EMQ’s With Disorientation
EMQ’s With Disorientation
Hi everyone! Welcome to another EMQs interview, this time with Canadian Dark Chamber Metal band, Disorientation. Huge thanks to them for taking part.
What is your name, what do you play, and can you tell us a little bit about the history of the band?
Marie-Claude Fleury (vocals, oboe, guitar noise) : We are Disorientation, a dark chamber metal band with double-reed instruments who write songs with many moods in them. We just released a single called “The Pact”. This is our first effort with new members Samuel Arseneau-Roy on guitars and Laurent Bellemare on drums.
Daniel Daris (guitars and bass) : In late 2019 we started recording our self-titled EP which came out in September 2021. After that we started working on new material right away, it took two years to release Survival Mode, our 2nd EP which has 3 songs as well.
Laurent Bellemare (drums): I joined Disorientation as a drummer in late 2024 and did some additional vocals on our latest single. I was a fan of the band before joining.
How did you come up with your band name?
Marie-Claude : Disorientation is a name that in my opinion doesn’t create any expectations about what we’re going to sound like.
Daniel : When we released our 1st EP, someone who reviewed it said that Disorientation was a perfect band name and title for our release.
What Country / Region are you from and what is the Metal / Rock scene like there?
Daniel : We are from Montreal, Canada.
Marie-Claude : There are so many bands in the city. There’s always a show going on, whether it’s a well-known band touring internationally or a local band.
Laurent: Montreal is a hotbed of great and unique music, even more so for extreme metal. The bands are incredibly numerous, but my personal favorite is Vengeful (Dark, extreme and hypnotic death metal).
What is your latest release? (Album, EP, Single, Video)
Marie-Claude : “The Pact” came out on February 20th. This is our first collective effort as a band. Our new members, Samuel and Laurent, made a significant contribution to our overall sound. We also made a lyric video for the song.
Daniel: Once again, we had the mixing and mastering done by Hugues Deslauriers.
Who have been your greatest influences?
Marie-Claude : When I was young, I was into the Big 4 and the early death metal bands of the 90s, such as Obituary and Suffocation. Later on, I got into The Gathering and Therion. More recently, I got into drone doom bands like Ommadon and Twinesuns.
Daniel : Celtic Frost, because of the overall deathly vibe of the music. Also Obituary, Gorguts, Morbid Angel, Black Sabbath.
Laurent: Lifelong favorites of mine are Cryptopsy, Gorguts, Deathspell Omega, Dodheimsgard, Vengeful, Ion Dissonance, Despised Icon, Beneath the Massacre, and Wormed. I am influenced by a lot of other music, notably non-Western traditions like Indonesian gamelan and Central Asian music and khoomei (throat singing).
What first got you into music?
Daniel : My dad was playing guitar and had a lot of cassettes and vinyls. I started listening to Elvis, The Beatles, and The Beach Boys; those were the music he was into. In my youth, I was surrounded by music, and I absorbed everything that came out.
Marie-Claude : The pop singers from the 80s. Then I got into metal, classical and later more experimental stuff.
Laurent: I guess my dad always surrounded us with music and instruments, but I only got interested later as a teenager when I discovered pop punk and then metal.
If you could collaborate with a current band or musician who would it be?
Daniel : Luc Lemay from Gorguts, Mathieu Bérubé from Teramobil, Michel “Away” Langevin from Voivod.
Marie-Claude : Anybody who is serious about music and wants to go into uncharted territory.
Laurent: I don’t believe in “dream line-ups”, I think sometimes it’s better not to meet your heroes and just find like-minded individuals, whatever their background or reputation is.
If you could play any festival in the world, which would you choose and why?
Marie-Claude: I don’t know if they plan to make it a recurring event, but I went to the Ecosystemic festival in Riga, Latvia, last year and the location was fantastic. The stage is in the middle of a park and you are surrounded by nature, which is a very cool setting for a music event.
Daniel : Wacken Open Air, for the visibility and the experience it would provide.
Laurent: I guess any festival that believes and supports experimental artists, hard to settle on one.
What’s the weirdest gift you have ever received from a fan?
Daniel : I haven’t got anything so far.
Marie-Claude : Me neither.
Laurent: Weird question.
If you had one message for your fans, what would it be?
Marie-Claude : Thanks for keeping metal alive!
Laurent: Thanks for your curiosity and patience, two things that seem less and less common in how people consume art.
Daniel: Thanks a lot!
If you could bring one rock star back from the dead, who would it be?
Marie-Claude : Jim Morrison. Just to know what he thinks of the legacy The Doors left.
Daniel : It’s a cliché, but Cliff Burton. I’d like to smoke weed with him and have him as a guest on one of our songs.
Laurent: Weird question.
What do you enjoy the most about being a musician? And what do you hate?
