Interview:Momentum

Following the "Light Bearer" interview from last year, it is time to get in touch with one other branch from the famous band family tree, this time the one named "Momentum". Once again Luka and myself collaborated, so after some time of waiting Matthew produced these fine answers for all of you to read. Check it out, it is a really great read!

1. Hey Matthew! Thank you so much for accepting to do this interview for "Natures With No Plagues". Please introduce yourself and the rest of the band.

Hello! I'm Matthew and I play guitar. I share the band with Gerfried, who also plays guitar, Joseph on drums, Olly on the bass and Alex on vocal and art duties.

2. "Momentum" is still a very young band, so I am interested in hearing the story behind the formation of the project.

The band formed half out of our love for political, fast and angry hardcore; half out of a bit of a catharsis and something to do to fill our spare time. Alex and I live together and spent a lot of time talking about music, which we shared very common interests in, so we decided to start a band that catered for another degree of our musical taste. After a while of looking around for other people that would put up with us we met Joseph, Olly and Gerfried from long term friendships and the hardcore scene.

3. Thus far, you have released one album named "Whetting Occam's Razor". Tell me something more about it. I am also interested in hearing what does the name of the album and the name of the band itself mean to you?

The name comes from the theory of Occam's Razor: the idea that, in searching for an answer, once the unnecessary paths are taken out of the equation what you are left with must be the truth. In the case of this album Alex’s lyrics address the effect Abrahamic religion has had on societal norms, gender, species and understanding of the universe, the idea of how personal ideology and opinion has curtailed progression away from religious ignorance, but also gender equality, animal rights. The idea is that by cutting away redundant ideology makes for a better world and better understanding of our place in the universe.

4. The very opening of your album, the song "Prelude", begins with a sample from the show "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage", of course featuring the words of Carl Sagan. When and how did you first encounter his work? And what is it, in fact, that mostly inspired you, both personally and as a band, to craft your music based on Sagan's theories and writings?

I was introduced to him through the band members but had a brief knowledge before then being a . I appreciate very much his view on Earth in relation to the rest of the universe and his views on humankind’s delusions of grandeur. I remember the first quote I read by him was “Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and in triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot”, a short piece that really put in to context for me the insignificance and fleeting existence of myself and our species, or any species for that matter, on this planet. I know the whole band all admire his vehemence for the universe and his passion to teach the wonders of it. 

5. Aside of Carl Sagan, the band shows profound support for ideas such as "The Zeitgeist Movement", "Venus Project" and the message conveyed in the movie "Earthlings", etc. With all this being said, how did all these ideologies find their place in your work and how did they influence you on a personal level?

One topic which troubles me greatly is over population. Last year we supposedly saw the birth of the seventh millionth child which was greeted warmly by the media and people around the world as a bench mark of our species. Unfortunately, and I don’t do this out of the sake of being a contrarian, but I fail to see how this can be regarded as a good thing. We are a greedy genus that is brought up in a society which regards consumerism and our ability to consume as a medal of achievement. We live in a world with finite resources and build our culture around our abuse of these assets. In continually spawning without regard for the world around us we only exacerbate this problem. Being able to formulate a means to create a sustainable environment we would then manage to circumvent a lot of the problems that lay in our future. The Zeitgeist films and The Venus Project illustrate this perfectly. We have the technology at our disposal capable of producing these results but I believe that we’re far too proud an organism to admit that we’re not entitled to all the things we take for granted.

6. Aside of your support through music, are there any other ways you put into effect those ideologies, some sort of activism or anything similar?

I think making changes pretty much starts with how you choose to live your life. I know a lot of people who choose the same dietary habit as I have consider direct action the best course. Whilst measures should be taken to ensure that no animal suffers for me the act of opting for a vegan lifestyle is a form of direct action in itself. You take it upon yourself to lower the demand for the meat industry. That being said I do support the Sea Sheppard group. 2010 I had the pleasure of attending the Pope protests in London. It was very much a homogenising experience to be surrounded by thousands of like minded people who felt as strongly as you do. These are the routes that I take when it comes to expressing my ideologies outside of music and other creative forms.

7. Do you consider music as a tool for transferring knowledge toward the listener? Do you think that your words might touch someone enough to change their view on the world around them?

I'd like to think so. One could only hope. If it didn't I wouldn't be disappointed as we at least gave it a chance to hopefully influence people. But we definitely use our music as a means to convey a message. It’s one of the reasons we started the band. This has been pretty evident with me as Meat is Murder by The Smiths turned me vegetarian and, eventually, vegan. But if half of the reason that we do this band is love of playing the music, the other half would be the message we’re putting across.

8. Seeing as how "Momentum" openly criticizes civilization and humanity, I am inclined to ask you about your thoughts on the current situation on our planet. 2011 has been labelled as "the year of revolution" on many occasions. Do you think that all these revolutions, riots and movements can succeed in changing the world entirely? In your opinion, who or what is the main culprit                                                                                for the state our planet is in?

