Intervju - Kiko Loureiro, Angra N: So, how are things? K: Good! N: First time here, right? First time at the Sweden Rock Festival? K: First time here, first time in Sweden. N: So, what do you think of it? K: Itīs real nice, but we havenīt seen that much to be honest. We arrived last night, went to the hotel, which is far away. Then we went here but it was dark so...and then back to the hotel and now weīre here. N: Are you leaving today as well? K: Yeah, unfortunately we have no time to watch other concerts... N: And after this youīre going to...? K: Weīre going to Milan and weīre playing tomorrow at Gods of Metal, so we decided to go there and have a rest and tomorrow morning we have soundcheck. Itīs better sleeping there. N: Are you doing just festivals or...? K: Weīre doing just these two festivals. Last year we did a big tour in Brazil, South America, Japan, Taiwan, Europe and this year we started working on the new album and then we were invited to this festival and we came. N. Do you like being on tour? K: Oh yeah! After a while itīs kind of tiring. You travel a lot...After being in the studio, a small room, then you want to go on the road. We did more than 100 concerts, so for us it was kind of long for one year. S: Do you mostly play in South America or is it North America and Europe as well? Asia? K: In Japan, normally you do one tour. We did like six concerts in Japan and one in Taiwan and that was Asia. We did the European tour in March last year, like thirty concerts and then we did some summer festivals. We went to the US and played Prog Power Festival and then we did a few concerts there and went to Canada as well. We did Argentina, Chile in South America. In Brazil weīre doing really well. There we got into this mainstream kind of thing, even if we play heavy metal and sing in english. Itīs funny, but weīre getting played on radio and we go to the big tv shows. Somehow...because we are international artists. And Brazil is as big as Europe, so there are so many places to go. Not talking about money but talking about fans, it could be the biggest market for heavy metal in the world. Like Sao Paolo, the city where we live and the biggest city there, if youīre like Helloween... they play for six to seven thousand people. So when we play we play the same kind of venues. Itīs much easier than here. To play here in Europe for six thousand people, you have to be really big. We have really die hard fans and Brazil is a great market and a lot of European bands see that and they go there to play. N: How about the South American fans? You always hear about them being really dedicated and crazy. Why do you think it is like that? A lot more bands seem to tour there these days than they used to. K: Itīs related to the culture in general. Because when we play...people always asks us about the differences between fans. In Europe you could compare Brazil to Spain or Italy and France as well. The latin countries somehow are different in the way they react. Greece as well. Theyīre much more aggressive. N: Not as cold and quiet as the Swedes? K: I donīt know! When we play in Germany itīs just different. Of course for us, we play much better if people are screaming, but if you go to Japan theyīre like quiet but you know they enjoy it. Thatīs just the way they behave. But in Brazil they jump and do whatever. S: It must be a special feeling when thousands of people are jumping up and down? K: Oh yeah! Maybe itīs related to football. The European bands, German bands that go to Brazil think itīs incredible and when they go back home they talk about it a lot, but for us itīs normal. The problem is when we play in Germany...the first time was very hard, because nobody moved. They applauded but the action wasnīt there... N: So, how are things in Brazil these days? You hear a lot about the economy in Argentina and problems in other countries. K: Before in the past, if Argentina was going down...you know they are the two biggest countries, But now Argentina is really bad and Brazil is steady. We have a new president now. Fifteen years ago the military dictatorship ended which is very late in Latin America, so things have changed a lot. The market opened up and a lot of bands came out. The professional level of the Brazilian bands is much better. Itīs easier to buy instruments, studios etc.When you change the economic point the market opens and you can get the best of the best in the world. Before it was really hard and the big artists had to go abroad to record an album and for the heavy matal bands it was no way! So the politics was not good. And it was hard to go abroad and show the heavy metal from Brazil. So after Sepultura...they did a great job and opened the doors for everybody. N: Yeah, that mustīve been a major break through for the heavy metal scene in Brazil! K: Yes, and people from Europe got to see that good bands could come from Brazil. The music from Brazil is famous, the samba, the traditional music, the bossa nova, the jazz. So it was just a way of recording properly so that we could bring good music in heavy metal also. So things are going much better now and the bands are coming there and we have exchange...the kids watch the bands from Europe and the US and ten years from now weīre gonna have much better bands coming. Thatīs another big difference compared to Europe, the audience is very young. Our fans are around twenty years old, maximum! 