RHAPSODY Vs SHAMAN/ANGRA: Intercontinental War Of Words

Italy's RHAPSODY have slammed Brazil's ANGRA and SHAMAN over the negative remarks made by the latter two groups in the Brazilian Cover Baixo magazine about the relationship between RHAPSODY and their German producer Sascha Paeth.

In a posting to their official web site, www.mightyrhapsody.com, RHAPSODY guitarist Luca Turilli writes, "It's since 1997 that we are facing lies around our band... We decided to never reply to not place [ourselves] at the same level of these people. But now happened something that we didn't like at all... a lie bigger than ever before...

"In the forum of this site we received an incredible message from one of our Brazilian friends... some strange things were told by [ANGRA's] Felipe Andreoli (bass) and [SHAMAN's] Luis Mariutti (bass) . . .regarding RHAPSODY in the recording studio.

"These are some parts of the interview...

" 'Cover Baixo - Give us an example of these 'fake bands':'

"Luis – 'I know I'm gonna shock many fans, but RHAPSODY is the typical example of this kind of things...'
Felipe – 'Oh, about that one everybody already knew...' (laughs)
Luis – 'Yeah, in that case Sascha Paeth is the one who does everything, the guys of the band give ideas for the songs, but all the part of studio is not done by the group, but by Sascha and electronic drums. Luca Turilli just started to record the guitars by himself now... Man, if I go to Italy, I'll end [up getting] killed by the metal MO...' (many laughs)
Felipe – 'Yeah, the guys didn't even do tours, obviously there was something wrong...'
Luis – 'I don't know how far it's good for metal. The ideal thing is to make band and keep its roots.'

"Well, in a first moment me and [RHAPSODY keyboardist] Alex [Staropoli] couldn't really believe to what we were reading... then we decided to react...

"These are some facts:

1) It's [been] six months that me and Alex completed the basic songs for the new RHAPSODY album, working hard every day. Three months ago, we met again to [perfect] everything... and in this last month we met a third time to take care more and more to the littlest details and to be fully satisfied of the musical result to give to our fans the best album they can wait for... that's why we can't endure anymore these stupid lies !!!!!

2) On the second day of August the recording sessions for the new RHAPSODY album will begin and actually Sascha doesn't know 1 (one) single note of the album!!! He's only the producer, a great producer (recordings, editing, premixes setups, sounds processing, mix, mastering, and n-o-t 1 (one) note of composition!). He knows that is also very hard to give only one advice regarding a song to me and Alex. One more [thing] regarding this... the new RHAPSODY album will be produced by RHAPSODY for the first time!!!

3) Since 1997 me and Alex prepare the songs in the most complete way before going in studio and it never happened that we composed just 1 song in the studio with Sascha... not even 1!!!!

4) We are [protective] of our compositions, that's why we are used to write always on every album the famous sentence... all music, songs, vocal and bass lines composed by Luca Turilli and Alex Staropoli!!!

5) We [have] plenty of floppy disks, demos and master tapes (from 1995 till today) that can demonstrate all the hard work we made in Trieste and only Trieste to obtain the 'Hollywood metal' sound !!

"You can now fully understand why we are really tired of all this situation... and so we decided to make something to stop these kind of lies FOREVER:

"Right now just one week is missing before starting the recordings of the new RHAPSODY album... the songs of RHAPSODY are all in the Alex's computer in Trieste and Sascha doesn't know still one single note of them...

"So we are ready to pay the flight to Luis Mariutti to come right now in the studio to have the possibility to see what is the reality there and to be ashamed for what he told in that absurd interview...

"Immediately after we expect public [apologies] to end this stupid soap-opera.

"Thanks for your understanding, beloved friends... it's really not nice to receive these moral hurts from people we always used to deeply esteem. Right in this moment we are finishing another great session of long composition to offer you another exciting travel on the notes of RHAPSODY's music!

Peace and love to all of you, Luca and Alex"

A couple of days later, a follow-up message was posted on RHAPSODY's web site containing what is apparently a statement from Luis Mariutti about the whole incident. It reads as follows:

"Hello. Reading the interview I gave to Cover Baixo, I admit that I also thought it was [unethical] and foolish from me to tell those things. I will not stay here trying to explain what was said. What can I do is to apologize with the fans of the band, the musicians because of the wrong words that were told in a bad day. I hope one day I will be able to fix this error with the fans and the musicians of the band. Thanks for the attention, Luis"