SHADOW REBELS – Interviews

Guitar model: Gibson Les Paul Studio 120th Anniversary (2014) Desertburst.

GITARRISTA: Tell me about your main guitar and what drove you to choose this instrument – What is your favorite feature?
RUSTAM SAFARALIEV: What can I say? I always played on Fender-style guitars, but dreamed about Les Paul. First one was by Epiphone (custom black model). It was great instrument; we recorded our 1st album with it. But, after a lot of gigs on different equipment I realized, that I grow enough to purchase the Gibson axe. I very like push-pulls – it makes me easy switching to strat-tele tones. Work horse! Never f%cked me up! Of course, I didn’t forget about professional setup with truss rod, fretwork and nut work.

GITARRISTA: Can you talk me through the specs on the guitar? – In which ways did the guitar help to shape your band’s sound?
Rustam: As I said, push-pull versatility makes me sounds different on every song. Glass stratish with push-pull up and fat, humbucker tone for drive! Everything that guitarist need I can find in my LP. Tremolo I never use with Shadow Rebels, so I can feel easy about stable tune of LP through all the gig. I also installed Drop-D by hipshot tuner for 6th string and all our Drop-D songs I ready to play in 1 second without getting crazy my vocalist, that before that waited when I will tune. All my tuners I replaced by Groover and just happy how they keep the tune strong!

GUITARRISTA: Tell me about your latest album (musically and conceptually) and the recording process.
Rustam: It’s was a long story. We decided to save a money on a record. All the band entered in the recording room and all songs we played live all together. And everything was recorded on 16-ch tape. It’s was miracle. Like in best times of 70-s classic rock and 90-s grunge band we recorded fast – in 6 hours all the rhythm section and even guide vocals and few solos. Then, we overdubbed the guitars in vocalist home studio. Then, vocalist recorded all additional stuff like sitar, keyboards, acoustic guitars, viola and percussion. After that we rerecorded vocals and was ready to mixing in 2017 autumn. But… here the problems began… Mix-man fucked with his work more than… 3 (!!!) years. Yeah! Tree years! In this period our vocalist-bassist lost his mother, it’s drive him out on a long time. Then, this pandemic began. All gigs terminated. Then, our drummer decided to leave. Not only band. The music totally. And finally, we decided to finish the work by ourselves. We finished all little things and one song mixed completely from the scratch. Of course, I’m not so much about all the guitar sounds in album, but we just had to finish this epic process. And we did it. Our aim was to create album, that sounds like classic grunge album. And I think, that aim was achieved. So, we invite everyone to test “Shadow Rebels 2021 LP ‘On the Ride”.

Hromovlad zahrkal metalovými kockami v kostenom pohári a šmaril ich na stôl s mapou sveta. Biele kocky strašidelne zachrastili a pristáli v Izraeli, odkiaľ pochádza skvelá skupina SHADOW REBELS. Predstavte si, že sme si s tieňovými rebelmi sadli k jednej partičke hry a popri tom si nezáväzne pohovorili o progresívnom rocku, novom albume, domovine… prípadne len tak, poprevracali niektoré zaujímavé stránky života.
Na otázky mi odpovedal hlavný rebel, charizmatický spevák a basgitarista Michael Rosenfeld, postupne sa pridali bubeník Stalik Istaharov a gitarista Rustam Safaraliev.

Interview was prepared by Erik Nádudvari (Rock Hard Magazine #31)

1) SHADOW REBELS, a rock band from Israel. I never heard about you, guys. Can you please introduce yourself?
Michael: This is in fact the 2nd reincarnation of the band. The project has started in 2004 as a guitarless trio (on purpose). We’ve released a demo and then a full album, played a few gigs and festivals, but after 4.5 years this line-up has disbanded. 4 years later I decided to recreate the trio but this time with a guitar and I’ve assembled a new line-up. So essentially we are a new band.

