KRVNA

One-man band from Sydney (Australia), KRVNA has just released a new recording, the entitled EP “The Rhythmus of Death Eternal”. The opportunity to interview Krvna Vatra Smrt (KVS), so that he can introduce his Black Metal project to us and comment on his recent release.


1. Hi, reviews generally agree that you play traditional '90s Black Metal but with modern production. What do you want the listener to feel when listening to your sound? You can take advantage of this to further present KRVNA as I believe this is your first interview for a French media.

I couldn’t really argue with that description of my music. To me it’s honest, traditional Black Metal - played the way it should be. It sounds this way because this is how it sounded to me in the 90’s during my formative years of becoming a musician. So it’s really just a case of me doing what I feel is most natural. I expect listeners to be able to hear and appreciate this in my music, too. What they get out it - is purely subjective, I suppose!
I’d formed KRVNA officially in 2020, when some recordings and demos were undertaken which were made up of material I’d spent the last 10 years writing. CoVID hit, we all had much more time on our hands. I was recovering from a broken shoulder and grieving over the death of my father at the time… and I suppose the rest is history, now. I’ve released a demo (and rereleased it with new material), two albums, and now, most recently, an EP with 3 original tracks and two covers of some of my favourite bands/favourite songs.

2. KRVNA is regularly compared to Swedish Black Metal, most often to melodic bands (DISSECTION, SACRAMENTUM, DAWN) but sometimes also to the most brutal fringe (MARDUK, DARK FUNERAL). What is the secret to achieving such a synthesis?

Again you mention bands and influences that are all entirely appropriate, and/or apt when defining my sound & approach. There aren't necessarily any surprises - and most people who are ‘in tune’ with what was happening in the early to mid (even late) 90’s may find my material ‘familiar’. Combining what I consider are the best aspects of all of those bands is a bit of a dark art. I can’t put my finger on the process. To give you an example I don’t sit down with an instrument and try to write music or compose riffs. I would much rather wait for an idea to pop into my head, or as I usually describe it - ‘to pluck things from the aether’.
Perhaps there’s much more happening sub-consciously and I’m definitely not in much of a position to need to question how, or why it works. It just ‘seems to’.

3. A commentator on your Facebook page noted a mixture of Slavic melodies and waltz rhythms in your early compositions; is this really the case?

Most certainly. Many of my melodies and rhythms based off traditional Slavonic music are absolutely an integral part of the formula. It was once said (to paraphrase musicologist David Byrne), that ‘Slavonic Music used minor keys…’ even ‘…for happy music…’ because ‘… their lives were so hard they didn’t really know what happiness was, anyway.’ There’s a lot to take out of this idea. This notion felt so familiar to me, and I tend to lean toward the assumption that perhaps we endure some kind of collective memory or despair. Depression is not necessarily uncommon among us Slavs, just take a quick glance at some of our greatest writers.

4. We hear the keyboard in your music, but it is far from being predominant. What contributions do you want this instrument to have in your songs?

This is one of those perennial questions for me - on every release I am torn between either using them, or not. They typically tend to make it onto my recordings - I find they just add a small amount of ‘ambience’ or air to the music. Some of the riffs can be pretty intense, so offsetting that with minimal amounts of keys can help balance things out. Having said that though - I didn’t feel they were necessary on my latest EP, ‘The Rhythmus Of Death Eternal’. Most of the riffs were quite melodic in nature, and keys weren’t necessary.

5. Your drum work in KRVNA is often noted as a strength. How do you approach it compared to EARTHE where you also play this instrument?

Drums were actually my very first instrument. Even to this day when arranging music, I tend to view the compositional process from a drummer’s perspective. The way drums are created for DEARTHE and KRVNA are similar. It’s somewhat of a dark art, but it involves an electronic drum kit, information recorded to MIDI and the rest - lots of patience and time editing, arranging and making things perfect. There’s much more to the process but I won’t elaborate on that here. My acoustic kit (a nice 7 piece NATAL) has been gathering dust in a basement for well over 13 years, now.

