Interview: Flat Earth Society

Recently DutchMetalManiac’s Tim van Velthuysen reviewed Flat Earth Society’s debut full-length, titled Friends are temporary, Ego is forever, here. Now, he also did an interview with them.

Hey, how are you holding up under these strange circumstances of the corona-virus?

We’re doing relatively fine considering the lockdown we’re suffering in Spain right now. However, isolation isn’t that bad when you’re a nerd and play videogames a lot (you’re already kind of used to that lifestyle anyway).
Stay home folks, don’t risk your health or other people’s.

First of all, what’s the reason you chose Flat Earth Society as your bandname?

A band’s name is an important presentation letter. We take life with lots of sense of humor and we think that a group of people that takes the Flat Earth model seriously is something that stupid that we can’t avoid using it. Our image, lyrics and videos are as stupid as the whole idea is. 

What do you think of people who think the earth is flat, and especially the ones thinking you do so too?

We live in a society.

The people who think the Earth is flat have been deceived or are idiots. But people that see our videos and tell us “you retards, the Earth is not flat!” scare us a lot more than those. If you can’t see the irony and humor behind our videos and lyrics you probably know that the Earth is not flat, but you’ve got worse problems. 

Is there something you want to say to those people?

Guys, we travel through space on the back of a giant turtle with 4 elephants that share the weight of Earth. Don’t let anyone try to change your minds, because it sounds like the smartest idea in the whole universe. 

On February the 21st you released your debut album, titled Friends are temporary, Ego is forever. Congratulations with that. I really like it. How does it feel to have your debut album released?

It feels amazing, especially considering the fact that its original release was expected to be early 2019. In the end it’s the culmination of almost two years of work between finally setting up the band and getting to studio. 

In 2018 you already released a standalone single, titled The Cataract. What’s the reason you didn’t include this on the debut album?

We recorded The Cataract in a different studio than the rest of the album. The first plan was to record the whole album in there, but then we had the chance to record on The Metal Factory, and that’s a pretty big leap. If you listen to The Cataract and the rest of our songs, there’s a huge sound difference. We talked about using our first single as a bonus track, but that finally never happened. 

What did your friends think about the new album title?

They all seem to like it a lot so far, so we’re really spoiled in that aspect. A lot of the reviews we’ve been receiving have been really positive as well, so we’re happy with its reception. 

You released it via Art Gates Records, what makes them the best record label for Flat Earth Society at this moment?

We already had contact with them due to a friend who collaborated in the past with Noctem and AGR, so he recommended us. We showed them part of our music and the general idea around the project and the album. They liked it and we moved forward with it. 

Everything was going smooth until the recent crisis.

Working with them has been an enormous learning experience regarding how things are done the right way for a band who wants to reach faraway places.

Now we have to wait until things get better and see how we can resume our course.

I also really like the album cover, which is made by Iñigo Arr. What made him the best person for this job?

He’s a friend of ours and we’ve already worked with him previously for The Cataract art piece so it only made sense to have him be the drawing hand behind such work.

I think the album is quite strong, especially for a debut. Do you think you will surpass this in the future and if so, how are you going to manage that?

We’ve already talked about this internally. We tried to look at our work critically and thought that at some points it lacked a bit of ambience and breathing room in between, so that’s something we definitely want to work on going forward from here. 

We already have some compositions done and are looking at our next album with more preparation and time, so it will almost certainly be better rounded up. 

What’s with the Spanglish on your social media?

It all started as an internal meme between us but then we started doing it with our friends because it just was too hard not to. We took it to our socials as well because most of our friends follow us there as well. Some people like it and some find it silly, but the whole point of this project is to have fun and laugh some while at it.

Can we expect some Flat Earth Society shows as soon as the Corona virus measures are less tight? Maybe coming to The Netherlands?

We had to cancel everything we had prepared but we hope we can return to the stages both in and out of Spain as soon as it is logistically possible. 

Thanks for your answers. Is there anything you want to say to our readers?

Thank you everyone for reading this and hopefully listening to our work. Thanks to DutchMetalManiac for the kind review and taking the time to interview us.

Please stay home and stay safe.

We will see you all on stage soon.

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