On The Wane - Do All Your Best To Make What You Love

The13th AÑO: 4 | NÚMERO 42

UNA R E VISTA IMA GINARIA

ON THE WANE DO ALL YOUR BEST TO MAKE WHAT YOU LOVE

[ Interview with Dari Maksimova and Eugene Voitov from On The Wane by Benjamín York.

Photographs by Roman Shalamov and Ruslan Onishchenko. ]

DO ALL YOUR BEST TO MAKE WHAT YOU LOVE

3 Formed in March 2014, in a land far away from us (in Kyiv, Ukraine), Shameless Promotion PR introduced us to the band On The Wane.

Called "Schism", they released this beauty in November, this second album of the quartet, which consists of Anna Lyashok, Dari Maksimova, Eugene Voitov and Eli Laika. Through their music, they reveal a world where postpunk rises like a flag dotted with shoegaze. So we open the door to a dark, noisy world, where everything can happen since, from its very beginning, the band has been in a constant state of mutation. We speak with On The Wane...

Hello, first of all I wanted to thank you for the possibility of doing this interview. To begin with, we’d like to travel back in your memories to the beginning of everything for On The Wane. How was the band formed?

In the beginning of 2014 me, Eugene and Alexander (our ex-guitarist) were playing in another band. And all things about that band were wrong: members didn't like that music, no one wanted to go to rehearsal and actually see each other. So we were tired of this situation and decided to make the new band with only members who are burning with music, to play only music we love, to have it all naturally and honestly. So On The Wane started with the main point: do all your best to make what you love.

I read that you initially went into debt in order to buy equipment and that you were also partially living in your rehearsal space for some time in order to hone your sound. Is this true?

Have you already paid off those debts?

Yes, we went into debt to buy equipment, that's true. We wanted to have unlimited time and our own place to play, and that was the decision. We weren't living in our garage literally, but we have spent there a lot of time. And yes, we have paid off those debts in on year or so. Now, our rehearsal studio moved into new place — a little bigger and with better acoustic.

In less than a year, you had already put out

your first album "Dry". What impressions do you have today when listening to that album?

What do you think about work as novices in decisions taking during the recording?

A musician is a kind of transformer which receives from out world sounds, words, nonverbal impressions, put it all through himself and gets new music on the out. As musicians, we have had small experience and all influences from our idols were pretty obvious in our music on the start. But this naive sound we made on DRY has its own charm, I guess.

The 27-hour session on that cold October was the best way to record and release that first raw music. We did our best at that time.

What came first? The name of the band or the song?

I can't say for sure. We were looking for the name of a band and at the same time we wrote some of our first songs, but they were nameless. So maybe the song was first, but without this name.

Your sound palette allows you to breeze through any style without problems. Did you plan this or does it all just flow naturally?

It flows naturally.

We are getting bored with the same sound pretty fast, so we are always looking for something new.

Ely can totally change all pedals in his pedalboard twice a week. Sometimes 80% of our rehearsal sounds like atonal noise, and neighbors are thinking that we are doing satan rituals or so.

We are pretty weird.

Then came the EP "Sick". The songs here take things one step further in the transformation of your sound. This makes it interesting and difficult for me to foresee the next step.

Can you foresee what’s ahead yourselves?

Yes, we can foresee in the general terms. As you said in the start, we are in a constant state of mutation and we will be in this state further. Now we are trying to make the sound more transpa-

rent and bright and melodies more dramatical and emotional. It's time to use less to say more.

Also, we are passionate about electronic sounds (synths, drum machine etc) now.

We arrive at 2017. Your second album is brilliant (one of the best of 2017) and also a new step in the history of the band. In addition, the sound is darker than on "Dry" – what differen-

ces do you find between both?

They are very different in the base. While writing and recording the first album we didn't actually know how to do that, so it was like the very first semi-blind step.

And after three years of playing shows and writing new songs, visiting a lot of shows and festivals, listening to an ocean of new music the Scism came as conscious work on music and sound.

Track by Track Truth Isn’t Bright It was the very first song written with the synth. For us, "Truth isn't bright" came as opening the new sound palette and a new side of Ann's voice. Sweet pop melody was unusual and we liked it!

Fear All lyrics on Scism is about inner problems inside our heads and general problems in the world which actually starts in people heads. The "Fear" is our minimalistic hymn to the oldest and the strongest issue.

Human Race It might be the most melodic and cinematographic song on our album. The sound illustration of the main course of all human history. Everything is temporary and our part in it is not that big as we want to think.

Sultry Song The only song on the album without drama in lyrics. I and Eugene have visited Lisbon, fell in love with the charm of its night narrow streets in the hot summer. When we came home to Kyiv and shared our impressions with Ann and Ely "Sultry Song" just came out in a natural way.

Revenge (Deeper Than You Can Imagine) That song was written a pretty long time ago, but we have changed it totally several times. Maybe the most gothic, dark and cold one in our discography as far. It has difficult uncomfortable structure and sweet melodies. Just like that feeling, when you arŃƒ hurt, you are angry and dreaming about your revenge.

Alcohol Sometimes we are trying to avoid facing our inner demons. We use alcohol, drugs, insane parties, whatever it takes just to don't face the reality as is. But it does not help.

The Real Coward "The real coward" is a long lonely walk by the foggy swamp between wet black branches.

Drop Bombs Mixed with the jungle drums, vocals and south guitar melodies "Drop Bombs" is one of the most serious songs on the album.

Home Everyone wants a better life, but not everyone wants to do something for it. Lazy whiners are annoying, aren't they?

Bad news During the life, a man gets an experience, knowledge and kind of a wisdom. But for everything you need to pay.

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Now that you’ve peaked everybody’s interest, what are your plans for On The Wane in 2018?

We are going to play a lot of shows, take part in festivals and work on the new songs, of course. By the way, 2018 will start with the presentation of our newest track at the live video show in January.

Stay tuned!

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