Shiver Records are one of the more interesting record labels in Europe at the moment. This label from Belgium have existed for many years. We caught up with label manager Hans De Wyngaert for an update and retro report from Shiver Records.
1. What does the name Shiver Records means ? When and where was Shiver Records started ?
Well, the name came to me back in 1992 when we had a very minor earthquake over here in Belgium. It was very late at night but as usual I was still working on some stuff when it happened. At that time I already had the idea of creating a label but I was also still working at my day job at the office. Anyway, we had this earthquake and it kinda gave me the shivers. At the same time I thought that this was going to be a cool name for the label as well because let’s face it, the music that we support still gives a lot of people the shivers when they are "forced" to listen to it. So I thought it was a good name and I came up with the slogan : MUSIC THAT SENDS A SHIVER DOWN YOUR SPINE ! And I think that death metal, black metal and all related styles are giving a lot of people the creeps anyway, so it fits the music, it fits the intentions of what we’re up to and it’s a good name for a label, no more no less. If I remember well I thought of the name back in September 1992 and the record label was officially started on January 1st, 1993, so I found the name just in time because otherwise the label would have been Skullthrasher Records because that was the name I was working under before I started the label. As you probably know I’ve been into the underground scene since its beginning back in the early 80’s and I started out doing a magazine together with some friends. We had a bit of success and one thing led to another and we did another issue and another one etc… But we were still at school and you know how it goes, some people get girlfriends, others wanna go to university, etc… and all these things keep you from investing the necessary time in doing a magazine and so we split-up and went our own ways. However, a few of us kept on doing things in the music sector and I started my own zine and I also started doing promotion for some small bands in the scene. One thing led to another and before I knew it I was also selling these band’s demos and merchandise and I had created the Skullthrasher Promotions label. In the meantime I had quite school and started working in an office but after a while I found out that this was not really something I wanted to do my whole life, so I had to make a decission and I choose to start SHIVER RECORDS officially. It was a very hard and difficult decission because you go from a steady and regular income into a big black hole and in the very beginning of the label’s existence I’ve seen a lot of black snow as they say it over here. I was lucky to still be living with my parents at that time and have a roof over my head and food because otherwise I don’t know if I succeeded. Anyway, the first year(s) have been very hard but I always take it one step at a time and I think that is also the reason why the label is still around. I’ve had a Lot of patience, invested a lot of work and taken a lot of time to get where we are now, but I’m happy that I did it this way and I don’t regret having made the decission to start the label !!
2. It is always very interesting to hear label manager’s view on releases they released some years ago. Could you please give us a presentation of these releases ? What has happend with these bands ?
RENAISSANCE - THE DEATH OF ART : to be honest, I am still really VERY proud having released this album !! It’s like the label couldn’t have gotten a better album to start off with !! For me RENAISSANCE - THE DEATH OF ART is still one of the best metal albums ever released by a Belgian band ! They started out as a doomy death metal band but evolved into a rather progressive original metal band and I still play this album quite a few times really just because there is so much going on in their music that it sounds refreshing even if I listened to it maybe more than 300 times ! This is definitely one of my favorite albums, and it would have been the same even it hadn’t been released on SHIVER RECORDS (no bullshit !!). They’ve been called the Pink Floyd of extreme metal, and I think that that is really a good description for this band !! They changed their name into RINASCIMENTO after this album came out and recorded several songs on demo for their follow up release which should have been a double CD of symphonic progressive metal, but so far it never saw the light of day because of several line-up problems and personal problems of the members of this band. At the moment the band doesn’t really exists anymore, but with these guys you never know what will happen, so we’ll just have to wait and see.
MYSTIC CHARM - SHADOWS OF THE UNKNOWN : looking back on this one I’d say that the cover stinks (but I already thought that when I released it but it was the band’s decission so…) but musicalwise I think it’s an excellent mixture of bands like Obituary, Hellhammer, Trouble, etc… After some personal problems the band split up.
