Deadtide
Tyler
Lords of Metal
Richard G.: The second album 'Enter Insectmasterplan' by the Polish outfit Myopia is offered a second chance by Selfmadegod Records. Because we missed the first try, a self-financed release about a year ago, at Lords, we will treat this re-issue as a new release, for convenience. Myopia consists of three guys that know the prerequisites for creating technical death/thrash metal.
'Enter Insectmasterplan'' is filled to the brim with tempo changes, weird rhythms and freaky riffs and it will appeal to many a lover of difficult music. As a member of said group I also must conclude, unfortunately, that the band is lacking in some departments as well. In the first place there is the genre's most important characteristic: making a smooth alloy of all of your sick ideas. Here and there the transitions are not handled as well as they should have been. Then we also have the production, which could have done with a bit more attention. The record misses just that little bit of 'oomph' at the right moments. If Myopia have not let up their practicing the past year, I trust that their next release will be rid of these details. For now I am not totally convinced of the quality of 'Enter Insectmasterplan' resulting in this score.
Rating: 65/100
Asice
Myopia - Enter Insectmasterplan
Selfmadegod
If this was a re-release of a previous band of vocalist Jens Kidman from Meshuggah I would’ve believed it immediately. The tone of his voice and the way guitarist/vocalist Robert Kocoñ screams reminds me a lot of Kidman’s voice. Although Myopia from Poland already put out their first demo in 1995 you can hear Meshuggah’s influence on this band. The technical thrash metal is also inspired by the likes of Pestilence and Atheist. Not as developed as these bands because Myopia still operates in their larvae stadium. They show they have their technical skills but sometimes there’s too much in a song so they forget the flow of the song completely. Capable song writing isn’t directly related to technical capabilities.
Due to, I guess, less time in the studio (they self-financed it and released the album first in February 2006 on their own) the drums are too tinny and the vocals dominate the thin guitar sound. A well balanced sound is at least necessary to impress with technical thrash metal.
With these facts in mind will the future still look bright for Myopia? Yes, because they are now supported by a label, have a secure line up and technical music is still on the rise. If they could afford a good studio, book enough studio time and be critical at their new song material they can follow the same path of success of their fellow-countrymen from Decapitated.
Live Metal
Myopia - Enter Insectmasterplan (Selfmadegod) Review by Don Baird
Off the wall! Thrash based! Mathematically precise! Unconventional! Yeah, I'm thinking it too, Voivod. Would it be fair to call Myopia a Polish version of the Canadian masters? In the purposes of this review, it is. I mean, how else am I going to describe the pummelling drums, the quasi-thrash attack, the pulsating off-kilter riffing and the vocals that would fit very nicely into War And Pain, yep Denis Belanger would be proud of Robert Kocon's performance.
Enough of the Voivod comparisons, Myopia are worth listening to in their own right. Having been around for over 10 years, they do posses an old school vibe. And this re-release of
their second album on Selfmadegod, should bring them to the attention of 90s obsessive's of technical thrash/death that takes forever to get into. Despite the familiarity of the sound, Enter Insectmasterplan still requires 100of your attention to fully grasp it's complicated essence of being. And would you want it any other way? This is created for a certain niche and bandwagon jumpers are most certainly not allowed in. For fans of Voivod, Pestilence, Athiest and Cynic only. http://selfmadegod.com
Unboundzine
Myopia-Enter Insectmasterplan
(Selfmadegod Records, 2007)
This was originally released in 2005 but Selfmadegod is bringing the album back and it is a damn good thing that they are. This is an unconventional thrash album that almost comes across like a cross between Voivod and Meshuggah. The riffs are dissonant and all over the place, but still very much thrash in nature. There are a lot of rhythmic riffs but they are played with much more energy then you would normally hear in music of this sort. The drumming especially plants this firmly in the thrash genre. What really stands out here is that even though the band is technical the music is extremely energetic and the songs don’t overstay their welcome. They get to the point in three or four minutes and then move on to the next song. The album just breaks the half hour mark so it is the perfect length. The production is fairly stripped down and simple. It has a nice natural sound that works well for the style of the band. The guitars ring through clear which is pretty much necessary as the band uses quite a bit of dissonance in their riffs. The drums could have been a bit louder and packed a bit more punch particularly in the snare department. That is being overly picky though as at face value there is really nothing wrong with the sound of the album. If you like technical music but don’t care for the Dillinger Escape Plan style that is so common right now, this is the album for you. This borrows from some of the best of the genre and is easily recommended for fans of Voivoid, Athiest, or even Meshuggah.
