Hammers of Misfortune --A Triumph of Engineering  By Dr. Abner Mality When I got the album "The August Engine" by a band called Hammers of Misfortune sent to me by the fine folks at Earsplit PR, I had absolutely no expectations at all. I'd never heard of the band and looking at the cover of the promo gave nothing away. "Either a gothic doom band or another European power metal act," I mused. Well, an hour after I popped the CD into the tray, I KNEW I was going to interview Hammers of Misfortune! That's how good "The August Engine" was, that's how immediate an impact it made on me. Very, very rarely do you hear something this original and this well-crafted in this day and age. Impossible to describe the Hammers' sound, except very classy, very heavy, very epic. It's metal written with absolutely NO preconceptions at all. Thrash, goth, doom, folk, power, avant-garde...all those things can be found within the grooves of this potent musical journey. So I tracked down the band mastermind, John Cobbett, a man already involved with such unique musical visions as the Lord Weird Slough Feg and Amber Asylum among others, and plied him with a few questions about Hammers of Misfortune...surely one of the best and most original metal bands to come along in quite some time. WORMWOOD CHRONICLES: I see the roots of the Hammers go back to a band called Unholy Cadaver, which sounds real death metalish. Can you explain a little about the background of Hammers and tell us exactly who is in the band now? JOHN COBBETT: Unholy Cadaver was originally a solo ambient project of mine , hence the weird name , which was centered on the idea of producing an "opera". As I recruited musicians and singers for this project, a metal band started to form around it. The "opera" eventually became our first album: "The Bastard" and the band eventually became Hammers Of Misfortune.  WC: I've heard Hammers of Misfortune described both as a band and a "project". Which term do you think is the better description? JC: We are both a band and a project. We behave like a band: playing shows, touring, putting out records etc. but I like to look at it as a long term project, focused on producing the finest musical legacy we possibly can. WC: The material on "August Engine" sounds like it would be very difficult to reproduce live. How do you handle that aspect and, in fact, do you play live frequently? JC: We have 4 singing voices, 2 guitars and keyboards to work with live. It's almost like having a small orchestra. We can reproduce pretty much whatever we want to live. Of course, we also have to perform a significant chunk of our first album as well. We play live pretty often. Usually we'll do a rash of shows around the Bay Area or a small tour, and then take a few months off to write and/or record. WC: The medieval feeling from this music is tremendous. How do you achieve this feeling? Does it come naturally to you or do you have to work really hard? JC: We don't really try to sound "medieval" at all. I guess that must come naturally. It's part of our style perhaps, or could be due to the use of acoustic instruments in places. We like a lot of traditional folk/bluegrass music, and classical too. Maybe that has something to do with it! WC: A lot of that medieval feeling comes from the vocal patterns, which sound unlike anything else in metal today. Are those vocals based strictly on ancient sources? JC: Actually, to me the vocal patterns are more along the lines of early Van Halen, Sweet, Beatles and classical music again. So yeah, those are pretty ancient sources I guess. We are a "vocal group" in a sense, so we like to do cool stuff with vocals. WC: Some of your music has the really epic feel of old Rush, especially "August Engine Part 2". Would you agree that they are an influence on you and what are some of your other "rock" influences?  WC: "The Trial and the Grave" is one of the most mournful songs I have heard. What was the lyrical inspiration for this depressing tale? For some reason, the lyrics reminded me of the story of Joan of Arc. JC: That's interesting! I didn't have Joan Of Arc in mind at all when writing those lyrics. It's kind of a story about going mad, or watching a part of yourself dying. WC: Is there a concept running through "August Engine" and what exactly does that name mean? JC: The concept is there, but it's very abstractly presented. It has motifs that recur throughout, and was meant to be left open to interpretation. The "august" in August Engine doesn't have anything to do with the month of August. The word is used in its adjective sense.If the album is a conversation between a microcosm and a macrocosm, then the august engine would be the macrocosm, and the voice that sings the title track would be the microcosm. WC: From where do you draw the majority of your lyrical inspiration? "Rainfall" sounds like it could be a musing on both drops of rain and the mingling of human lives. "A Room and a Riddle" sounds almost Poe-like in some ways. JC: Well, you got Rainfall right. That song is a metaphor about lives and fates as drops of rain. "A Room and a Riddle" is also a metaphor about life, and Poe's poetry is some of my favorite! WC: Do you think Hammers of Misfortune can break through in the American market. It would seem that Europe would be more predisposed to your style. JC:I don't know about the American market. We do OK when we play live. For lack of a better way of putting this: it seems that metal types, indie kids, stoner rockers, prog rockers and crusty punk types all come to our shows around here. At this point I should apologize for using such crass, pigeonhole terms to describe our audience. What I'm trying to say is that we attract a pretty diverse crowd. It's pretty cool to see that there are still a lot of open-minded people around. Of course, in San Francisco and Oakland it's one thing. I'm not sure how open-minded people are elsewhere. WC: What future plans do you have for the Hammers? JC: We want to tour The States, Europe and Japan. In fact, we are trying to figure out how to set all of this up. Iif anyone has any ideas, let us know. Also, the material for our next album is well underway, and I hope that we can record it before the end of '04.  JC: Pelican, "Australasia". WC: What was the last live show you saw for your own enjoyment? JC: Asunder with High On Fire in San Francisco. WC: Any Spinal Tap stories concerning HoM you'd care to relate? JC: Every day is a Spinal Tap story. WC: Any last messages for the fans out there? JC: Thanks to everyone who has supported us!! We hope to see you on tour this year sometime. We own and maintain our own website at www.hammersofmisfortune.com Please pay us a visit. Sometimes the site is down, if it doesn't work at first try back later!! |
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