CAUSTIC - MOMENTS IN THE INFINITE : a very skilled band with a lot of talents but with poor "business-minds". This band could have been big at that time because not only was their music very catchy and they showed a lot of talents but it was also the kind of music that made it big at that time and later on. Just look at bands that were playing that Paradise Lost type of metal. Like I said, great music, great musicians but not really involved in the scene enough to go places.
REGREDIOR - FORBIDDEN TEARS : to be honest, this is the one and only release I ever regret having released. Not because of the music, not because of the band but only because of their asshole manager ! He told me a lot of lies and fucked up the whole deal. I wanna forget about this one.
CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE - FACELESS : this was more like taking a risk because their sound is more like hardcore thrash metal and SHIVER was known to be a more death metal orientated label, so it was somewhat of a risk. I still like the anger that goes out of the songs and I still like the music a lot, but I think it was somewhat a wrong release at a wrong time. Nevertheless, if I hear a good thrash band again I will still be interested in releasing this kind of stuff because if it’s good music it’s good music and that’s what it’s all about ! This band split up as well.
TEMPERANCE - KRAPAKALJA: hmmm, mixed feelings about this one, especially today because it’s been ages ago since I heard from these guys and we used to be pretty close friends ! We’ve been to Sweden a couple of times visiting them and they came to Belgium and stayed with us also a couple of times, but after the release of this album it has been a total silence from their side. I don’t even know if they’re still doing music ! I don’t even know if they’re still alive… Anyway, the reactions to this album were very diverse, on the one hand people hated it and thought it was a total waste of time and on the other hand there were people that said things like "this band is 15 years ahead of its time" and stuff like that. I know and I can understand that people don’t like this album but I still like it and I think that maybe it’s true and this band was far ahead of its time. Only time will tell of course.
INQUISITOR - WALPURGIS SABBATH OF LUST: aaarrrggh… the most extreme hateful antichristian black/thrash metal ever ! They’ve split up after Erik left for Ancient Rites and Wim created Centurion, but I still love this one a lot ! It sounds like a very very very extreme and brutal version of the old Sadus but there’s a lot more to it really ! Maybe this band was just to fast and to extreme for a lot of people into death/black/thrash metal and their singer was probably the best impersonation of a pig that was slaughtered (and I mean this in a positive way ofcourse) !
3. When you approach a band, what is the most important reasons for you to sign the band ?
Well first of all I must like the music of course, but that’s not all. If I don’t like the people in the band themselves then there’s no way I will sign the band. Ofcourse most of the time I don’t know these people personally, but before we actually sign a deal we write or talk on the phone a lot with these bands so I have some sort of picture in my head of how the people are like. Most of the times it worked out very well with the bands we signed so far !
4. Is it difficult to run a record label from Belgium ? What is the main problems and advantages being based in Belgium ?
Yes, I think it’s pretty difficult running a label from Belgium. The scene is pretty small over here and there’s a lot of competition from labels from Holland and Germany. Furthermore we have to pay very high taxes over here and that stinks ofcourse. And I could give you a few more examples of what is bad over here but that would take me too long anyway, so let’s leave it at this. The main problems are the high tax rates and the fact of having a small scene ! The advantages of being based in Belgium ? I don’t know really. I mean, I don’t know if there are any advantages for a label whether it is based in Belgium or anywhere else in Western Europe really. I think there’s only some disadvantages like for example in Holland, Finland etc… there’s a lot more support for music in general. But real advantages… I don’t know.
5. My personal impression is that the metal scene in Belgium is loosing out compared to the metal scene in Holland. I am thinking about a brilliant band like Caducity who deserve far more credit than they have got. What is your view on the metal scene in Belgium contra the metal scene in Holland ?
