For many bands out there, the urge to play fast and intense music is the sole driving force behind playing grindcore, which is totally understandable. In our case, though, I could say personal struggle against the system was pretty much the main motivation to play politically and socially aware music in the first place;

SAKATAT is a three-piece raw as fuck old school grindcore band from Ankara/ İstanbul, Türkiye in 2005. Their influences include early NAPALM DEATH, S.O.B., EXCRUCIATING TERROR, WARSORE, AGATHOCLES, ROT, ASSÜCK and many more early/pre grindcore bands from the previous century. So far, they’ve recorded seven split 7″s, toured hard and played some of the sickest festivals all over Europe. Their debut-album was released in Summer 2012. After a long summer tour and a few gigs in autumn/winter, the band split-up at the end of 2012.

“Bir Devrin Sonu” is our very first album which is also our final. We recorded it around early 2012 in winter solitude at our friends’ studio in Ankara and the record came out on single-sided 12” and CD just in time for our European tour last summer. Although it consists of eight songs we tried to make it somehow “flow” rather than sound like separate songs put in a row, if you know what I mean. Despite very minor details, I would say the album represents how we ever wanted to sound like, intense, fierce and in your face that is. So, we are more than glad to see a lot of people are also digging it.

I don’t remember if we’d ever called it a ‘full-lenght’ or if it was what people assumed when we announced the ‘album’ but obviously it is rather silly to call a 8:08 minute release a full-lenght. We consider it our album regardless of its lenght, though. An obscure grindcore record isn’t supposed to be a ‘finished product’, therefore can’t be classified using the mainstream terms that are appropriate for pop music releases sold at chain-stores and malls. We could have easily added bunch of filler tracks as well as an intro and outro but that would only ruin it.

It is obvious that we barely handled our instruments when we first started. However, ever since we had this three-piece line-up, we aimed for the tightest and the most aggressive we could possibly get. Also, it is safe to say that our approach to grindcore has changed throughout years since we kind of figured out that it was possible not to lose focus on song-writing (whatever that means) and still pull off catchy tunes even with more emphasis on speed.

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It is funny that our decision to call the album “Bir Devrin Sonu” coincided with us deciding to break up once the album is released and the tour is over.

The title refers to the fact that there is no way back from the point we, as the whole society are all in now. All the riots in human history is about reclaiming however, considering how we’re now in hand’s of the system, it is too late to bother reclaiming anything, whether it be human rights, access to resources that provide basic human needs like water, food etc… you name it. The human race’s immunity fed the system to own the future of all mankind.

It is funny that our decision to call the album “Bir Devrin Sonu” coincided with us deciding to break up once the album is released and the tour is over.

I am pretty sure that for many bands out there, the urge to play fast and intense music is the sole driving force behind playing grindcore, which is totally understandable. In our case, though, I could say personal struggle against the system was pretty much the main motivation to play politically and socially aware music in the first place; which is obvious if you consider we were quite a sloppy band with longer lyrics on our first couple of records. However, as we evolved in years, the need or urge to play furious music has become half of the motivation as well even though personal struggle and hatred was still there. After all, most of our songs have been written after being pissed off at political or social events that have happened at the time.

“Screams of a cat suffering in the middle of a crushed nuclear power plant”

As I said earlier, the message had quite an important place when we started the band. Later in last few years though, the feeling has also gained an importance. I guess that is why we ended up having shorter lyrics and tighter songs

I think the first record that has motivated me to actually do vocals was NAPALM DEATH’s “From Enslavement To Obliteration”. The slow opening track that makes you wanna tear your clothes off and the next one where the tempo suddenly speeds up and makes you wanna eat those pieces of cloth… that is the feeling we’ve always aimed for. So, I guess that is what I have in mind when screaming, to add kind of a post-apocalyptic insanity feel to it, that is.

A couple of nuclear plants are being built in Turkey as we speak, who knows, maybe we won’t really need to struggle at all so as to sound like that soon? In fact, considering how nothing works properly here, you guys better start building shelters before the first plant crushes.

What’s your opinion about bands who have no, or partly, no lyrics? For you, as a singer, what is the most important: The meaning of the texts that should express something strong, or the feelings that have to come out (Even if there’s nothing meaningful to say)?

This is a topic that I’d given a lot of thought in last few years and I think sometimes it does make sense not to have any lyrics. At least, it is a lot more sincere than writing down all those supposedly political lyrics but not meaning any of them, know what I mean? I have met many bands on tours that you’d assume were politically-aware and all that looking at their lyrics, but turned out to be just your average consumerists. So, the bottom line is, it is better not to fake it than actually pretend to have something to say but don’t believe in or practice what you say.

