Dead Rhetoric: You also mentioned that you pushed Titan to more extreme heights than previous albums. What were those heights that you reached for in doing Titan and do you feel you met those heights and met those accomplishments and goals that you tried to reach? [Another push to Christos into the question] I know there was a lot put towards Titan, you guys had to do your metal part and you had to work with the symphony and the orchestra and make sure that’s all together, too. From the initial image, do you feel you met it, exceeded it or fell short of it?
Christos: When you compose the music, you reach some moments when you don’t care about what you have to achieve. The most difficult part is the beginning, once the beginning starts, everything will flow, with experience, it will flow. Our aim is always to experiment and to create an album that is a step forward; it cannot sit with previous ones. I believe we did that with Titan but there’s not a recipe behind that, we just follow our instincts and because if you follow any rules you’ll find something else not the one.
Dead Rhetoric: What sprung the idea of Titan? What made you decide “yes we have to do this,” or start it? What inspired you in the first place to start on the whole project?
Christos: Well, we had the three years break and we decided it was time to create a new album. Although it sounds a bit cult that you have to go and compose but we don’t see that it is because we see that we have to follow every two years to create an album and we’ll do it. We need some time to compose music. We also need to experiment as much as we can because we have to not recreate nor pick up from a previous album. Communion was a successful album, the Great Mass was a successful album and now, at the moment, it looks like Titan is going to be the most successful album for Septicflesh and this shows that we are really serious about our creations and that we don’t just go and compose music.
Dead Rhetoric: I wanted to ask Sotiris this: all the songs and lyrics in Titan sort of interlace and interconnect to each other. Can you maybe explain the whole story or image interlaced into Titan?
Christos: It’s not a concept album but some songs as you mentioned are interconnected like “Burn” and “Prometheus” with the theme of fire. There’s the title song, “Titan,” “Order of Dracul” and “The Prototype” that talks about the manipulation of the masses through fears and power. Also, we have “Ground Zero” that acts as a prologue to the last song of Titan, “The First Immortal.” Sotiris, again, I think he made an exceptional work because the visual, the music and the lyrics are of equal importance for Septicflesh and I think, as I said, he did an amazing job again. Somehow, only Sotiris knows that, he can describe and he can make me listen and dream with our music and our lyrics and this is very important for our band.
Dead Rhetoric: “Confessions of a Serial Killer” is probably the oddest, for lack of a better term, among all of them. Do you know the initial concept and idea of that song?
Christos: It is not a song that has significance to a serial killer but becoming this serial killer. Sotiris shows how a normal person, like me and you, can become so violent and in order to create this murder.
Dead Rhetoric: In the “Prototype”, do you know exactly what “the clockwork empire” cited in the lyrics Sotiris was talking about?
Christos: Ha-ha. No. [Sotiris truly is out in his own world. Well, at least he puts his deep and obscure prose to good use with Septicflesh’s music!] … He never follows the band because his work, he’s working at a bank that doesn’t let him.
Dead Rhetoric: I read in a statement that he “usually” doesn’t tour with the band but he does sometimes so I thought, hey maybe he’ll be here but obviously not.
Christos: Very rarely.
Dead Rhetoric: Did you replace another guitarist, like a fill-in guitarist, and vocalist? I know Seth does most the vocals, but he has some parts too.
Christos: We have only one song, “Anubis,” and we use it from the laptop. But Sotiris, it’s impossible to tour, it’s very rare to play some special shows. In the last six years he’s played only three shows with us.
Dead Rhetoric: This might be another one of the things on Sotiris can answer, he discussed this in the making of titan videos, but a planet that satellites Saturn is said to be very significant to the album Titan. Can you elaborate or explain that more for everyone? Or does only Sotiris know about that?
Christos: Sotiris describes in this song that there is a planet that can be like the new earth, it has all the elements that can be a new life there.
Dead Rhetoric: I’ve read about those theories. I also noticed he changed his name to Sotiris Annunaki. Did he really name himself after the Annunaki from the planet Nibiru, the planet that satellites Pluto?
Christos: This is a Sumerian thing… You have read many things, huh? We are all our own persons here.
Dead Rhetoric: If you would only pick one, what would your favorite song be on Titan be and why? Or, name couple if you can’t.
Christos: I would say I have best moments because I cannot pick and I cannot be objective because I have songs that are mine. I have good moments from “Prototype,” “Prometheus,” “Order of Dracul,” “Dogma,” “The First Immortal.” [Yes, he listed over half of the songs here]. Good moments. It’s about moments not about the song.
Dead Rhetoric: A lot of your music contains religious or mythological things but what are your personal perspectives on religion, humanity and mankind? Sotiris writes lyrics for these but do you have any personal perspectives of that?
Christos: I’m not antireligious but okay, Sotiris is more into the supernatural. I’m not a guy like that, I’m the kind of guy that has to see something in order to believe but, for me, religion has created only problems. It’s like a drag that is only for controlling people. The biggest crimes in humanity have been from religion but I expect of course that people will have their beliefs. Who am I to say? I’m not talking about any kind of people it’s just that I just don’t care about these issues… Sotiris is looking deeper into things and searches into religion. But, we are not like Sotiris. It’s not that that we don’t want to be but I have to see some things in order to believe.
Dead Rhetoric: I see that you do the orchestra stuff and he does the lyrics. It’s interesting how you guys take your own things and combine everything.
Christos: Yeah, Sotiris designs a lot of the lyrics. We all have our opinions but we don’t interfere to Sotiris’s work or to my work or to Seth’s work. I know very well how the orchestrating is and I can listen to their advice or ideas but I’m the last person who will decide what is best for the band, it’s also Sotiris and Seth. Each of us computes from our own and know the things to do better. Sotiris knows more than us how to write very interesting lyrics. And then he works with Seth to get some ideas to produce, not just lyrics, but for the visual, for the artwork.
Dead Rhetoric: Yes, Seth does most if not all of the artwork and I wanted to ask him about that. Do you know how long it takes him and how does he have the time to do that?
Christos: Well, because he made so many editions, he worked excessively for three months after the mixing. It takes a lot because two labels, different editions.
Dead Rhetoric: His artwork is very intricate, very nice and works really well.
Christos: Yes, he has studied fine arts.
Dead Rhetoric: The artwork being done by a band member really makes it stronger –
Christos: All the things come from the band.
Dead Rhetoric: That is the most important thing about Septicflesh for me because everything should come from the band. One last question, about the band’s name because it changed over the last year. Or, it didn’t change but was combined into one word, from Septic Flesh to Septicflesh. What initially was the meaning of the band’s name and what does it mean to you now?
Christos: Well, let’s talk about the change. It’s only a visual thing and nothing more. We did Septic Flesh, then Septicflesh. Septic Flesh, Septicflesh. It was an idea of Seth’s but only because of an aesthetic reason behind that, there is not any meaning. To be honest, we are not so proud about the name because during the time we were really young. I was fifteen years old, my brother was seventeen and Sotiris was older. We felt that, during that time, Septic Flesh was the best name for the band. I cannot say that Septicflesh is a proper name for the band now, it doesn’t go with the music or the visual or the lyrics but it was difficult to change it.
Dead Rhetoric: Well thank you for sitting down with me, that was excellent. Anything you’d like to add or say to the world?
Christos: I hope the fans out there will appreciate our work for Titan. We worked really hard and I can see already that our efforts have been awarded.