SOURCE – Recently signing with Prosthetic Records is a significant milestone. Can you share the story behind the signing and your expectations for the partnership in terms of your future releases and career?
John (Vocals, Guitars, Drums) – It definitely is, and we’re beyond happy to have joined the Prosthetic family. We’ve both been long-time fans of the label and the quality of bands they’ve had on their roster, both past and present. When we had finished recording ‘Corryvreckan’ we were with UK underground label Trepanation Recordings. The owner there, Dan, has been extremely supportive of us, and he said that while he’d be happy to put out the new record on Trepanation we should pitch it to a bigger label and see how things go.
Sophie (Vocals and Bass) – It didn’t take us much time to come up with a list of labels we’d love to work with, with Prosthetic at the top. When we sent out the tracks to them, their A&R manager Steve Joh replied within a couple of hours saying they were interested. It turned out Steve was already a fan and had actually picked up one of our very first CDs and had been following us since. Things progressed from there really quickly, and we signed the contract a few weeks later, with our heads still spinning a little…!
John (Vocals, Guitars, Drums) – It’s a huge boost for us as a band to have the Prosthetic team’s support and reach, which let us do some things we wouldn’t have been able to do ourselves, like the music video for our lead single “Fell Reigns”. It also sets us up with a great platform for future releases with a network of contacts and potential future collaborators that Prosthetic brings, so we’re really excited to see what this partnership develops over the coming months and years.
SOURCE – How would you describe the sound of the band Hand of Kalliach to anybody that’s maybe not familiar with you?
Sophie (Vocals and Bass) – This is actually something we’ve really struggled with given the weird mix of genres and styles we combine, and we’ve been given a very wide range of descriptions. But for now we’ve settled on a hybrid mix of melodic death and folk metal, although you might hear elements of progressive and atmospheric black metal in the sounds too.
John (Vocals, Guitars, Drums) – As much as we operate at the more extreme end of the metal spectrum, the core to our sound is really traditional Scottish folk music – we take melodies and rhythms that are typically used in Scottish folk and adapt them for distorted guitars. This lets us meld all our favourite elements of extreme metal with the melody, passion and energy that is found in traditional Scottish folk, but still keeping quite an aggressive edge to the sound.
SOURCE – What are you most proud of with Corryvreckan?
Sophie (Vocals and Bass) – Honestly, the feedback so far! We’re really delighted with the positive reception, particularly given our style is quite unusual. Getting featured in the likes of some of the big US publications like Decibel and Revolver magazines has been a huge lift, and it’s amazing to read the kind comments from writers, radio hosts and of course our fans.
John (Vocals, Guitars, Drums) – Absolutely. When we wrote our debut album, Samhainn, we didn’t have much in the way of expectations as it was all new ground for us. We were pretty surprised when it got such a positive reception, but it meant with Corryvreckan we were really focussed on making sure we were building on and evolving the sound. While we’re really happy the result, you can’t help but second-guess yourselves sometimes as to whether you’re making it as good as it can be, so getting the positive feedback has been fantastic.
SOURCE – Tell us about the track Fell Reigns and the video you shot for it. How important are videos in the promotion process these days?
Sophie (Vocals and Bass) – The track, along with the rest of the album and our band name, is heavily tied in with the mythology surrounding an ancient Celtic witch-god of winter, called the Cailleach. She’s variously depicted as both a vengeful hag and a youthful woman, and is responsible for ushering winter, arising from her slumber beneath the Corryvreckan whirlpool off the western Scottish isles. With Fell Reigns, the narrative is very focussed on the story of the Cailleach’s attendants, who she pulls from the lochs and seas of Scotland every year in autumn. She hurls them into the skies, where they become winter storms before falling back to earth as rain and hail to await their next summoning.
John (Vocals, Guitars, Drums) – Becky Laverty at Prosthetic kindly put us in touch with the video directors, David and James at Cineoteric Films, who were absolutely brilliant from the outset. We wanted to do something a bit different, and not just have the usual shots of a band playing in a room somewhere. David and James were really keen to interested in the details and put in a lot of work coming up with an interesting storyline for the video that fit with the mythology, lyrics and themes. The locations were all in Scotland just in the middle of autumn, and the resulting visuals were absolutely stunning.
