I found out about Italy’s Sherpa through the kindness of Sulatron Records label owner Sula Bassana who sent me a copy of their sophomore album Tigris & Euphrates. I was blown away. There is a certain place between the heaviness of post metal and the foggy haze of shoegaze in which Sherpa has made its home. It is a sound unlike any other band, utterly dreamy, but heavy enough to steamroll a Roadburn audience (which they did in 2019). Needless to say this new album Land Of Corals was highly anticipated over here at the Weirdo Shrine hideout. I can tell you it does not disappoint. We talked about it with Sherpa’s main man Matteo Dossena.
How is Sherpa doing? Can you give us a peek into your life as musicians?
At the moment we can say that Sherpa is in a good mood; we spent a lot of time in our rehearsal room to find the best sounds for live shows. We’re totally involved into this.
Can you introduce the band? How did you get together?
The band passed through a lot of changes since it started in 2015. For this new album (Land of Corals) the band is composed by me (Matteo Dossena, composer, vocals, guitar, synth, and drums) and Franz Cardone (bass, synthesizers, vocals). At the moment we are structuring the live set with two other guys (Paolo Giacci & Giuseppe Sericola) to complete the full live set.
Me and Franz met each other around 2016, we were involved in another band and we always had a good musical chemistry, so I decided to involve him into SHERPA, and he is still here, he’s my sound brother.
Where do you live and what is the music scene like there?
We live in Pescara, a city on the Adriatic seaside, center of Italy. It’s really sad that our city doesn’t have a real musical scene, maybe because we miss spaces or clubs to play and invite artists from the rest of the world. It’s a classical situation of a small city where often culture and music are left behind.
What is your musical background? What got you into this kind of music you play?
I love heavy sounds and pop music as well… probably SHERPA born exactly from that: “Land of Corals” is the heaviest album I’ve ever made because it was written during a hard period of my life, between the break-up of the old Sherpa formation and the restriction due to the lockdown.
What is your definition of “psychedelic”?
To me “Psychedelic” is something that lets you dive into your brain and lets you float away from the place you are.
How do you write and record music? Did this change over the years?
Land of Corals is the first album of my life that I almost wrote all alone in its entirety. In the past years, with the old formation, we used to play together, jamming, so for sure, on this new album I totally changed my approach.
What are some of your favorite contemporary bands out there?
Hard question… I love Big Thief, Ice Age, Kikagaku Moyo, Alexander Tucker, Colour Haze, and a lot of other bands that will come back to my mind too late!!
What is the highlight of your career so far?
Absolutely Roadburn 2019. After the release of our second album “Tigris & Euphrates” we were invited to the festival. It was an amazing experience, playing with a lot of great artists and being part of one of the most important festivals in the world.
What are you looking forward to most this year (or the next)?
I hope that Land of Corals can communicate to people what it speaks about; it’s a concept album about the acceptance of a dimension change, like birth or death, or cosmic movements. Everything is explained in the LP’s liner notes. I really appreciate when people try to understand what is behind an album, I often try to do it, because I think that music is a powerful language…so we have to use it in the right way, trying to communicate something more.
What should the Weirdo Shrine readers do immediately after reading this interview?
Try to imagine a planet during its formation, with mud, lava, prehistorical plants…everything under a quiet heavy grey sky. First life-forms come, then religions, then submission to morals. Now put on your headphones and play “Land of Corals”.
Serbian avant-garde orchestra The Cyclist Conspiracy struck a nerve at the Weirdo Shrine headquarters from the second we laid eyes on them. The strange moniker was only the tip of the iceberg it appeared as the more we uncovered about this strange and interesting group, the more intriguing things got…
The further we wandered into the Mashallah Plan, the harder it became to find a grip on where we were. Was this ethno folk territory? Psychedelic kraut rock? Avant-garde sax pop? Nomadic Arabian desert blues? Or a little bit of everything all at once? Pretty soon we did not even mind anymore, as all we could be was mesmerised by the angelic voices of the The Cyclist Conspiracy choir…
Surely enough, in 60s style and reminiscent of musicals like Hair and Jesus Christ Superstar, The Cyclist Conspiracy has incorporated a choir of heavenly female voices into their folky fold. It creates an extra outlandish attraction within an already pretty varied melting pot of styles. Proper “world” music in its freest form. Meet The Cyclist Conspiracy!
