Shaft of Steel Châlice the Music Is out There 1 Free
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wine. We are able to accept the egos of all band members without losing our own. In the end you get very special melodic rock stuff you can’t compete in total with anybody. Every song is an experiment - no chance for stereotype thinking,” Gino laughs. The band are very happy with the new record. “Yes, it took some in London, but the vocals were recorded all over the years to write the new SHAFT OF STEEL place, as Rob lived in Germany for a while and Andy material and to work on lives in Sheffield. “So all of his backing vocals were it until it was definitely recorded up there. Of course the legend that is Dennis ready to be recorded. Ward from Pink Cream 69 also sings backing vocals on But in the end it is a big the record, so he sent us his choirs over from Germany. reflection, a picture of It took about three years to record, which sounds like our lives. We put in all an awfully long time, but a few of us have moved our creativity and energy house, changed jobs or got married, which certainly to make it happen. The difficult tide of events of all didn’t speed up the process! I handled production our lives, like birth, marriage, children, divorce, ups duties myself and because I’m a huge perfectionist, and downs of all colours forced us to take time for the there were a few rewrites and we ended up scrapping whole process. But as the music was always part of a song at last minute in favour of ‘Drive’, which has our lives it was also our personal catalyser of it all. ended up being the opening track. We wanted to make And over the years we had the chance to learn on tour UK melodic rockers SHAFT OF STEEL have been the best record we possibly could and I think we’ve how a song needs to sound like to make the people gaining positive press for their recent EP called achieved that. Dennis Ward also mastered the CD and move and to feel the music. And with this background ‘Art Of Steel’. The band are Robert Fenning - Lead I’m so pleased with the outcome.” we started writing our stories in melodies. And now vocals, Alex Markham - Guitar, Andy Cooper - Bass The band are hoping to get a few gigs booked in we have real rockers like ‘You Better Get Used To It’, and backing vocals, Adam Carruthers - Guitar, Chris for later this year. “We supported Vega on the London ‘Rock’n’Roll Machine’ with a real funky beginning and Smurthwaite - Keyboards and Garth Vickers - Drums. date of their UK tour last November and that was really ‘Shake The Earth’ that tells the story of the band how If you read Fireworks then you will love these guys. I amazing. HRH AOR 3 was also a blast, so now we’ve it goes. With the title track ‘Overyears Sensation’ we caught up with Alex Markham. really got the itch to play live again! We’ve put this EP have a 80s melodic track reflecting the band’s status All the guys have known one another for many out ourselves and there’s been a lot of interest recently, with a little wink. There are epic tracks like ‘Chasing years. “They’re my best friends from university and so we’re not going to be resting on our laurels. Right the wind’ and ‘Turn Into’, a song that questions the my hometown of Kendal,” says Alex. “When I was 16, now we’re working on a full-length album and we’re virtual realities of the kid generation that eliminates I was in a melodic death metal band with our other looking to do some collaboration’s with other artists, ‘authentic’ face-to-face adventures at all. The short guitarist Adam and I played in a prog rock covers band if we can. It’s really difficult to get a head start as a riffer ‘Glorious Again’ is telling the story of a little boy with our keyboard player Chris around the same time. recording artist in the current climate but we love who tried to commit suicide before he was 15 - a sad I met the other three guys at university in Scarborough making music. It’s our passion and we want to be true story. The sing-along video track ‘All About Your ten years ago, when we were all studying on the same able to keep doing it for many years to come. If other Love’ is the story of a father who only realises that the music technology degree. That’s when the band you people get as much enjoyment out of listening to it as daughter leaves for one year when it is almost too late. see today as Shaft of Steel originally formed. We had we have making it then we’ll have accomplished our The mid tempo ballad ‘Sign Of The Times’ gives a little a break between 2007 and 2011 and I spent a lot of mission, Alex concludes. More info at: chance to sit down and relax before the album goes to that time working in recording studios producing other www.shaftofsteel.com the end with powerful songs ‘Taste It’ and ‘Don’t Tell bands, so when we reformed a few years ago, I felt www.facebook.com/shaftofsteel Me Lies’, a song about politicians who know exactly like I was finally ready to make an EP that did the how to play the games. The short instrumental ‘Last music justice.” Wish’ is the outro of the record. When the lads started out, they were more or less a CHÂLICE I think the whole album sounds very powerful and straight-ahead power metal band influenced by groups it comes up with all trademarks of Châlice: Several like Gamma Ray, Manowar and Blind Guardian. Myself voices on a hard foundation. Classic hard rock in the and Rob, their vocalist, has always handled all of the tradition of Deep Purple and Uriah Heep meets heavy song writing duties and back then they discovered rock a la Mötley Crue & Van Halen,” he explains about pretty quickly that they had a shared love of 1980s AOR the album and songs. and progressive rock. “So our sound naturally shifted With this album the band went further on our road more towards those areas. Our bassist Andy arranges to create the music that they love for the ears of their most of the backing vocals. Being from Sheffield, he fans ready to conquer the whole world with it. “We was raised on Def Leppard and you can really tell love catchy melodies but we also love interesting that when you listen to the massive choirs we’ve got grooves sometimes peppered with complicated going on in the choruses! Also, Peter Gabriel is a huge breaks - hidden for them who only want to rock but influence on the keyboard sounds we use. I’ve been in recognizable for musicians. The powerful sound love with that Yamaha CP80 piano sound since I first The excellent CHÂLICE are back with a superb (thanks to Andy Horn) is also an advancement heard ‘Red Rain’. We try and throw that into any song new CD called ‘Overyears Sensation’ which is out now referring to the earlier records.” we can,” says Alex. via Keiler Records. Chalice are Gino Naschke (voc), The album was recorded in various studios under What makes Shaft Of Steel different is the fact Oliver Scheer (g), Axel Hoffmann (keys), and Michael direction of Oliver (Scheer - guitar). “Oli was recording that they combine metal influences with out-and-out Mehl (dr). I caught up with Gino Naschke to find out the keyboards, the guitars and the bass himself in his AOR. “You get a lot of metal bands that blur the lines more. Gino and the guys were just starting as a band own studio. The drums were recorded by our friend between hard rock and metal, but not many that go all at school. It was Oliver and Gino founding the band. Atti and the vocals were recorded and produced by out with the glossy AOR melodies of the 80s. We’ve After some time they found some good fellows who Henning Basse in his own studio. The whole record been compared to Serpentine and I can certainly see just had the same idea behind the music. “Very simple was mastered by Andy Horn (Rob Halford, Rob Rock, why, and I find that really flattering as they’re a great - stopping with everything doing apart from playing Edenbridge and many more). In total it took about 10 band, but we’re definitely more at the metal end of the music on our way to become the biggest rockstars weeks to record the album,” Gino explains. hard rock spectrum. We want to delve even further ever,” Gino tells me. For the future the band will definitely go ahead into AOR territory on the next record. For me, the 1980s Life itself is always the biggest inspiration for Gino. writing songs and recording them for posterity, as was the absolute pinnacle of rock music and Shaft of “We just live our lives to get new stories to put them they need to do it. “We can’t live without it, anyway. Steel are paying tribute to that, while doing our own into words for our music. We are five people with But first of all we are going out again to hit all stages thing at the same time,” he says.