Baest: Heavyweight Television Champions
Over the summer, Danish TV channel DR3 aired a four part documentary entitled Den Satans Familie. A fly-on-the-wall affair, it followed homegrown death metallers BAEST on their tour across Europe supporting DECAPITATED, including their string of dates across the UK. Naturally it’s all in their mother tongue but, halfway through episode three in the only segment to be subtitled, the scene cuts to their tour bus as they are interviewed by the magazine you’re currently reading this feature in.
Okay, so it’s a nice massage of our collective egos to have made the final edit of the documentary, but we’re not in the spotlight here. To really gauge how well Den Satans Familie has been received, the answer has to come from the band themselves and, if guitarist Lasser Revsbech is to be believed, it’s been a rousing success.
“The profile of the band has grown immensely,” he reveals, “and people who have never heard of death metal show up at our concerts to experience it first-hand. That makes us super proud, and we love the opportunity to corrupt the masses! Although we were not involved in the editing itself, we had the opportunity to accept or decline the results and we couldn’t be happier. We love the documentary, it’s real and showcases the band in the most honest way we could have hoped for.”
It’s apparent, though, that whilst the band – made up of Revsbech, fellow guitarist Svend Karlsson, vocalist Simon Olsen, bassist Mattias Melchiorsen and drummer Sebastien Abildsten – are clearly ecstatic at their new reputation and swelling audiences, they’re not letting it get to their heads in the slightest. When asked if there are any bizarre stories of people recognising them from the documentary in day-to-day life, Lasser answers with a hefty dose of tongue-in-cheek humour. “We have plenty, from random elderly drunk people sitting on benches to screaming hordes of young students,” he laughs. “We try to play it cool, albeit with miserable results [laughs]!”
All joking aside, what cannot be denied is that morale within the camp is currently very high, especially as sophomore record Venenum has just been released. A concept release, the album is built around BAEST’s own version of The Divine Comedy poem written by Italian Dante over twelve years in the 14th century and giving rise to the well-known first sections of the trilogy known the world over as Dante’s Inferno. It’s an album Lasser is incredibly excited about. “We all feel there is a huge development from (2018’s debut full length) Danse Macabre, and can’t wait for people to fully experience BAEST 2.0,” he reveals. “Venenum is more progressive and aggressive but continues to be experimental and searching. Outside of our own increased songwriting skills, the Swedish influences have been turned down a notch, making room for some DEATH/Florida appreciation as well. That said, I feel that the more melodic songs feel particularly special, as it was important for us to try and use melody more throughout the album.”
Not resting on their laurels for a moment, BAEST are heading out as the opening band of the Hell Over Europe III tour headlined by ABORTED and ENTOMBED A.D, which kicks off with a sole UK date at The Dome in Tufnell Park, London on October 18th. Lasser struggles to find the words to describe how it feels to be part of such a billing with two legends of the death metal world, but he’s suitably unfazed when questioned about BAEST’s position as the opening band. As alluded to in the documentary by, erm, ourselves, it was a shame that they didn’t have more people in front of them when they performed on the DECAPITATED tour over here, but Lasser is keen to point out that the only way it affects them is by inciting them to up their game even more. “It only affects our energy levels in the sense that we blast it up to max! We find a smaller, tougher crowd is a great challenge and we’ll give it our best to make those fuckers go mental, be there ten people in front of us or 500. We’ve experienced it plenty before; we played a disco in Denmark once as part of an after-party for a festival. The crowd was lacking and introvert – and standing in a freaking disco, [laughs]!”
The tour winds up on November 17th, but BAEST aren’t going to take the rest of the year off from there – in fact, they’re already pushing ahead for the next record. “We agreed to begin writing the third album in December,” Lasser reveals, “so it’s gonna be a very heavy, death-like Christmas!”
So, whilst most of us will be tucking into roast turkey, BAEST will be cooking up another bludgeoning slab of death metal merriment. Season’s beatings, indeed.
Venenum is out now via Century Media Records. BAEST are featured in our latest digital issue. Subscribe to our Patreon Page to check it out!
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