Celeste: Making A Killing

Of the many changes which we’ve seen in the last thirty years of heavy music culture, perhaps the most defining is the idea that metal bands can aspire to be artists in the fullest sense of the word. Bands like NEUROSIS, SUNN O))) and AUTHOR & PUNISHER challenge our precepts of what metal can mean by pushing the genre towards the expansive possibilities of musical heaviness which lie beyond it. These art-metal innovators (among many others) have shown that metal musicians are no longer just guitar virtuosos concerned with their own ego and narcotic overindulgence: they can be thoughtful, artistic individuals too. Among the fruits of this change are Lyon’s CELESTE who, as you’ll see, take a holistic approach in pursuit of their musical oblivion.

“We started sixteen years ago,” recollects vocalist and bassist Johan Girardeau, “and back then, we were much more involved with the punk/hardcore scene.” It is that blissful but ambiguous time between Christmas and the New Year, and we’ve both come armed to the conversation with local ale. “In the first three years we released an album every year, which seems all but impossible now,“ he says, taking a swig with raised eyebrows. “After the third album Misanthrope(s), we found ourselves becoming much more embedded in the metal scene. We wanted to develop music which was as violent as we could manage,” he explains, “and I think we managed to do that with Mortee(s) Nee(s).” That album was the first to really catch the music press’ attention: a barrage of bleak half-music half-noise sustained for forty minutes, which would go toe-to-toe with the likes of FULL OF HELL and NAILS. “We knew that we had created the most violent thing we would record,” smiles Johan darkly. “After that, we have tried to develop more melodic music. Animale(s) and Infidele(s) are still very dark, but to our minds they should be easier to understand; more melodic and more melancholic. Assassine(s) is, in my opinion, a whole step forward in that direction.”

Their seventh album is the result of a nascent idea having reached maturity. What Animale(s) and Infidele(s) aimed at in the way of emotive dexterity and musical sophistication has been refined here, and Assassine(s) will be remembered as a landmark album for CELESTE. “We tried very deliberately to put more contrast in here than last time,” Johan discloses, as our discussion turns to the new album, and the circumstances which brought it about. “For our previous albums, the setup was always much the same. Our guitarist Guillaume would write the fundamentals of the songs, which we would work on in rehearsal. Then because of the pandemic,” he sighs sincerely, “we could not work that way any more. So we split the album in two: Guillaume wrote his songs and I wrote mine. That ended up being more interesting,” he explains, “because whenever we brought riffs to rehearsals, we would reject some very quickly. Writing in isolation, we had the time to let those ideas develop. In the end, a lot of riffs and ideas which we would have left on the floor in the rehearsal space found their way onto the album, and some of them are among the best.” The contrasts and unusual dimensions of Assassine(s) can be attributed to this segregation of creativity, which have transpired to be it’s success. “We’ve learned a lot through this process,” agrees Johan , “and we’ll keep writing this way in future. There’s a definite breakthrough with this album.”

While Assassine(s) represents a change in CELESTE’s approach, one thing which remains the same is the striking artwork the band have become known for. “I take care of all the artworks,” explains Johan. “My goal is always to create something which has continuity with our other records, but which is different to other metal records.” With Johan’s oversight CELESTE have managed to develop their distinct visual language, which uses monochrome photography to capture variations on the human body and intimacy. “I don’t like it when artists become overused,” he continues, “and that seems to happen a lot with metal artwork. So I work with a lot of different photographers, and every artwork is something which I build especially for each record. It takes me two to three years for each one, from conception until it is finished. “Each time they have an influence on the music and the lyrics,” he continues. “Personally, I don’t like the idea of a concept album, but I do think that it’s much more interesting to listen to something when there is something to engage with beyond the music. I try to make something mysterious with an ambiguous meaning, and leave it to the audience to try to make sense of the theme along with the album’s title. It would lose its meaning if I told you exactly what Assassine(s) is about,” he grins.

Taken together with their characteristic live performance, it becomes clear that CELESTE are pursuing the gesamtkunstwerk – or ‘total work of art’ – where multiple artforms are used in parallel to create something complete, or all-encompassing. “We’re interested in provoking thought in that way,” Johan tells us. “It’s great when people say they love the music, but when they explore the artwork as a whole it’s more rewarding for us as artists. We think of an album as film, almost like cinema. With Assassine(s) every song is like a scene within a movie. It’s not just the music, either” he illustrates, “but the lyrics too, which could be compared to dialogue, and the record itself which could be compared to the tape itself. We’ve done a lot of music videos: we have two already for this album and we have three more to come, and we’d like to bring projections into our live performances too.”

In concert the band wear red headlamps against a pitch-black backdrop, creating another layer to their gesamtkunstwerk: an unusual lighting choice where the audience become aware that they, like the band, are being watched. “Playing live is what we enjoy the most,” admits Johan, “but the studio album is always the most important thing to us. After all, if you don’t make a good album, no one will show up!” Neatly, we finish by asking after their touring plans. “We have a tour booked in March with CONJURER, a thirty-two day straight tour,” We wince, and Johan smiles uneasily. “I won’t lie, it’s going to be tough! Right now, it’s fingers crossed. All we hope is that this tour will happen.  I wont pray because fuck religion,” he laughs, “but I really hope we can finally bring Assassine(s) to life.”

Assassine(s) is out now via Nuclear Blast Records.

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