that we would like to do differently on studio albums – all these things happen for you to learn, they help you do better in the future. It’s good to make some mistakes, because that’s why you always want to do better. We always want to surpass what we did in the past, and I want to see the mistakes that I’ve made to be able to correct them. I don’t have a problem with my mistakes, I don’t want to change them in the past, I want to change them in the future.

Going 15 years back, what kind of goals did you have when you were starting Angra? Did you expect this international success, or did it come as a surprise for you?

In the beginning, we were 19 or 20 years old, and of course, we had a dream of putting a heavy metal band together and we were working for that. We didn’t have any clue that we could be playing 15 years and touring many countries, that’s something you can’t imagine. You do it step by step, you always know what you want from the next step, but it’s very hard to look 15 years ahead. Of course, I never would expect to play for so many people and have so many albums.

How did you meet the rest of the original Angra members? Did you know each other before putting the band together, or did you have to arrange auditions, search for suitable people, etc.?

I used to play with Rafael Bittencourt, the other guitar player, we had a band before Angra, a garage band that never did a single concert. The original drummer of Angra, who never recorded any albums with us, was also in this band. Rafael was a friend of Andre Matos, our singer for eight years, they studied in the same musical university, and the bass player, Luis Mariutti, was a friend of ours whom we know through the local rock scene. We decided to get together and play two songs, and then we had a dream of doing a very organized and professional band. We decided to rehearse a lot, every day, five or six hours, to prepare a very good demo, and with this demo try to get a record deal. Our first dream was not to have a famous band, what we wanted on the first stage in our career was only to record a good demo. When we had this demo out, which, of course, was not very good, but at that time we thought it was excellent, the next step was to get somebody to listen to this demo and to sign the band. That happened a year after we recorded the demo, when the Japanese label JVC offered us a contract. That’s when everything started – we recorded the first album and so on.

How did you get interested in folk music? You always use a lot of folk elements and instruments on your CDs, but what originally attracted you to this kind of musical culture?

Here in Brazil guitar players normally start on an acoustic guitar with nylon strings and play Brazilian music. I started like this, and Rafael started like this, and if you’re good at this maybe your mother will let you continue studying the guitar. After two years of playing Brazilian music on acoustic guitar and becoming OK at it, I started playing rock and heavy metal. That brought me the passion for Brazilian music as well. It’s very hard to deny the music that you have inside. If I play a heavy metal song or riff, it’s very hard for me to play it exactly like a German band, because I’m not German. I listen to them, I get their sound, but I bring my own influences in the way I play it. That’s why it’s very important for us to live in Brazil, because I’m always in contact with Brazilian music, and I keep studying it and playing it for real. I have a solo album out where I play only Brazilian music. That’s something that I like.

Angra has always had a very stable line-up, there was just one major change in 2000, when three people left the band. How do you manage to maintain this stability, how do you settle conflicts? Is it difficult nowadays to reach an agreement between the five members of the band?

Of course it is! I’m not gonna say it’s easy when it’s difficult. We are five guys in the band, and we also have a manager, and also a keyboard player that travels with us, which makes seven people. Then we have the road crew, which we try to keep together as much as we can. So we have a lot of people that have been traveling together and living together for six years. Of course, it’s not easy, because people are different, they have different ideas, but the music connects us. It’s very important to have a healthy relationship through the music, everybody should be satisfied with the music and sound of the album, with the compositions we record, so that when we go on tour, we are happy to play these songs. When a musician is happy to play the music and has the passion for it, it’s much easier to control the other parts. It’s much easier to get along when you have a discussion about whatever subject if the music is there. Some bands are more into the business side, and that causes damage to the relations between band members, because you start comparing who gets more money, who’s making business decisions and so on. But when you share the passion for music, all you want is do good music, play together and have fun. If you put the music in the first place, it’s much easier to get a stable line-up. Our first line-up was together for nine years, that’s a long time, and the current line-up has been together for six years already. Now we are ready to go for a tour that will last at least a year, and we will have to be together all this time.

