at once.In the end we had to play at the administration building at the Stegny district, where it took us parting in a competition to play there and suprisingly we won. Then we had rehearsals at my parents’ basement where we recorded our firsst demo, „Voices From The Graves”. In the ‘90s it was bit better. We were going to Włochy (one of Warsaw’s districts). As for the equipment, there was one main and constant problem. The lack of funds. We played on whatever was in the local club or youth centre. The scrap of a drums mainly by Polish company Polmuz with drumhead soft and sticky as a snot. Amplification by Eltron (John, hehe), selfmade guitars or Russian shit called Kosmos. In the later years it was a bit better and the guitars were made by professional local makers. I myself ordered custom drumset from Szpaderski company and bought myself professional Remo drumheads thanks to my escapades to Germany. All this playing was paid in a terrible exhaustment not necessarily connected with music. When I think of it now the degree of determination in the name of creating something was huge. I don’t regret anything, but nowadays I don’t think I would be able to handle it all. Which of the Polish Undergound bands were the most pioneering in the People’s Republic Of Polnad? Pioneering: 1) Merciless Death (for professionalism. Unfortunately they’re also the scene’s most unlucky bunch) 2) Vader (for determination and „Necrolust” demo) 3) Imperator (for the kick and aggression unknown in the music before...) Favourite: 1) Prosector (for the „Terrible Ceremony” demo. Jacek Gnieciecki rules!) 2) Separator (for the uncompromising, dirty and spasmoidal music!) 3) Scarecrow (for the executioner hoods, hehe. And of corse for killer „Deo Optimo Maximo”) In the ‘80s you kept the contact with many zines and bands from behind the Iron courtain? Can you tell us something more about it? There was some kind of contact because I had to distribute our materials.They were of course small and independent labels the type of which is now flooding the scene. About the bigger sharks like Noise, Roadrunner or Steamhammer you can forget. From the perspective of time it gave us nothing but nowadays all of the sudden everyone’s interested! What is it? Some kind of love for the cold goulash that needs reheating? Of course I also ran a correspondence with foreign zines. The most important was I think Slayer Mag. from Norway, but as I said earlier there was a lot of other killer zines like FETU, Death Scream, Blackthorn, Snake Pit, Brutal Torture, Suicidal Legacy, Decibel Of Death etc. Hah I remember also the Hungarian Metallica Hungarica Mag., ran by the guy called Laszlo... He came to us during the Thrash Camp wanting us for a live interview. He introducxed himself, telling us that he’s from the aforementioned zine and the parents called him Laszlo. And it was his biggest mistake, because as we were completely boozed up we found this name the funniest thing in the world. The guy stood for some time watching us rolling on the ground with tears from laughter. He told us he’s gonna find us later in the camphouse, but he didn’t. Instead Iwona Sieluś from Thrash Attack zine found us and also got nothing from us. Hah! We were sooo professional... Today I still give the interviews, mainly to the South American zines. There are still siome maniacs who secure the legacy of the past. As for the bands I mainly corresponded with the Polish scenme. I used to love it and I still do, despite the fact the t I lost my interest in the news in like mid-‘90s.
Have you traded the demos? Of course I did! I’m still doing it, but the medium changed from the audio cassette to the CD-R. The tapes were awesome, but their longevity was somewhat questionable so I had to put everything through SOund Forge and burn it on CDs.Today in the times of internet, blogspots aqnd share sites where you can download many cool stuff this medium seems just more comfortable.As I said before I had shitloads of stuff from Marcin and later after his departure to Norway I started to fix things on my own.It was this easier that lots of the stuff I had already in my collection so I got a lot in exchange. The rule was simple: one for one and all the smartasses trading one demo to three or to forur, thinking that they’ve got something cult enough, like Mayhem’s „Pure Fucking Armageddon” were avoided by me at once. I have never traded for money and I’ll never do that, just for the sake of information to those who’re too lazy to write to collectors or search the net and want everything with the lowest cost. And how was from your perspective the Polish post? Did you got the letters with big delays and lost many packages? Hehe, I think that nothing changed in that matter maybe except for the fact that it’s easier to get some reparation for the lost package and the letters are not as ripped as earlier. I think that in the central office noone is looking for the dollars in the letters because nowadays we have so many money transfer possibilities, much more secure. Of course some shippings never reached the destination. I remember how my friend suffered because every now and then he got just empty pack. Nothing, maybe except for the sole letter from the sender. As the time went by it turned out that in the central office there was also a metalhead working and whenever he got his hands on the trade package he just grabbed the stuff for himself. It was impossible to get this guy however so I came with the idea that the packages can be sent to my home address. Now it was me who could steal his stuff, hehe. The delays and even returns to the sender of the letter without letting me know were occuring also after the system transformation. Mainly I got to know about that via e-mail in which the astonished sender asked me why the shipping returned to him. To get it once again I had to pay the shipping costs for the second time. And you can do NOTHING about that. Those idiots don’t know that for the trades we waited, we wait and we will wait always with no patience. And how was your attitude towards the bands from the roster of Metal Mind Production? When I see an intelignt blonde with nice, shapely legs in tall high heels I’d be caught at once (see the underground scene), but when it turns out that she has a black tooth and the breath of the old goat my intterest would fade away instantly (see the metal mainstream) because I’ll be too busy vomiting. This is the metaphore that shows my attidude towards MMP and which was described by me already here and there. As for the bands sorry but at least 90% of them was utter shit. The only band that counted was Dragon and
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maybe Wilczy Pająk/Wolf Spider, but the rest, like Open Fire, Stos and my favorite Destroyers from Bytom presented pitiful music and were resposnible for the shame that the Polish scene had to suffer in the world being so called „elite”. At Metalmania festival in 1988 I was so bored with those bands supporting Rage (which is not my favorite band neither) that by the end of the day I was feeling like dying of boredom. How many great bands could achieve success if the MMP wasn’t the monopolist? How many had the situation comparable for the workhorse: no advantages, playing some silly local gigs and working their asses off for Mr. Promoter? Tomasz Dziubiński (the boss of MMP) ’s situation was fucked already in the beginning but he had no balls to admit it. Then he loosen up a bit but those who already had the contract had to play not what they wanted but what Mr. Promoter wanted. Dziubiński had as much of knowledge about metal and the scene as me about the use of Kepler’s lens in curing eye diseases. And how the underground gigs looked like from the promotional and organizational side? Different. Very different. It was just like with zines. Some of them were fat, professional and filled with the interviews for a few pages and photos and some wee like 10-paged toilet papers with questions like „What do you play?”, „What alcohol do you like?”, „Do you watch porn?”. Who the fuck cares about that? Just the same it was with gigs. Maybe I’ll describe the bigger ones, like Thrash Camp which was the first so big underground festival in Rogoźnik. It was meant to be ass-kicking event! We got the invitation in which everything was professionally printed and described, with questions like how many backstage passes should we prepare, how many technicians do you bring along, how many band’s friends, does the drummer use single or double bass drum? We just waited for the questions if we need additional underpants and a private blowjobber. Full success. I answered all the questions and off