Detritus
Mini-Issue #358.5 - April 7, 2006
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*** CAST OF CHARACTERS ***
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Patrick Brower, Editor
patrickbrower@...

Sean P. Gahgan, Editor
lof@...

Tim Wadzinski, Owner
tsw512@...

Steve Shumake, Co-owner
vongoober@...
http://www.vongoober.com/

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*** LET IT BE KNOWN ***
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-Take a gander at Neal's recent e-mail interview with Hubi Meisel. Go
Cubs! - Tim

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*** SPECIAL REPORT ***
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by Neal Woodall (MysticX9@...)

-Interview w/ Hubi Meisel
March 29, 2006

Hubi Meisel is somewhat of an anomaly in the world of hard rock and
metal: a composer and vocalist who eschews the shopworn, pessimistic
topics so common to the genre in favor of exploring more encouraging
themes. Following the recent release of his latest epic KAILASH, Hubi
was kind enough to answer some questions about the creation of this
unique album...

DETRITUS: KAILASH is an interesting concept. What inspired you to
create the story?

HUBI MEISEL: After the release of my previous concept disc EMOCEAN, I
just knew that the next album would become a concept album again, but
I had no idea about the direction yet. As the inspiration for my
previous album had came over night all of sudden, I simply decided to
wait what would happen this time... And in fact one night, shortly
before waking up, a beautiful fiery sky with orange and golden shades
appeared in my mind, and below I could see majestic snow-covered
mountain range. After that night I clearly knew that the new album
would be all about the Himalayas and Tibet, and very soon the strong
connection to Holy Mount Kailash also became more and more apparent.
The main plot of the story came to my mind quite intuitively, but as I
hadn't known much about this topic before, I was also reading a lot
about the Himalayan regions, Tibetan culture as well as speeches of
the Dalai Lama, which all helped me to enrich the basic story with
detailed background information. The concept itself is rather
comprehensive and not part of the 16 pages booklet, but those who are
interested in finding out more about the story behind this album, can
download it for free on my homepage! ( http://www.HubiMeisel.com/ )

D: Do you subscribe to a particular religious or spiritual point of
view?

HM: I do not belong to any religious or spiritual group, but I believe
in reincarnation and in the Golden Rule "Treat Others As You Would
Like To Be Treated." Even if I am not a Buddhist myself, I like the
compassionate aspect of Buddhism, above all the expression of love and
respect towards all life forms.

D: I know you have worked with all the KAILASH musicians in the past
except for Jorge Salán. How did he become involved in the project?

HM: Jorge Salán is a good friend of mine, I met him on the Internet
some years ago during the time when he was studying guitar at Berklee
College of Music in Boston. When I listened to one of his instrumental
guitar songs for the first time, I was totally fascinated by his
tone... It means a lot to me that he took the time to participate in
KAILASH despite his busy schedule with his main band Mago De Oz. But
of course I also love the work of Vivien Lalu (keys), Marcel Coenen
(guitars), Daniel Flores (drums), Johan Niemann (bass) and Joop
Wolters (guitars)... ALL of the musicians did a truly amazing job!

D: I seem to hear some elements from New Age music in KAILASH. Who are
your major influences?

HM: The appearance of "meditative" elements was more or less clear on
this album, as this simply matched the spiritual topic of the album,
but it also has to do with Vivien's keys and style, he sometimes uses
sounds which are also common in New Age music.

D: I understand you write the lyrics and vocal melodies. Does Vivian
Lalu write all the rest of the music or do you suggest other melodic
themes?

HM: I will explain more in detail you how it works: After I had
written the concept story, I was adding rough musical directions and
instructions for each song and sent all of this information to Vivien,
so that he could imagine what I had in mind for the instrumental
music. Then he started sending me his first ideas via MP3s, and we
were discussing and arranging the material together until each song
matched my vision of KAILASH. After the instrumental base of the songs
was done, I started writing my vocal melodies and lyrics. The other
musicians involved then received a pre-production with instrumental
guidelines, but all of them certainly still had the freedom to include
their own ideas and creativity!

D: The production is very clear on KAILASH. Please tell us a little
about how the album was recorded?

HM: The instruments were recorded in various European studios, as all
musicians recorded in their own studio or a studio in their city.
After I had received all instrumental tracks, I mixed the album in my
studio in Munich, where I also recorded my vocals. For the vocal
recordings and the mixdown I was using high-grade vintage analogue
tube gear, for example, which helps to achieve a fat and warm sound.
As the arrangements are very dense on this album, I was investing
quite some and energy into the mixdown... It was important to me that
the each element sounds "embedded," but at the same time each
instrument and the vocals should still be audible separately and not
intermingle too much with the frequencies of the other instruments.
All in all the mixing took about 2.5 months.

