Jewish Metal Mayhem 006
By Jewish Mayhem
Gracious help provided by Aviva – Metal Israel
Much respect to the David Segal former pop music critic of The Washington Post and Jeffrey Goldberg, former Middle East correspondent of The New Yorker. FOUNDERS OF jewsrock.org
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Where does I come up with my ideas and where do I find the stories and content that we feature? The answer to them all is look for the mayhem and there you’ll find the Jew. I learned that lesson in fact from Orthodox Rav Shmuel Spiro of the ChinaTown Shule in Chinatown in downtown Toronto. He often has individuals who work downtown and when their loved ones pass away they need a location to say Kaddish. Sometimes they do not have enough men for the minyan and require a tenth so where does R. Spiro goes to find Jews? Straight to the lineups outside of the Chinese food restaraunts and even sometimes in them while they are waiting. If that doesn’t pan out, he goes to Abby Roach’s legendary HotBox cafe just around the corner where plenty of Jewish stoners lounge, shmooze, eat, drink and get high, and there he scores the Jews for his minyan. Take for instance the crazy, hedonistic world of heavy metal out of the multitude music genre’s, if you look hard enough you’ll find Jews on stage and off of the stage in management and production. On stage, you have Israeli born Gene Simmons of legendary supergroup KISS, Ian Scott of ANTHRAX, and Geddy Lee of RUSH are just a few Hebe’s who rock onstage. While I have every intention of trying to acquire candid interviews with them, what I am really interested in is chronicling artists and bands who are on their way up the success ladder, and an amazing source for that is in fact our homeland, Israel. In the last five years there has been a veritable big bang of Israeli metal, thrash, and punk bands and solo artists onto the Israeli music scene where there were none before. Once upon a time not too long ago, an Israeli metalhead and a mohawk bearing punk rocker were definately anomalies to see in Israel but for a variety of reasons, Metal and Punk music have since seriously manifested themselves there. I have a excellent series of new articles on Jewish Metal Mayhem coming and the first feature is on a band called AMASEFFER www.amaseffer.com These guys have something really interesting going on and the quality of their sample tracks are amazing. Amaseffer’s first CD will be the first in a trilogy of CDs and the basic concept behind their project is it’s an epic, cinematic scope sized project with huge philharmonic orchestrations, all wrapped in pounding drums and heavy guitars about the Biblical story of Exodus. Jewish Mayhem contacted AMASEFFER the moment I net surfed their myspace profile to their website. It is apparent that these guys are putting tremendous amount of thought and their own money and resources behind their work and that they have something very special to offer. JM: Shalom AMASEFFER Erez: Shalom from Israel Joshua, I’m Erez Yohanan , founder and drummer of Amaseffer. Thank you for trusting in what we do and we hope we meet one day. JM: Where are each of you from exactly? Erez: I’m Erez yohanan and I’m from Tel-Aviv, Yuval Kramer is from Jerusalem , Hanan avramovich – Jerusalem , JM:What are you backgrounds? Erez: We are all full time musicians and we are involved in some way or another in the Israeli metal scene. JM: What inspired this project? Erez: I wanted to write this concept for a long long time but i did not think i have the maturity as a person and as a musician . 3 years ago i thought it was the perfect time to start writing it and that’s what i did . I’m a strong believer and i knew that if i ever write a concept based on a bible story it would be this one , the Exodus story. The biggest event in the bible. The trilogy will cover the story from the slavery period in Egypt all the way to the death of moses and entrance to the promised land. JM: How did you hook up with Andy Kuntz? Erez: After we had a few songs in hand i contacted his manager and told him about the project, the concept behind it and that i want Andy to be the singer on it. A few days later Andy contacted me and i told him everything about Amaseffer and the concept of the trilogy. I sent him our music and he got really connected to it immediately. He is a very spiritual person, through his religion of course, so it was clear to him that he want to be a part of Amaseffer . JM: What are your musical influences? Erez: We don’t let music influence us , we love every music that touches our soul and make us complete. of course metal is the main thing for us but also classical music, all kind of oriental stuff and much more. JM: Are you guys shomer mitzvot or shabbat? Erez: We are all shome mitsvot and very strong with our religion. It is who we are and we keep that in our heart and soul every single minute in our life. JM: Any plans on touring? Erez: Yes but it will be only when the CD is out so it is a bit soon to talk about touring. JM: Any upcoming shows? Erez: Not at that moment . JM: What would you change in Israel or with the Jewish people if you could? Erez: I would not change a single thing , we are who we are and that’s what make the Jewish people so different and unique. We are the chosen ones and we should stay like that by keeping our identity. ###END### |
