Interviews: Age Of The Wolf

In this new occassion, we have had the opportunity to interview the Doom Metal band Age Of The Wolf from the Costa Rica. Check out the interview and follow the band on their  FACEBOOK PAGE. 

1.Where did you get the idea for the band name, you planned it or came out just like that?

We didn’t really planned it, some random day after rehearsal we kind of suggested the idea of calling the band Age Of The Wolf as it sounded powerful, not a thought out name, but that gave us the basis to work concepts around the name, such as the band’s mascot, The Hypercarnivore.

2.Why did you want to play this genre?

We started as a hard rock band, with stoner brushes in our sound, that later evolved into a more concise but not yet fully stoner doom act, we all had been fans of the genre, its different deviations and sub-genres, and with the present formation it was very clear from the start that we would only get heavier and dirtier, which we think reflects in the album.

3. Did you know each other before the band was formed?

Yeah we did. Actually we were very close friends. Beto and Gabriel knew each other for the cover videos they used to upload to their YouTube channels, Chris and Jorge used to work real close to each other so they used to hang out a lot, everyone hanged out with each other before the band became what it is now. We think that us being so damn similar helped us in a lotta ways. So yeah, you can say we were pretty close before we became an actual band.

4. Each band member favourite band?

This is probably the hardest thing someone could ask us, so we decided to bend the rules and add our individual top 2 bands (it was still hard as fuck, though)

Gabriel: The Body, Conan.

Jorge: Iron Maiden, YOB.

Chris: Mastodon, YOB.

Beto: Black Sabbath, Melvins.

5. Who or what inspires you to write songs?

We're always hungry for experience and that experience always ends up pouring into our new music and lyrics, we take anything we can and try to deliver our interpretation of several subjects such as destiny, death, attachments, addictions and cycles. We are greatly influenced by our emotional spectrum which is a thriving force in the record, emotions leads the way to illumination, in this case, composing either music or lyrics.

… but mainly Tony Iommi.

6. Where was your last gig? 

Our last gig was on December 14, 2018, along with 2 awesome bands and good friends: Nostoc and Kerwa.

That was Gabriel’s birthday so we had two things to celebrate. It was in a bar in downtown San José. We had a great time that night, and after that we decided to start planning everything for the upcoming release. Plenty of shows planned now though, so we're making up for our absence in stages the past few months.

7. Where would you like to act?

In Costa Rica we have limited spaces to do gigs for our genre. We are lucky enough to have played in a few of them, however they are all bars, so, for a change we would like to play in some festivals that take place every year in here; Domingo en Mingo is a great place for this sort of bands to play. Every time we go there are a huge amount of awesome bands playing there in their respective genres, we always have a great time and it's a fest that keeps growing every year, it would be an honor to be featured in the lineup for the next one. Internationally, we have been following quite a few festivals that keep amazing us every year, Psycho Las Vegas, Roadburn in the Netherlands, NRMAL in Mexico, Desertfest in the UK. Just thinking about being there gives us the chills, and we plan to keep working very hard to make it happen sometime in the future.

8. Whom would you like to feature with?

You know, we tend to dream big because it's free and can't harm anyone right? We would love to do dates with bands that have inspired us to this day. Actual bands such as Monolord, Red Fang, Sleep, YOB, Yatra, Green Lung, Dopelord, Bongripper, Conan, Toke, are definitely amongst the bands we would love to see our name next to the show lineup.

9. Whom not?

Well, there are a lot of bands that would have nothing to do with our sound, so in this one is probably the more rather than the specifics. We would like to play with bands that play the same music we play. No reason to name anyone we don't wanna play with since it would be a long, pointless list.

10. Any of you has ever suffered from stage fright? Any tip for beginners on how to beat that?

We really believe that never really goes away, we always get nervous before a show. All of us have different mechanisms to mitigate or reduce the pre stage anxiety we get. Some of us smoke a lot (but not too much as to be stoned out of our minds and play like shit), get some water and/or a couple of beers to loosen up a bit, definitely eat well before the shows (no stage blackouts allowed), meditate minutes before the show, STRETCH!, and of course, know your damn parts, cause if you don't, none of the above would help since you would probably still sound like shit, therefore, get nervous ON stage, and that, definitely is a problem.

11. What bands have inspired you the most?

We listen to a lot of music, and a lot of different music, but definitely bands such as Black Sabbath, Sleep, early Baroness, Electric Wizard, YOB, early Mastodon, Monolord, Candlemass, Cathedral, have shaped and inspired us to our current sound.

12. What's the weirdest thing a fan has ever asked you for?

A very good friend of the band was organizing a festival in the wilderness and asked us to be a part of the lineup. That was a weird enough proposal since it was sort of a stoner/indie/psytrance fest in the middle of the woods, with little to no light anywhere. But fuck it, we said yes nonetheless. Imagine a house show (if you guys have ever been in one or played in one you know how it goes, party everywhere) in the wilderness. The amount of substances we did that night was something we will never forget even though some of us hardly remember what happened after (or during) the time we were playing.

13. What do you think of your fans?

Our fans have come to appreciate the growth in our sound, they’ve come to know that we as musicians and as humans need to grow and express ourselves in different ways. They are a big part of the reason this band has grown so much, and some of them have become almost like family to us. We are definitely eternally grateful for that. And, they won’t say no to a joint, so these are definitely keepers.

14. What do you think of our site?

We really like the fact that despite this site being focused on mainly core-oriented genres, you guys give the chance to other bands from different genres to be discovered and heard, this is really important since it gives an input to people that would've probably never hear from us otherwise, considering how different is Age of the Wolf compared to core sub-genres. 

The website overall it's pretty neat and has a lot of content for all tastes, it definitely stands out from the bunch.

15. Something add?

Not much more than thanking you guys for the opportunity of this interview, thank you for giving us a spotlight in a country where it's so hard to get little to any attention, thanks to everyone reading this, to the people that's just getting onboard the fuzz worship train, and the ones who have been since day one in this journey. Expect to keep hearing more from us, and make sure to grab a copy on Ouroboric Trances when it comes out in May 10, on your closest music store shelf, website, or streaming service. FUZZ WORSHIPING DOOM )))))).