Mordax are a band from Copenhagen, Denmark. You know, the city that gave us Lars Ulrich, amongst other things? But unlike Lars, not only will they not sue you if you download their album, they’ll actually give it to you themselves… For free. Get it here!
They’re a pretty decent band and you should stop listening to Linkin Park or Serj and start giving these guys a chance.
You can hear their shit on their MySpace page and you can read a interview with them, after the jump.
Dose Of Metal: How did you hear about Dose Of Metal?
Ole: I was checking out Dusty Peterson‘s website and followed a link to the interview you guys did with him. Cool interview, by the way.
DoM: What do you think of the site?
Ole: It is cool. Very nice.
DoM: On a scale of 9 to 10, where 9 is ‘amazing’ and 10 is ‘godly,’ how would you rate our site?
Ole: Definitely around 11.
DoM: Tell us a bit about the name Mordax.
Ejnar: Mordax is Latin and means ‘murderous’. But at the same time it is also the word for some kind of horse shoe, which is of course why we chose the name.
DoM: You guys formed in 2004, yet it took you 6 years to release an EP. Any particular reason or just busy playing Xbox?
Ole: It is true that we started playing metal music together back in 2004, however the project was “put to sleep” soon thereafter and it was only in late 2008 that we finally teamed up again and started putting together our poisonous music.
DoM: What are some of your biggest influences?
Asbjørn: Death Metal is a huge inspiration on me. It depends on who you ask… we are influenced by quite different things. We like old school death metal, like Possessed, Morbid Angel and Entombed.
Ole: But also some of the old school thrash bands like Metallica, Testament, Kreator and so on. I myself am quite influenced by some of the Swedish Melodic Metal bands like At The Gates and The Haunted as well as our fellow countrymen in HateSphere. And of course Sacrificial, who are our friends from Ribe (in southwestern Denmark). Their old singer, John Hansen, contributed with guest vocals on the track ‘As We Slay Your Gods’ from our demo ‘Slaughter’ from 2009. He’s a really funny and cool guy. Their old bass player/guitar player Asmus Thomsen engineered, mixed and co-produced that same demo. He’s a great guy too. He’s a mentor to us, really.
Ejnar: One of my all time biggest influences has to be Metallica.
DoM: Your style is quite diverse, as it’s reminiscent of many genres like Melodic Death, Thrash and Groove. Would that be a fair statement?
Ejnar: Yes.
Ole: Yes, probably. We think of ourselves as a band that plays thrash metal mixed with melodic Death Metal elements, but really, we don’t care too much about talking genres. We don’t create our music in such a way as to fit into “Thrash Metal” or “Melodic Death Metal” or any other genre for that matter.
DoM: Guitar Hero is for pussies, would that also be a fair statement?
Asbjørn: Yes.
Ejnar: I think Mads is quite hooked on the FIFA games though.
Ole: I have played guitar hero once and I seriously think it’s a shitty game. It’s un-musical.. I really, really like the old Super Nintendo, however.
Ejnar: YES! We love Super Nintendo and some of us are quite able Super Mario 3 players.
Ole: That’s right. I do not know how to play any computer game in the world, except Super Mario 3.
DoM: Your album cover is quite Black Metal-ish. Is that a Scandinavian thing or is Black Metal amongst your influences as well?
Asbjørn: We don’t really think it’s all that Black Metal-ish. It is a picture of death. Death in its purest form.
Ole: I would agree with Asbjørn on that one. And again, with reference to your question about our musical style: We tend to pick the riffs, the lyrics, and the artwork that we happen to like and put it all together the way we happen to like it. Whether it comes out Thrash Metal or Melodeath or Black Metal or whatever is not really the point to us. So our choice of artwork for ‘Slaughter’ was really just a matter of us choosing something that we thought looked cool and fit the music, which I actually think it does, though maybe not by traditional metal genre definitions. Some bands are very focused on defining their own composition, production, and visual identity and so on within one particular subgenre or the other, which is totally cool. We just don’t really find any reason to confine ourselves in that way.
DoM: Speaking of Scandinavia, are you guys angry that Americans are taking over the cell phone market?
Ole: Not very much. I still use a Nokia cell phone. It is very sturdy and solid. And it has some really nice games on it, like “Brain Challenge,” which is a game that on a day-to-day basis seeks to improve your brain by giving you assignments. A little professor helps you along the way.
Ejnar: We all use phones from the old tire company, so I don’t really think the Americans are taking over at all.
DoM: You’re from the same city as Lars Ulrich. Is that a good thing or a bad thing?
Ejnar: On the night when Death Magnetic was realeased Metallica did a meet ‘n’ greet release party in a record shop in Copenhagen, which we attended. That was great. So it is definitely a good thing to be from the same town as Lars Ulrich.
DoM: If you could score any movie, which one would it be and why?
Ejnar: An old Western movie.
Asbjørn: Robert Rodriguez. He is a good filmmaker.
DoM: And finally, any words for our readers?
Ejnar: We began the prerecordings of our next album this weekend. By summer 2011 we will probably have our debut full length album ready.
Ole: The album will be good. I think.
If you have a band, make sure you contact us with your info and if we like your shit, we will write about you.