In line with their enigmatic moniker and collective stage presentation, The Cyclist Conspiracy answered their questions as a group entity. Who are they? What are they on about? Where do all those worldly and otherworldly influences come from? We asked, and found the answers we were looking for…
Hi guys, how are you? Can you introduce the band to the Weirdo Shrine audience?
Fine, thank you. We are the Cyclist Conspiracy, the (anti) world orchestra. We were formed as an informal project in 2014 within the Society for the Development of Alchemical Studies “Vasko Popa” and nowadays we are a musical troupe consisting of seven male and female souls.
Where do you live, and how would you say it influences your music?
We live in the Balkans, on the fringes of the Empire, or more precisely in Serbia, a liminal space between the East and the West. Our country, as well as the whole region, has a very rich historical background and has witnessed numerous catastrophic and miraculous events – the Ottoman conquest, the vampiric plague, and the birth of Barbarogenius, to name a few. All these events tended to shape cultural and crosscultural dynamics in a unique way – so our culture was always a synthesis of various influences and a very primordial basis of our own. This, in general, goes for the rest of the Balkans as well. The Balkan is, in spite of the exotic picture most of the people outside it might have, a birthplace of tragedy. The tragedy that was born out of the spirit of music, of course. No wonder “the song” and “tragedy” sound almost the same in Greek.
What can you tell me about the creation of Mashallah Plan? Most of the songs were originally released on an EP, weren’t they?
Yes, they were. The EP was supposed to be a teaser but it took us more time than expected to do the proper album, obviously. Also, we recorded the EP in an improvised studio, with very modest equipment so it didn’t really sound the way we wanted. Three songs from the EP will re-appear on the album (“The Great Staurocycle”, “Virility”, and “The Blood of the Lamb”) simply because they were part of the story from the beginning and they make whole only with the rest of the songs on the album. It was a long process and sometimes I had a feeling that it was almost out of our control – that the album was this separate entity with its own schedule, regardless of what we wanted. Luckily, everything ended up well. Actually, even better than we expected, since we’ve been super lucky with the labels too – Davide and Subsound have been extremely nice and supportive.
In what way was the novel by Svetislav Basara responsible for the band name? And (why) should we all read it?
“The Cyclist Conspiracy” is actually an English translation by Randall A. Major. The original Serbian title, “Fama o biciklistima” is a pun that refers to Fama Fraternitatis, a Rosicrucian manifesto from the 17th century. So, sometimes I like to describe it as Robert Anton Wilson’s/Robert Shea’s “Illuminatus!” trilogy from the Rosicrucian perspective 😊. Joking aside, the book is one of the Serbian (post)modern classics and it tells a Borgesque story about a secret brotherhood that recognizes the bicycle as the last invention in accordance with God’s will (because the man produces the labor in his own sweat) and thus renounces all the technology and the modern world. But it’s crazier than you think. This typical postmodern playfulness was brought to another level and there are all kinds of references and characters intermingling throughout the book, from Vladimir Solovyov, Kemal Ataturk, Stalin, Sherlock Holmes, and Freud to Faulkner, Situationists, Artaud, and Paul Virilio, creating this unexpected network of correspondences. The cyclists themselves do some pretty crazy things as well, like smashing clocks, waging an occult war against Nazis through their dreams, or enjoying mystical dinners with the “Nightmare Chicken” as the main dish. It’s funny, it’s witty, it’s deadly serious and tongue-in-cheek at the same time, and it just fills you with this wonderful fanaticism 😊. And fanaticism is a necessary thing if you want to create art, as Laibach pointed out years ago – so we named ourselves after the book and this concept gave us a brand new playground to pursue our musical, esoteric, philosophical, and other interests.