Unrestrained
MYOPIA QUESTIONS – Unrestrained Magazine
The story in your bio detailing the on-again, off-again status of Myopia over the past decade is one that is fraught with disappointments. In all that time, what kept you wanting to do Myopia? Did you ever think about giving up? After all the false starts and roadblocks, what kept you wanting to be on the performer side of music as opposed to simply being a listener?
This on and off status is because since the very beginning we’ve had problems with guitarists and couldn’t have permanent, firm line-up. When a new guy joined our band we were on, but usually soon after he was gone and we were off, and as it’s pretty difficult to find somebody wanting to play such music those several offs took a while in our career, made us start from scratch many times and slowed down the band’s development. The idea of giving this all up crossed my mind a few times but you know how it is if you have a real hobby: you spend all your time and money you can on that, it becomes your passion and you can’t really get away from that, sooner or later you want to do it again. Drumming for Myopia and keeping it alive is my hobby so after going through even the most difficult moments I’ve always wanted to carry on and stay on the performer side. It just still gives me a lot of pleasure despite all the disappointments.
What were the problems you faced when originally trying to self-release
“Enter Insectmasterplan” yourselves? At what point did Selfmadegod enter the
picture?
It wasn’t just a try, we actually did self-release the album at the beginning of 2006. The main problem when you want to do it is money. We had no sponsors and had to share all the costs between just two of us at the time, which meant a lot to spend. We did that though, spreading about 500 CDs through various distributors. Then Karol from Selfmadegod got in touch with me saying he was inspired by an interview with me he had read in 7Gates, one of Polish metal magazines. Karol said he would like to have such an original band in his label and offered help with releasing our next album. I explained we were left with no guitarist and that our next visit in the recording studio wouldn’t be too soon but that didn’t discourage Karol, who suggested re-releasing “Enter Insectmasterplan”. We obviously agreed and the record hit the stores again at the beginning of 2007.
Listening to Myopia, you’re very obviously big Voivod fans. What was it
about Voivod that made them more attractive in your eyes than other bands?
Rank Voivod’s albums from your favourite to least favourite.
It’s not so easy to answer. By the end of the 1980s when I first discovered them I just liked everything about Voivod from the very first moment: their outstanding and unconventional music, post-nuclear science-fiction concepts and Away’s artwork. For me experiencing this band was just like going through your favorite film, book and music, all at the same time, and given so much I simply got hooked on this group. The first album I heard was “Dimension Hatross” and I reckon it still is the top one, “Nothingface” comes right after-their music from that period will always be timeless. I also like “Killing Technology” and love two albums recorded with Eric Forrest, that really was a powerful trio. I’m not crazy about Voivod’s other records but they’re nice to listen.
What other bands or artists do you draw influence or inspiration from?
I guess it’s pretty unwise to come up with any names as we’re much too often compared with those bands (laughs). I mainly grew up with the music released at the turn of the 1980s and ‘90s so thrash leaders of that time became my great inspiration, with special focus on Voivod, Atheist, Cynic, Death Angel and Astharoth. Later my music interests developed and nowadays, besides favorite technical thrash, I listen to different styles, for example any kind of jazz is good to listen anytime, anywhere. I’m quite sure that Robert Kocon and our new guitarist Robert Słonka, would agree with the above list to a large extent.
How does “Enter Insectmasterplan” differ from what you were doing on
“Unknown Controls” and “Subconsciously Unconscious”?
“Unknown Controls” is a five-piece demo recorded in 1995, with poor, flat and soft sound it is more rock than metal. At that time we used two guitars so there are even some guitar solo parts and the vocal section was more sung rather than screamed or growled-I even tried to do some back vocals, you know I wanted to be like Andy Galeon from Death Angel (laughs). Later I gave up singing completely and focused on drumming, Robert Kocon actually gave up guitar, concentrated on bass and his vocal became harder and sharper, we also agreed to keep only one guitar in the band. All these changes you can hear on “Subconsciously Unconscious” which was our first proper studio album. On this record we decided to rearrange previously recorded songs and give them nice sound they deserved, which was worth it. There are eight songs, and the lyrics are short science-fiction stories, all dealing with different forms of control. “Enter Insectmasterplan” is our best production because we went to the best equipped studio in our career. This album is also different as it’s our first concept album. To sum up: the music we make hasn’t changed so much over the past twelve years and still moves around what we call psychodelic metal while the texts have always reflected some problematic issues of our world, but have been dressed up in sci-fi cover.
