The Obelisk Questionnaire is a series of open questions intended to give the answerer an opportunity to explore these ideas and stories from their life as deeply as they choose. Answers can be short or long, and that reveals something in itself, but the most important factor is honesty.

Based on the Proust Questionnaire, the goal over time is to show a diverse range of perspectives as those who take part bring their own points of view to answering the same questions. To see all The Obelisk Questionnaire posts, click here.

Thank you for reading and thanks to all who participate.

The Obelisk Questionnaire: Darkplace

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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?

I define this project as an art project. After 5 years of Music theory and audio technology studies, together with a lifetime in the music business it all came to a halt. I just couldn’t bear to make another album let alone release it. Releasing an album is sometimes the same as killing it. Before an album is released it can be whatever you want and the possibilities of success are limitless. But when you release it, it’s all there in the views and listens. There is no mystery in releasing music anymore. you can see exactly how it’s going, so can everyone else. This is when I turned to painting. To be able to create again without ambition, hopes and dreams. I wanted nothing with my painting, it was just an outlet… But then it became more. One year after making my first painting I got accepted into an art school. I went there during the pandemic and it was lovely. This is when the idea for this project was born.

Describe your first musical memory.

My first musical memory is “Eye of the tiger”. My mother and father were not at all music listeners but I was old enough to figure out how to turn a cassette on, and I found a cassette with only this song on. And I played it on repeat. Back then, repeat meant you listened, then rewind, then listened again.

Describe your best musical memory to date.

This is a tough one. It is usually not the epic “party” moments that are the best and long lasting ones. One memory comes to mind. I was at my first music festival in Sweden with a camp-site and all.
I was 18 and I remember I just met a new person and the sun was setting. The whole forest where the festival was held shined golden red and Air was playing in the distant main scene. They played their song “Sexy Boy”. And usually when you hear a song you love you kinda waste a bit of time running towards the concert trying to get as far in as possible. Not this time. It was just so beautiful being this far away, seeing the whole spectrum of the festival and having a moment.

When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?

I don’t even know if I have any firmly held beliefs, I have values and opinions but a belief is something else. I try to be open but at the same time I am very closed in a sense. I know this is a none answer but yeah finding it hard to come up with a firmly held belief that then also got tested. A belief most likely gets disproven if tested because a belief needs to be believed and therefore have no proof.

Where do you feel artistic progression leads?

Progression is needed to keep it interesting. One of the coolest things is when you can age together with an artist you love. A decade later neither you nor the artists are at the same place as you were but it can still be a perfect match.

How do you define success?

I used to count the streams and views. And count the crowd and number of shows played. Now I think I try to own my “success” by measuring things I can control. With this album, my success is that I actually finished it. I made the album and I animated the whole album and it took me 2,5 years of hard work but I did it. My goals are local. Like with my oil painting, my only goal is that I want to paint a 1000 paintings before I die. They don’t have to sell or be admired by anyone else. Just… 1000 oil paintings.

What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?

I was there, in the early years of the internet, where horrible videos were on rotten.com etc. Maybe it’s all still there but yeah, I saw some stuff there I wish I hadn’t.

Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.

I would like to make an animated movie, with dialogue and all. Same style as the music videos.

What do you believe is the most essential function of art?

The most essential function of art I think is to make you feel something. Different kinds of art have different kinds of delivery but it’s all about feelings. A painting can give you an instant feeling, the second you look at it you feel and think something about it. Music can be instant or it can grow, you can even hate it at first. Same with movies and books. Same goes for all art.

Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?

I look forward to going to Poland this weekend to see the Beksinski painting up close, he is my favorite painter.

http://www.instagram.com/darkplacemusic
https://darkplacemusic.bandcamp.com/
http://darkplace.se/

http://icea.se
https://www.facebook.com/iceaofficial
https://www.instagram.com/iceaofficial

Darkplace, About the End of the World (2023)

The Obelisk Questionnaire is a series of open questions intended to give the answerer an opportunity to explore these ideas and stories from their life as deeply as they choose. Answers can be short or long, and that reveals something in itself, but the most important factor is honesty.

Based on the Proust Questionnaire, the goal over time is to show a diverse range of perspectives as those who take part bring their own points of view to answering the same questions. To see all The Obelisk Questionnaire posts, click here.

Thank you for reading and thanks to all who participate.

The Obelisk Questionnaire: Carlos Ibarra from Maulén

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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?

Wow! Talk about dropping a bomb as the first question! My current project Maulén was defined by a period in my life where I had to stop making music to take care of my health. During that period I had time to think about WHY I make music and WHAT part of it that gives me joy and energy. I realized that for me music is a vessel, A vessel that has taken me across the world. Music is a sound in a space. And I realized that space was important to me. The actual place that the music is made. So for Maulén the place becomes an important element. It’s a huge part of what inspires me to write and record and I always want to take a piece of the place and freeze it in time to put in on wax.

Describe your first musical memory.

When I was like five years old I loved the band Europe and especially their drummer. I remember seeing the “Rock the night” video where there are big explosions behind him when he makes drum fills. I had a toy drum set at the time and I wanted shit to blow up when I played, so I started beating the drums really hard in hope shit would explode. When that did not happen I got really pissed and thought it was because I wasn’t hitting it hard enough. So in my rage I went and got a hammer and beat my toy drum into a million pieces and when there was no explosion I started to cry.

Describe your best musical memory to date.

There are so many great memories but maybe seeing Fantomas live at Roskilde Festival was one of them. It was a thorough display of Mike Patton’s twisted mind. Bending and twisting some of the best musicians on the planet to create his vision. I stood there with a huge grin on my face!

When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?