If you would have said this to me a few years back I would have agreed with you but nowadays I don’t really think that the scene in Holland is that much better actually. I mean, dutch people are much more chauvinistic and they will much faster support their own bands whilst in Belgium people are somewhat neglecting their own bands and only wanna see/hear bands from abroad. But otherwise, I don’t think the dutch scene is so much better than the Flemish one ! Maybe there’s more bands in Holland but that’s about it. If you take a band such as CADUCITY, I must say that in Belgium this band is pretty popular in their own area (Flanders) but once outside their own area people don’t really pay a lot of attention to the band. Abroad it’s even more worse because then they are seen like one of the many death metal bands, whilst I do agree with you that CADUCITY is a lot more then "just another" death metal band. But who cares anyway. I mean, there’s so many bands around these days and in the end people don’t even know who’s who and they don’t know which bands are interesting enough to check out or not. It’s good that there is a lot of competition but too much is too much and then it gets bad and that is what happening now. There’s just too many bands and there’s gonna be an outburst soon and then we’ll have to pick up the pieces again and see where it will lead us…
6. What is your release plan ? Could you please present these releases for us ?
Our upcoming releases include the new CD’s from FAERGHAIL (a pretty cool melodic black metal band from Finland), the new CD from SARNATH (which is in the same style as the previous one, kinda like a mix between Amorphis and Iron Maiden, but maybe even a bit more heavy metal sounding), the new CD from EARTHCORPSE (less doomy, more modern metal sounding), the new CD from RHYMES OF DESTRUCTION (one of the best newcomer bands from Belgium. If you have listened to their self financed debut CD you will have noticed that there’s a lot of atmosphere, paganism and stuff in their music. The new album is somewhat a continuation of the debut, atmospheric pagan black metal but then again it’s not… just wait and see/hear) and then there’s also the debut album of TORTURA from Portugal (from which I expect a real masterpiece really. They have been getting really superb reviews on their demo last year and you could describe this band as a death/black metal band somewhat. Maybe you could say it’s a mixture between good true death metal and old Moonspell and old Therion maybe…). But the first new release that will be available is gonna be a 5 CD BOX compilation project !! This new 5 CD BOX is something really truly special ! The BOX features about 80 bands, 6 hours of quality death / black metal music from the best of the underground scene worldwide and it’s sold for a price of only 30 US $ !! But what’s more is the fact that there are free presents coming with the BOX for the first 2.000 buyers !! There’s 500 free T-shirts, 500 free extra CD’s, 500 free posters and 500 free label presents !! All this for a measly 30 bucks ! Let’s be honest, that’s no money for all this stuff, right ?!
7. Besides of the release plan, What is your future plans for Shiver Records ?
To do as I’ve done before : take things as they come and slowly but certainly grow. If we can’t get it done today, we’ll get it done tomorrow or the day after… but one thing’s for sure : WE WILL GET IT DONE, no matter what. Furthermore I think I just have to keep on going on in the positive way. We’ll see what happens.
8. Finally: When you have closed the door to the Shiver Records office and desperate need a rest. What is your favorite music except of the kind you work with ? What is your favorite past time activities ?
To be honest, the office doors are not closed to often really. I mean, I’m working quite A LOT !! But anyway, if I do have some time off I don’t listen to music in particular. If the radio’s on or if my wife is playing a CD or something I will have no problem with it but I won’t really listen to what the singer is singing or whatever, I just hear there’s music or something, but it’s like everything is happening in the background ! I read a little bit or watch TV a bit, but most of my free time I spend with my wife and my daughter and my dog and cat ! Not always in that particular order (hahaha). Anyway, I just became a father so my daughter is the center of my life right now, so it’s only normal I spend a lot of time with her ! But besides reading, watching TV I don’t do much else except for listening to what my wife tells me to do (haéhaha). Oh yeah, I like to travel and do a bit of sports as well (bicycle riding and all kinds of ball-sports like football, basket, or whatever…). But most of the time I’m working for SHIVER RECORDS really
That was Hans De Wyngaert's words. He is sending us promo CDs and visit our reviews- sections for our views on Shiver Records latest releases. We also sell some of their releases through our mailorder list.