Interview with: Morbid Path

Hell on Fire: Hello Yuval and welcome to H.O.F, everything ok with you?

Yuval: Hi! Everything’s great and I’m glad to talk with you about Morbid Path.

Hell on Fire: Thanx friend! What can you say about Morbid Path since the begining, how everything started?

Yuval: Cory (vocals) and me formed Morbid Path in 2008. Cory had a short lived death metal band and I’ve played in a grindcore band. Both of us decided to quit these bands in order to create something different that we wanted to express. We recruited some friends of us but the line up changed several times until today, when the band consists Cory and me as well as Tomer Talias (drums), Barak Carmeli ( rhytm guitars) and Ran Shem-Tov (bass). We feel that this is a really stable line up and we hope to continue that way as long as possible.

Hell on Fire: Being you the lead guitarrist can i suppose that is you that compose the tracks for the band?

Yuval: I’m actually composing the basics of the material but we work as a team. When we rehearse (and we rehearse a lot these days) everyone have something to offer: if it’s a drum beat, the repetition of different riffs, different ways to express a specific idea, the directon of a song and everything else that we feel is necessary. The lyrics are often written by Cory and sometimes I have my own ideas that we add. Generally, we are very open minded when it comes to song writing.

Hell on Fire: How do you describe the sound of Morbid Path?

Yuval: I don’t think that words are able to describe fully any type of music , you can’t pick a word that truly make you feel the exact feeling you get when listening to any artist. However, If trying to do so, I guess we play some pretty heavy stuff with different melodic vibes within.

Hell on Fire: The band has a new single intituled “The Winter of Us”! What is the meaning of this title? Is this single exactly how you wanted to be?

Yuval: It’s difficult to explain the meaning of the lyrics and titles of our songs because they are mainly abstract . We want every listener to chose for himself his own way to observe our ideas and lyrics. We decided to record ‘The Winter Of Us’ because we felt that it would be the right song to release as a single from all of the material we wrote to that point. It came out very black metal sounding at the end and we liked it. We are still a young band and we tried different methods of recording, we don’t have any specific sound that we are aiming for, we doing what we feel is right for us at the moment and we’ll keep on progress.

Hell on Fire: Talking about the previous work and demo “Nightfall”, for you Yuval which are the main differences between this 2 records? From 2008 until now do you feel somehow that the band now is more mature and professional?

Yuval: “Nightfall” was a really rough demo. We recorded it 5 months after our formation and it’s includes our earliest material together with a brief keyboards intro. I guess that “Nightfall” is the prologue of Morbid Path and “The Winter Of Us” is the first chapter . I feel that we gained a lot of experience after doing these recordings yet we have a lot more to do and that’s only the beginning!

Hell on Fire: I said 2008 and yes only last year the band came out, so you guys are really new in the metal scene and i must congratulate you because your songs are really good and well composed for a band that is so young! But tell me in your country Israel it is hard for a band to survive with music and to have supports?

Yuval: Metal music isn’t the mainstream in Israeli music. It’s pretty underground comparing to the music industry here ,which is pretty middling in my opinion. However, there is a lot of audience for this type of music in Israel. There are a lot of Israeli bands which playing different types of metal music and there are a lot of metal concerts in Israel. There are also pretty much foreign bands that come to play here and receive a great feedback from their crowd (Nevermore, Dream Theater, Dark Funeral, Mayhem, Sabaton, Megadeth, Paradise Lost, Down...just to name a few). Compared with the size of Israel, the metal movement is huge. I think that the only obstacle in Israel for young bands such as us is the 3 years military service, which is an obligation of each 18 years old for the country. However it shoudln’t be a big deal, ‘Salem’ once canceled a tour with the american famous band called ‘Death’ due to their army service, but they continued their activity long after that. It may cause bands to stop their activity for a while or to temporary low their progress, but it can also devolp you as a person and in the end, although the 3 years of relative calm, it can only boost your will to create metal, no matter what. I would like to add that contrary to what a lot of people think, Israel isn’t a third world religious country and people here are going out to clubs, movies, concerts and living a normal life. It’s true that the security condition is a bit tense, but most of the time people aren’t living underneath flying rockets above their heads or driving in the car along with army tanks in the road...it’s a very normal country after all.

Hell on Fire: Indeed some people think that nothing happen in Israel, it’s not true, actually you people have in there great bands coming out with good music! Now that Morbid Path will be more recognized from here what do you wanna say for a band that as difficulties to come out in this hard world of music and which is the best advice you can give to a band in the begining?

Yuval: If you like it, never give it up.

Hell on Fire: Good advice! Did you or do you have any kind of guitar lessons?

Yuval: I once had a teacher when I was 11 or 12 years old. I dumped him after 3 lessons more or less because all he could teach me was some boring mainstream songs with the same specific method of playing. I just learned by myself after that. I think it’s good to try learning an instrument by yourself, it can really open your mind.


Hell on Fire: lol that was funny, there’s no patiente at all for lessons! Yuval, do you remember with which bands did you grow up listening to?

Yuval: My first metal record was “...And Justice For All’ by Metallica. I’ve also always liked bands such as Iron Maiden, Pantera, old Megadeth, Destruction, Sepultura, Anthrax and more. Later I discovered bands such as Dissection, At The Gates, Opeth, Orphaned Land, Entombed, Napalm Death and the list continues.

Hell on Fire: Great bands! Which is your favourite guitarrist/s of all time?

Yuval: I’m not really that into individual guitar players but I guess that I’ve always liked the style of Dave Murray and Adrian Smith (Iron Maiden) and Joe Satriani had done some pretty intresting records as well.

Hell on Fire: If you have to share the stage with 1 band which will be?

Yuval: Iron Maiden no doubt.

Hell on Fire: What do you like to do in your free times?

Yuval: Nothing too special: hanging out with friends, playing basketball, rehearsing with Morbid Path, watching some movies here and there, improvising music, listening to new bands, going to concerts etc...

Hell on Fire: Talking about concerts, how as been the reaction of the crowd so far?

Yuval: At this point we’ve had only 4 gigs. We haven’t performed since Feb 2009 due to line up changes as I mentioned earlier and because we decided to concentrate on writing new material. However, the reactions were great, I personally liked each of our gigs and for me our gig in Jerusalem was our best one to date. We are about to return to the stages very soon and hopefully we’ll have some gigs outside of Israel at the future, maybe even in Portugal one day :) .
Hell on Fire: I hope so, to see you guys in Portugal! What do you want to say for those that always supported Morbid Path since the begining?

Yuval: I must say that we received some pretty good responses and support outside of Israel thorugh the Facebook and MySpace, especially from the U.S.A. We really appreciate this, and every single person that comes to our shows in Israel and every one that supports us in any way from anywhere, a bit thank you for all!

Hell on Fire: Thank you very much Yuval for your time for this interview, i wish you guys all the luck for “The Winter of Us” for next records to come and also for your concerts, lots of power!

Yuval: Thanks a lot, it’s been a pleasure! Keep up with this great zine!




By: Nightshade

Morbid Path Myspace
www.myspace.com/morbidpath