CELTIC FROST Frontman: If This Album Doesn't Do Well, We'll Never Be Able To Do Another One

Vocal Martyr recently conducted an interview with CELTIC FROST members Martin Eric Ain (bass) and Tom Gabriel Fischer (guitar, vocals). A couple of excerpts from the chat follow:

Vocal Martyr: What bands have you guys been listening to over the past five years? You mentioned MESHUGGAH and ARCH ENEMY.

Tom: "I like FIELDS OF NEPHILIM, the new album; I think it's fantastic. I listen to GORGOROTH and IMMORTAL. Basically everything from the electronic gothic field to the extreme metal field. Martin?"

Martin: "I like the SATYRICON 'Volcano' album. It's a great black metal album, as well as just being a great metal album. The last two or three years, we've been listening to alot of the stuff that we listened to in the early days; the New Wave of British Heavy Metal. The stuff we listened to when we were first getting started. I've also been listening to JOHNNY CASH, all his American recordings."

Tom: "Well, that's true, for this album, we dabbled a lot in some of the material that influenced us in the first place, like Martin said. We also listened to HELLHAMMER material [the band Tom and Martin were in before forming CELTIC FROST] very analytically, and things like that. Things that were probably a little difficult to perceive from the outside, but to us, mean a lot and have shaped our lives."

Vocal Martyr: The first time I listened to your new album, it gave me that same feeling I've gotten the first time I ever listened to any CELTIC FROST album. Its sounds like nothing really came before — on the seventh day God created CELTIC FROST and then he rested. It doesn't sound derivative of anything else.

Tom: "I think we agree.

Martin: "I think that was one of the prerogatives that we worked on over the last four years, getting to that point where it was genuine emotion in the music, not trying to sound like, 'Oh, what does CELTIC FROST have to sound like?' Trying to get back that frame of mind, but we're not trying to go back in time.

Tom: "I think it was very healthy for us to go away for awhile. We only wanted to get back together if we had something to say as CELTIC FROST."

Martin: "It was the right decision. Not having to be commercially forced to get a record deal, or going out and play live, we didn't succumb to the temptation of the absurd fees we that could get if we played the big summer festivals."

Tom: "They offered us much more money than the band is worth. But we said no, CELTIC FROST is always about taking a risk, about creating. Not going out in wheelchairs and just harvesting the money. We are taking on the full risk that this new album carries."

Vocal Martyr: So, are there more chapters in the Celtic Frost saga planned out ?

Tom: "Well, that's really for us to decide. It depends on how the media and the audience perceive this album. If they don't connect with this album, then we'll never be able to do another one. I believe we are capable of doing more like this. We have quite some ideas for another album. But we will not close our eyes to reality if noone likes this album."

Martin: "After working on it for over four years, we are going to let 'Monotheist' grow, become an entity of its own."

Read the entire interview at www.vocalmartyr.com.