I’m pretty cynical about the human race. I find very little redeeming qualities about us. Judging from the rate at which the liveable world is declining in correlation with our unprecedented consumption of both resources and space and our inability to confront this in a serious manner only foreshadows the fact that we won’t last on this planet. Although progression has been made such as the green light for same-sex marriage in New York (a topic I’m personally very passionate about) and movements like Occupy Wall Street have shown an increase in awareness. However, humankind is more at the mercy of the planet than anything else. Even though people refer to the planet as “dying” I don’t believe this to be true. Unless we literally blow the planet to pieces Earth will be here for a very long time after we’re gone as it has been here a very long time before we crawled out of the ocean. Global warming will no doubt play a major role in this and with the meat industry being the main cause of this threat and our reluctance to consider other life choices for the benefit of both human and non-human animal alike we can consider the effects that we are currently witnessing to become more grave as we continue on this route. The world would have to go through a severe shake-up in order to stop the problems that we are blatantly seeing.

9. The track "Theory" features a guest vocalist from the band "Monachus". How did the collaboration with that band happen?

Alex’s old band used to tour with "Icos" (Monachus’ old band) and last year I had the pleasure of meeting them when "Light Bearer" toured Europe for ten days with "Monachus". They are all truly lovely guys and we were really stoked to have them involved on the record. We endearingly refer to them as the “Viking Choir”.

10. Tell me something more about the very sound of "Momentum". What other artists or records managed to inspire your work?

I guess, to put it simply: straight up, fast and angry hardcore. We all kind of got sick of silly sub-genres of even sillier sub-genres and wanted to create music that was direct and would reflect the immediacy of the subjects we wanted to address. "NOFX" were a big influence for many of the members of the band. "American Nightmare" and "Modern Life is War" gave us inspiration to make the music a little more intense and melodic. With this album we still managed to get labelled as something we’re not but come next release we’ll hopefully be able to shed those brands get to exactly what we want to do with this project.

11. You had a number of shows behind you, so I am interested to hear which of those was your most memorable one? 

Errrrrrrmmmmm. To be honest we have a pretty limited history of shows but we promise to rectify this problem post haste!

12. How much is "Momentum" actually involved in the local scene? Is there anything you particularly like or dislike in your hometown when it comes to this type of music?

We all reside in London which, of course, is a cultural hot pot but the punk scene actually feels a little narrow. There are a few good bands in the area and a few people trying to keep shows a regular occurrence but sometimes it feels very difficult to get drive in the hardcore scene going considering the size of the city. Having been a promoter of shows a few years ago I know how it feels to put a lot of time and effort into coordinating shows to only have very few people turn. It’s very deflating. Half the battle is finding people willing to put on the show; the other half is the people willing to turn up to them.

13. You have also been involved, along with Alex, in the work of "Light Bearer". When it comes to the actual process of writing music, is work the same in both bands or is it vastly different?

Very different! For "Light Bearer" we have a rigidly structured narrative that we both discuss when it comes to creating the music. There are a lot of bands who write concept albums and use the lyrics to tell the story but with "Light Bearer" I wanted the instrumentation to play just as much of an emotionally engaging part of the story as the words. I listen to a lot of film scores as I like how they create an atmosphere for the images that are being seen on the screen and I wanted that exact same effect when we write for that project. With "Momentum" the process is a lot more spontaneous. We have three members of the band who write riffs and songs so one day we might go into practice with a couple of ideas and 4 hours later finish with 5 new songs. I don’t want to say that we’re restricted with "Light Bearer" in anyway, because we’re not, but with "Momentum" there isn’t a commitment that we have to fulfil when writing the songs. Except to make then as good as possible. Although now "Light Bearer" shares even more members after Joseph and Gerfried joined the band so writing new material is going to be a very different experience from both "Momentum" and "Light Bearer".

14. Are there any more bands with which "Momentum" members are connected, both past and present?

We all have a pretty rich history in terms of bands. We’re a pretty prolific group of people but to name a few the band has links to "Light Bearer", "Pnakotus", "Fall of Efrafa", "The Black Lodge", "Drivers Against", "The Plague Mass", "Dungeons", "Black Mass"... it’s a pretty long, sprawling family tree of bands.

15. Time for you to ask a question!

Why?

Reasons.

16. 2011 is slowly coming to a close. Which releases managed to attract your liking the most? And would you be willing to share some of your all time favorites?

For me, personally, I've really enjoyed the new "Deafheaven" album. It is a little cheesy in places but in a way I can completely enjoy. Giles Corey, Dan Barret from "Have a Nice Life" solo project. That record caught my ear a few weeks ago and really inspired me. After that I'm really looking forward to catching up with the new "Maccabees" album. Their second album, "Wall of Arms", has been on constant rotation for the past two years.

17. What does the future hold for "Momentum"? 

Currently we're in the process of writing for a six track E.P called "Herbivore" that will be released at some point this year and hopefully play some shows in the mainland.

18. Once again Matthew, thank you so much for this interview! Do you have a final message for the readers of this blog?

We are currently working on a few new things including the next record in the "Light Bearer" quadrilogy called "Silver Tongue" and a split that we are recording at end of March, the aforementioned new "Momentum" release and an album for a new band called "Pnakotus" that we are currently writing. All of which will hopefully be out by the end of this year. So keep your eyes open for those!