We get in the studio with Sepultura to hear new concept album Quadra.
Concept albums? String sections? The Brazilian metal legends are harnessing lofty ambitions for their 15th album
With more Than three decades’ worth of experience leading the charge for Brazilian metal, Sepultura are a national institution in their homeland. Boosted by the success of 2017’s Machine Messiah to push themselves onto new heights, guitarist Andreas Kisser tells Hammer that new concept album Quadra intends to explore the fundamentals of everything we know.
album number 15, what can we expect this time round?
“Something different as always! I think every time we come up with something new, we bring all the experiences we had on the road. Machine Messiah sounded like a new beginning. It opened up a lot of new possibilities for Sepultura, especially musically.
The formation is very tight, we are very motivated. I guess Quadra is a consequence of that. The idea was really to expand on everything we did on Machine Messiah for Quadra and we are very happy with the result.”
a new song, Isolation, was debuted at rock in rio; is that an indicator of what the album will sound like? “A little bit, yeah. When you write an intro, it’s like writing a great overture for an opera; you have little elements of what’s coming, it doesn’t say everything but it gives you hints. We are going to have something a little more epic. We have string sections, we are expanding our possibilities!” The concept surrounding Quadra revolves around the number four.
Can you elaborate?
“The number four and geometry was very influential to build this concept. When I started thinking about what we are going to do, numerology and the number four, that is the number of manifestation where everything happens. In my concept, it’s an idea of the present, the moment, it’s where everything happens and that is very powerful for Sepultura. We respect our past, we build our future now. So the number four was really essential for the starting point to build this. I divided the album into four parts. It’s almost
like we are doing four EPS!”
The importance of the number four is the centrepiece but it digs deeper lyrically. What are you looking to talk about on this album?
“We are talking about life itself! The concept of Quadra, it is what we are! I was born in Brazil, you are born in a different country, you have different tastes and flavours. Life itself is the concept of Quadra. Brazil is a Quadra, the UK is a Quadra, you have borders, you have a set of rules and you have the game to be played according to those rules. Pre-concepts of race. What is sex? What is family? What is good? What is bad? All are a collection of rules that we agree on, it’s an agreement that we are forced to live by. This concept gave us this possibility to talk about anything, to relate to different cultures. Sepultura visited more than 80 countries in the world, that helped me to create this concept because nobody is guilty of being what they are.”
has the process of writing and recording gotten easier over time?
“I think so! This is what we do. I love to write. I not only write for Sepultura, I write for acoustic, I write for soundtracks for movies in Brazil, it’s something that is very natural for me, I love it! I always have an instrument with me on the road; nowadays with technology you have a fucking home studio in your hotel room so you can do a lot of stuff! It’s great and it’s a very exciting time to be a composer.”
Quadra will be released in february 2020 via nuclear blast records