I have the impression that bands from Varna play Sofia shows less often than before so I use this chance to catch up to events by asking the man/scene of Bulgaria’s seaside capital Joro (Crowfish/A-Moral) what I can think of. And he answers!
- What’s up with Crowfish lately?
- We gave ourselves somewhat of a break. We’re playing Sofia now for maybe the first time in like half a year. Other than that we do have some future plans – we write new songs, there is going to be a new album, but it is not exactly clear when it is going to be ready yet. Most likely it will be done sometime next year. Now, at this show, we aren’t going to play any new songs because the idea of the Way Fest is to play old songs. Probably next year when the album is out we will also make a big European tour. But for now we’re having a much needed rest. The situation for playing in cities is quite bad right now, not only in Bulgaria but everywhere.
- OK, and what about A-Moral?
- We have an absolutely ready second album. We will enter the studio to record it most likely in the next month and we expect it to be out by the beginning of the next year. It is going to be titled “Life on Credit” because everyone right now is living on a loan after all. It will include 11 tracks.
- Crowfish’s drummer Bojo also plays with G.O.T.C. – what happened with this band?
- I don’t know really. They haven’t played in a while. They do have new songs but I don’t know when they are going to record them or release anything.
- After the club Area 51 in Varna vas closed where do bands from the city play now?
- There are a few places. One of them is the so called Seaside Casino. It is somewhat contradictionary. As a position in the city it is almost perfect, but when it comes down to sound there are a lot of problems. It is this big hall and the acoustics aren’t that great. There is also this smaller club called Usmivka (smile) where we do shows as well. But as a whole the situation is really hard after they closed our club down. The city administration tried to save itself trouble and work by doing this. We had asked numerous times for a police car to be sent in front of the place when there were concerts. After all when there is police present there are no problems. But they never sent one, probably because they had better stuff to do. And there is always these people who would call the police if there is a crowd gathered in front of the club, no matter if there is actually trouble or not. And in the end it turned out that it would be easier for some people to just close down the club. And actually we are in no way responsible for what is going on the street. The police should take care of things there.
- Besides the club, there was also the label named Area 51. Does it still function?
- Yes, even though we have hardly put out anything new in quite a lot of time. We will have to think about that. I think the last thing we released was Cold Breath’s album. Now they are recording a new one so it is most likely going to be our next release.
Halfway through the set Chavdar starts wondering whether he turned off the oven before he left home or not...
- Most of the bands in Varna – Crowfish, Indignity, Outrage and the likes… have been together for quite a while now and even newer projects like A-Moral and G.O.T.C. are basically the same people with different roles. Where is the new guard?
- There are a few young bands, but for them the problem with the lack of a place to play at is very serious. After all the biggest stimulus for a young band is to perform live and present itself to people. And this is just not happening. This is the reason many of the bands gave up. There is no places to play live at, it is hard even to find a rehearsal place, and then the city authorities hardly do anything about it – it is actually the opposite by trying to silence that kind of happenings and shows. The situation is really bad. We try to do all we can but it is hard.
- To what extent is the mayor Kiril Yordanov responsible for that? After all A-Moral have a song about him – “Mayor-Idiot”, and as far as I know it is you who writes the lyrics…
- Kiril Yordanov isn’t directly responsible but after all this is the policy of the whole city. They do not tolerate such rock events and concerts. There also a lot of other things. The city is a nightmare for drivers, there are no parking spaces – everyone parks everywhere, on sidewalks… and the city authorities doesn’t do anything about it. All they do is sell municipal properties. This is not politics in favor of the people but rather in favor of some businessmen. All the construction sites in the city, all the companies ruin the streets and the leave the Municipality to take care of the situation and this is done with the mayor’s knowledge. And then it is us, the taxpayers, who pay for the repair works. I do not think he deserves to be mayor. And this is why we have pointed our anger to him. He is serving his third consecutive mandate but his election is sort of relative. I guess most people just don’t think. This is the main problem not only in Varna but in the whole country. We have had the same government for 30 years, or even 70 years. Only faces in government change but the main driving forces behind it remain. And people vote just out of habit. The mayor does some surface stuff like painting a few zebra crossings and people are like “look, he really does do something for the city”. But then problems like the lack of bike lanes remain.
Crowfish bathe in blue light. Well, it is better than chicken blood...
- Years ago the hardcore scene in Bulgaria seemed more united. I guess you remember how Vendetta used to sing “from Sofia to Varna as one we stand” and then they changed the lyrics to just “as one we stand”… now the scene doesn’t seen as united. What changed?
- Times were different. There weren’t that many shows and people weren’t that alienated back then. Not the principle of globalization is active at full force. People get alienated, everyone stays at home, they try not to go out as much, they go only to work, buy some stuff and head back home. And that is it. This makes people easy to manipulate. It is the world tendency, it is not limited only to Bulgaria. You can see less and less people going to shows. This is one of the reasons. People have become apathetic to everything. It is not like 10 years ago – people were more energetic, they travelled around. Now the young ones don’t care at all.
- You know, some might say you think so only due to nostalgia…
- No. This is not something only I think and not something limited only to music. It is the same in every other sphere. It is the so called World Government. The moment when this thing will be a reality draws near. This crisis and all the bank bankruptcies is no coincidence – all the money and property has to be concentrated within a group of a few people. This is the whole idea of the crisis. And this is it – people’s routine’s have been getting tighter and tighter and in the end they have no time to think for shows and all kinds of entertainment. This is not so clearly sensible now but it will be obvious in some ten to 15 years.
- Isn’t it the exact opposite – people becoming easier to manipulate when they waste their energy on entertainment instead of focusing on real issues?
- This is the exact idea – to make people unable to think why things end up that way. To make the apathetic. And in the end everyone will be ruled by a single corporation that would decide everything. This is the goal of this whole globalization thing and it is fully in motion as we speak.
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