What’s the theme or concept behind “Enter Insectmasterplan”? Considering the
song titles, I’m assuming there’s a sci-fi background to some aspects of the
album. Do sci-fi authors or television shows play into what you do lyrically
or even musically as an influence?
Like I said before, “Enter…” is a concept album and eight songs/chapters form one story: people discover pure planet Groth in The Abneveroth System, which is very much like Earth in terms of bio- living conditions. First human colonists settle down on the planet but soon after the contact is lost. Another expedition reveals the colonists were annihilated by unknown factor X. Instead of human beings then, lab mutated insects are sent to adapt the planet to living. After years planet Groth seems to be “cured”, but to be absolutely sure it’s safe people send there human clones to set up new settlements. Meanwhile the insects move to the dark side of the planet. Things get out of control when the clones realize they were only subject of human experiment and what makes their anger even stronger is the fact their life expectancy is only about three years. Many clone generations pass away but eventually they get ready and after many years set course to Earth to take revenge. There are no winners when the nuclear conflict comes to an end but at the end of the story, on Earth’s ashes insects land their spacecrafts. Through years they developed their own civilization on the dark side of Groth. That’s the story. Of course sci-fi books or films have huge influence on what we play or write. Personally I got interested in this genre being still in elementary school. Everything started with the books by Polish writer Stanislaw Lem, then came movies like “Star Wars”, “Alien”, “Blade Runner”, “Cube”, “Dark City”, then came cyberpunk stories by William Gibson and movies again like “Event Horizon” or “K-Pax”, I could go on and on.
What is supposed to be happening on the album cover?
I’ve got no idea!(laughs) I described the whole concept to Kamil, our former guitarist, and he came up with what you actually can see. For me, though, you’ve got those two hands held somewhere in cosmic space and trying to reach each other, the upper one comes from the dark (evil?) while the lower one comes out of the bright background (good?). One hand may belong to a clone, the other one to someone representing the human race, but which is which, who’s trying to help whom and who’s good or evil it’s really up to you and other listeners. This is, however, only a suggestion and you may as well come up with your own interpretation as anyone else can, having checked all the lyrics, music and artwork.
Do you think the change in the political climate and labour/worker’s rights
movement in Poland has had impact on Myopia in any way over the course of
the band’s existence?
I don’t think so really, we were too young at the time to be engaged in the changes that came. The only thing I remember before and after 1989- system- change is that I wanted to emigrate somewhere west, but I don’t reckon that would help our career either.
Is it a goal for the band to ever get out of Poland to tour, sign to an
international label and take a chance at making Myopia as full-time as
possible or do you have jobs/families that prevent the band from becoming a
primary focus?
Of course we’d like to sign a big deal then tour the world and the universe but the reality is different: in the past years lots of records have been sent all over the world but no international label has answered and we don’t count on anything much in the future. We do have families, live in different cities, which makes rehearsing more difficult and obviously we have jobs. Like I said before, Myopia is more like a hobby for us, brings no profits at all so we’ve got to be busy with other things to support our families and as a result we don’t have so much time for the band. It doesn’t mean, though, we don’t want to spread our music, of course our goal is to gain as many fans worldwide as possible. And who knows, if we signed a lucrative contract our priorities could change!
What does the future hold for Myopia? Do you have a full line-up? Is there a
new album being worked on? Are you playing shows or are you falling more
towards being a studio project?
I hope the future is bright! Yeah, we have a full line-up for now, the new guitarist and I go for regular rehearsals and so far we have three songs done for drum and guitar sections. There is also a story concept in my head and I think this next project will be a concept album too, but everything is not far advanced so I don’t expect to go into studio before summer next year. We haven’t played many shows but we’re not meant to be a studio project. I don’t know how you do things in Canada, but in Poland it’s pretty hard for unknown and unpopular underground bands like us to play gigs and get as much as travel refund, so yeah, you can play shows but you’ve got to pay extra just to do it, which is simply ridiculous for me, and some time ago I said we were not going to play concerts like that unless the organizers cover our travel expenses. At the moment we can’t play live anyway because Robert Słonka has actually just joined the band, but in a few months we’ll be ready to hit the stage waiting for some reasonable offers.
