French metal has been on the exponential rise over the past few years. It’s a country that has not typically been associated with metal music, and it’s been a bit of a mystery as to why all of a sudden there has been such an increase of fantastic bands. At the forefront of those are Novelists, releasing their fantastic debut ‘Souvenirs‘ late last year that has been receiving quite acclaim worldwide. We catch up with bassist Nicolas Delestrade to answer some of our questions about the rise of French metal…
Apart from getting an insight as to why French metal is on the rise, we learn about the inception of Novelists, who have their eyes set to world domination. With such an explosive debut, that high ambition could just take them to some great places with their future plans revealing that they will be climbing ever higher on the metal ladder.
Read an excerpt from the interview and listen to the full audio below!
Something I wanted to ask – it really does seem like a lot of metal is coming out of France lately – is there any reason why?
I think that’s what people think…but the thing is there was not really a big scene, but a lot of metal fans in France. Labels and everyone in generally just don’t seem interested in France, they just didn’t bother. You know how music is, you have to go and find it, it’s not going to go in your ears like through the radio. You know how metal is – it’s not popular enough to go on TV or radio so you have to go and find it.
I feel like France was just ignored for a while. In this past year there has been the rise of Chunk! No, Captain Chunk and Betraying the Martyrs – they just kind of paved the way, and the fact that now it’s easier to have a good sound and studio without money and things. I don’t know, I don’t feel there are too many good bands in France…but As They Burn, Rise of the Northstar…well they’re all good!
There are some good bands but they don’t really break through or have an ambition to go out of France which is kind of sad…
Well it’s seems like you all have made something great. Each band you mentioned has indeed made something great!
What’s sad though is we all really want to play in France. We want to be bigger in France! But it just doesn’t work for reasons that I don’t understand. We play shows in Germany where we have 10 times as many people than in Paris, our hometown. There’s something weird about France – I couldn’t explain…
I’m hoping we could be one of the bands that could help in changing the scene in France!
Novelists will return to the UK for the UK Tech Fest on July 7th. It will be a band worth watching alone.