2) The new album was named “Oversleep Hurricane”. What is hidden behind this name? Is there a link among the songs making the album conceptual or every song lives its own story?
Michael: It wasn’t planned as a concept album, but the mood and the atmosphere is definitely shared across the entire album. It’s feeling of an approaching disaster, despair and simply fear… and a strong desire to sleep through this storm. We live in a crazy time: wars, so much bloodshed, and natural cataclysms… Everyone would think that the end of the world is upon us. Many songs are written from a first person perspective. The hero of these songs is rarely a superman. This is a normal man with his fears and shortcomings, such as lack of will and selfishness, drug addiction… But there is a light in the dark as well. It comes through towards the second half of the album. There’s desire to become one with nature and songs of eternal power of love. Thus even amongst total despair there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel.

3) According to the web site, Shura Petrenko (guitar player and composer) wrote a lot of material for the new album. Shura dwells in Kiev (Ukraine) and you guys in Israel. How did you cooperate together for such a long distance? (I know, the Internet, but anyway.)
Michael: I’d like to emphasize that S. Petrenko nevertheless is not an official band member, but I have played together with Shura Petrenko about 20 years ago in a Ukrainian band Nepenthes.
Many of the songs that our band plays today have been written by us together back then. Unfortunately in that time there was no internet and no other means of making it big. Nowadays it’s significantly easier. At the same time I visit my friends in Kiev frequently. I visit almost every year and of course Shura and I get together, work on the ideas and songs, I record these on my laptop and bring it back to Israel. All the rest are just technical details.

4) How was the work going on in studio and where the new stuff has been recorded? In general, do you enjoy working in studio?
Michael: Studio is an interesting story. We took the rhythm guitar parts that Petrenko has recorded (to keep the author’s signature playing as authentic as possible) and started recording the other instruments, as it is usually done into a computer. And here when 70% of the album is ready, we realized it began to sound the same as many other alternative bands nowadays: compressed, cold, dead… And we said –Enough! Grunge has to be recorded like 20 years ago – on an analog tape! And we started everything from scratch. The only resource that we converted to analog tape was the guitar parts by Shura Petrenko. Everything else… for me it was pure sweet nostalgia. I do remember what’s an analog recording is. Juicy dynamic sound… It’s beyond compare…
Stalik: For me it was amazing to dive into the studio atmosphere for a few weeks. Especially for analog recording. It was a very interesting and useful experience. It’s the first time when I tried what it truly was. The most wonderful is that we almost didn’t have to do anything with the drums sound. Imagine, we didn’t even have to compress it. The tape did everything.
Rustam: Frankly, until now, I have never recorded om a serious studio and of course I worried quite a bit. Also before the second recording session I’ve injured my hand and my thoughts were focused only on that. Eventually, if it wasn’t for the rhythm parts by Shura Petrenko, it would be really tough for me. But now I’ve overcome that and played out pretty well and the next album we’ll write ourselves. Of course I have to say that analog recording is an amazing experience. I strongly advise it to every musician: no cuts, no copy-paste. Just play what you can and you will hear exactly that in the end and no computer will play this for you the same way.

5) I´d like to know a bit about the cover artwork. Who brought it into live, when, how…?
Michael: The idea for the cover art came to my mind after a bit of thinking. I wondered: who can sleep through a hurricane? Only the most sinless and pure being – a baby or an angel. And then the picture by Giovanni Battista Caracciolo “Sleeping Cupid” of the 17th century caught my eye and I “framed” it, slightly tilting it on the wall, like it went through an hurricane. A colleague of mine (Dima Grossman) from the music instruments store where I work helped me bring the idea to life and he made the cover art for the front page of the booklet. I hope we won’t get blamed for child pornography (laughing). Our label Metalscrap-records took The lion’s share of the following work of designing the booklet, for this I’m eternally grateful.

6) Rustam comes from Azerbaidjan and Stalik comes from Uzbekistan. Guys, this is a unique occasion to spend a few words of local rock scenes in both countries. How are things going in rock or metal in Azerbaidjan and Uzbekistan?
Rustam: I’m sure that in both countries there’s plenty of metal bands, however I know nothing about them. When I was 4, my family moved to Russia, and a few years later to Isreal, so…
Stalik: It’s completely the same for me. I remember almost nothing about the life THERE. All the music that I listened to, was already in Israel. I only remember seeing a cd with my father’s recording which was published in USSR by his band “Gruppa IKS” (Band X).

