#may1999

R&B Princess; Aaliyah Haughton

Photography By: Michael Thompson @michaelthompsonstudio

W Magazine, May 1999. 

Model: Gisele Bundchen on the cover

IRON SAVIOR

Interview Piet Sielck by Daniel Hinds

(conducted May 1999)

Piet Sielck may not be a household name quite yet, but he has been involved in the metal scene since the late 70s.  Joining Kai Hansen in an early version of Helloween, he dropped out of the music scene for a while, recently resurfacing with the stunning Iron Savior not long ago.  Quickly following up that success with the equally impressive Unification album, Iron Savior are quickly establishing themselves as one of the world's leaders of top-notch melodic speed metal.

Taking a break from his work on the next album, Piet was kind enough to answer a few questions for me...

Could you give me a run-down on what you did between the time you worked with Kai before Helloween and when you put together Iron Savior? Since 1987 I worked as a sound engineer and producer. I worked with bands like Blind Guardian, Grave Digger, Saxon, Uriah Heep, Domain, lots of not so well known acts and of course Gamma Ray.

What was the genesis of the name Iron Savior in the first place? In our teenager days we had a song with that title. I always liked the name, so 15 years later I made a new song being inspired by those old times of my life. Since it was the first song I really finished up for the IS#1 album and I wanted people to understand instantly what this band is about I choose the name Iron Savior.

What has inspired the sci-fi themes of the two Iron Savior albums? All the Star Wars movies, all the Star Trek movies and TV shows and a probably in the US unknown German sci-fi story called Perry Rhodan. It appears weekly and gives you 64 pages. The series is on since the early sixties and by now they must have reached their two thousands edition.

The story-line on both Iron Savior albums is pretty elaborate.  Have you done any or thought about doing any serious fiction writing (short stories or a novel maybe?) The whole story started as a novel I wanted to write. When I was working with Blind Guardian in Denmark on their Imaginations...album I usually worked at night with quite decent spare time in the afternoons. To fill this time I started writing this IS story, but I never finished more then 50 pages…But this was or still is the basis of all what is happening on the two albums storywise.

Who are some of your favorite authors? Frank Herbert's Dune is simply the best!

The production on Unification is excellent.  Could you tell me a bit about how the whole recording process went? Somehow we never had any major problems. All of the material was recorded and mixed on Pro Tools, a Mac based harddisc recording platform. I just love this system. Except for the drums and the bass guitar (which were recorded in a different studio) all the stuff was put down in my little place. We choose a different recording situation for the drums and the bass because we needed a studio with a big and nice sounding recording room. But after that no super big recording facilities are needed anymore so we moved back to my place.  This is the real cool side about this computer systems. Wherever you put them up you can do state of the art recordings then load everything in your car and go some place else. But also performing the song as a band who has been on tour together made the production really tight and punchy. I gave the musicians a lot of freedom how to perform their instrument for the simple reason that it is THEIR and not my instrument. This was a great way to work.

What is the typical creative process behind an Iron Savior song? Usually everything starts with a guitar riff. This decides about the general attitude of the song. Weather it's gonna be aggressive or more melodic. After that I try to think of a good chorus, because this is the most important part of a song. After that I come up with verse and a bridge. If the song is still working and I am getting gooseskin it can stay. If not…do it again, Sam.

Do you ever come up with material that you like but doesn't quite fit the Iron Savior sound? Yes and no. Somehow if I like something I was always able to make it fit to IS. I really hate to be restricted in that matter. If I like it, it stays. It then will automatically become IS like.

I like the fact that Iron Savior's music is very melodic yet retains plenty of speed and heaviness, too.  Is it important to you to have that balance? Yes, indeed. I hate to be to linear. In my music I always want to create a good balance of everything I like. Even with ten "killer songs" it would get quite boring if they were all in the same speed for my taste. I definitely try to avoid this.

Glad to see the cover of "Neon Knights" - so many people overlook the Dio-era of Sabbath and it is my favorite.  What inspired you to cover that particular track? I have to admit, that I never was a big Sabbath fan. I always had problems with Ozzy's voice. But when I heard that Dio joined the band I went to the record shop and bought the album right away. When I later on at home listened to the first track, I knew instantly, that I' just bought myself a killer album. Together with "Heaven and Hell" "Neon Knights" always was my favorite track of the Sabbath/Dio era.

How did you come up with the idea for the band competition to have a track included on Unification? At first we just had the idea to work with local bands to open the show, then we thought about turning it into a band-battle and give this price of releasing one track on our next CD. The general idea behind it was, to give young and unsigned bands a chance to promote themselves in a way, which usually would not be possible for them. In our early days we would have loved a thing like this…

How did your last tour go? Very well, even though Kai couldn't come with us. We got lots of positive reactions and the people really liked our show. I was very surprised about the fact, that people accepted IS without Kai just as well as with Kai. But for our next tour in August or September Kai will be with us again since he then has finished up all his G-Ray work.

What kind of a set-list do you play live? A good mixture of the first and the second album. Atlantis Falling, Iron Savior, Brave new World, Riding on Fire, Watcher in the Sky, For the World, Coming Home, Brothers, Starborn, Eye to Eye, Mind over Matter, Deadly Sleep, Prisoner of the Void, The Battle, Unchained and some surprise tracks…

In almost every photo I've seen of Iron Savior, the band is smiling and seems to be enjoying themselves - not the usual overly serious or pissed-off metal look.  Is that intentional or just coincidence? Well, that's just the way we are. Music is fun and we enjoy ourselves very much when we perform music, so it's quite natural to see us most of the time with a big grin in our faces. We do take our performance very serious but the fun factor for IS is very important. Posing and looking mean is also OK but we just prefer a natural presentation since we don't have to act.

Since you seem to be skilled at a number of instruments, I am curious which one is your favorite to play?  Why? Guitar and Vocals. I always saw myself as a guitarist and vocalist. I just learned to do some keyboards because it's quite useful for the composing process. As a guitarist I am able to play a bass guitar, but a real bass player still is a different thing. He really has a different attitude in playing HIS instrument. So I am quite happy, that I not longer have to do it by myself.

How did you first hook up with Blind Guardian? When I was working on the first G-ray CD Kai told me about a studio guy who wanted to move his studio to Hamburg, my home town. So I visited him and we agreed that I will assist him with his upcoming production. The guy was Kalle Trapp and the production was BG Tales from the Twilightworld. So I recorded all of the guitars for this thing, all the keyboards and also did all the backing choirs (together with Rolf Köhler and Hacky Hackmann). During the production we really started liking each other and somehow I became the guitar/keyboard/choir man for BG.

Is the climate for metal in Germany better these days than in the past or not?  Do you guys get much radio or video airplay? The climate is a lot better than it used to be three years ago, but still HM is a very specific music with a very specific market. It is quite popular but not in terms like Phil Collins or Michael Jackson. Also the radio situation in Germany is quite different from the US. Somehow ALL stations broadcast the same, boring mainstream stuff. Top 40 and that's it. They're all afraid to loose their listeners and the advertising money when the play non-mainstream stuff. That also goes for TV . There's only ONE show, that plays HM stuff.  So we are still hoping that the maker of all these programs will understand, that HM has come back to the peoples mind…

What are some of your interests/hobbies outside of music? Surfing, frensh billiards, books, movies, traveling, having a private live with my family and meet friends.