Infanteria-Back With New Single And New Album

Interview By Duzzy Clayton

Intro

Infanteria is a three-piece Progressive Thrash Metal Band from Cape Town, South Africa and Manchester, UK. Currently independent, the band released two studio albums with Burning Tone Records, with their third album, ‘Patriarch’, due for release Friday 17 June 2022.

Formed in 2005 by Vocalist & Guitarist Chris Hall, and his brother Rob, Infanteria managed to thrash through the high school party years to release their 2013 debut ‘Isolated Existence’. The release saw Bassist Tim Leibbrandt join the fold, propelling the band to win the Wacken Metal Battle South Africa Competition that year, affording them the opportunity to play at the Wacken Open Air festival in Germany alongside Rammstein, Motörhead, Meshuggah, and many more!

Upon their return to South Africa, the band was direct support for Killswitch Engage and Trivium at Ramfest SA 2014. The following year, their critically acclaimed sophomore album ‘Where Serpents Conquer’ was released with Adrian Langeveld taking over behind the Drums. The group subsequently enjoyed extensive touring of South Africa.

With Chris emigrating to the UK in early 2020, and the arrival of the pandemic, sessions for the band’s next album were put on hold. Two years later, the Thrash Metal Trio is now set to return, revitalised and ready to unleash ‘Patriarch’, their long-awaited third album. A mature expansion on their previous releases, ‘Patriarch’ shows the full development of Infanteria’s progressive metal sound from hardcore crossover runaways like ‘Embrace the Trauma’ to rich sonic opuses such as ‘Swansong’.

Questions

Hello guys, welcome to Fanbase Music Magazine.  Before we get to know you guys a bit better and talk about the album, lets get the Covid-19 question out the way, how have you all been, have you and your family been safe through the pandemic?

Thanks for chatting to us, Duzzy! We’ve all managed to survive relatively unscathed and adapted to life in these crazy times. Fortunately, we and our families are all healthy and hope to stay that way for as long as possible.

For people who are not quite familiar with the band, yet can you tell us who is in the band and what do they do in the band?

We’re Infanteria and we are a 3-piece thrash band. Some folks refer to us as progressive thrash and we guess we can hear that. We don’t mind that label at all. The band is made up of Tim Leibbrandt on the bass, Chris Hall on guitar and Vox and Adrian Langeveld on drums.

Can you tell us where the band is situated and where each band member grew up?

At this stage we’re split between Cape Town, RSA and Manchester UK, but all of us are South African, from the Cape Town area.

How did you come up with the band name Infanteria?

The name came about with Chris and his brother Rob (the original drummer) when they were coming up with band names circa 2005. After throwing about a few ideas, Rob happened upon his mother’s English/Spanish dictionary, and they liked how the Spanish word for “Infantry” was translated to “Infanteria”. The name stuck and the rest as they say, is history!

Who is some of the band’s influences?

All the usual suspects of course: Metallica, Megadeth, Iron Maiden, Testament to name a few. Bands with great energy, song writing prowess and catchy melody, yet still heavy.  More modern influences are bands like Sylosis, Architects, Opeth, Mastodon and Machine Head, but we tend to take inspiration from a variety of places since between all the members the tastes are quite varied and can range from Hip Hop to HxC.

Ok let’s talk about the exciting new album, what is the name of the new album?

The name of our shiny new Infanteria baby is ‘Patriarch’.

It has been 7 years since your last album, why the long wait and what made you decide the time is right to bring out your 3^rd album?

It has been a long time, hasn’t it? It’s taken so long for a variety of reasons. Chris & Adrian began bouncing the ideas around in late 2016/ early 2017, and then during the course of the next year refined the ideas and got the songs into shape. We recorded demos in 2018 and were on track to begin the recording in earnest during 2019, but as it tends to do sometimes, life got in the way.

After Adrian concluded the drum tracking and Chris had completed the guitar and vocals, we were hit with the curveballs of Chris needing to make the move to the UK at fairly short notice. Not long after that, the world came to a standstill with the pandemic which made completing the remaining parts such as bass even more difficult. When we finally did manage to complete that, we were thrown an additional curveball when our producer Heinrich Köllner also had to pack up his life and move to Canada which then delayed the mixing/mastering process.

We’d love to have brought it out earlier, but these things tend to have a way of working out for the better and it’s probably become a stronger piece of work because we didn’t rush it. So yes, it’s been a lengthy wait for fans, but we really think they’ll enjoy it. We’ve put our hearts and souls into this one.

How is this album musically different to anything you have released before and what is the inspiration of this album?

This is definitely a much darker sounding album. Sonically and thematically. If you can describe the first album ‘Isolated Existence’ as the energy fuelled angry teenager and ‘Where Serpents Conquer’ as the much cooler big sister, then ‘Patriarch’ is definitely the deep thinking and mature older brother.

There’s still certainly thrash elements and speed in places, however, there are some slow chuggers on there, some prog-like elements and quiet spots. It makes for a great all-round listen.

Lyrically, Chris dug deep into this and took inspiration from concepts such as the weight of familial legacies, expectation, how we treat each other in society and the state of discourse we have with each other in the modern-day world. Visually, Tim then executed capturing the essence brilliantly, coming up with the eerie album artwork to tie it all together.

How many tracks are on the album?

There are 8 tracks in total, with a run time of about 43 minutes.

The lead single is called ‘Embrace the Trauma’, can you tell us how this song came about and what it is all about?

You just need to log into any social media channels and it kind of gives you an idea of the inspiration behind the song. How we interact with each other in the modern age, how much of a cesspool it can be and the way in which people are celebrated and vilified in equal measure, with that cycle just continuing over and over. Hopefully it provokes some thought about it.

You have a really impressive music career and have even represented South Africa at Wacken and even opened for Killswitch Engage and Trivium, can you tell us how all those experiences were?

Absolutely amazing! Teenage Infanteria would have spontaneously combusted at the chance to have an opportunity like that. Wacken was brilliant and to be able to play to thousands of die-hard metal heads in a European setting, was definitely a highlight in the career so far.

Killswitch Engage & Trivium show at RAMfest was probably the standout moment though. Getting to be able to warm up the crowd before the mayhem started with the band firing on all cylinders was so special. Best moment was when we closed the set with a cover of Megadeth’s Holy Wars, Corey (and his guitar tech) from Trivium came running over to side stage to watch with a grin on his face.  Memories we’ll treasure forever.

How is South Africa different to any other part of the world you have been or played shows?

There’s just something about the intensity of a local crowd that can feel like it’s missing at open air or bigger shows overseas. When you’re in that club, sweaty, packed with bodies and you can feel that electricity in the air.  There’s something magical about it that you miss outside of home shows. Likely down to the fact that our metal community here is so small, but so passionate and close knit.

You work very closely with Devographic Music Media, PR, Events & Artist Management, can you tell us how that experience has been?

Couldn’t be happier having Devo to help us in bringing ‘Patriarch’ to the world. We normally DIY this sort of thing, but it’s been a pleasure to be able to let go of some of the responsibility of bringing a new album into the world and he’s been great to work with.

Can you give us your social media links?

All Links can be found HERE
Facebook @infanteriasa
Instagram @infanteriam

Website www.infanteriaband.com

Thank you for doing this interview, do you have any last messages for your fans and our readers?

Our pleasure! Thanks for having us once again. To the good people out there, we hope that you enjoy the new album and thank you to our long-time fans for your patience and support. We truly appreciate you and hope that ‘Patriarch’ will make you feel all kinds of good things.

Go and grab your copy on infanteria.bandcamp.com and all good digital music platforms.

 

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