7) It´s not easy to classify your music as it is rich for other elements. However, how much are you influenced by ethnic music and culture from your homelands?
Michael: Music has no limits. You are influenced much farther than only by the ethnic music of the country you are living in. While living in Ukraine I very much enjoyed listening to Azerbaijani pianist and singer Aziza Mustapha Zadeh, the great Indian sitar player Ravi Shankar and many others. However also Ukrainian folk songs / lyrics make my heart beat in a special rhythm. Most important that we understand: any music, that has national, ethnic roots, will always find a response in people. This way Earth’s energy returns to people.

8) Michael is a multi-instrumentalist, playing violin, sitar, etc. That is really amazing. Is there any musical instrument he would like to learn? (… and still doesn´t? 🙂
Michael: (laughing) I, you can say, collect musical instruments. The only type of instruments that are playing hard to get for me are the winds, with the exception of the harmonica. But frankly, I wish I’d learned to play really well on the instruments I’ve already mastered and won’t forget the skills that I’ve lost through the years of irregular practice… I don’t like to practice a lot. I always take it with a swoop.

9) The “Little girl big heart” song (and others) has a very intimate atmosphere. What role play feelings, emotions and atmosphere in your music?
Michael: Undoubtedly, emotions, personal experiences is most important. No one will believe you if you’ll sing about something that you hadn’t lived through, if you will not put up your personal emotions into your music. And this is true not only for lyric songs…
Rustam: If you speak of personal experience, then songs like “You don’t feel good” and “Deepest gloom” they very much resonate to what I’ve experienced myself. I’ve spent several years on the very bottom of a drug addiction. Today I’m not ashamed to talk about it. If it wasn’t for the music, we wouldn’t be speaking now… This is the only thing that brought me back to life…

10) When playing gigs, do you prefer small audience in small room to big one? Do you play exclusively acoustic?
Michael: Small venues are the only stages where we could shine up to now. However we would definitely won’t say no to playing a set on a stadium. Although, in my opinion in a small pub every note you play will be more vivid and more noticeable, every error as well though. Nevertheless an intimate atmosphere allows you to communicate with people on a more personal level. On a big scale concert, the most important is not to shit your pants from fear (every band member is laughing)… Acoustic concert – that’s a dream for us and we have accumulated a lot of material especially for such an occasion.

11) Can you please unveil a bit of your plans for the future?
Michael: This question is a natural continuation of the previous one. In our nearest plans – we’d like to assemble all the songs from our repertoire which can played as an acoustic, add a few more of such songs if need be, bring a violin quartet, a keyboard player and a back vocalist and have a grand “unplugged” concert, record it live and on video as well. I think it would be awesome!.. Of course we’d like to record a video clip for our new song and get onto a festival in Europe, one that would suit our style of music.

12) Whatever you would like to say to our readers, please, you are welcome.
Michael: I’d like to address all fans of rock music and young bands our there playing pubs and local festivals – you are the real Rock! The future of music is only for that which is free from cliché and stereotypes. Discover new horizons and never stop dreaming! Remember – only yesterday what was considered “alternative” today is the “mainstream”.
Stalik: Keep On Rocking!
Rustam: Good Luck!

Когда-то я услышал израильскую группу SHADOW REBELS. Музыка у них была странноватая как для меня, но запомнилась. И вот пришла информация о подготовке группой нового альбома и о выпущенном сингле. Решил пообщаться.

Привет! Давайте будем знакомиться. Расскажи краткую биографию коллектива с момента основания и до дня сегодняшнего.

Группа собралась как раз, когда я восстановил голос, который я потерял на полтора года. Мне тогда казалось, что это произошло из-за непомерной громкости гитаристов с которыми я тогда играл. Поэтому я решил собрать минималистичный состав, который мне не приходилось бы перекрикивать. И без гитары, естественно. Только бас, барабаны и клавиши. Мы выпустили демо, потом полноформатный альбом, наснимали самодельных клипов и выступали по местным клубам и фестивалям, но потом энтузиазм угас и группа разошлась. Через 4 года, я снова остался без комманды и решил восстановить свой проект, на этот раз уже с гитарой. Мы решили перенацелить свои взгляды на Европу. И не прогадали. Выпустили новый альбом и отправились в мини-тур по Восточной Европе. Теплый прием нас очень вдохновил. Снимаем как можем клипы, стараемся выступать почаще. И сейчас мы заканчиваем следующий новый альбом.