D: Will you perform KAILASH live, and if so, will you use the same
musicians who played on the album?

HM: I do enjoy playing live, but as the lineup consists of musicians
from five different countries, it's not that easy to go on tour. The
costs and risk for such a venture would really be tremendous... But
who knows... Let's wait and see what future has in store!

D: KAILASH is a very visual story. Do you have any plans to do videos
for any of the songs, or perhaps a full DVD?

HM: That's an interesting idea... But on the other hand, any
visualization of EMOCEAN or KAILASH would also destroy the individual
perception of the journey that is told by these albums... The
listeners of my CDs often write me that they can see their own movie
in their mind when listening to EMOCEAN or KAILASH, and that is
something which cannot be topped by any DVD in my opinion... The mind
simply has infinite possibilities when it comes to creating
landscapes, images and colours!

D: Chris Kallias' artwork is beautiful. How did you discover him?

HM: I totally agree! Chris is a very special artworker and he really
illustrated the concepts of my CDs in a perfect way. Five years ago he
had reviewed my album CUT on http://metalreviews.com/ , and on this
occasion he told me about his art... I was very impressed by his work,
and very soon we agreed on a co-operation!

D: Your music seems to be the antithesis to a lot of what is going on
in hard rock and metal these days. Do you find that you are reacting
against the anger and aggression in today's music or do you just
naturally write and sing in a more positive manner?

HM: It's true that there's a lot of darkness and negativity in this
field of music, but I would not say that I realized KAILASH as a kind
of "countermeasure"...haha! I'm just a naturally optimistic person, I
tend to see the positive challenge in every situation instead of
falling into a state of fury or resignation... In my life I've made
the experience that whenever you have aggressive thoughts or feelings
about someone or something, you always hurt yourself, too, in some
way... Of course it's just natural to have negative emotions once in a
while, and of course there are lots of reasons to get upset about many
things that happen around us, however it feels much better to me to
take a deep breath and focus on a constructive viewpoint instead of
ranting and raging about the things I dislike in this world...

D: KAILASH has a very positive ending. Are you optimistic that
humanity can come together in a spirit of peace and cooperation?

HM: I strongly believe that there is hope, no matter how bad things
may seem sometimes, and I also believe in the good inside every human
being... I think that ALL human beings are actually craving for peace
deep within their hearts, this craving is just buried under all kinds
of fears, and exactly those fears create the illusion of hostility and
separation... Even if some hard times may still lie ahead of mankind,
I do believe that world peace is possible and not just a utopian
dream... I trust that the yearning for peace and the sense of
brotherhood will grow stronger and win over hate and fear sooner or
later...

D: You've been involved in several side-projects in recent years, such
as Book Of Reflections and Mistheria. Do you have any plans for
guesting on anything in the near future?

HM: It's not unlikely that I will participate in some other projects
again... But after the promotion of KAILASH, I will definitely give
top priority to my next album.

D: Where is your greatest fan base?

HM: To be honest, I don't know exactly... I've noticed that the
feedback from US listeners has been particularly enthusiastic, it
seemed that many of them really dig and understand my albums... But on
the other hand I also received very warm lines from many European
listeners, so it would probably be nonsense to restrict this to
certain countries...

D: Any books, movies or Web sites you could recommend for those
interested in further exploration of Buddhist and Hindu perspectives?

HM: I can recommend all of the books of the Dalai Lama, they are a
great lead-in into the world of Buddhist/Tibetan spirituality and
philosophy, and also show his completely non-violent "Middle Way" of
compassion and understanding. But also the books of Catriona Bass are
very interesting as she has the talent to capture the Tibet's culture
and beauty in a very vivid way. The Web site http://www.tibet.com/ may
also give a very good first impression about all of these topics...
Hinduism and Hindu mythology is actually just appearing as a side
issue on KAILASH, but I wanted to include it as well, as the Holy
Mount Kailash is not only worshipped by Buddhists, but also by the
Hindus and Bons.

D: Would you like to add anything in closing?

HM: First of all, thank you very much for your time and interest! In
case you became curious, I would like to invite you to check out the
free on-line single "Potala Palace" and other MP3s of KAILASH on my
homepage http://www.HubiMeisel.com/ ! Take care and best wishes from
Munich!!!

-Thanks to Hubi Meisel and Andy Craven for the interview.

Relevant links:

Hubi Meisel
http://www.HubiMeisel.com/
http://www.myspace.com/hubimeisel

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*** OUT ***
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