Fabulae Dramatis defies genre boundaries with
their progressive metal infused with Latin American rhythms. Their upcoming
album 'Violenta' explores personal experiences and cultural reflections in a
cathartic journey.
1. Fabulae Dramatis has been described as a
band that transcends traditional genre boundaries. How would you describe your
musical style and what influences have shaped your sound?
Our musical
style is progressive metal and now with more Latin American rhythms in it. You
can say that for this album we focused more in those 2 styles. In general we
describe our music as a Metal act of heavy world music.
2. Your new single “Fábula Violenta” chronicles
a childhood during war. Can you share more about the inspiration behind this
song and its significance to the band?
This song is
based on one of the situations I experienced in my childhood during the
Colombian drug’s war in the 90’s. The context in our new album “Violenta” is
because we choose to address personal topics in a way to express ourselves in a
cathartic way. Every song refers to a personal experience of the band members.
In the same way were the previous singles “The City (Translucent)” and “Lead
Astray ⋅|⋅ Indigo”, were also based on personal experiences of our band members.
3. The upcoming album ‘Violenta’ appears to be
deeply personal and reflective. How did the process of creating this album
differ from your previous works?
The concept of
“Violenta” is to tell stories as we
usually do. This time these are situated in the actual time and our reality and
based in our personal perspective of the world. Every song refers to a personal
experience of the band members.
4. You’ve received numerous awards for your
music videos, including the Cannes Film Awards. How important are visuals in
your storytelling, and what role do they play in your overall artistic vision?
Fabulae
Dramatis is a project that includes different artistic disciplines besides
music. Such as video art, dance, theater, costume, fire arts, etc. So the
visuals are also an important part of the whole concept. We want to take the
audience to a unique world of creativity where they allow themselves to
experience the different paths that we have to offer to them.
5. Classic Rock Society magazine mentioned that
your music has “the spirits of Zappa and Beefheart”. How do you feel about this
comparison, and what other artists have inspired you?
When we come
together to create music we don’t consciously focus on projecting our music
influences. If they happen to appear in our compositions it’s definitely in a
subconscious way. It’s funny but none of us really listened actively to Frank
Zappa or Beefheart, but we understood
what Classic Rock Society meant in terms of being experimental. Those artists
didn’t really care about music genres. They just enjoyed music creation without
limitations and labels. Those were examples of how we sounded back then. Now
our music is more directed to 2 genres. You may call this new album
“Progressive Latin Metal”.
6. The
new album ‘Violenta’ is produced by Martín Furia and Gustavo Adolfo Valderrama.
How did their involvement influence the sound and direction of the album?
They helped us
channel our music direction to this Progressive Latin Metal style we were
initially composing. You could hear the first ideas with The City (Translucent)
which was released in 2020. With the rhythmic influences from the Balkan and
Bulgaria from our drummer Teo Dimitrov we could find a lot of similarities with
the Latin American percussion patterns. So given the fact for him it was so
natural to play, we just let our roots talk through our music in each personal
way and be ourselves surprised that we have much more in common than we
thought. So Furia and Valderrama are both Latin American producers specifically
from Argentina and Colombia and they have a wide ‘music vocabulary’. So they
put their own vision towards music structure, harmony, lyrics and even band
projection. It has been an honor to work with both. In the process we have
become very good friends and we will continue the same workflow with them for
future productions from now on.
7. Your music often deals with intense and
dramatic themes. How do you balance the heaviness and intensity with moments of
intimacy in your compositions?
This depends
on the mood. We can manage to incorporate several types of sound, So sometimes we can sound very soft and
intimate and use different singing techniques; vocal ranges and balance
instrumental and vocal parts in order to evoque a specific feeling of emotion.
We also sometimes mix languages in our lyrics to give a special touch.
8. Can you tell us more about the personal and
intimate experiences that are reflected in ‘Violenta’? How do you hope these
stories resonate with your audience?
We want to
project ourselves in a very humble and human way. No fantasy and legends this
time. We present this album just as human beings like you and me and our vision
about the world where the audience hopefully can relate to our music and
message.
9. Looking back at your discography, how do you
feel your music has evolved since your debut album ‘Om’? What are some of the
key changes and developments you’ve experienced as a band?
It evolved in
all perspectives. The debut album ‘Om’ meant literally the first syllable we
pronounced in our music carriere as Fabulae Dramatis. It was raw, no planned,
no channeled, we were a studio project back then. “Solar Time’s Fables”
collected fables/stories from different cultures and times. It was kind of a
split in two parts where you could find some world music and some other
progressive/avant-garde songs.
Now “Violenta”
has a specific music direction Progressive Latin Metal, exploring lower tunings
and time signatures.
10. What are your plans for the future after
the release of ‘Violenta’? Are there any tours, collaborations, or new projects on the
horizon that you can share with us?
We are working on our album release which is going to be September 7th 2024; followed by a festival day in October and a “Violenta-tour” for 2025.
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