6. As for the voice, what impression do you want it to creates? Which singers would you like to sound like?

I don’t specifically try to sound like anyone else - but my favourite singers are (early) David Vincent, Pete Helkamp, Jon Nodveidt, Legion & Daniel Rosten, to name a few. As for impression, as long as my vocal performances convey intensity, aggression & some kind of clarity - that’s all that really matters to me.

7. Almost all your titles are between 7 and 8 minutes long and I read criticisms for this uniformity. What does this inspire you?

I’m not necessarily averse to writing shorter songs, truly. During the arrangement process I’m constantly trying to cut things down. Initially many of my tracks sit at around the 13-15 minute mark. Once I arrange vocals - and ensure I’ve said what I need to say lyrically & that it all fits within the musical framework, I generally cut them down to around the 6-8 minute mark. I’m definitely not writing songs for those challenged with attention deficit, haha. We are not in the business of writing pop songs or radio tunes, I suppose.

8. Who drew KRVNA’s logo? We see two scythes there, was this to announce that death would be an omnipresent topic in your lyrics?

Scourge - the singer & main man behind the band PESTILENTIAL SHADOWS drew the logo for me under some initial instruction, notably with regard to the two scythes - and sure, death is fundamental to what defines KRVNA. I contemplate death every single day.

9. This brings us to the concept and major theme of KRVNA: vampirism. Your texts and your inspiration span the ages: from antiquity (“Gethsemane Ablaze”, “From the Shades of Hades…”) to the 19th-20th centuries (the authors Lord Byron/Polidori, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Bram Stoker, Dudley Wright and Samuel Beckett), through the Middle Ages (“… To the Targovistean Night”, “The Flaming Hordes of Basarab”). Can you present the stories your words tell and the messages you want to convey? Don’t hesitate to elaborate.

My mother’s family comes from a small village based in the Istrian Peninsula, in Croatia. Her family/ancestors have lived there since the 1400’s, after they’d fled an Ottoman Incursion in Transylvania, hundreds of years ago. To this day, despite their language and culture being listed by UNESCO as severely endangered, a few hundred people all over the world still manage to utter a few words in their mother tongue, ‘Istro-Romanian’ and I was lucky enough to have grown up hearing all manner of stories from my mother’s village; some of which pertain to witchcraft and of course, even vampirism. Not far from her place of birth is another village, ‘Kringa’, home to Europe’s first officially documented case of vampirism.
My focus on the darker aspects of my people’s culture was a way of ‘shedding light’ on these stories once more, to showcase them a new audience, before time completely eradicates them.

10. The concept of the flesh comes up several times, notably in "The Triumph of the Flesh over the Spirit", "For Thine Is the Kingdome of the Flesh" and of course "Gethsemane Ablaze" (consumption of the flesh of Jesus - via transubstantiation).
What do you put behind it?

It’s quite obvious that Christianity in many ways is just European Paganism ‘dressed in Abrahamic’ clothing. Christians adhere to all the same high festivals and even worship and glorify gods of old via the proxy that is christianity (a great example is Saint Elijah, who is actually based off the Slavonic Pagan God of ‘Thunder’, ‘Perun’). Blood veneration and sacrifice… old paganistic themes, again, having found their way into modern dogma.
Comparing Christ’s promise of eternal life, particularly via the very consumption of his own flesh and blood - sounds so eerily similar to that of the vampire’s curse.

11. What is this relic that the title of the demo “Long Forgotten Relic” refers to?

The actual song itself describes the plight of the Istro-Romanians, lyrically, and describes the gradual disappearance of a language and culture.

12. Still at the concept level, how do you compare yourself to other Black Metal bands inspired by the same theme (CRADLE OF FILTH, ABYSSOS, DROWNING THE LIGHT…)?

I don’t think I’m too particularly similar to other vampiric Black Metal bands. Particularly with the newer releases, the music itself, and lyrical content is diverging quite drastically. For example, much of the new material focuses on existential issues and death. Having said all of this, I still consider DROWNING THR LIGHT to be par excellence, when it comes to True Vampiric Black Metal. Hails Azgorh!!!

13. In March 2023, you announced that your next two productions would notably address existentialism and the death of God.
Like in the lyrics of “Heresy” by NINE INCH NAILS, do you think that “God is dead, and no one cares”?

