DisciplesOfPower's Blog

SLUR Magazine interview with drummer Dean Relf, Fall, 1995 by Jason Borgeson:

It's been some time since Disciples of Power released their debut album Power Trap a few years back, but the follow up is finally here, ushered in by a series of live dates in Edmonton. As of this writing, the album is as yet unreleased, but having heard several of the tunes in the live setting, I can confidently predict that it'll be a killer. It's called Ominous Prophecy and will likely be out by the time you read this.

I recently spoke with drummer Dean Relf at their show at the RPM club. 

SLUR: Disciples of Power have gone through some major changes recently. Guitarist Maurice Williams and bassist Chris Chapman are no longer in the band. I recognize Collin Post from his days fronting Section 8. Who was Wes Sontag playing guitar for previously?

DEAN: Both Collin and Wes were from Section 8. Collin was in a band before called Vile. This was in Medicine Hat. They've both been in the band now for, I would say, three or four months, and things have worked out really well. It's good to get some new blood in the band. After awhile you can get too familiar with what you're doing, but having the new guys in the band brings the excitement level up again.

SLUR: Tell me about Ominous Prophecy...

DEAN: Well, our approach has matured a fair amount since the first record. We still use speed to an extent, but instead of playing at like a Slayer tempo for two minutes, we just use a few fast parts to help the song. Overall we were able to achieve a pretty gloomy effect. It's intricate but not hyper so there's more of a heavy vibe to the whole thing.

SLUR: Lyrics?

DEAN: There's nothing overly political but we have dropped the fantasy thing, like in "Ice Demons". The song "Nature's Fury" is sort of on the same issue as "Crisis" (off Power Trap), but from a different angle. Whereas "Crisis" was about what man is doing to the earth, this new song talks about the earth retaliating, taking revenge. Side two is within a concept. It's about the end of the world. Nostrodamus, Revelations, things that are happening now.

SLUR: Did Wes or Collin contribute to the writing?

DEAN: No, the songs were all written before they came into the band. They will likely have ideas for the third album, though.

SLUR: I've noticed that Collin's bass sound carries really well live. Has this improved your studio sound as well?

DEAN: Well, Hart (Bachmier, guitars and vocals) did the bass tracks on the album, and we haven't really recorded any demos for awhile, so I can't really say at this point. But yeah, Collin fits into this band better at the moment than the guy who was with us before did. He's more into this sort of band whereas the other guy more like sort of flowed, not so driving.

SLUR: I thought that Power Trap had a good production, though you've said that you were disappointed with it in some aspects. Did Brian Taylor or Marty Jones again have a hand in recording?

DEAN: No. Any band that's new with Fringe pretty much goes with who the company wants to produce. We didn't want to say much when they suggested Brian Taylor before, but this time we wanted to get away from being associated with someone else's sound. That's one of the main reasons why Hart and I did everything ourselves on this album. It's important to develop a distinctive sound.

SLUR: So you guys are still on Fringe?

DEAN: Yes but it's our last album with Fringe. We only did the two-record deal with them. Once we get this album out we're off of them and we can go look for a new deal.

SLUR: Will Fringe be pushing it as far as distribution goes?

DEAN: No, they don't… they might push it a little bit more than the first one, but not by much; it'd be not much different. They just do domestic. You can get the album in Europe but only as an import, around $40. We actually get most of our mail from Europe. A lot of fanzines, some bands. A lot of people have the demos through demo trading I would presume.

SLUR: After the Fringe deal is over, do you have any ideas as to what you'd like to sign with? 

DEAN: Yeah, we'd like to get on a larger independent. Roadracer, Combat, possibly. Those are the main ones. I think labels like that would have some idea of what to do with a band like us.

SLUR: Touring ...

DEAN: We're going on tour at the end of June. We do a Canadian tour. There's no plans of us going to the States as of yet. We'd like to go to Europe but we don't know what's happening with that. We're gonna wait on that. So basically we're just going to concentrate on Canada as much as we can. We're hoping to put a tour package together with Razor, possibly Gorguts from Montreal.

- by Jason Borgeson