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BACK
 RUDRA
A Blaze in the Far-Eastern Sky
By Nathan T. Birk
"We wish more bands did what we’re doing. This would add
more spice into the saturated metal scene, where at times we can’t
tell one band from the other. I sincerely believe that this could
be one of the ways metal could diversify and remain current."
And that way? Combining loping Eastern modalities with bewitching
blackthrash. It’s no surprise, then, that such a musically
foreign combo comes courtesy of Southeast Asia, and under the moniker
of Rudra. On the back of their third and latest album, Kurukshetra,
the Singaporean quartet have solidified an aesthetic that’s
all their own, and one that blossoms more bizarrely by once again
lyrically delving into the mysticism and philosophy of the Veda.
Oft-galloping to an off-kilter groove, dizzying in its construction,
manic in its execution, flat-out inspiring in its erudition: With
Kurukshetra, Rudra have managed to one-up their already high standards.
Better yet, investigating its creators proves equally intriguing.
"The title Kurukshetra is the name of a famous battlefield,"
says vocalist/bassist Kathir, "which finds prominence in the
famous Indian epic Mahabharata. In the middle of that epic, a symbolic
war takes place between two rival factions in Kurukshetra. The album
cover depicts this battlefront, featuring the crest flag of a chariot
and the armies arrayed for battle. This album was written with a
battlefield theme in mind, so we found the cover and the title perfect
for the album.
"It’s a name that we’ve coined for ourselves to distinguish
us from the hordes of metal bands out there," the frontman
continues, now explaining their "Vedic Metal" tag. "The
adjective ‘Vedic’ is derived from the word ‘Veda,’
which is one of the oldest known scriptures, and the Veda consists
of both mysticism and philosophy. We’re greatly inspired by
the philosophical purport of the Veda, and that’s been the
inspiration for all of Rudra’s lyrics. Hence, the need to make
a distinction seemed necessary for us to better describe what we’re
offering. Apart from that, we also have another reason to name our
music as such, and that’s the fusion of Indian traditional
melody structures in extreme metal.
"The Aryan Crusade took off from where we left off on the self-titled
debut," Kathir says about Kurukshetra’s sprawling predecessor.
"It was a much-matured effort and a little more aggressive
than the debut album, but Kurukshetra is shorter than The Aryan
Crusade with twice the intensity, both musically and lyrically.
And that was exactly how we wanted it to be. I guess we achieved
that, and we’re very satisfied with the way it turned out.
The lyrical expression, too, finds harmony with the intensity of
the music. Kannan [co-guitarist] kept reminding us that we’re
fighting a war throughout our songwriting sessions, and that helped
in maintaining the overall intensity of the album."
So, from Kathir’s perspective, what would he say the intended
"ingestion" of Kurukshetra is: mental, physical, or something
else entirely? Meaning, the music’s not solely about all-out
aggression, nor all about atmosphere, nor all about technical complexity,
and so on. Rather, it’s an amazing amalgam of all those elements,
and then something mysterious beyond such a sum…
"You’ve guessed that right," the songwriter confirms.
"In spite of the all-out aggression musically, there’s
an underlying philosophical drone in all of the songs—in fact,
all our albums have this philosophical drone in them, and it just
got stronger on Kurukshetra. This mysterious drone is the ancient
Vedic philosophy called Advaita, in Sanskrit, or Non-Dualism. This
has been the inspiration for all our lyrics since our first album—in
the grand vision of Advaita, the Self alone stands supreme. It’s
saddening to know how years of religious indoctrination has caused
a dent in the psyche of mankind. It’s made us weak and feeble,
and we’ve become slaves to irrational beliefs without even
analyzing its veracity. Rudra’s mission is to purify fit minds
by pointing out the defects of this mental slavery and subvert the
erroneous notions about oneself. We may sound just like any other
occult, Satanic, or anti-religious metal band, but the difference
is that we’re not interested in revolutionizing the world at
large—we’re more interested in causing a revolution in
the subjective world that exists in our minds. The human mind is
our Kurukshetra! So, it’s only right to say that our music
should not only be appreciated by listening to it, but appreciating
it ‘mentally,’ too. Rudra is fundamentally a medium to
carry this ancient wisdom, which destroys the world of duality and
establishes the Self as the sole reality of the Universe. In our
absolute vision, there’s no place for Heaven, Hell, Evil, and
Good—even the Creator God is destroyed with mere reasoning!"
Being from a rather isolated place like Singapore, do you ever wonder
what Rudra’s fortunes would be like if you were from somewhere
else, say, Europe or the U.S.? The band would probably be drastically
different, then, too.
"I believe Rudra would’ve seen better success if we had
hailed from Europe or U.S.," Kathir says. "The opportunities
to tour and play more venues would’ve been there for us, and
we would’ve also been better exposed to the underground metal
circuits. But being stuck in a small island in Southeast Asia puts
us in a disadvantage of not having enough avenues to expose ourselves
to the bigger American and European markets. In hindsight, if we’d
been from the U.S. or Europe, I believe our musical direction would’ve
been much different from what it is right now due to the lack of
a dominant cultural influence, which we have readily available in
Singapore. The chances of us being a Vedic Metal band could’ve
been slim if we had hailed from other countries."
URL: http://rudra.audioreload.com
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