Музыка группы весьма разнопланова. Поэтому не лишним будет узнать какие группы оказали решающее влияние на SHADOW REBELS.

Stone Temple Pilots, Alice in chains, Pearl jam, Soundgarden, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Police…

Дай пожалуйста краткую характеристику каждому вашему альбому, в чем отличительная особенность?

В “Oversleep Hurricane” мы собрали самые многоплановые и пестрые композиции. Это альбом, который показывает нашу разноплановость, тут есть не только живой скрипичный квартет (никогда не стану больше записывать себя на скрипках, слишком давно я на них регулярно играл), но и совсем уж экзотические инструменты, как ситар! Но, несмотря на всю пестроту палитры – сквозь альбом проходит главная идея, близкая многим любителям гранджа – о хрупкости мира и ощущении надвигающейся беды, от которой хочется спрятаться, т.е. – “Проспать ураган”.
Новый альбом вот-вот будет готов. Он называется “… On The Ride” – там намного больше самоиронии и меньше пафоса. Меньше клавишных партий и всяких других студийных штучек-дополнялок. Мы вообще записали всю ритм-секцию за один вечер. Здесь больше пост-гранджевости и даже немного элементов прогрессива. Но на мой взгляд альбом получится менее пестрым и более стилистически выверенным. Самое главное – абсолютно иной подход. “Ураган” писался чисто по-студийному – все по одному заходили в студию, даже не видя друг друга… А потом пытались это все сыграть вживую на концертах. Нынешний альбом записывался абсолютно по-другому – все одновременно играли вживую, я даже пел, чтоб не наиграть лишнего на басу. Потом только переписали вокал начистую и добавили дабл-партий гитар и немного клавиш. Ну и о ситаре не забыли конечно. Все, что мы накатали на концертах и отработали – попало на запись в самом естественном живом виде. И конечно – как всегда – на пленку!

На некоторое время группа прекращала свою деятельность. Что тогда случилось?

Было дело. с 2009 по 2013…Апатия… такое бывает. Здоровье у клавишника ухудшилось – это повлияло на игру, и тогдашний барабанщик решил уйти. Спустя 4 года я набрал состав, и он дежится уже 7 лет! И даже клавишник смог вернуться в качестве сессионного музыканта.

Поговорим о вашем новом сингле. Самый главный вопрос. А какой в нем смысл? Он выпущен в преддверии выпуска нового альбома? Обычно такие синглы выходят на виниле у известных команд ограниченным тиражом и представляют коллекционную ценность. Ваш сингл пока только в цифровом виде существует. Будете ли вы искать для него физическое воплощение?

Мы вначале думали включить эту песню в новый альбом, но он слишком отличался от остального материала и решено было его оставить за бортом. Хоть песня и класная – сама по себе. Вот мы ее и выпустили синглом, снабдив Би-сайдом с ранней версией другой баллады “Mirror”, с барабанщиком из предыдущего состава и… детским хором! Было б недурно конечно и на физическом носителе выпустить, на виниле, например… Эх, мечты-мечты…

Что можешь сказать о концертной жизни в Израиле? Есть ли большие фестивали, часто проводятся андеграундные клубные концерты? Посещает ли их публика? Как часто вы сами играете вживую? Какими выступлениями можете похвастать?

Пожалуй, клубняк – чуть ли не единственная возможность для выступлений таких групп как наша. Благо их хватает. Но публика ленится. Многие (тысячи просмотров) “ходят” смотреть концерт по трансляции на Фейсбуке или Ю-туб-канале. Но немногие ходят физически. Обидно, конечно. Не из-за денег, а из-за вынужденности играть в полупустом зале. Мы регулярно играем вживую. Есть места, где нас очень тепло встречают. А есть и такие, куда боятся звать, чтоб мы там не затмили местных “звезд”. Причем абсолютно разная публика – и байкеры, и “старперы” за 50 и совсем молодые – тинейджеры – всем нравится и материал, и подача. Можем похвастаться выступлением в Сербии и Украине, а также на дне Независимости Израиля на стадионе перед 8000 зрителей!