Sure, I think in many ways, from a collective perspective the need for such notion as ‘God’ seems ridiculous and redundant in our day to day. In addition of it being a complete waste of time I don’t see any appreciable benefit to clutching at metaphysical straws. We exist, not from our personal choice, and we just have to make the best of things within our means and circumstances. I’m reasonably content with doing my time quietly… and one day, the lights will go out, and all of it will cease to matter, God, or no God.

14. You think “If it’s not dark, evil and violent, it’s no longer Black Metal”. How would you then characterize a subgenre such as Cascadian Black Metal?

Sure, Black Metal has diverged. In many ways. And when I espouse, or talk of these principles, I hearken back to a time where Black Metal felt dark, it felt evil, and it WAS violent. These were the core/fundamental differences between black and death metal of the early 90’s. All of a sudden, a group of people came along and didn’t just ‘talk the talk’ – they ‘walked the walk’, too. Tell me this wasn’t, and still isn’t convincing, to this very day?

15. The 2nd album “For Thine Is the Kingdom of the Flesh” was announced to be released by Seance Records but it was finally by Third Eye Temple / Ancient Dead Productions. What happened?

Very late in the piece, near the completion of the album actually, the lovely people who are behind Seance Records embarked on a huge life move. Literally, they left our home town of Sydney & moved thousands of kilometres away. I don’t blame them. Sydney is a soulless city, everything is expensive, and there are few true opportunities to do well or succeed, here. So the idea originally was that Seance would release the second album, we had been in a number of discussions about it, but the timing just didn’t work out right for either of us. We are still friends, despite the album not having been released via Seance.
Third Eye Temple and Ancient Dead did a fantastic job with regard to the release, and all seemed to work out for the best, in the end!

16. Greallach did a very good job with the covers for “For Thine Is the Kingdom of the
Flesh” and the EP “The Rhythmus of Death Eternal”. Can you explain to our readers what to see there?

Sure - a couple questions back we’d touched on transubstantiation. I just figured why not make the artwork about that, in literal terms; and my immediate thought was ‘The Last Supper.’

17. We find the words “eternal death” in the title of your new EP. I would have rather expected “eternal life” to continue on vampirism…

Yes, indeed. My focus has changed, and I’ve found a far greater muse in Death, compared to that of ‘eternal life.’

18. I have the impression that your new compositions from this EP contain more slower passages (like the title “A God's Work” which has also been described as dreamy or even on “What Great Lengths”), less keyboard & choirs, and much more solos. Do you share and is it done purposely?

Yeah very much so - My typical M.O is to arrange most of my riffs to blast beats. So when I make moves counter moves, like on ‘A God’s Work’ - it becomes glaringly obvious. When I was arranging it, I’d actually considered the slower pace to be a bit of a risky move. But in the end, it definitely worked out for the best. The song wouldn’t have been the same if it was just all blast beats. It has a swagger now, it’s slow and brooding. The solos feel more prominent on this EP I think due to the fact that there are only 3 songs. It wasn’t necessarily a deliberate move to make them overtly more obvious, but I’m happy with how they sit within the songs, and it’s a good point of difference. I don’t hear much Black Metal with high quality solos.

19. The last 2 titles are covers of ABIGOR and BATHORY. Did you use different equipment to try to recapture the atmosphere of almost 30 years ago or did you do as usual?

Actually I wanted to keep all the same equipment I’d used for the rest of the recording. I didn’t want to recapture much of anything from their original states versus trying to incorporate them into the overall direction and sound of the EP. Both bands had a huge influence on me, in different ways. Also, there are many BATHORY covers out there. Just about all of them are from the early albums. Again, I wanted to do something different.

20. Your version of BATHORY’s “Man of Iron” is much more powerful than the original.
What was your intention?

Absolutely - I’d always wondered what that sound would’ve sounded like if Quorthon recorded it with a full ‘band’. I suppose this is the next best thing. I do wonder if he’d have liked it, though, haha. I guess we’ll never know.

21. If you had time to listen to it, I would like to take this opportunity to ask your opinion on the new ABIGOR album which was released at the very end of 2023?

ABIGOR are at the forefront of Black Metal evolution, and yet they still manage to keep a complete authenticity about themselves. They are undoubtedly one of my all time favourite bands, and a big reason why I’d turned out the way I did, musically, was due to them. I had the new album on just the other day, and thoroughly enjoyed it.