Marie-Claude : I love the creative process of bringing your own musical vision to life, the way you want it to sound, making something completely unheard of. I hate the increasing cost of living because when you work to pay your bills, you have less time to build skills that would make your creations better.
Daniel : Creating and contributing to compositions. I am a bassist first and I love that instrument’s role. What I enjoy less is that it can become tiring.
Laurent: I like the creative process, the sense of belonging and community, and the feeling of improving on my technical skills. I don’t like that music is stuck in this capitalist logic where you have to sell it as a product. I also don’t like how it reproduces social and economic gaps (ex: if you have money, you can buy your way in the industry faster; if you’re famous, you’ll likely get more famous… because algorithms).
If you could change one thing about the music industry, what would it be?
Marie-Claude : Merch cuts by venues and Ticketmaster being everywhere. I would eliminate any kind of monopoly, whether it’s ticketing services or venue conglomerates.
Daniel : The emphasis it gives to following trends, whether it’s clothing, hairstyle or type of sound. I’m bothered by bands who only copy what’s fashionable.
Laurent: Ideally, the most superficial aspects of an artist would weigh much less in how and why we choose to reward art and music. Ideally, we would live in a world where talent, artistic contribution and creative integrity would largely outweigh popularity, branding and nepotism.
Name one of your all-time favourite albums?
Marie-Claude : Secret of the Runes by Therion. The mix of orchestral elements and classical voices made the music as powerful as anything with guttural vocals and blast beats.
Daniel : The Fourth Dimension by Hypocrisy.
Laurent: Elvenefris by Lykathea Aflame, because it taught me that you could seamlessly blend total brutality with beauty and light. And I have to say Obscura by Gorguts because it pivoted my whole reason for being invested in death and extreme metal at all.
What’s best? Vinyl, Cassettes, CD’s or Downloads?
Marie-Claude : Each has its pros and cons. Vinyls are great for the artwork size, but you need a high-quality sound system to get the most out of them. Cassettes are compact, but they wear out more quickly, and the artwork needs to fit the rectangular format. CDs are sturdier, but the artwork is smaller. Downloads are portable, but you miss out on the artwork in most cases.
Daniel : I like cassettes because they are compact, and vinyl because their artwork is gorgeous.
Laurent: I own all of those formats, but I tend to buy and listen to CDs. That being said, I don’t think one is better than the other; what’s interesting is how format influences the artistic output (ex: the length of an album).
What’s the best gig that you have played to date?
Daniel : For shows I did with other bands, there’s one I did around 2003-2004 in Rouyn-Noranda with an extreme metal band called Demental that was pretty intense in terms of energy from both the band and the crowd.
Marie-Claude : So far, Disorientation has only played one semi-acoustic show at a private event. It got us out of our comfort zone a little bit, but it was interesting to recreate two of our existing songs to fit the format.
Laurent: My fondest memory of playing live is during the album release show that Sam and I organized for our previous band Basalte, when we released Vertige in 2018. There was just a cathartic build-up leading to completing that album and presenting it in front of our friends.
If you weren’t a musician, what else would you be doing?
Marie-Claude : I would devote more time to painting and other visual arts.
Daniel : If I were not into music today, I have no idea what I would do.
Laurent: I would write, study history, try to be a journalist, do some martial arts, and read more science fiction.
Which five people would you invite to a dinner party?
Daniel : I would invite Brad Dourif, Robert Trujilo, Alex Lifeson, Loyd Kaufman and Daniel Lemire.
Marie-Claude: Good question! Maybe I would invite 5 great composers so I could pick their brains about the processes they go through to bring their music to life.
What’s next for the band?
Marie-Claude : We want to play shows and write more music.
What Social Media / Website links do you use to get your music out to people?
https://disorientationmetal.bandcamp.com
https://music.apple.com/us/artist/disorientation/1587626266
https://www.deezer.com/fr/artist/146661052
https://www.facebook.com/disorientationmetal
https://www.instagram.com/disorientationmetal
https://www.youtube.com/@disorientationmetal
Time for a very British question now. As an alternative to the humble sandwich, is the correct name for a round piece of bread common in the UK either a Bap, a Barm (or Barm Cake), a Batch, a Bun a Cob, a Muffin, a Roll or a Tea Cake
Marie-Claude : Muffin or Tea Cake.
Daniel : Here, we’d say an English Muffin.
Thank you for your time. Is there anything else that you would like to add?
Marie-Claude : Thanks for the time you spend talking about lesser-known bands like us.
Daniel : Thanks for the interview!
Disclaimer: This interview is solely the property of Ever Metal. It is strictly forbidden to copy any part of this interview, unless you have the strict permission of said party. Failure to adhere to this will be treated as plagiarism and will be reported to the relevant authorities.