How do you answer that when you don’t believe in anything? Maybe meeting Jesus during an acid trip?
I used to believe in the goodness of mankind but the last 10 years of where the world is going is challenging that really hard.

Where do you feel artistic progression leads?

Forward.

How do you define success?

When you allow yourself to have a vision of something and then you accomplish it. It can be a song, getting rich or just about anything else. It can also be when you allow yourself to feel accomplished.

What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?

Sabaton and Limp Bizkit.

Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.

One of my idols is Salvador Allende. A deposed democratically elected Chilean president said “No hay revolución sin canciones” with roughly translated means “there is no revolution that does not have songs”. I want to write songs that inspire change.

What do you believe is the most essential function of art?

It allows us to feel what we don’t dare to feel and speak about what hurts us the most.

Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?

This is a hard one! Maybe sleep?

http://www.maulen.org
http://www.facebook.com/officialmaulen
http://www.instagram.com/officialmaulen
http://www.twitter.com/officialmaulen
https://officialmaulen.bandcamp.com/
https://open.spotify.com/artist/2kXcqUWmDpY8EPmgJGzc8u

https://www.facebook.com/iceaofficial/
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https://iconscreatingevilart.bandcamp.com/

Maulén, El Miedo De Amar Pero Igual Lo Hago (2022)

Carlos Ibarra stands at the epicenter of Maulén. The multi-instrument experimentalist, formerly of Age of Woe, will offer the second in a new pair of EPs through Icons Creating Evil Art (ICEA) next year, and to herald the arrival of the first EP on Sept. 29, titled El Miedo de Amar, Maulén today unveil the single “Rostro,” a nine-minute droning post-metallic procession that reminds of Neurosis circa 2001-2004 in its howling guitar without copping the “Stones From the Sky” riff — a rare feat — and has a melodic wash of its own that speaks to the years over the course of which the outings were apparently put together, with travels to India, recording in Sweden, and in the case of “Rostro,” spoken lyrics in Persian by guest vocalist Behzad Barazandeh.

There’s a slow unfurling happening, and a full band feel despite Ibarra‘s spearheading, and the song is duly consuming by the time it has laid the groundwork for its full tonal breadth. Open collaboration is apparently part of Ibarra‘s stated purpose here, so I wouldn’t expect the rest of an EP to sound just like “Rostro,” but the single sure makes for an intriguing proposition on what may follow across the release(s) to come.

The PR wire brought the following background:

Introducing new signing: Drone/experimental solo artist MAULÉN releasing his stunning new single Rostro (feat. Behzad Barazandeh)

Out August 12 on Icons Creating Evil Art

Drone/experimental solo artist MAULÉN will release his stunning El miedo de amar pero igual lo hago two-part EP via Icons Creating Evil Art early 2023. The brainchild of composer/musician/artist Carlos Ibarra, Maulén collaborates with a multitude of artists to create art with the ambition of manifesting something unique, beautiful, strange, and alluring. “Maulén” is the surname of his grandmother, a member of the Mapuche people in Chile, and translates to “a wet valley.”

In 2019, after spending a year composing material, Ibarra began work on a solo record. He recorded the music in a subterranean water cistern that has been abandoned for almost one-hundred years and is located 20 meters under a small hill in Gothenburg, Sweden. This water cistern just happened to have magical natural reverbs that are up to eighteen seconds long. Working in this was a true challenge: electricity was limited, it was wet, cold, and full of rats and spiders. Not many recording engineers would do it, but Carlos Sepulveda (Psycore, Leather Nun) was up to the task. For four magical days, Sepulveda and drummer Stefan Johansson (Abrovinch, Jimmy Ågren), worked in this enchanting setting.

The following year, Ibarra went to the Thar desert in India to find the peace and serenity necessary to write the lyrics to these songs only to get stuck there during the outbreak of Covid-19. This served as a huge inspiration for the lyrics of his upcoming album: El miedo de amar pero igual lo hago. The record touches the subjects of loss, heritage, and the feeling of belonging or not belonging with lyrics sung in Spanish, Polish, Arabic, Persian, and French.

El miedo de amar pero igual lo hago, translates to “the fear of falling in love but I still do it” and will be released as a two-part EP, the first of which, El miedo de amar, will see official unveiling September 29. In advance of its release, today Maulén reveals first single, “Rostro,” noting of the captivating, near-ten-minute hymn. Released Aug. 12. Ibarra comments:

– “This was the first song i wrote for this album back in 2019. The lyrics are about a connection i got with someone and in just a few days she was gone from my life forever. The song is a slow and beautiful monolith in Persian featuring Behzad Barazandeh on vocals. With an epic and melancholic mood the song takes you on an journey inwards towards your inner darkness.”

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Carlos Ibarra began his career as a guitarist and songwriter in various local bands before reaching infamy and notoriety across the metal and punk scene in Europe as a guitarist/songwriter/producer of the death metal act Age Of Woe. With them, he recorded two albums and two EPs: Inhumanform (Suicide Records, 2013) and An Ill Wind Blowing (War-Anthem, 2016). He has also released music with Terrorstat, a band featuring members of Walk Through Fire and Serpent Omega as well as Wefring featuring members of The Leather Nun, Exhale, and Psycore, amongst others.

http://www.maulen.org
http://www.facebook.com/officialmaulen
http://www.instagram.com/officialmaulen
http://www.twitter.com/officialmaulen
https://officialmaulen.bandcamp.com/
https://open.spotify.com/artist/2kXcqUWmDpY8EPmgJGzc8u

https://www.facebook.com/iceaofficial/
https://www.instagram.com/iceaofficial
https://twitter.com/icea_label
https://iconscreatingevilart.bandcamp.com/