22. You accumulated riffs during the 10 years preceding the creation of KRVNA, which then allowed you to quickly release a series of releases (a demo, 2 albums and an EP in less than 3 years). Are you now reaching a stage where you will have to start from a blank page?

Great question - I was actually at the ‘blank page’ phase prior to the recording and writing of ‘The Rhythmus Of Death Eternal’, barring one or two riffs. Everything else was reasonably new!

23. What is planned for after “The Rhythmus of Death Eternal”?

I’m going to take a small break, recompose myself, write as much material as I can and look at working on another album, when it’s possible and appropriate for me. This year I already have a number of musical related works on the horizon, including a collaboration with the mighty ACHERONTAS - I will be playing lead guitars on their upcoming album. Back to KRVNA - I want to make sure that what I write next is a step above everything else I’ve done previously and won’t be rushing to release anything - it will come, when it comes.

24. Should we expect new instrumental tracks, as was the case with “The Triumph of the Flesh over the Spirit” on “Sempinfernus” album?


I don’t mind the idea of instrumental tracks - but they really have to speak to me on that level. Sometimes the music doesn’t require words to move you. When I was writing ‘The Triumph Of The Flesh Over The Spirit’, I’d hoped it would’ve turned out similarly to Emperor’s ‘The Wanderer.’

25. Do you have plans to make music videos for KRVNA?

Not particularly. I know this is what many bands do these days. The jury is still out and I know it’s generally best to say ‘never say never’, in circumstances like this.

26. What are the activities of the community of Australian Black Metal bands called “Ordo Ater Anguis” (“Order of the Black Serpent”)? What is your relationship with them? Do these bands record at your studio “Last Gasp Recordings”?

Yes, I have recorded a number of them, and have also been involved in a number of these bands in the past, including NAZXUL and PESTILENTIAL SHADOWS.

27. At the end of 2022, you announced discussions for splits, is it still relevant? With bands from the “Ordo Ater Anguis”?

I do still have the idea of doing a couple of splits in mind, but with material to draw from at an all time low, this may take some time to come to fruition! After ‘The Rhythmus Of Death Eternal’, I’m feeling a small break would be appropriate.

28. You keep control over all stages of a KRVNA production, from writing to mastering. Do you want to continue like this, or do you plan to involve other people?

Yes, it’s very much been a solo effort on many fronts. I’ve gradually invited people into the sphere with regard to art and design/layout, and the future surely will bring more collaboration with other musicians, discussions surrounding this kind of outcome are almost constantly taking place, in the background.

29. In the photos & videos you share, your face is barely visible. It's usually hidden behind your hair, makeup, or sunglasses. Why so much mystery?

It adds to the appeal, don’t you think? I don’t particularly think it would add anything by showing who I am… & the music speaks for itself.

30. Can we hope to see you one day give a concert in France for KRVNA?

There have been a number of talks of taking KRVNA to the stage. This is still a distinct possibility - but not something that I’m in a rush to achieve.

31. You are the drummer of DEARTHE and at the end of 2022, you joined PESTILENTIAL SHADOWS on guitar. What is the news and what are the projects of these 2 groups?

I’d recently had PESTILENTIAL SHADOWS in the studio, details of which I’m reticent to speak of at this particular point in time, but expect to hear some news regarding this, imminently. As for DEARTHE - there has been some talk of follow up material, but nothing is slated for the near future, unfortunately!

32. This year a new version of the movie “Nosferatu” should be released, starring Willem Dafoe, who you liked in “Shadow Of The Vampire”. What do you expect from this 2024 version? We'll let you finish the interview.

‘The Shadow Of The Vampire’ is one of the greatest vampire movies of all time. I’m hopeful that the new Nosferatu will be great - I enjoyed Egger’s ‘The VVitch’, so I wait in anticipation.
Lestat & Thrashocore, thank you for the opportunity, for taking the time to put together such involved and detailed questions - I appreciate the effort!! Also a huge thank you to anyone who has meandered among the ruins, and found something special in what KRVNA has to offer. Hails!
K.V.S.