Eliott Raveau-Everything
Well,Friends Of Aristocracy!
We speak again of our newsroom, where in a little while, the hundred and eighth interview of the Aristocracy will begin in all its emotions. This time, with the solitaire project Wooden Maw. Process made by Eliott Raveau, a Frenchman who practices an excellent and friendly Deathcore .Let's chat with him and some short songs. We did it today and posted it today too. Before that, music and thanks to him and his French producers for the nomination!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaIYOFLGB_E
Hello Felipe !I hope you're doing well, here are my answers to your interview questions !
A1:Deathcore, Djent and Grindcore. Why are these styles present in your life and project? Wooden Maw:They aren't that much to be honest. My main metal genre would be melodic death, and I tried these more rhythmic-oriented genres because I like to try new things. I tried a lot of different genres between my several projects, and this rhythm-heavy style is convenient because it appeals to the singers with whom I like to work
A2:Do you believe you can make your band more than a solitary project? Wooden Maw:It would be a dream to play these songs live ! Actually I began writing in a more "realistic" way recently,I stopped writing kick drum bursts at 300bpm because it's so fast that I wouldn't ever be able to find a drummer to play these songs live.With that more realistic approach I hope that one day I'll be able to tour with Wooden Maw
A3:How come emerged the invite to Thomas Ferry? Wooden Maw:We've known each other for more than ten years, and he has always been an excellent vocalist but never had the opportunity to release a record, so we worked together on that one song Rite of Passage. He didn't like the first two song sketches, and wanted it to be specifically violent, so I came up with that raw and upfront deathcore and he liked it !
A4:Why the band have this name? Wooden Maw:In french, "Wooden Maw" translates as "gueule de bois", which means "hungover". Like, you drank too much, the day after the party you feel like your face is locked, something like that. I enjoyed the idea that people would wonder what it means, mission accomplished !
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICNpab7DuXU A5:France had a sincere help in metal. Your extreme metal is fantastic. How do you keep it that way despite the problems? Wooden Maw:The situation in France is pretty convenient for a studio project. There aren't that many metal shows though and when you want to tour you either have to play in front of the same people every time who'll get bored eventually or go abroad, but I don't have the means to plan a tour so I keep it in the studio for now
A6:What´s the idea behind artwork´s album? Wooden Maw:The artwork is not a complicated metaphor or anything, I just asked a freelance artist what he thought would look cool and gave him a lot of room for creativity. I just wanted something with warm colours as the other artwork (for "Collabs") has cold colours
A7:What catharsis do you want in this job? Wooden Maw:I like small victories. Learning a new production trick, challenging myself into recording parts that are more complex than on the previous songs etc. The ACDC song deals with the lack of a proper salary for many independent artists, it's so deeply anchored that metalheads don't make a living that I find it fun to turn it into humour and sing about having enough money to buy a cup of tea
A8:Nothing against it, but why do your songs come from Normandy? Wooden Maw:I don't know if I put it in words a wrong way, but I physically live in Normandy so my songs are written and recorded there
A9:What are the influences of Wooden Maw? Wooden Maw:The bands I get inspiration from are mainly Benighted, Slaughter to Prevail and Cattle Decapitation. The genre of my songs may vary because I adapt to the tastes of the singer and to my mood but mainly I try to capture that kind of sound
A10:How are your current projects different from Wooden Maw? Wooden Maw:My live bands Sekhmet and Carbonic Fields release albums whereas with Wooden Maw I organized the whole thing in two "compilations" : "Independent Songs" and "Collabs" and I release only singles belonging to one of these two or the other one. And Wooden Maw revolves around trying new things and collaborating with new artists, so there isn't a research for coherence between the songs. In the future, you might hear me try different genres all metal though,Wooden Maw doesn't have a clear direction, the only constant is that it is violent metal
A11:This song is conceptual? Wooden Maw:You can find the lyric video on YouTube, I changed the lyrics to tell the story of an independent musician giving up on complaining about not generating income and just going to the bar to get a cup of tea with the monthly royalties he got at that time. It is a parody of traditional death metal where gore things are described in detail : here you can hear about the taste of that tea and the feeling of victory from the sole fact music gave the opportunity for that protagonist to consume something edible.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vKZdmk0y6E
A12:What kind of experiments do you want in this project? Wooden Maw:Mix-wise I try a lot of different things in Wooden Maw. New plugins, new techniques that I learn, and the fact I work with several different vocalists teaches me how to make a voice fit in the mix, other than my own voice that I already mixed a lot of times
I like to see how other people proceed when working on a song. Some will wait for the instrumental to be fully done before writing lyrics, some will write lyrics and ask that I write the instrumental "around" them, I enjoy very much to absorb different people's ways of doing
A13:Carbonic Fields, Sekhmet, Ruska, Oniromancer, Wooden Maw. Do you love these bands or do they love you? Wooden Maw:I always talk about bands as people would talk about a couple ! You have good moments, difficult moments, you bond over the years and try adjusting your vision to match that of the other people in the project
A14:What was the first metal band you listened to in your life? Wooden Maw:I discovered metal with Linkin Park and Evanescence on MTV in the early 2000's, then met a friend who introduced me to Slipknot's music, and from there I started researching new bands to listen to on the internet
A15:What would the 2022 Elliott say to Eliott who was going to listen to metal for the first time? Wooden Maw:"Don't be narrow minded. Metalheads around you are trying to teach you that metal is the only legitimate music genre and that everything mainstream is evil. But you won't be that good of a musician if you only get inspiration from one genre. Music that makes people dance isn't the enemy, stop hating it and embrace the fact people enjoy art for different reasons. You can even get inspiration from mainstream music to create metal if you want, try new things, keep an open mind".
A16:What do you understand as something violent and spontaneous besides your music? Wooden Maw:The way drunk people will insult you without you having said anything. When the mind is blurred by alcohol or anything else people tend to just have zero filter and spit venom on you
A17:It is clear that evil exists, but what we must question is whether there is good? Wooden Maw:Everything is neutral. Nobody sees themselves as the bad person. From everyone's standpoint the evil people are the others.If you have good speaking skills, anything you do can be considered good when told the right way, and that is very dangerousThanks a lot for the interview ! You are the first one asking me to answer questions outside of my bands and as a solo artist ! I won't forget it !
Musically yours,
Eliott RAVEAU and Wooden Maw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ha3XVu9sEKI
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