After the break-up of Shaaman, people on the Internet once again started speculating about the possibility of reuniting the original Angra line-up. Can you comment on this? What are the chances of you and Rafael getting back together with the Shaaman guys?

(laughs) The problem that resulted in the break-up of Shaaman was between Andre Matos and Ricardo Confessori, the drummer. This means that the reunion is not possible, because these two people have a problem with each other. As to us, we just keep working and doing our music, we don’t care. To be honest to the fans, the chances for them of seeing the original line-up are very low. We are very much satisfied with the music we are doing now, we don’t think it’s worse than what we did with the original line-up. We have great musicians with us, everybody is a good composer and a good performer, so what’s the point to get back? Our sales are good, we are doing long tours, and a lot of people are coming to see our shows, so why? I don’t have any problems with anybody from the original line-up, I like and respect them as musicians, and one day we may have somebody from the original line-up as a guest musician or something. Andre could be singing a song with us, or others may join us if we have a sort of celebration concert. I don’t say that it’s gonna certainly work, but that is much more possible than the comeback. I look forward, I don’t look back.

Speaking about your solo album “No Gravity” (2005), what made you do an instrumental solo album at this particular point in time?

I don’t know, it just happened. I’m now more mature for composing, for doing things alone. I’m composing much more than in the past, I used to give Angra all the songs I composed, but now I’m composing a lot for Angra and I still have a lot of other ideas, so I was able to do a solo album. Apart from “No Gravity”, I have just recorded some other stuff with Brazilian musicians, it still has a lot of guitars, but it sounds much more ethnic and much more Brazilian. I have time, and I have the passion for composing music every day, so that is the reason.

How did you get Mike Terrana to play drums on “No Gravity”? How was it like working with Mike?

I got to meet him at European festivals where he was playing with Rage, so we met on several occasions. I’m a fan of his playing, he’s a really aggressive heavy metal drummer, but he plays with a lot of swing, and he’s an American guy, so he grooves very well. I wanted “No Gravity” to go from the heavy metal Angra-kind of thing to a more fusion kind of thing, jazz rock or Brazilian rock. Mike is a well-prepared and experienced drummer, and it was very easy to work with him, because he’s so fast in learning and recording and deciding what to play. He learned the songs in three or four days, then we rehearsed together, and then we recorded all his parts for the album in 1.5 days. He plays a little bit of percussion on the album as well, so we had a lot of fun playing percussion together. He’s a very all-around drummer, so he was very important in making the record.

Mike told us that you are a good drummer yourself. Why didn’t you play the drums on this album?

Did Mike Terrana tell you this? (laughs) You know, Mike is a funny guy, he likes to make jokes all the time.

So was it a joke?

No, no, I like playing drums a little bit, but I’m not able to record an album. I’m not as powerful as him, it’s just impossible. A heavy metal drummer is also something physical, you gotta practice all the time. I play some little things and percussion effects on the record, but I’m more of a guitar player and a piano player. I can explain what I want from the drums, it’s easier to work this way, because I’m telling Mike what I want him to play. And that’s probably what makes him think I can play the drums.

Apart from solo albums, what do you do outside Angra? How much is Kiko Loureiro different onstage, in the studio and in everyday life?

You know, I like music so much… Actually we are working all the time, traveling, doing interviews or playing. When I’m home, I’m doing normal stuff. As I said, I like to play piano, that’s something I cannot do on tour, because I don’t play that well. It’s something I like to do at home. I’m not a soccer player, you Europeans think all Brazilian guys can play soccer, but I’m not the case. (laughs)

Angra on the Internet: http://www.angra.net

Special thanks to Maxim Bylkin (Soyuz Music) for arranging this interview

Interview by Roman “Maniac” Patrashov, Natalie “Snakeheart” Patrashova
Photos by Natalie “Snakeheart” Patrashova
October 31, 2006
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