Page 52 - Sick Drummer Magazine Issue 29 - Hannes Grossmann

SDM: What’snewwithBlottedScience?Hannes: We have a lot of material written. I already recorded some songs in my new studio. This time all of us wrote music and by working with Ron’s 12-tone composing system we make sure we don’t totally leave common ground and keep Blotted’s trademark sound. The album should be finished in a few months, hopefully we will be able to release it in 2016. I’m still psyched to play with Webster and Jarzombek, they are awesome dudes and great musicians.Hannes: Thatwasaone-song-onlyprojectfeaturing Christian Muenzner, Ron Jarzombek, myself and Spastic Ink bassist Pete Perez. Great lineup! It was just a fun thing to experiment with Ron’s 12-tone cycle. We came up with the idea after Watchtower’s gig in Germany in 2010. Ron was here in Germany, so we decided to write a song together based onhis system. I played drums and wrote two riffs. It actually sounded a lot like Blotted Science, so we didn’t really think it makes sense to go on with it.Hannes: ThealbumsoundsalotlikeObscura, because all of it was written for that band. I just put it out as a solo album because Steffen felt offended by the amount of material I had written. I just recorded it to have those songs “out of the way” and to thus solve the problem. That didn’t work. But no matter what happened I’m really happywith the album, especially because I had so many great guest guitarists like Jarzombek, Muenzner,Per Nilsson or Jeff Loomis, and all the other great guys. I also play rhythm guitars on it and wrote all the lyrics and vocal lines. But I don’t sing myself though. That would ruin it, haha.I started playing the guitar at the age of 10 or so, but never took it really seriously, especially because I tought myself. I was all about drums, haha. I was just lucky enough to play with so many great guitar- ists and learned a lot by watching them play. I’m not nearly as good as my bandmates Chris Muenzner, from who I learned most, or Danny Tunker or Morean. But for a drummer who writes music, it is essential to know what those other guys do. I think Gene Hoglan would agree with that.Hannes: Thatwascool.Iplayed3songswiththem: Crystal Mountain, Spirit Crusher and Symbolic. And I had to play on Sean Reinert’s drums, which was a bit weird. It’s definitely not optimized for fast techy drumming, haha. But I got used to it after a few shows. Sean is a supercool guy, that’s why I did it in the first place. The whole band and crew was just great. They offered me to do the same thing on their US tour, but I was too involved in producing the ALKALOID album.Hannes: Ilearnedreadingfromthestart,butIreally suck at it. Especially chart reading is somethingI never do and that’s why I’m bad with it. Drum notation is no problem, I can read it fluently. It’s easier anyways, or something I am just more used to. Of course I use notation for other instruments, it just takes me longer to read.SDM: About Terrestrial Exiled, you only released one song called “Duodecimal Leverotation.” What’s up with that? And what was your involvement in this project?52SDM: Tell us about your involvement in the Death To All Festival Tour 2014.SDM: YoustartedtoplaythePianoat8yearsold. How much exposure to reading musical notation have you had? How important is being able to read and write music to you?SDM: Tellusaboutyoursoloalbum“TheRadial Covenant” (2014). How long have you been playing guitar?hannes cntd.