I love the way the album sounds super eclectic, like there is a strong folk vibe but you cannot really pinpoint which part of the world it originates from…can you help us out? Which parts of the world have influenced you musically?
Definitely a lot of North-West African and Middle Eastern music, as well as some Byzantine choral music. However, they were just “incorporated” into the rock form although some of the songs were written in a manner that distantly resembles modal music. Actually, we prefer the word “synthesis” instead of “syncretic” or “eclectic”, it gives a clearer picture of what we are trying to do. It is like an alchemical process, you must be aware of the nature of the elements you are experimenting with, their origin, the way they correspond with each other, and above all – the fact that your final goal is a synthesis of the given elements, not the experiment for the sake of experimenting. It’s not an easy process and it often results in failure and frustration but when everything falls in its place it becomes a true blessing. “Mashallah Plan” represents just one aspect of the band and the traditional/folk influences are actually much wider. We have this general curiosity about traditional music that spreads to different parts of the world. Also, we are deeply rooted in Balkan music and we already had a few releases in “Cyclomanges” series dedicated to rebetiko.
What about lyrically? What message does the album convey in general?
Music has been considered to be the highest form of art since Ancient Greece and we worship it as such. So we really wanted to put the emphasis on the music that creates the story in its own language without too much lyrical content blocking it. We also really hate to write the lyrics, it’s such a pain in the ass 😊. On the other hand, we tend to use certain symbols or certain signs on the map, to put it so, that can generate meaning. For example, “Mashallah Plan” refers to “Marshall’s Plan”, “master plan”, and Marshall guitar amps at the same time so there are definitely some anti-imperialist and crunchy overtones to it 😊. However, the album tells a very personal story about a spiritual journey. Originally, “Mashallah” is an expression in Arabic and it means something like “what God has willed has happened”. It’s obvious that we are going through a very difficult period of human history and “Mashallah Plan” was our search for hope. Everything starts with a man riding a bike (and thus crucifying himself from the bird’s perspective), away from civilization and towards the desert, and ends with Simorgh, the ultimate bird itself. The latter is a direct reference to “The Conference of the Birds”, a mystical Sufi poem from the 12th century by Farid ud-Din Attar . “Deneb” also carries this bird symbolism – it is a star in the constellation of Cygnus (The Swan) with a very long cultural history. So basically, it’s all about birds, as always 😊.
Which contemporary bands do you listen to on a regular basis?
I can never get tired of Secret Chiefs 3 and Killing Joke, for sure. I love Circle very much too, Diminished Men had a couple of really cool releases… I saw Poil/Ueda live a few months ago and have been obsessed with their latest record since then. There is this amazing Russian psychedelic prog-pop act I discovered a few years ago, Inna Pivaras and The Histriones, they are absolutely brilliant. USSSY are also awesome. I also listen to some local bands like Ab Re, Crno dete, Lenhart Tapes, Hotel Makedonija, Dunavski Buzukije – there is a pretty interesting underground scene in Serbia and all of these bands have a very distinctive sound which is, in one way or another, influenced by traditional or urban folk music.
What are your future plans?
We are currently working on “Back to the Hermetics and Martial Arts Vol 1.”, a collection of songs that was shaped during the “Mashallah Plan” era but couldn’t fit the album musically and conceptually. Actually, it’s totally different compared to “Mashallah Plan”, the songs are shorter and more cinematic, they flirt with all kinds of genres, and have a certain “Faustian” quality – they are definitely less “solar” and darker than the “Mashallah Plan” stuff. So, we hope to enter the studio again in early 2024. We also plan to play live as much as possible. The first concert will be in Belgrade in early November and then probably more gigs in Serbia and the region.
What should the Weirdo Shrine readers do immediately after reading this interview?
I don’t know. Whatever they think is the right thing to do, I guess. Anyway, if they don’t have better things to do they can always check the first three volumes of “The Music of the Secret Society that Owns Belgrade” on Inverted Spectrum Records. There are some great bands and authentic weirdos there. The fourth volume will be out soon so keep an eye on that too! Thank you for the interview!