In our case, as I said earlier, the message had quite an important place when we started the band. Later in last few years though, the feeling has also gained an importance. I guess that is why we ended up having shorter lyrics and tighter songs? The life-style differences among three of us has set a bar regarding how far we can go with the lyrics, too.

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I might be wrong, but I have the picture of SAKATAT as a band that tours a lot, playing many gigs here, and there, and also there.

How many gigs are you able to play monthly? Which were the nicest towns/ countries to play in? What’s the hard side of organizing gigs in various countries? Aren’t there problems with your jobs, and how are you able not to loose too much money (Because you play grindcore, which might be less “glamorous” than metal sometimes…)

I would say we toured as extensively as we could. 5 tours in abroad in 4 years is not bad, I guess, although still wasn’t enough for me, personally.

We started the band as a duo in 2005 but it wasn’t until 2007 or 2008 that we had a three-piece line-up that allowed us to play live. Since then, we toured about a month in abroad and played one or two gigs in Türkiye every year. We were all students within 2006 and 2012 which left us a couple of months every year to do whatever we wanted, which was to record new 7”s and go on tours.

It is safe to say every town/venue we played had a unique feel to them, so I am glad we played every single one of them. So, I guess, as cheesy as it may sound the best town to play is the one we haven’t play before?

Our first tours were all financial suicides but a lot of fun nonetheless. We learned fast though, so our last couple of tours kind of financed themselves which is quite a rare case for totally DIY bands like us. Especially if you have to buy expensive flight tickets to have an access to mainland Europe and buy visas to enter pretty much any Western country.

How is the situation for rehearsal places in Türkiye? Should you be very careful not to awake the suspicions of authorities with your “revolutionary” and “rebellious” sounds, or is this only about not bothering the neighbors with too much noise?

Haven’t ever heard of a band that had a problem rehearsing or even playing in public since not a single band here is rebellious enough to make anyone care. It is mostly the activist folk musicians or bands that are in trouble with the authorities in Türkiye.

You used to run a paper fanzine called IMPACT DRILL and released 3 issues on recycled-skin-paper (AhAh). Can you tell us more, so that the readers can gather some infos about it? Do you wish you had more free time to try and release more issues, or you became too tired with it and preferred to move to something else?

Well, I did run a ‘zine called Impact Drill but I am pretty sure you are mistaking it with another local metal ‘zine called Sonic Splendour put out by my comrade which was the one with recycled-paper. Impact Drill was your typical paper-zine focusing on international death metal and grind scene. I managed to put out three issue of which last one came out around summer 2007. I did actually put together another issue around 2011 however I totally lost the motivation and never printed it even though it was pretty much ready to go to the print. I guess I figured it wasn’t worth all the trouble after all. Back when I was in high-school or working full-time, putting out a ‘zine and doing the distro were all I could do with limited free time in hand but lately throwing parties and touring seemed a lot more fun.

I have a lot of respect for people who still make fanzines, whether it be on paper or online, and distributing obscure underground records and I do hope to start a new ‘zine as soon as I have the motivation.

You also used to run a small label assorted with a distro… Now I wonder if this is really over, because you released a grindcore and grindnoise compilation entitled “LOFI OR DIE” not so long ago… In 2012 this distro/ label might consists in selling recordings (Mostly your band’s music?) during gigs?

It was a lot of fun to run a distro til early 2000’s in Turkey but as soon as local folks stopped paying attention, it became pointless. I still enjoy putting out compilations though; with all the great new bands, it is hard not to do anyway! “Lo-fi or Die” was my attempt to pay tribute to 90’s-style compilation tapes with rehearsal recordings that helped me discover the underground grindcore scene back in the day like “Grind The Faces Of Rock Stars” and others. I will keep gathering new bands for more editions and in fact, the 2nd edition should be out soon featuring bands like ALCHEMY OF SICKNESS, CAMPHORA MONOBROMATA, FRUSTRAZIONE, MINDFUCK, PARALYZED SOCIETY, SKRUTA and more.

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S H R E D D I N G GRIND P O W E R

You’re a big fan of grindcore, on the “core” side of things, it’s not a surprise. So I’d like to have your feelings and opinion about the current health of the metal scene, and especially the genres that take quite some importance in today’s deep underground: Old school/ retro death metal, ultra brutal death and affiliates, 80’s heavy metal, thrash/ speed metal… It seems the 80’s are back for quite a lot of peoples, or at least it’s in the way…

Yeah, apparently human beings’ music preferences have a certain cycle which gets back to the starting point in every 20 years or so. From what I see, brutal death metal trend is already over and old school death metal is on the rise more or less since that book came out; 80’s classic heavy/thrash metal also seem to be doing fine and grindcore scene is growing rapidly as well.

