MYSTIFIER INTERVIEW
Excerpt from THE BLACK METAL: INTO THE ABYSS BOOK
Hailing from Bahia in the Northeast of Brazil, Mystifier appeared at the very tail end of the 80s, breaking new ground with a truly dark and unearthly sound that blended primitive brutality with a restrained use of synths and a mind-bendingly sinister and ceremonial atmosphere. In fact, it’s no exaggeration to say that the band are responsible for some of the darkest and most occult-drenched recordings in black metal to date, even now, in an era when more bands are exploring such territories than ever before.
Brazil had of course already played a considerable role in the history of extreme metal by the time of Mystifier’s formation in 1989, the sizeable country contributing a notable number of thrash, death metal and first wave/proto-black metal records in that decade, the latter coming most obviously from the early incarnations of Sepultura, Vulcano, Holocausto and Sarcófago. Such music would help form the bedrock of Mystifier’s sound and despite preceding the second wave explosion by a couple of years there is also a notable use of high-end icy melodies, screamed vocals and other aural identifiers associated with 90s black metal. In much the same way as, say, the early 90s Greek bands, Mystifier demonstrated pronounced local influence while nonetheless also displaying a more universal shift in extreme metal values that ultimately manifested in the rebirth of the genre worldwide around 1991 and 1992.
Still, as much as one can make links to the early black metal movement in Brazil and the return of black metal internationally, there were also a lot of other influences at work and comparisons can be made to a number of pioneering bands who formed in the 1980s and blurred the line between death and black metal such as Blasphemy, (early) Possessed and Mortuary Drape. Meeting with our friend, guitarist and sole remaining founding member Armando Beelzeebubth, we began by talking about the band’s initial influences…
Beelzeebubth: “Back then we were listening to releases like Sepultura’s Morbid Visions, Vulcano’s Bloody Vengeance, Sarcófago’s Black Vomit and Satanic Lust demos, as well as lots of bands from around the world; records like Metallica’s Kill ‘Em All, Venom’s Black Metal, Sodom’s In The Sign Of Evil and lots of other stuff from the beginning of the 80s.”
Cult Never Dies: How was it to be an extreme metal fan living in Bahia in the late 80s and early 90s? Was it easy to find and buy this kind of music as a fan living there?
“No, no, no, it was not so easy. I got lots of stuff from tape-trading. I got from shops in Brazil as well, but in the past that shit was so expensive, so to get that kind of stuff on [dubbed] tape was the only solution. I got tape trader’s contacts from lots of magazines like Ablaze or Slayer Magazine and I also traded with people in Brazil, mainly in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.”
If finding music to listen to wasn’t easy, then presumably finding people who actually played it was even more of a challenge, particularly since the black metal movement barely existed at this time?
“It was fucking difficult in the past, it took years to find people that were really interested in making that kind of music, music that was so radical, so brutal, so fast. Nowadays it’s also hard to find members to play our music. I am lucky to find guys like these [gestures to the other members in the room]. It’s hard when you try to make a serious band and play around, make world tours.”
Today at least Mystifier has the status of an internationally-respected group – how did you go about finding musicians back then when you were still trying to create the band?
“From ex-bands I had been in like Corpus Christi and Putrefaction. I tried to play in these bands but it was always so hard to keep the bands alive, so I decided to make my own band, be the owner, decide who played in it, and so Mystifier began. With the best members of these ex-bands.”
The punk and metal scenes in Brazil during the 80s and 90s have become quite infamous because of the level of violence and gang-related activity that fans were involved in. I’ve read that you yourselves used to have a lot of conflict with skinheads and punks back in the early days, is that true?
“There were lots of fights outside in the streets, mainly in São Paulo, but we never got that kind of problem really. Sepultura did. In the 90s that kind of skinhead bullshit was a fucking nightmare in Brazil. It was punks against skins, skins against headbangers... But today the shit you had is over. Punk in the beginning here, it was fucking violent for sure, not so much heavy metal.”
Even on your very early releases [specifically the Tormenting The Holy Trinity demo from 1989, the T.E.A.R. (The Evil Ascension Returns) EP in 1990 and the Aleister Crowley demo in 1991] the occult/Satanic/anti-Christian ethos is made very clear, both in the music and lyrics and the artwork and song titles.
“For sure, I am into that sort of shit since the beginning. It’s easy for me to hear Venom or even Judas Priest playing ‘Sinner’, and say, ‘Ah, how Satanic is this!’ So I was into this sort of heavy metal for a long time and it’s easy for me to keep this Satanic atmosphere in my life.”
What would you say inspired you and the band to take such a strong philosophical/religious position?