Sophie (Vocals and Bass) – I think videos are really important for promotion these days – they give you an opportunity to really frame the atmosphere and concepts visually, and with the amount of focus on video with social media it’s one of the best ways to make an impression on viewers.
SOURCE – Collaboration is an important aspect of many bands. Have you worked with any guest musicians or artists that have had a significant impact on your sound?
Sophie (Vocals and Bass) – We’ve not had any guest musicians yet, although it’s something we’re really keen to explore for any future releases. The biggest collaborator we’ve had is with our mixing and mastering engineer, Wynter Prior at Sphynx Studios, who has done both of our albums. He has an incredible level of skill to take all the layers of guitars, vocals, drums, and loads of other instruments and samples and somehow jam them all together in a great sounding mix.
John (Vocals, Guitars, Drums) – Yeah, he’s incredibly patient with all the stuff we throw at him! Some of the most fun we have during mixing is going through his amazing libraries of samples and picking things out that would match the atmosphere we’re going for. His enthusiasm is really infectious, and I’ve definitely got way too carried away with it, spending ages chatting through the perfect Gaelic choir sample for all of 5 secs of track time…
SOURCE – Many metal bands have a strong connection to visual and graphic art. How do you collaborate with visual artists to create album artwork and merchandise designs that complement your music?
John (Vocals, Guitars, Drums) – We really love getting artwork made for covers and merch designs. Much like the video, it’s fantastic to have a finished art product that reflects the concepts and atmosphere in the music, and with all the mythology we throw into the tracks there’s no end of designs that could work really well with them.
Sophie (Vocals and Bass) – We spend a lot of time over our art briefs, even if we’re giving the artist quite a bit of leeway to interpret and design (which is always our preference). A lot of it comes down to being really focussed on the key mythology pieces or figures we’re trying to include, and to try to find the balance between those harder extreme metal influences with some of the softer folk aspects.
SOURCE – In the digital age, music consumption and distribution have changed significantly. How do you see the role of physical formats like vinyl and CDs in the context of your music, and how do they contribute to the overall experience of your releases?
Sophie (Vocals and Bass) – We really love physical formats, and while there are clearly a lot of benefits to digital music something definitely gets lost when you no longer get physical products when you buy from a band. Getting little things like stickers, posters or liner notes with your physical albums was something we always enjoyed when we were younger, and so we do like to make sure we’re offering something tangible to our fans. We even got a small run of cassette tapes done for Corryvreckan!
John (Vocals, Guitars, Drums) – Yeah, it’s been great to see the resurgence of physical formats, particularly vinyl, over recent years. There are some amazing options of vinyl designs you can get today, and it’s great how much simply adding the right combination of colours and patterns to a record can really make the whole thing tie in with the music extremely well. The oceanic vinyl pattern that we’ve chosen for Corryvreckan is very similar to the one we did for Samhainn but with differing colours, and we absolutely love how they look side by side or on a turntable tying in with the winter seascape themes.
SOURCE – How are you personally coping with the situation in the world at the present time?
John (Vocals, Guitars, Drums) – It’s undoubtedly a very difficult time for so many, and for so many reasons, both closer to home for us in the UK and further afield. It’s challenging sometimes not to be overwhelmed with the constant streams of horrific news that the digital age facilitates, and it can be hard to see the awful situations so many people are having to live through on a daily basis, and be largely unable to help.
Sophie (Vocals and Bass) – We do try to help where we can, and to stop ourselves from doomscrolling through social media which can help personally, but there’s no denying it’s difficult at times. Music is of course very important to both of us and it can absolutely be a solid tool to help cope. Whilst there are of course very real limits on how much we can do to resolve global horrors, hopefully the music we make does give our listeners some degree of an outlet.
Promo photo (credit: Mathieu Gill)
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