People seem to need at least one badass new band to come out of blue and slap them in the face so as to get exited again. I guess it was REPUGNANT who did that for death metal and probably INSECT WARFARE for grindcore.

I personally pay little to no attention to how much a new band is being appreciated though, since you don’t need bigger labels’ expertise to figure out if a certain band is badass or not and whoever does that is gonna miss a good deal of great bands that are out there and kicking ass.

In your humble grinding opinion, what could please fans of old school Death metal and brutal death in your music? What could you tell them to try and convince their hears to remain opened once you pushed the “play button”?

Grindcore, or at least the type of it that we look up to, appeal to a very small audience worldwide, so I kinda doubt that any death metal-only fan would appreciate our stuff more than any WARSORE 7”. That is why true grindcore scene will always remain small. On the other hand, you have other grindcore bands that lean towards more death metal direction, both style and image-wise, like NAPALM DEATH, ROTTEN SOUND etc… that can appeal to a lot more people, including the death metal fans. Not that there is anything wrong with that though.

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What were your favorite albums and demos for 2012? Which bands kicked you or impressed you the most on album, or during live conditions?

Oh, this will take a bit long, haha! 2012 has been a long year with so many great new records and shitload of vinyl re-presses. In fact, it felt so long that I don’t even remember what I’d been listening to in the first half of the year! So, despite the risk of failing to remember many rad releases, here is the list of some of the records I have been enjoying last four months of the year:

AMPUTEE 7″, VIOLENT RESTITUTION “s/t” 12″, ENGULFED MCD (local obscure death metal trio in the vein of INCANTATION), GELO/BAKA YORO Split LP, DEPHOSPHORUS LP, COLUMN OF HEAVEN LP, ARCHAGATHUS/CAMPHORA MONOBROMATA Split 7″, CELLGRAFT 7″, MINDFUCK/CONTROLLED EXISTENCE Split Tape, BESTHOVEN/GO FILTH GO Split 7″ (It is really amazing how this one-man ANTI-CIMEX army can still pull off good records after all these years! “The Shadow Of Fear” is already a classic in my book and Greece’s GO FILTH GO is a good match indeed!) and BLACK TEMPLE BELOW “s/t” CDR (Nasty sludge/doom! Think ABRUPTUM meets ELECTRIC WIZARD!) had quite many spins here lately.

Notable re-issues, collections etc… are FEAR OF GOD “s/t” 7″ (Picture vinyl with great packing!) and WARSORE “Violent Swing” D-CD (I didn’t even know about those two 7″s!). Stuff that obviously rule though I haven’t got yet include SIXBREWBANTHA LP, THE KILL CD (waiting for the vinyl version on To Live A Lie) and IL MALE LP. Still haven’t really listened to the PROPAGANDHI, either.

Some of the live highlights are ENGULFED (Istanbul), LAHAR (Brutal Assault Fest), SHAPES OF DESPAIR (Brutal Assault Fest), AGATHOCLES (Berlin), TOOLS OF THE TRADE (Praha), HUMAN ERROR (Budapest), THE AFTERNOON GENTLEMEN (Play Fast or Don’t Fest) and TONER LOW (Play Fast or Don’t Fest).

Also, I should state that there is a huge pile of grindcore records and tapes sitting here that I haven’t had the time to check out yet, so there might as well be some note-worthy stuff among them; and needless to say, I didn’t include many punkrock and radio-friendly stuff since it probably wouldn’t matter to anyone reading your webzine.

Tell us about the future projects of SAKATAT, what the listeners could expect in the future, and feel free to conclude with what you wish. Grinding greetings.

First off, thanks for the interview, G.! I have been a fan of Nihilistic Holocaust ever since it was on paper, it is truly great to be featured!

The tape version of our album should be out soon in addition to a 4-way split tape with live recordings from our last gig in Praha. Moreover, we will probably be re-pressing the vinyl version of the album since the first press seems to be almost gone. Last but not least, we will be playing our final gig before we split up in Istanbul on January 27th with AGATHOCLES, REPULSIONE and xKATExMOSHx. This is also our attempt to start an annual DIY grindcore meeting/fest in Türkiye. So, as of January 28th, we will be nothing but history.

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