“Formed in 2021 by Matthew Rozeik from London experimental duo Necro Deathmort, The Cortina Protocol explores the darker side of cinematic noir. Featuring a fluid cast of like-minded musicians, their debut self-titled album is the first of many deep explorations.”
Today Weirdo Shrine is very proud to be able to host the preview of this amazing new project. The Cortina Protocol is everything it promises from the onset, and a lot more. We get dark and smokey jazz holes, soundtracks to arthouse black and white movies, jawdropping free jazz drumming, and beautifully eerie intermezzi.
It is an album very much in line with current artists like Ivan The Tolerable, and Emergency Group in that they have found a way to melt jazz with kraut-inspired psych and wavey darkness into something completely new. It is a mind movie, with plot twists and cliffhangers around every corner, that will leave the listener constantly at the edge of their seats.
But hey, don’t take my word for it, judge for yourself! Here it is: The Cortina Protocol‘s self-titled debut album in full, available from Subsound Records today:
We talked to TPC mastermind Matthew Rozeik about his new project and how it came to be. Taking a break from his main band Necro Deathmort, he found new energy in movies and soundtracks and the result is well worth lending your ear to. Let’s introduce The Cortina Protocol.
Hi Matthew, can you tell me what your are doing musically at the moment and in which shape/entity? Because there are multiple artists within you, right?
Hi Jasper! I am one half of a band called Necro Deathmort who have been around since 2008, and I also release jungle/drum n bass under the name Rozzer and techno under the name Basic Vanilla. I have released stuff under different names, but some of it is best left anonymous.
Tell me about how the Cortina Protocol came into being?
The Cortina Protocol came into existence after a phone conversation with JJ the drummer. I wanted to record an album using live drums with an early 70s soundtrack vibe, so we worked out exactly how to record the drums to keep faithful to that specific sound. We recorded a few sessions with him playing, and I took these recordings and wrote the music around the drums – nothing was planned before we recorded. I wrote and recorded the album in 3 days at my flat during the lockdown in January 2021, then got a few friends to play on the tracks that needed extra instrumentation.
Matthew Rozeik
Can you introduce the band? Some amazing musicians there!
I play the guitar, synthesisers, zither, percussion, and various electronics, James Johnston (not the Gallon Drunk/PJ Harvey guitarist-ed) is on drums, Dan Knight is on keys, Barnaby Hodges plays sax, and my bandmate in Necro Deathmort AJ Cookson mixed the record. I was very lucky to be able to ask such talented musicians to play on this record.
How does the CP relate to your other musical outlets? What did you learn from starting it?
It’s probably the opposite of the drum n bass tracks that I make in that it’s organic and sounds like it’s from an older era. There is a little overlap between this project and Necro Deathmort sonically-speaking, but The Cortina Protocol is more rooted around acoustic instruments. I use less studio-manipulation and layering as well, the music is much more raw and spontaneous.
The music is quite “cinematic” were you watching movies around the creation of the album? And/or: which movies would you link to the project?
I am obsessed with film scores from the 60s and 70s, so that is by far my biggest influence. Most horror and sci-fi from that era has amazing soundtracks. I am especially influenced by the scores of Roy Budd, Ennio Morricone, Lalo Schiffrin, John Barry, and Barry Gray. Some films that I think directly influenced this record are Colossus: The Forbin Project, The Ipcress File, The Andromeda Strain, Phase IV, and Westworld.
Where do you live and how does that influence your music?
I live in London. I’m not sure how that influences my music beyond the fact there is constant hyper-stimulation living here. There is also a huge wealth disparity around me: housing estates for regular people get demolished to build skyscrapers for rich children and banks, so I see poverty and wealth existing a single street apart.
What will the future hold for you and your musical endeavors?
I’m not really sure what the future holds for me. I’d like to record another Cortina Protocol album soon, perhaps incorporating some different sounds this time. I’ll continue to make jungle, and I have some unreleased electro tracks that I’m looking to release at some point.
What should the Weirdo Shrine readers do immediately after reading this article?
