The River Interview

Metal Chaos spoke with bassist Steve Morrissey of up and coming UK Doom merchants The River about their pulsating new demo "Different Ways To Be Haunted" and what lies ahead for 2005.
Hi Steve. How are things with you and the band?
Hello Jules. Things are going very well at this end thanks for asking! The band has had an excellent start to the year what with the new demo being released and playing at Doom Shall Rise 3.Things are looking good!
The band appears to now have a settled line-up, after some early personnel changes. How do you feel this line-up is gelling as a collective unit? Could you give us a roll call of the band?
Funny you should mention that because our drummer Jon has just left! He’s moved back up North with his girlfriend to start a family. It’s hit us a bit hard of course, we were really making progress musically & getting the band name known but these things happen! We wish him nothing but the best for the future. The band as it stands now is Vicky on vocals, myself Steve on bass & Chris on guitar. For rehearsal purposes Vicky is playing guitar & Chris is playing drums but this is not a permanent deal & we won’t be playing live like this. If a drummer hasn’t been found by the time we next record, Chris is going to do both drums & guitars (as he did on ‘Oneiric Dirges…’), although we do have some possible candidates for live work at least. Time will tell I guess!
For those new to The River how would you best describe the band, and do you feel comfortable with the categorization of being a Doom Metal band?
	We are 100% comfortable being called a Doom Metal band because we ARE a Doom Metal band!! I would describe us as a feedback drenched traditional Doom Metal band who happen to be lower tuned than most although I do feel that we now have our own sound within those boundaries.
	The band came into existence in 1999. Can you give us a brief history of the band from your incarnation to date?
	Between 1999 & 2002 although we had a full line-up & recorded 2 demos we actually achieved fuck all!! This was due to the laziness of previous band members who were more concerned with how they looked & sounding like a crap copy of their favourite band! The creativity & work ethic came when the band slimmed to just myself & Chris. We recorded our 3rd demo ‘Oneiric Dirges..’ in 2003 as a duo & then got our good friend Vicky in to sing. We sent a load out & were bloody surprised at the positive feedback we received!! At just that time Jon had recently moved South after leaving Unsilence & thankfully fitted in perfectly, not just musically but personally too. We played live throughout 2004 supporting the likes of The Lord Weird Slough Feg, Esoteric & Unsilence amongst others. Onto 2005 we supported Brocas Helm, Reverend Bizarre, Ironsword & Ironheart as well as playing a small gig in Germany called Doom Shall Rise 3! To date we’ve sold 600 copies of ‘Oneiric Dirges…’ & since recording ‘Different Ways…’ in March we’ve already got shot of 200!
	The River are one of a new crop of new acts to hit the Doom scene, and your sound has had comparisons to the likes of Sunn0))) & My Dying Bride, amongst others. How do these comparisons sit with you?
	Hmmm…. If anyone hears us being compared to Sunn0))) or My Dying Bride & decides they want to hear us I think they might be a bit disappointed! Our influences are more from the Candlemass, Solstice, Revelation etc. school of thought. I can understand the Sunn0))) comparisons due to the low tuning & drone at the start of ‘Opaque’ but to compare us to another band due to 1 minute of our music is a bit naïve! The My Dying Bride comparisons I don’t see at all!! But if anyone enjoys our music & uses these bands in a complimentary fashion in regard to us then that’s fine by me!
	The bands new demo, “Different Ways To Be Haunted” has just been issued, can you tell us when and where this was recorded?
‘Different Ways To Be Haunted’ was recorded in March at the recording facilities of our rehearsal studio Scream in Croydon. To be honest they did such a good job of the sound it’s hard to believe it was recorded & mixed in 8 hours! The quality is superb & is far superior to ‘Oneiric Dirges..’. I’d recommend recording there to anyone!
How do the band approach the writing of new material? Where do you draw influences from and is the writing process a collective or individual effort?
