We talk regicide, the perils of touring and about things to come with Eugene from the mighty Jinjer.
Hi! How are you?
Hi, I’m fine thanks. I’ve been getting some rest in preparation for the Autumn tour. Finally we have a whole two weeks off!
Let’s talk King of Everything where you have a very eclectic style. What other styles did you explore for this new album?
We tried not to think about styles while writing the songs for King Of Everything because on our previous albums we inhibited ourselves by being overly critical, saying things to ourselves like “this is too much” or “that’s not our style” but on KOE we got past that and you can hear everything that inspires us in music: starting with strict groove metal, death metal, hardcore and djent then polished up with jazz, soul, funk and even oriental influences. It all combines into our own progressive metal style.
“We don’t care for hidden meanings.”
Can you give us a deeper insight into what King Of Everything is about?
The concept of the album is about the dependencies we all have. Each of us has their own king of everything, things we are bound to, like a rat-race life with a constant lack of time, an ideology or a religion, love and finally our own innerself. Each song discusses a king that trumps us. The dead mouse on the throne on the front cover just shows that we all can get depose and eliminate our kings.
What is the story behind the name Jinjer, what does it mean?
Ha! The problem is that when the band was named JINJER none of us were in the band. We all joined the group later on, one by one. It’s the funniest thing, at first each of us, even Tatiana, was considered a temporary substitution to a previous member so we don’t really know about the why and how the name came about. All we know is that there is no real meaning behind it. It’s just a good name with a ring to it that’s easy to remember and looks great when written. We don’t care for hidden meanings.
“Music literally saved us, fed us.”
Although Jinjer has had a rough past your conviction to music has brought us to this point. How did you work through those tough times?
Oh, indeed we have had some very harsh periods. The war broke out at home in the East of the Ukraine and we moved out under a bombardment of shells and bombs. During that day we saw an aircraft being shot down. It was a nightmare. In 2013 while we were on tour a road accident left us in between life and death. Later we lost our drummer Eugene Mantulin, when in September 2014 he fell from a window three stories high braking his spine. Looking back I realize that those things would kill almost any other band.
There are two reasons for why we made it work, the first is we really love what we do. We have always wanted to create music. The second reason – we had nowhere to go after the war broke out. Since we left our home as refugees we had no backup, no home and no job. Music literally saved us, fed us. We just kept on touring to earn money to survive on and it worked.
Where do you hope to take Jinjer in the future and what are your tour plans?
We’ve just announced a tour beginning in September and then into October going around Europe including EuroBlast festival, Germany, Poland, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Austria, in November we have a show in Israel and later we plan to hit Romania with a couple of dates. We’re planning to spend the rest of 2016 and the whole of 2017 touring where we’ll be going to some new territories for us like the UK and Scandinavia, and if we’re lucky enough the USA. We’re also hoping to get onto some huge European festivals next Summer.
