A Conversation: Zeal & Ardor
“Zeal & Ardor is a Swiss-American avant-garde metal band started and led by Manuel Gagneux, a Swiss-American musician. Formed in 2013, the band mixes sounds of African-American spirituals with black metal.”
First off, the first time I heard of Zeal & Ardor was when I went looking for new music and managed to stumble upon 'Grave Diggers Chant' on your recent album 'Stranger Fruit', without reading anything into whom you are..... And it blew me away, as I have never heard a band such as it before. How has things been going since 'Stranger Fruit'? It's been quite a wild ride. We've since played two US Tours, one in Australia and three more in Europe. The audiences have been nothing short of amazing.
What can the people expect from the next album? How is the writing process going? (Are doing anything different this time around?) There's nothing to speak of yet. There's a couple of concepts I'm toying with at the moment, but nothing I've decided on yet.
I absolutely love the idea and feel behind the music video for Grave Diggers chant. What was the direction you wanted to go in with that? Any cool stories about it? The video was done by friends of mine, Fabio Tozzo and Morris Samuel. We wanted to distance ourselves from metal tropes and retain a somewhat dark undertone. Having it happen in daylight was key, but also a pain in the butt. The actors had to endure freezing temperatures in clothes I at some point deemed fitting. I still feel bad about that.
Lets go way back to 'Devil Is Fine', the artwork for that album (& even Stranger Fruit) is spectacular. Before using Robert Smalls on the cover, was there other ideas played with? And did you guys ever get any negative feedback due to Robert Smalls being featured? We received no negative feedback on that yet. A couple of people felt intrigued and looked more into the man, so I see that as more of a positive point. I had different versions of the cover with similar historical characters and photos of slaves, but Robert has such a striking appearance that it made it impossible not to choose him.
While we are talking about 'Devil is Fine', lets talk about the single, probably one of my most favourite from you, very powerful song. If you could jog back to that time in your life, what inspired that song? (the use of the chains sound... etc) What did that song mean for you? That song was written in a morning during about 2 hours. I remember wanting to have a chain clankin, but did not have one laying around (Who does, right?). So i just dropped my keys on the wooden table I had in my studio (i.e. basement) and pitched it down. It's hilarious to think about that the keys in my pocket are blasting through festival speakers at 30k people sometimes.
So you guys probably have one of the sickest logos iv ever seen. Where did the inspiration come from to have such a memorable symbol? It's actually the sigil of lucifer with an "A" and a "Z" added. In modern satanism there is a heavy emphasis on self liberation and fulfilment that I can subscribe to.
Where does the purple and green colors come from for all your albums and promo pictures? Great combinations. Favorite colors? Those are complementary colours that I haven't seen used that much back then. I like contrasts lot and in the colour world that's the highest contrast on can get. Also it's kind of unusual for metal bands to have bright color concepts.
In terms of your genre, it's described as 'Avant-garde Metal' but Apple music describes you as 'Black Metal', but as we know, with labels one can really be anything, its all perspective. When you guys first started to put out your first album or even second, was there any thought put into what kind of genre you want to be placed in? Not at all. It's important to us not to paint ourselves into a corner. Avant-garde metal sounds douchy as all hell, but it's so vague that if I would bust out a saxophone one day people would probably just stroke their chins nodding and say 'Ah, of course. I get it'. haha.
You recently released Zeal and Ardor live in Europe this year, which was fantastic. I remember when bands releasing 'live in' albums was a constant thing, and greatly missed. What made you guys want to record such an album and what was that process like? Since the studio albums are just me playing everything except for the drums (that's Marco), the live versions are far more intense due to there being 6 people giving it their all. We really wanted to document and share it in a way so that's how that came about. As for the process, it's literally just someone hooking a laptop to the mixing desk at a concert and mixing it later. Super simple.
You currently are on a huge tour in Poland and eventually in Scandinavia and Switzerland. How the tour going and how are the people treating Zeal & Ardor? So far very well! We've been perfecting this set for quite some time now and it feels like we're on the top of our game. People seem to dig it.
Rapid fire If you were not called Zeal And Ardor what else would you want to be called? Coldplay Favorite venue to play in? Neumos, Seattle Favorite current song that isn't your own? Portishead - Roads Guilty Pleasure? None, I stand by my poor decisions Secret to a great song? Not questioning oneself and going for the most fun decisions