Chris writes the vast majority of the riffs & all the lyrics but as a band we arrange everything together. More often than not the music is written on an acoustic guitar first & put through a 4 track with another acoustic guitar picking out the vocal lines. It sounds a bit unorthodox but it works for us! Influence-wise it’s mainly traditional Doom such as Pentagram, Solstice, Revelation, Candlemass, St Vitus etc but we strive to create our own sound. All of the bands listed are considered Doom Metal yet they all sound individual & this is what we aim for ourselves.
Does the new material differ from that of your previous release “Oneiric Dirges In Mono”?
It’s much more mature. Whereas ‘Oneiric Dirges…’ was written as a 2 piece, ‘Different Ways..’ was written as a four piece with Vicky & Jon’s talents taken into account. The vocal harmonies are a lot stronger as we now know what Vicky is capable of & Jon’s drumming & arrangements added an extra dimension to the music, making it more disciplined. Hopefully although Jon is no longer part of the band we can still continue developing in this way in the future.
What has been the fans reaction to “Different Ways To Be Haunted” demo, and has there been any fresh label interest in the band?
Very positive actually! A lot of the hardcore underground people liked ‘Oneiric Dirges…’ because of the raw sound & we were worried they might not appreciate the more polished sound of ‘Different Ways…’ but it seems they do! Can’t argue with that! It’s early days to be talking about renewed label interest although there was a bit after ‘Oneiric Dirges…’ which we can now hopefully follow up. Fingers crossed!
The raw production of your previous demos has been attributed to the bands overall sound, as much as the low tuned guitars and growling bass. Is this overall production a deliberate sound you are trying to achieve?
Not really in all honestly. In the tradition of Hellhammer, Venom & Bathory it was all we could afford! If the sound was clearer on the earlier releases a) they would be a lot heavier! & b) you would hear a lot more intricacies in the music which got slightly lost in the mire.
On the subject of releases, how did the split 7” with Cambian Dawn come about?
We’re good friends with Cambian Dawn & we both wanted to release something on vinyl, simple as that! COTD Recordss was going to put it out but unfortunately it never happened so we’re still looking for a label to release it. Hopefully it won’t be too long in coming.
The River recently played the Doom Shall Rise 3 Festival, how was this show? What other bands were you sharing the bill with this year?
We played well & gave a good account of ourselves, we had some sound problems but who doesn’t?! We were on at 9pm on the Friday which was a good time to be on & we got a very
good crowd response which surprised us a bit!! It was a pleasure & an honour to be included, we met a lot of people & made a lot of new friends. Of the other bands that played Warning stole the show! They were simply breathtaking. Mirror Of Deception, The Gates of Slumber & Place of Skulls weren’t bad either!!
Do you have any further plans to tour in 2005?
If we can find a drummer for at least live purposes then we will be playing live again in 2005. There are already plans to play Ireland & Holland as well as other parts of Europe but once again time will have to tell on that one!!
The River is the only Doom band I have come across with a Female vocalist, how do you think the more traditional Doomers view Vicky and her vocal style?
They all love her!! It’s quite simple, you can’t argue with a decent singer! We’re a traditional Doom band with a good singer, nothing more, nothing less. The fact that she’s female shouldn’t enter the equation.
With each new release the bands reputation has grown, what is next for the band?
An album! We’re recording our debut CD around January 2006. We haven’t a label as yet but if we record ourselves we should be able to at least get a licensing deal of some sort I should think. The track listing so far is: A Close Study, If Only, So Down, Alone With My Thoughts, A Relation To Absence & Broken Window. 1 more song will be added before we record! As we stand at the moment the new demo is doing stupidly well so we’re going to push that as far as we can. We got 2 years of sales & reviews out of the last one so hopefully we can reach a lot further with ‘Different Ways…’ in the near future.
Thanks for the interview. Any last words?
Many thanks for the interview I hope all goes well for yourself and Metalchaos. If anyone wants to check us out they can download ‘A Close Study’ at soundclick.com or e-mail us at: info@doomriver.co.uk. The website is infrequently updated at www.doomriver.co.uk.

All photographs and images used with kind permission of Viv Stacey and Rob Mcdonland.