In the second part of our two part series of features with the indomitable Alan Averill, aka AA Nemtheanga of Irish extreme metallers Primordial, he discusses with Ghost Cult the veteran band’s eighth album, Where Greater Men Have Fallen (Metal Blade), and its powerful messages; the band’s legendary anger and intolerance of their homeland’s modern culture in his always thoughtful, forthright and occasionally provocative manner.
There seems to be less of a Celtic or Black feel to the new album, compared to songs like ‘Bloodied and Unbowed’ from the last outing. I asked Alan if this was an organic evolution or something the band was striving for?
“I really have a problem with the word ‘Celtic’ or ‘Folk’, but I know you mean the Irish traditional music thing which underpins some of the rhythms and notations in our sound. Nothing is planned though: whatever comes, comes. Take ‘Ghosts of the Charnel House’: the riffs are like Black Sabbath! It’s odd for Primordial, but we’re not one of these bands that’s going to go through an electronic phase or a goth phase, or get a female vocalist and do a folk album, or make an orchestral reinterpretation of our songs. The album’s a continuation of our path, in that sense.
“We’re our own biggest critics too so if it gets by us, then people who like the band, they kind of trust us to be bullshit detectors – which is something that we, and Irish people in general, are pretty good at! It’s a trait of coming from a sort of dark, rainy, gritty, grey, urban landscape. It also stops us taking liberties with each other. Primordial aren’t rock stars, we’re not difficult to deal with. We still get into fistfights with each other for fuck’s sake and we’re 40 years old! But sometimes that’s a better way to solve a problem than to bitch about each other, then have divided camps and end up having to throw someone out.”
You’ve been quite scathing in your views of modern Irish culture in the past. Primordial curated the recent Redemption Festival in Ireland, with some exciting names on the bill, not least The Ruins of Beverast. How well was it received? Have things improved at all?
“A little. Redemption was good. The proviso is that bands have to be our friends to make the bill: we have to either respect them or like them. Without the foreign fans travelling over for that weekend, we’d have possibly been looking at about 60 percent of people showing. But the weekend after Redemption, Dublin hosted Saxon and Hell, then we’ve got Sabbath and Behemoth…people haven’t got plenty of money.
“Things have changed for us in Ireland and we have to acknowledge that. But we’re still not particularly well-known and I would always look on myself as being at odds with the Irish mainstream musical culture. We’re not looking for acceptance, but Ireland is very ‘anti-rock’ despite breeding Rory Gallacher, Lizzy and all that kind of stuff. Popular music culture – and by that I mean the sense of ‘dumbing-down’ everything – has reached some sort of ultimate victory in Irish society, which is deeply unfortunate and something we stand against, but what can you do?”
It’s been a busy eighteen months or so for Alan and for Simon (O’Laoghaire, Primordial and Dread Sovereign drummer). 2014 saw new albums from those two bands, and 2013 saw the emergence of Alan’s trad metal project Twilight of the Gods. I asked Alan where middle-aged guys get such energy from?!
“From my own point of view, I’ve always kept myself fit: I’ve always played sports, I’m always running… I’ve always done things like this which means I can play harder in other aspects. Maybe it’s also because I don’t have kids, family, a mortgage, other such responsibilities the other guys have which obviously wear you out. I’m quite intense and always feel I have to have a challenge or a major obstacle to overcome. The Twilight of the Gods album was a challenge of my willpower: with Dread Sovereign, I told the guys ‘we make an album and within fifteen months we’ll be on tour’. That’s exactly what we did. That’s my way of doing things I guess: don’t fuck about!”
Primordial are bringing their famed live performances back to the UK and Europe from the end of January. What can fans expect when they take …Greater Men… to the streets?
“Well we’ve recently played six or seven songs in Dublin, so we’ve more or less played the whole album live. I think our future will see these ‘blitzkrieg’ weekends, two or three shows with proper support acts, and people will undoubtedly have to travel to see us: the chances of seeing us on a Tuesday night again, in front of 80-90 people in a small town, are pretty unlikely. What with our age and the economics, it’s just not feasible anymore. But we’re playing Glasgow, London and Manchester, and we just added Portrait to the London show which is killer. With the performance, we’re going to try and add a few different things, but it’ll still be Primordial.”
Amen to that. It’s a nice line on which to finish, Nemtheanga in high demand and already having overshot our allotted time. This interview was conducted some time before the recent horrors in Paris, which I don’t doubt Alan would have had a view on and which bear out his comments on the evils of our time. It is a harsh world we live in, and long may Primordial highlight and protest against its folly and iniquities with such stirring, emotive yet violent music.
Words by PAUL QUINN