В конце интервью назови для наших читателей несколько достойных израильских групп, ну и последние слова за тобой?

Deface, Illegal Mind… Ну и конечно более знаменитые Orphaned Land, Betzefer, Salem… Ребята, живая музыка это основа для всякой остальной музыки “играемой” с помощью гаджетов “почти музыкантами”, но если она умрет, то у уважаемых ди-джеев просто кончатся семплы и лупы. А если серьезно – ходите на концерты. Вы не представляете насколько вы делаете музыкантов счастливыми и востребованными. Если раньше они стачивались по наркоте из-за утомительных туров и супервнимания публики и прессы, то теперь – от недостатка внимания и востребованности. Лучше не купить очередную игрушку, которая перестанет быть актуальной через пару месяцев, а вместо этого потратить сущие гроши на настоящее живое представление, которое зарядит энергией (причем обе стороны) и оставит незабываемые впечатления надолго.

THE GRINDER

1. Thanks for your time. Tell us about your band and what you do for your band.
I’m Michael and I singer and bass player in Shadow Rebels band. Our band playing post-grunge with alternative and progressive elements.

2. When did you decide you wanted to be in a band?
I think first time it was in 1990. But real chance to create my own band I had in late 2004.

3. What is different about being a musician than you imagined?
90% things that you dealing with it – it’s all you want, except music (tour tickets, passport issues, effect pedals, etc) and only 10% – it’s naked music!

4. What gear do you use and why?
I use custom made Fender Precision bass (selfmade from Squier body and few original parts)… why? Because after 2 years of trying to play on special made for me double-neck bass I realised that I can’t dealing with 7 kg instrument 🙁

5. What music do you listen to that would surprise people?
Baroque.

6. How do we find your music and merch to buy?
Just search Shadow Rebels in Youtube, our site www.shadowrebels.com and at official shops:
https://metalscraprecords.com/shop/en/store/product/view/1/5990
https://metalscraprecords.com/shop/en/store/product/view/36/6409
https://www.amazon.com/Oversleep-Hurricane-Explicit-Shadow-Rebels/dp/B0138ANE8S
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/oversleep-hurricane/id1024209543
https://open.spotify.com/album/2Ei2VjwGIUPWMBiPwPMU0v
https://www.deezer.com/en/album/10855840
https://play.google.com/store/music/album/Shadow_Rebels_Oversleep_Hurricane?id=Behtb4bhvpjfv6qclmi5o3nu7ju

7. How did you get a record deal? Or do you want a record deal or are you DIY?
Friend of mine just recommended me to try Metal Scrap Records and I liked it!

8. What bands do people compare your music to?
Stone Temple pilots, Sound Garden, Pearl Jam, Alice in chains… etc

9. Are you pro Spotify / streaming services ? Or do you think it hurts sales?
I’m not so cool in Internet sales… 🙁

10. What’s the ultimate goal for the band?
To get tour in Europe and to get gig on big festival, when major labels searching the bands.

11. Will we see you tour?
I hope so.

12. Who would you love to tour with?
No metter. Band that mate with us in style direction.

13. What is your favorite song of yours and why?
I love all our songs and can’t choose from them better one… but sometimes… you know, my music boring me and I prefer not to listen it too much, just playing, but with feeling like we doing it first time.

14. Why should people take the time to listen to your band over the thousands of other bands?
We playing and writing our music in analog, warm way, we don’t use PC’s to edit music. It’s natural feel and breathe of real performance.

15. What are your favorite music websites labels podcast etc?
At work I like to listen internet radio with jazz and blues-rock, at home I use ClamRadio for sleeping aid.

16. Is imagery important to you? Do you judge albums by the cover?
Yes. It’s important.

17. If you could choose a cover song your band mates would hate what would it be?
Sweet child of mine 🙂

18. Is the record or live show more important?
Live live live… In studio you can do everything with help of all those tricks… but it’s not real you… Only live performance can open real face of band!

19. Name 3 people dead or alive you would want to play your music for.
Chris Cornell, Layne Staley, Scott Weiland.

20. Lemmy Ozzy Dio and Rob Halford in a cage match who wins?
Ozzy and Lemmy.