Xtreemusic - interview
INTERVIEW TO MYOPIA FROM XTREEMMUSIC.COM
1.Hi Bogdan How are things going with the band nowadays and what has been the response from fans about this first album?
Hey man! It’s actually our second full-length album, the first one “Subconsciously Unconscious” we only released ourselves in 2002, so it’s much less known than number two, which is “Enter Insectmasterplan”. Reactions for this album were absolutely positive and so far we got many really good reviews. But still we haven’t sold many copies, haven’t made money and haven’t become famous (laughs). Besides things are going pretty ok. The new guitarist Robert Slonka and I are rehearsing quite regularly and we’re getting on very well. So far we’ve done more than a half material for next album so we’ve been quite productive.
2.Well, the edition has been released by Selfmadegod Records. Why this choice? As I see it MYOPIA is the atypical band inside the label, I mean to say your music style is different to grind o death metal bands of Selfmadegod… What’s your opinion on the work, distribution and support to your band?
I sent our recording all over the world but there was no reply so we decided to release our second album also by ourselves. We did it and so we got several reviews and interviews, and one of them was read by Karol from Selfmadegod Records. Karol enjoyed what he’d read and offered releasing our next record. We were having problems with our line-up as previous guitarist left, and were not going to hit the recording studio in the near future. Karol got in touch with me again and suggested re-releasing “Enter Insectmasterplan”. As you can see it wasn’t our first choice but last chance label, which we obviously appreciated. Like I said before we haven’t become a well-known band, but Karol did a lot of good promotional work resulting in many reviews and interviews in Poland and beyond, so at least we became a bit wider recognised band.
3.Correct me if I’m wrong but I read that you have previous material published in demo format. Is certain?
Yeah, in 1995 we recorded five-piece demo “Unknown Controls” that came out only on the tape. In 2002 we recorded full length “Subconsciously Unconscious” which appeared with full cover package but only on CD-r format.
4.What is the cover concept about and the lyric's theme of MYOPIA? It has surprised me that that the layout cd is in negative colour, it is very strange isn’t it?
The concept behind the texts is science-fiction story: People discover planet Groth in The Abneveroth System. The planet is very much like The Earth, so they decide to colonize it. After a while contact with the first group of colonists is lost. It turns out that they were annihilated by a mysterious and unknown factor X. To cure the planet, and adapt it for people, lab-mutated insects are sent there. After some time they move away and people, to be entirely sure that the planet is safe, send there human clones to continue planet adaptation. Several years go past and fourth or fifth generation of clones discover that they were only a subject of experiment and want to take the revenge. Clones come to Earth and start a nuclear conflict with no winners. When war is over, the insects land on Earth and happen to be in charge of this situation. Nobody ever checked the dark side of planet Groth where insects through years developed their civilisation. That’s more or less the text concept. I described it to Kamil, our former guitarist, and he came up with the cover concept, which actually is his own interpretation of the story.
5.In my opinion your music is very dynamic, tech and personal but how you would describe your sound to the readers?
On the last album we sound stronger, heavier and sharper than before. The sound is more spacious and juicy but at the same time it’s razor-sharp and bitter-dry, therefore you can feel like floating in cosmic space in one moment just to be placed in the middle of robotic march in another one.
6.Why have you decided to play this musical style?
These sounds just were inside us. We tried different things but they didn’t seem to work so we came to the point where we still are now. Of course at the beginning there were those bands like Death Angel, Voivod, Cynic or Atheist which fascinated us and were a big inspiration for us so we must have copied certain patterns, even subconsciously. But when we made first songs and listened to them we just loved it how it was and decided not to become popular and possibly make money out of music (laughs) but go upstream and do something to satisfy ourselves in the first place, and this is the place we’ve been for years now.
7.How you see the current underground scene and what are your main influences (musical and others) to write the songs?