“Lots of pagan stuff led us into the Satanic view. Black metal for me is Satanism, is against Christianity. I’m trying to open the minds of our fans with our music, about the knowledge, about the dark arts, about Gnosticism. I use lots of stuff from Aleister Crowley, from Anton LaVey, something from philosophy like Schopenhauer and Nietzsche and mix all that fucking shit into Mystifier.”
Brazil is quite a religious country where Catholicism still has a firm grip on much of society – did this make it difficult being in a band with such unambiguously anti-Christian sentiments?
“Well Mystifier is so underground in Brazil. And around the world. I just give a finger to the Church and to religion.”
The 1992 debut album went even further in this direction and makes use of some very intense Satanic invocations. Given this and the unambiguous references to Satanism in the lyrics and song titles – for example, ‘Defloration (The Antichrist Lives)’, ‘(Invocacione) The Almighty Satanas’, ‘An Elizabethan Devil-Worshipper’s Prayer-Book’ and ‘Mystifier (Satan’s Messengers)’ – I wondered what made you choose to name the album after a form of paganism?
“The hate against Christianity. It was the first time a black metal band used a title like Wicca. Why Wicca? I decided to use a pagan name. Paganism is not Satanism of course, but you should tell that to the church, not to me. Lots of stupid people said, ‘Oh Mystifier titled their album Wicca, it’s pagan, oh fuck…’, but it’s like a trick. Anyway, it’s good to see that our first album made a mark on black metal.”
The band returned only a year later with the Göetia album, which is definitely a much more considered and carefully structured record. It still has that deep, cavernous and aggressive vibe, but it’s also more epic and has a lot more dynamics at work, as well as more varied vocals.
“Göetia does sound different. It’s hard for me to repeat the same formula all the time; I try to be fucking original with all our records. Maybe sometimes it sounds like heavy metal, because in my youth I listened to a lot of heavy metal bands – Motörhead, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Satan, Atomkraft, Black Sabbath, lots of shit like that.”
It’s interesting that both Wicca and Göetia feature keyboard players, as that’s something that was pretty unusual in Brazilian underground metal, and black metal in general up to that point, although this was of course beginning to change thanks to bands in Norway and so on.
“Well Quorthon added keyboards in Under the Sign… of course. But I am into metal music since the 80s and Black Sabbath and Judas Priest have influenced me a lot – I love those intro morbid synths in Mob Rules and Born Again. I love Deep Purple’s music too; those church pipe sounds made by Jon Lord were great. I can also mention that Ozzy Osbourne’s three first albums influenced me too about the keyboards.”
Is that perhaps where the Crowley interest came from for you originally?
“No. That was from the Brazilian singer/wizard Raul Seixas, he was into Crowley stuff. He is a legend in Brazil and he’s from my town/city, Salvador/Bahia. The father of Brazilian rock [laughs].”
One of the things I found most interesting during my time in Brazil were the many Macumba [an umbrella term relating to several forms of Afro-Brazilian religion/spiritism/witchcraft] offerings of sweets, cigars and alcohol that could be found at crossroads and waterfalls and so on. As it turned out, not only have a lot of the people I know from Brazil grown up with such things, but in many cases they also experienced the rituals and channelling first-hand through relatives. I wondered if this was something that had influenced Mystifier at all?
Armando: “Oh yeah for sure, it’s a big part of Brazilian culture, of black people culture – this practice came from Africa of course and got some improvement. This sort of pagan ritual is alive nowadays. They worship the goddess of the sea, the goddess of darkness, it’s awesome. We have a lot of history of Macumba, we saw this since we were kids and there was always this natural fear – like, ‘Oh fuck, there is a Macumba there, let’s go the other way’. There is this fear, this dark energy. The region of the Northeast of Brazil has this culture.”
I think it’s fair to say that your third album – 1996’s The World Is So Good That Who Made It Doesn’t Live Here – surprised a lot of fans. I remember hearing it when it was first released and I was really struggling with this very in-your-face operatic approach for a long time. What was the reception to this record would you say? Do you feel the fans understood it?
“I can’t work on this way. Firstly, I shall be satisfied with my shit. I don’t make music like a farmer or manufacturer. That album sold a lot but in a fucking different way, a lot of old Mystifier fans said, ‘Armando is crazy, this fucking album isn’t Mystifier’, but that’s good; to test the fans. Who are you? Are you a true black metal composer or trying to bullshit?”
What made you decide to include those vocal techniques; was that something you planned from the start?
“No. Asmoodeus just started making these fucking weird sounds in the rehearsals! Then I decided to add that shit in some songs. That is the saga of Mystifier. I tried not sounding like the same bands all the time…”
This is an excerpt of a much longer interview from the book Black Metal: Into The Abyss.
Mystifier also feature in the book Black Metal: Evolution of the Cult – The Restored, Expanded and Definitive Edition, which will be released in November 2023