80 % are like between fourteen and twenty. S: You mentioned Sepultura. Theyīre kind of a political band lyricwise and a lot of aggression. How about yourselves? K: They want to keep this aggressive image that has something to do with the music. So they say the police kill children in Brazil. They just show the bad side and of course, since weīre in the third world, we have a lot of bullshit going on with politicians, corruption and so forth. But of course we have a very nice country as well and itīs much easier to talk about the bad things like they do on tv. Tv does the same with the camera and they just show the bad things, not whatīs around. If you did that you would see all the normal people, the nice country and the nature. So we try to talk about this, the other side. Not forgetting the bad side, but you have to show the beautiful things from your country and Sepultura should be more patriotic. N: And you are, in a way, ambassodors of your own country! K: I feel like that, so in interviews you can defend your country somehow because our ambassadors donīt do anything ha, ha, ha! And Sepultura, they did wrong I think. But of course it doesnīt fit the music as well, if they talk about nice things. N: You canīt be aggressive and talk about nice things! K: Yeah, thatīs the problem! But the "Roots" album is ok with the indian thing. Itīs nicer. At least itīs not talking about the bad side of the cities, kids in the streets and so...because I think you have those problems everywhere. Itīs just that in Brazil we have more of it. In France and Germany you have those problems. But in Brazil, the people from the poor areas that come to the big cities increase the poorness and the problems. We donīt have people from other countries coming, itīs just from Brazil. Thatīs diferent. Itīs all Brazilians. Like in Germany, they can say; we donīt want the Turkish here and they put the blame on somebody else. In Brazil we canīt do that because itīs all Brazilians. So itīs not nice to say; we donīt want people from the north! Thatīs the difference. The problems you get from other countries, in Brazil itīs all Brazilians N: What about "Rebirth"? Itīs a very happy album and thereīs a lot of samba influences on there. K: We had a split in the band and a lot of people was asking us why it happened and they expect you to talk bad things about the others. We donīt want to talk about those things, because when you play, you have five guys playing together for ten years and you canīt just talk about the last six months that was not good. If you have ten years of good things you canīt go; I donīt like him because he said that to me in the last month. I did three albums with them and theyīre great musicians, so I keep the nice things with me. We wanted to show with the music and the lyrics, the rebirth. This concept of thinking positive and with enthusiasm...we talk about rebirth in different aspects, rebirth of the new man, rebirth of a new society, new laws and just being optimistic, positive and the music reflects that. The colour of the album is blue. Itīs really optimistic and really going against the trends of being aggressive and dark. We went a little bit against that. The popular music in the streets is always party, party so that affects us a lot when we compose. N: I think you need both, happy and dark! K: Oh yeah, and I like the dark stuff. N: How do you feel about the world wide heavy metal scene today? It seems like a couple of years ago nobody cared about heavy metal and these days it seems to get bigger and bigger. A lot of festivals and new bands coming out. K: Record companies complain about selling records. In general I think itīs growing, especially in Brazil. So for us itīs a big difference nowdays because in Brazil before, we had the samba and some trends that were so big it was destroying our kind of music. And now weīre on radio and tv shows. Everybody wants to know about it. The concerts are sold out, the records sell and itīs going against other artists. Some of the big artists are not selling as good as before... A guy interrupts and says that the band is supposed to be on stage in five minutes and therefore we have to end the interview a bit abruptly. N: True! Well, thank you very much! K: Thank you! Angra - Official website

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