Well, I don’t have much time for listening music and I can’t really keep up with the current scene so in fact I don’t have any specific opinion about it. My musical influences stayed back somewhere in the 1990’s, while we, once decided what style we want to play, just follow our chosen path and try to constantly develop within this area. Of course I do listen to music in some of my free time, but it doesn’t have to be any kind of metal, but nice rock music or smooth or acid jazz for example, which can only broaden your mind. Besides music my main inspiration is science-fiction stories and movies, from “Star Wars”, “Alien” and “Blade Runner”, through “Event Horizon”, “Dark City” and “Butterfly Effect” to “Cube” or “K-Pax” to name just a few.
8.Grind parts, tech motives, core, jazz, thrash, groove…The publication seems madness isn’t it?!! What’s the limit musical of MYOPIA?
The only limit for now is that we want to stay metal, this is our base genre and we don’t want to change it, but all other bits added to our songs have no limits I guess, recently, for example I came up with a nice swinging rhythm in one of our new songs, which I never did before. So even though we call our music psychodelic thrash metal, it also has been called by the critics as cyber, prog, postmodern, space or mathematic metal, probably because of various music structures being involved. Conclusion: no limits!
9.All the MYOPIA´s members living now in Poland? When you left London?
Yeah, all of us are living in Poland now, but in different cities: Robert, the bassist, lives in Warsaw, second Robert, the guitarist, lives in Zywiec, and I live in Bielsko-Biala, this situation makes it difficult to meet up and rehearse together, but we deal with it somehow. The bassist and I stayed in London between 1995 and 1997. I went back to England for summer time in 2004 and 2005, altogether some eight more months. But in mid January next year I want to visit Barcelona, so if you live somewhere close, you’d better get ready (laughs).
10.And what about shows? Where has MYOPIA played and with which bands?
We haven’t played live show for quite a long time now, but up to 2004 we’d appeared locally with Polish bands like Newbreed, Spinal Cord, Under Forge, Extinct Gods or Sphere for example. Then we had some problems with the line-up and had to search for new musicians. Now we’re good with all musicians, but you’ve got to know that it’s difficult for underground bands to play shows in Poland as it’s almost impossible to find a place where they pay your travel expenses. Yet we hope this situation will change.
11.Are involved the guys in MYOPIA in many side projects?
At the moment we’re not in any side projects. Robert Kocon played in Orbita Wiru, a Warsaw based band, but this episode finished some time ago.
12.Do you consider yourselves an antisocial, anarchical band or are you to the margin of all political idea?
So far we haven’t gone into any political subjects in our songs. Of course we want to tell about things which seem important to us and may not be noticed by the majority of people and, like I said before, we do that by wrapping it up in this science-fiction coat.
13.What know you about the Spanish scene?
Oh man, that’s tough question. I’m not going to lie to you though. I’m not into Spanish scene at all but I just hope it will change as I’m convinced that your scene has got a lot to offer and I’m sure there’s a great variety of talented artists.
14.How is a normal day in your life, and what are your hobbies?
I’ll speak for myself. I’m an English teacher so I basically work in a language school, before that I prepare for my classes, after work I drink beer, watch TV, listen to music, go out with friends or play the drums, you know, normal stuff. On weekends I usually hike in the mountains, having longer free time I travel with my wife.
15.Finally, what are the future plans for MYOPIA?
Well, we’re in the middle of making new stuff for next album. We hope to hit the studio in June next year and come out with the best record in our career. Selfmadegod probably won’t release it so we also hope to find another label or at least some sponsors. I just count that everything is gonna go ok and having new record done we’d like to appear live despite all difficulties.
Pull the chain
MYOPIA « Subconsciously Unconscious »
It is eventually easy enough to draw ties of connection between this polish Myopia and others in the death metal scene. One could easily say Kralizec, Behold…The arctopus, Aletheian etc, etc. «Subconsciously Unconscious» delivers eight tracks of mature and complex death metal that lifts Myopia to a technical level that is compatible with similar acts such as Voivod, Atheis or Death Angel (all those bands are anyway presents on the band’s thanks list). As a matter of fact, «Subconsciously Unconscious» is on a par with the aforementioned employing some eight themes of technical, half-paced death metal with a strong inclination towards rhythm changes and progressive passages. The main disappointing element is for my opinion, concentrated on the vocal works. It lacks of the needed power and energy. This quite complex material doesn’t allow an easy access and will without any doubt require a few reruns.
Patricia