Wisdom comes with age. And cosmic wisdom might come with experience and many cosmic travels. Italy’s L’Ira Del Baccano have made many of those travels, they recently returned from another one in their favorite touring country Germany, and their experience shows on this new album.
Having been the same band under various names since the mid 90s, L’Ira Del Baccano have earned their stripes playing progressive instrumental stoner rock, with nods to more psychedelic and weird wanderings. On Cosmic Evoked Potentials they have distilled all their road burning and jamming years into five adventurous stoner jams that burst at the seams with cosmic energy and fresh ideas. It is a versatile space rocket ride with many attractions, and its forty minutes are over before you know it.
It is an album that presents itself majestically, in all its revered experience and musical skill. The production is also drawn up huge and spacious, with plenty of room for weirdo synth freakery, but always with a slowly head banging longhair in mind when it comes to heavy and memorable riffery.
It is clear to this particular psychedelic “head” that with Cosmic Evoked Potentials L’Ira Del Baccano are sharing themselves among the greats of instrumental stoner music. I guess this year, with releases by Rotor, Buddha Sentenza, Clouds Taste Satanic, and this one, we are truly being spoiled!
Alessandro “Drughito” Santori photos by : @image-of-you.de @image.of.your.show
Freshly off his tour through Germany, I found main axe man Alessandro Santori more than willing to shoot the shit with Weirdo Shrine about the band, its moniker, his personal musical roots, and a lot more. My personal goal is to drink a beer with this dude and hear him out about all his adventures while touring Europe, but for now, our little internet chat will do just fine too…
How are you? How have you been lately, and how has the pandemic period been for L’Ira Del Baccano?
Ciao to you Jasper and your readers!! I’m tired but very good.. we just came back 6 days ago from the first series of concerts to promote the new album Cosmic Evoked Potentials, that came out on March 3rd on Subsound Records while we were on the road already. We played 9 gigs,mostly in Germany and it was amazing and almost surreal to be on stages again. The pandemic period has been, as for almost all I presume, very strange and unfortunately for many also hard and painful. To keep it on the musical side the impossibility to go on the road and play shows; in some cases, like here in Italy with the hard lock down the impossibility also to meet for rehearsal, for many weeks, changed the life and path of many bands and musicians. I must say that for L’IRA DEL BACCANO it was a bit different maybe; because before the start of the pandemic we already faced a huge change with drummer of 16 years having a heart attack and deciding to not tour anymore and just work as drum teacher. That was a monumental change for us because as an instrumental band the bond between instruments it is possibly more “important” and deep than music based on vocals, and also the specific type of songs we play..very long and complex..made it all more scary. In this sense our new drummer Gianluca, a good friend of our ex-drummer and suggested in primis by him, had time thanks to the pandemic stop, to really enter and become part of the band. First learning songs that we played for so many years at that point and then putting his style to the new compositions
Can you introduce yourself, how did you meet, etc, what does the band name mean and does it still 100% apply to you?
I’m the founder, together with the other guitarist Malerba of the band and L’IRA DEL BACCANO is a continued progression and evolution of a journey we started back in ’94 when the band was called Dark Awake and succesfully Loosin’o’Fequencies from 96 to 2002 and the line up had vocals at that point. As “Loosin'” we recorded and put out a mcd in 98 recorded and produced by the Italian guru of Doom Paul Chain. Later around 2004 after a long time searching for a new singer we decided to become officially instrumental. To mark the change even more we decided to choose another name and L’IRA DEL BACCANO was an idea by Roberto. Baccano in Italian refers to something loud, noisy but Baccano is the most energetic and vital form of uproarious chaos. It is not simply a loud and continuous noise from bedlam It’s the sound of the overwhelming, participatory party, it’s a human sound. The word comes from Bacco/Bacchus God of wine. Ira is Italian for “wrath” . It’s actually very hard to translate it litteraly..so we could say it means ” The wrath of Baccano “. Our connection with Bacco comes from the fact that the zone out of Rome where we live is a territory of vineyards and wine and close here during the ancient days was huge the worship of Pagan Gods like Bacco or Diana, the Goddess primarily considered a patroness of the countryside, hunters, and the Moon. We dedicated the cover and all artwork of our 2014 album Terra 42 to Diana.
