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Atlantyca is a quite new band from France and to learn more about them, I jotted down some questions who were answered by guitarist Julien Putigny.
When did you first thought about starting Atlantyca?
A long time ago. Max and I are playing together for years. We recorded demos and stuffs like that. I don't remember accurately when we started, but all that I can say is that we always wanted to do an album, and always wanted to do it with guys like Andy Kuntz.
How long did it take to hook up with Laurent Falso?
Back in 2009, we sent a demo to Brennus Music and they really liked it. They gave us the chance to record an album. But we had to find a drummer. Then, a friend of us gave us the phone number of Laurent. We met him and discovered a very friendly guy and an incredibly talented drummer. Exactly what we were looking for.
Why the name Atlantyca?
We don't know ourselves!!!! We just think it sounds good!
When did you start writing songs for To Nowhere And Beyond? And how long did it take to record the tracks?
The older one is the song Beyond Infinite, that I wrote in 2008, if I remember well. It was on the demo we sent to Brennus Music.
The recording process was pretty fast. Laurent did almost everything first take. But the production took a long time. We wanted to make the best possible arrangements, refining the songs until it sounds perfect for us. So we spent a LOT of time on the production. Moreover, when you have such talented singers on your songs, you want to do the best you can. We were dreaming of doing an album like that for more than 15 years!!!!
At To Nowhere And Beyond you worked with different singers, didn't you find a suitable singer for Atlantyca? Or did the lyrical 'concept' demand several singers?
I would say both. We searched for singers for years, but didn't found one. And moreover, we wanted different singers, because we wanted each song to have its own mood. Human voice is far more varied in tone than instruments. And there's so many singers that we like!!!!
But the funny thing is that when I write songs, I always hear the voice of a singer that I like in my head.
When I wrote Standard Man and Underworlds, back in 2009, I was hearing the voice of Andy Kuntz. I made Maxime listen to these songs, without telling him that fact. At the end of the listening, he said "You know what, I hear Andy Kuntz singing on them!" So I answered "Why not ask him?" After all, we had nothing to loose!
And we did that way for the other singers and songs.
Edu Falaschi, Paul Shortino and Andy Kuntz are well known, but David Steele many won't know... How come that you choose him for your album?
It is one of the big mysteries of the metal world: why David Steele isn't known? For us, he is one of the best singer ever. If you look closely on booklets of some albums from The Cult, Bon Jovi, Def Leppard,... You'll read that he is credited as a background vocalist. So we contacted him by mail. He did a try on a song and we felt in love with his fantastic voice.
Was it easy to get them involved?
Yes! We just sent a mail explaining our project and attached to it a file of the song, and we get very positive answers from them. They are all friendly guys.
Please enlighten us about Tara and Michelle! Who are they? And can we expect to hear them again on a upcoming Atlantyca release?
Who are they? First, fantastic singers! To our great regret, we didn't had the permission to write their last name on the booklet or add a photo, because they are session singers working with a middleman.
Before working with Tara and Michelle, we searched for female singers. We needed female voices for the mood of 2 songs. So, we searched and tried with 2 singers in our country, but it didn't worked, mainly for musical reasons. We were not moved by their singing. So we searched for a (too much) long time, without finding what we were looking for. As we wanted to release the album (at that time, production was lasting for more than a year), we contacted a middleman who make you get in touch with session singers. We heard recordings from Tara and Michelle and it was a revelation: it was the voices we were looking for.
This way of working was not very fun for us, because we couldn't have that much contact with them, but the result is here, their singing is perfect, really moving, exactly what we were expecting in our dreams. And about a future release, yes, I would like to.
How is the cover linked to the title? And why this shipwreck in the desert or dunes? Reminds me of photos I've seen from the Namibian coast...
We wanted a very poetic cover, almost like a painting. The desert means the 'Nowhere'. The ship looks toward the sun, kind of a pristine light inviting you for a journey, to go 'Beyond'. So, it is, in my opinion, reflecting the album title perfectly.
I want to add that it is a real photo, took by a friend of us, Arnaud Crepier, and not a photo montage made on a computer! It was shot on the dried up Aral sea, in Uzbekistan.
You did a video trailer for the album, would you like to do a video clip? Which song(s) would you pick for a video?
Yes, we'd like to. Personally, I would do it with the song Standard Man. But, honesty, a video clip is big bucks and nowadays, with the huge crisis in the music industry, finding money to do it is really hard.
Does working with different singers mean that you don't plan to play live? Or do you look for a singer to do concerts with you? Or a permanent member?
For sure, it would be very hard to do shows with the singers on the album. They are all very occupied with their own bands and stuffs like that. But we dream of doing that one day. We REALLY want to play To Nowhere And Beyond live. We are very proud of that record, we love it so much and we can't wait to play it in front of an audience.
Great singers are hard to find. If we find a good one, we'd love to play live. But we want to find the right person, not doing show with a not-that-good singer.
What's on your schedule for the rest of 2012? Can we expect another album in 2013?
I think 2013 would be too short. Writing, recording and producing To Nowhere And Beyond took more than 3 years. I wish to be a little bit faster for a next release, but we don't want to botch things working too fast. As I said earlier, we want to give our best and be 100% proud of what we do.
It would be really interesting to see the band on stage... And perhaps they find the right singer... or someone who is a singer reads this interview and approaches them... Whatever, I'm looking forward to hear more from the Frenchmen!
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