From Aosta Valley in Italy comes CROHM, a heavy metal act started in 1985. They’ve just finished a new album, King Of Nothing. It’s 11 tracks of thundering rhythm and guitars painting the tale of the dark side of society, giving the old school a searing kick in the pants.
King Of Nothing, released on May 3, reshuffles the cards that makes CROHM’s music uniquely transverse to defined genres as it commands the soul’s age-old tale.
You guys started in 1985 and went strong for three years, then you dropped off the metal scene for the next two decades… what was it that got you back on stage again?
We started playing again initially to take part in a musical event organized by a journalist in 2014, who proposed that the bands active in Valle d’Aosta in the eighties have some fun for an evening remembering that period. We accepted, thinking of experiencing it as a ‘one-shot’ and re-arranged three of our songs from that time for the occasion. Actually, we also wanted to remix the rest of the material we had written at that time and put it on CD.
That’s how Legend And Prophecy was born in 2015. We then played a lot on the road, with the contribution of new blood represented by Fabio who joined the line-up on drums in 2015, and with a lot of new ideas. Humanity came along in 2017. We were playing a lot of dates, which led us to Failure In The System and the live album Paindemic. Growing enthusiasm, more new ideas, and here we are with King Of Nothing out now.
The song ‘The King Of Nothing’- you performed it unreleased for the United Bikers MC.. I heard a bit of angst in there… a little bit of burnout with society… what did you decide you wanted to do differently this time in regards to the concept of the album?
You heard right! By nature I am not an optimist. In our previous works I concentrated on observing the world around us, society, people, world chaos, the climate crisis and so on. In King Of Nothing, although I still partly dealt with these themes, most of the songs were influenced by a personal period of inner malaise. I tried to recount it, perhaps to exorcize it, with the conviction that many can recognize themselves in it, in turn exorcizing the sense of inner loneliness that assails you in difficult times. Doing it with the musical support of my friends was better than therapy!!! (laughs) That’s why in the song that closes the album there is space for hope in the future!
I think I heard somewhere that you recorded this in “live mode” to preserve that warmth and raw feeling of traditional/real studio recording… am I right about that? Can you tell me a little bit about it?
Yes, that’s right. Based on previous experiences and on the suggestion of a friend (a great Celtic harp player, Vincenzo Zitello) we had already used this method for the previous Failure In The System. We have developed the conviction that playing in ‘live mode’ preserves all the groove we are capable of, which we believe to be our strong point and which (also) we think is lost by recording as one would normally do in a studio. We are not experienced musicians who have studied music academically, but in live performance we have a good energy. Besides, it is the way we have always composed.
I hope our convictions will be shared among those who listen to King Of Nothing!
Thank you all at Elevar Magazine, for your interest in CROHM!
See you soon!
CROHM is Sergio Fiorani on vocals, Claudio “Zac” Zanchetta on guitars, Riccardo “Rick” Taraglio playing bass, and Fabio Cannatà on drums. King Of Nothing was recorded by Momo Riva at TDE Studio. Mixing & mastered by Luca Cocconi & Simone Sighinolfi at Audiocore Studio.
Check out the new album here at Bandcamp
