PLEASE START BY TELLING ABOUT THE BAND, MEMBERS, AND HOW THE BAND FORMED.

Until Death Overtakes Me was formed in may 1999, simply because I felt that only with the aid of music I could express certain feelings or emotions, that were impossible to express in any other form of art. At the moment I am the only member, there have been 3 other members in the past, but they never got involved and never were as interested in the music as I was, so they couldn’t stay in the band. Being the only member has great advantages, I am not depending on other members for rehearsals, I don’t have to wait for recordings until all members find the time to come to the studio, I have almost unlimited freedom in creating my music.

YOU RELEASED “SYMPHONY II – ABSENSE OF LIFE” ALMOST A YEAR AGO NOW, HOW WAS THE RESPONSE TO IT? WAS IT WHAT YOU HAD EXPECTED?

The response is mostly positive, overall, people think that my music is quite original, especially due to the mix of ambient and funeral doom, but this mix is also the reason why some don’t like it, some still don’t like keyboards used in extreme doom. But in general I am very pleased with the comments I got so far on my music. The response is much much better than I expected, I never expected that anyone would actually like or understand the entity which is Until Death Overtakes Me.

WOULD I BE CORRECT TO ASSUME THAT YOU ARE CURRENTLY WORKING ON A NEW DISC?

Partially correct, I am working on 2 albums at the moment, one of them will be a 3-track mini-CD, with a new song, a re-recorded version of a track taken from ‘Symphony II – Absence Of Life’ and a cover. If all goes as planned, this mini, entitled ‘Prelude to Monolith’ should be released in October. The other album I am working on is the next full album, the title is ‘Symphony III – Monolith’, but there is still a lot of work to be done for this album and I don’t have a release date yet, but possibly it’s going to be finished somewhere in 2003.

IS THE NEW ONE GOING TO BE AN INDEPENDENT RELEASE OR DO YOU HAVE A LABEL TO BACK YOU? IF YOU ARE LOOKING FOR A LABEL, WHAT ARE SOME OF YOUR EXPECTATIONS FROM THEM?

The mini is going to be independent, although I was thinking about starting my own little label, for Until Death Overtakes Me and my side-projects and maybe another band, but it doesn’t look like I’ll be able to do this before the mini is going to be released. I am not really looking for a label, but if I see that the response to the new mini is very positive, I might send a few copies to some labels…

As for expectations, well, the most important thing is that I need a lot of freedom, so an open-minded label is a minimum.

WHO/WHAT DO YOU HAVE AS INFLUENCES WHEN WRITING YOUR MUSIC?

There are no influences when it comes to my music, several bands manage to influence me and since Until Death Overtakes Me is a personal project, something that has an influence on me, might indirectly influence the music as well. But I always try not to sound like any other band and avoid any band or artist to influence me. Lately I haven’t been listening to a lot of music, mostly when I am writing new material I simply have no time to listen to other music and get influenced.

WHY DID YOU DECIDE TO CHOOSE THE GENRE OF METAL THAT YOU ARE IN, AS COMPARED TO ANOTHER GENRE?

I don’t consider the kind of music I make as a sub-genre of metal, metal has become much too limited for what I have in mind.

And I didn’t really choose a genre from the start, although in the very beginning of Until Death Overtakes Me, the music was a mix between black metal and melancholic doom, it quickly evolved to funeral doom with classical influences to ambient funeral doom. The music still evolves, but the funeral doom and the dark ambient elements will remain present because I consider these two genres as the only genres that allow me to express certain feelings to their fullest extent.

WHAT IS THE CURRENT UNDERGROUND SCENE LIKE IN YOUR LOCALE OF THE WORLD? DO YOU HAVE ANY FAVORITES?

It’s doing fine I guess, at least when ambient and doom-metal is considered, I have no idea what’s going on in the other genres. Over a short period of time I have discovered several very good bands, most of them being much better than the ‘big’ bands. To me, the underground bands have become more important than the well-know bands, if I listen to music, it’s mostly underground. It’s hard to say which is my favorite, since there are so many good bands. But some of the very best are : Pantheist, Hlidolf, Hierophant, Undiscovered Moons Of Saturn, Uncertainty Principle…

IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE THAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO ADD, OR THAT I MAY HAVE MISSED?

Well, maybe just a little something : http://listen.to./udom - the URL to my homepage with Until Death Overtakes Me and my other solo-projects. I am also working on a small site dedicated to dark ambient or closely related underground music : http://udom.netfirms.com/edg.htm .

And thanx to you, Iced, for this interview!