What can you tell me about your musical backgrounds?
Speaking for myself, I started very young being attracted by music and guitar. Bought my first metal album, Iron Maiden‘s Piece of Mind, when I was 11 and recorded my first demo of original music when I was 14. I’ve always been a very curious person, as kid first, and then teen and man so I see myself still in a never ending evolution of new things to like and be passionate about. fortunately music is still one of these things! I can say that probably a very important passage for my musical background was discovering 3 Bands that changed me as listener and musician: Paradise Lost with the Gothic and Shades of God albums turned me into a fan of slow ,heavy music. Rush‘s live album Exit Stage Left for the progressive side and The Grateful Dead for the “open your mind and jam” side of music.
What does a regular day in your lives look like?
As thousands of other bands we do not live by our music, so in general therms we could say that playing music is still a wonderful hobby for us. Everyone has a regular job. Personally I’m a sound engineer so I stay in the music field anyway. I think I could say that my regular day turns around the fact to gain money thanx to other musicians..and then later I’ll spend that money as a musician myself for my hobby!!!
What is the best thing about Cosmic Evoked Potentials?
That is out and real!!! hahah..no really..for all we said before about the pandemic and also for some more personal reasons it feels incredible that the album is out, that it turned out so well and that it seems its not only me thinking this way! Lots of people are enjoying this new one a lot and almost every day new reviews are coming out and all incredibly good. I really think it’s our best one in terms of songs feeling and what the music seems to transmit. I’m very happy about how this time the mix between all our different influences are balanced with our own distinctive sound and songs structure. It is various and cohesive at the same time as I’ve always wanted our music to be. I want our music to take the listeners by the hands on a trip where they can be surprised sometime on what is coming next, and other times to be secure of something more familiar. Like reading a good book and arrive to the moment of turning the page not knowing if the the story on the other side will continue as expected or a huge plot twist will change the perception of everything. I think Cosmic Evoked Potential is a very good balance in this sense.
Who are some contemporary musical heroes of yours?
Every friend in bands goin on in the underground scene for the love of create music and possibly bring it on stages for other to enjoy. Those are my heroes today at this point of my life as man and musicians.
Can you tell me about how you went about composing and recording songs differently after the last album?
For Cosmic, after 2 albums recorded in what we could call a traditional recording studio, we went back to our roots and we recorded all live, no metronome , no pre production. I took, together with my work associate in Roaming Sounds Recording, our equipment to an old mansion of late ‘1700 outside Rome. We recorded all the live parts there in 3 days and lots of thing happened actually in those 3 days!!. for example since we had spare time and we started to improvise..months later 14 minutes of that improvisation became the second track of the album ” Genziana ( improvisation 42) ” and with that I decided to take out a song that was ready and arranged before starting the recordings. I learned to keep my mind open and free because when you work a lot and for long time, as musicians and in my case also producer, you can risk to get stuck in your ideas and become inflexible. Genziana was too good to not be on the album even if that meant to take out another one that was in original plan for 2 years at that point.
What are your immediate and long term future plans?
We hope to be able to promote Cosmic Evoked Potentials as much as we can live on stages around Italy and ourside. As I said we all have jobs etc so we cannot be around for too long time, but we will do our best if hopefully promoters and bookers will be interested to have L’IRA DEL BACCANO in their cities. Another thing that I really hope would be to finally be able to play some festivals around Europe..because as much as I love even the level that we are now, I know very well that to reach a wider audience would be vital to go on a Festival stage and until now we are not been very lucky.
What should the Weirdo Shrine reader do after reading this interview?
Well..I can only suggest to try our proposal…and see if they want to start their personal trip with us! But In general, what I really feel to say to your readers is..be curious, always..try new music, new books, new art and so you always will be prepared to be amazed by something in this life, even in a very dark day.
Weirdo Shrine 