Interviews About Albums: Kaamosmasennus - Le Jour Ne Se Lève Plus (2023)

In this new interview, we sat down with the French Atmospheric Doom Metal band Kaamosmasennus to ask some questions about their album "Le Jour Ne Se Lève Plus". 

1. What can you say about this new EP/CD?

Julien: “Le jour ne se lève plus” (could be translated as “The day doesn’t rise anymore”) is the first effort of my doom metal project Kaamosmasennus. I founded it in 2018 and started to compose at this time. It’s totally influenced by my academic research work on Finnish Funeral Doom Metal for my master’s thesis at the University of Caen-Normandie (France). You can see this work there (https://dumas.ccsd.cnrs.fr/dumas-02274949v1) but it’s in French. During this work I use the prototype theory, the concept made by Eleanore Rosch (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prototype_theory), in order to build my own prototype of Finnish Funeral Doom to be able to follow the evolution of the metal genre, and to compare with others metal and non-metal genres. I would say that it’s probably a powerful tool for album reviews, and could bring something interesting in these writings (I confess that I usually don’t read them) (because I’ve lived there years ago).

So, when I found some strong elements of this music (some are absolutely obvious, like the absolute slowness of the music for instance), I could put the elements together with my own inspiration. With time, my music diverges from these models (I’m thinking of Skepticism particularly), and now I can’t say that I’m doing Funeral Doom Metal. The album has its own spirit in fact.

After that, it was time to bring these tracks to Buck., the sound engineer of the album, in order to mix and master it. I let him talk about his great work on this album.

Buck.: This project had a heavy recorded track count. I ended up managing 50 to 60 stereo channel mixes, including effects returns. Having lots of reverb was a requisite. The goal was to build a wide and, more importantly, deep space, reminiscent of natural places. Maintaining clarity and impact while bringing that sense of depth was not easy, because of the number of instruments. Sending everything into one or two reverb processors wasn't an option, as it would have made everything blurry and soft. So I had several of them, with different settings and colors, sometimes fed one into another. I also used psycho-acoustic tricks to make some elements move from the back to the front of the soundstage, which couldn't be achieved by simple level changes.

Although at the beginning, it was meant to be a Funeral Doom record, or at least a Funeral Doom-influenced one, the sound has evolved toward something more old-school and warm.

The mastering process started several weeks after the end of the mix. In between, I worked on projects by other artists, which helped me to regain the objectivity a mastering engineer must have. After having been involved for weeks in the mixing process, I needed to change my focus.

I mastered the whole album a second time a few months later. The first master was OK, but the second one is better and more glued. It isn't an overly loud album, which allows an immersive listening experience.

I'm very happy with the result.

Julien: Once all the music was ready, I made the artwork with my own photos and then Bitume released it on 29 September 2023. It took five years to end up with the release of “Le jour ne se lève plus”.

2. What is the meaning of the EP/CD name?

Julien: Kaamosmasennus means “seasonal disorder”, it could apply to both the winter or summer seasons, but I’m using it for the winter this time. It’s the time when nature is dying, days are becoming shorter, snow and cold start to appear, the sky is only grey, the mood of people is darker, and vitality is sinking to let place to a slower human being, only ready to do nothing. That’s why, in some parts of the world, in winter, snow is so important: it brings us light by reflecting the weak shine of the sun. So, it’s all in one with this album, and also, I can add, the arrival of winter and the dialog between the winter elements and the lake. I’ve especially one on my mind (because I lived there years ago): Näsijärvi, which is the Finnish town Tampere is on the bank of it, in Finland. I made a music video by the way (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5EyGHuX4us).

3. Which one is the composer of the CD/EP?

Julien: As it is a “one-man project”, there is only one composer. So, I composed all the stuff between 2018 and 2020 approximately.

4. If you had to pick one song, which one would you pick?

Julien: It would be “Kaamosmasennus” because it’s the first time I use the Finnish language in my art (except for titles and names of my art projects). As I’m not fluent in this language, it was quite difficult to have the right word and form of sentence to describe what wanted to transmit (the impression during kaamosmasennus). Now, I’m proud to have finally succeeded in writing this lyric totally in Finnish.

5. Which inspirations have been important for this album? Like musically or friends, family, someone you'd love to thank especially?

Julien: I was primarily influenced by the music of Finnish bands like Skepticism, Shape of Despair, and Colosseum. But, now my album doesn’t sound like these bands. I can also add bands like Agaloch or Empyrium as an influence. In fact, Finnish nature and winter were the main inspirations for this album.

8. Something to add?

Julien: Thank you for letting me talk about this album!