Hi there Bariel! It seems that Imperator has started writing another chapter of its story, You've already played a few gigs, including the  Merry Christless mini tour with Behemoth and  Black Silesia Open Air Festival IV, more and more shows are being announced... what's it like to be back on stage after so many years? Do you feel the same energy as in the old days? 

 

 

 

Hi. Definitely. You know, the Black Silesia show was just incredible, the audience was slightly different, more radical than at Merry Christless, as if some sort of natural selection took place. And it seems we did alright, people responded to us in a very positive way, not only during the show. It wasn't a concert in a fully packed club, as with Behemoth, but the reception and, so to say, the quality of those maniacs brought back the memories of our shows back in 92 or 93 (or even before that time) when that sort of people appeared at our gigs. Nothing was out of place. You will always see a poser here or there today, but at that festival everythinmg seemed just fine. And all those conversations with the bands from the old days – they were so uplifting. Take for example  the one with Don from Nunslaughter, who sent me their demo in their early days and he still remembered it. We had a couple of Imperator beers and chatted about this and that for a minute. In general, everyone had something good to say. 'Bariel, it was a really fucking awesome show!' We're highly motivated to face what's ahead of us, to carefully plan our next steps. By the way, the whole festival was great, really well organized, kudos to Michał Sabatowski!

 

You had a chance to share the stage with Tormentor, a band which, just like you, came back just recently after a really long hiatus...

 

True, and here's a fun fact. We were just in the middle of our soundcheck, when the guys from Tormentor arrived. One of them came to me and said they were really happy to play on the same day with us. We talked for a while, I gave him my band's T-shirt. He offered me Tormentor's and told me a story when, back at some festival in Sweden, during a heavy rain, Fenriz, yes, that Fenriz, gave him his Imperator T-shirt he was wearing at that moment so he could change his wet one. And he remembered it. You know, a nice little thing, though I've no idea where they could've got out shirt in Sweden. I still have those postal receipts from the days when I'd send Imperator demos to guys like Fenriz, Vikernes or other people who were unknown at that time in return for their bands' tapes...

 

Let's go back a few decades, to the days when Imperator was taking its first steps. At the time when you started playing you must have been one the very first bands with such a brutal sound. How did people react to your music back then?

 

People's first reactions were, let's say, not that positive. We played our first show in one of Łódź's community centres. It was either 84 or 85, I can't remember exactly. I guess it was 85 and, if I remember correctly, it was the 'Railwayman' community centre. Some soldiers from a nearby military station were invited, probably to have a taste of some higher culture. They couldn't really grasp the meaning of our show, they booed us, giggled and did not cheer with delight (laughter). 

We didn't really care and just did our thing. But things like that would happen more often. Even before gigs, when we were trying to find a place to practise, those party appointed heads of community centres would first say, 'come on, guys, play something' and then only, 'hey, that's not the way to play, please, maybe come back next year.' We had to face difficulties like that all the time, including our first show at Jarocin Festival in 1986. We sent them a reh tape. Before that me and Tomek, the guy I started the band with, attended the festival in 1985 and we really wanted to play there one day. The next year we got a message saying that our recording was interesting, but they weren't really sure yet. And just before the event we still hadn't got a final answer – maybe the letter got lost somewhere, maybe someone at the post office stole it because they liked the stamp – who knows. But I had an idea: 'let's just go there and get on the stage no matter what! It might work, right?' (laughter).  We had plenty of gadgets at the time, most people had never seen such things before. You know, spike bands – I made one with 15 or 20 cm nails after I'd seen the one of Kerry King's – or a belt I'd bought in Reich, that is in East Germany - it was original, something completely unavailable in Poland. It had spikes as well. We came round to the back door of the small stage – I was carrying my guitar, Mefisto was holding his bass  The guy at the entrance asked for our band's name, but we were not on the list so he said he wouldn't let us pass. I asked him to check again and then the other guy standing there in the back said we looked like a band so we should go and play. And so we played, hah! People's reactions were really good, the music we played was completely different from everything else around that time, so we caught them by surprise. You could always listen to speed, thrash metal, but I knew what we had to offer was just something else. By the way, this story shows what things were like at that time, how everything worked. I'm glad I could be part of it, experience it all...

 

Do you remember any other interesting stories from those days?

 

Let's take for instance the show we went to without our drummer – I think it was 1987 in Piła. Tomek, AKA Adrian, didn't make it to the train station. We had no idea what had happened to him, why he didn't come and, more importantly, what to do about it. We were supposed to headline that show and it would really suck if we didn't play. There was another band going with us there on the same train, Forst, so I asked their drummer if he could play fast and if he would sit behind the kit. 

He wasn't really enthusiastic about it, he said he didn't know our songs and things like that. So I told him, 'Listen, I'll just give you signs, for one you hit the snare and the kick as fast as you can, after another you just slow down.' This way we played for about forty minutes and everybody was happy. Yeah, you could pull thing like that back then. But it wasn't the last time a drummer failed us. We were supposed to play at Thrash Camp in Rogoźno. We were all there, we even managed to do a soundcheck. I think so, I can't fucking remember for sure. There were plenty of people, some of them had already seen us in the back so they would shout 'Imperator! Imperator!' while other bands were playing. And then Marek Gaszyński, the concert's backer of some sort, a guy from the Polish Radio, asked us if we were ready to play. So I told him we weren't ready yet as our drummer had run into the woods. 'The woods? What do you mean?', he asked. But it really happened. Moloch disappeared into the woods, do you get it? While breaking it to the audience I tried to be more subtle about the whole situation, I said something about a technical problem. We obviously parted our ways with Moloch after that. Both Piła and Rogoźno were obstacles of the sort after which you have to start things from scratch. I had to look for another drummer and, again, it wasn't the last time!

 

It seems safe to say that today the metal scene is suffering from some kind of overload. There are so many bands, every local club will offer you a small gig a few nights every week, let alone all those international tours visiting and later revisiting almost every corner of the globe. We've got fewer people coming to the shows of even the most accomplished bands. What was it like back in the 80's, when there weren't so many gigs to go to?

 

Yeah, something strange is going on, right? I remember coming to Sodom gig some time ago, they were touring with Assassin then, a band I was actually more interested in than Sodom itself. I really wanted to see Gonella and co. as I used to listen to their demos over and over again – I liked these recordings much more than 'The Upcoming Terror'. There were like 200 people there and I think it all happened about ten years ago. Back in the days when we started playing, that is fifteen or twenty years before, those bands would play for a huge crowd. And today, let's take Warsaw or Łódź as those 'circles' are especially close to me, every now and then there's something going on. It's a totally different reality now. When we went out to the people with our first shows after the reformation I didn't know what to expect. But people shouted 'Imperator!' again, it was nice. But even ten years ago I noticed those experts standing right in front of the stage, with their arms folded, their legs slightly apart, their heads held high, just judging. In the past there was just mosh, stagedive, slamdance, pure energy. It's different now, but if you can't change something, you just have to accept it, maybe even like it – that part might be hard though. 

 

I suppose many things have changed in those over thirty years since you started – the stage equipment that is now available, sound engineers or music instrument lessons – they are all available on a daily basis. But back then you could only dream of such support as musicians, am I right? What was it like in those days?

 

As for the availability of instruments and other equipment, now it's way easier than it used to be, no doubt about that. I don't want to sound like a martyr of the old days, I really loved doing what I did and I did it the only way possible. If  I had to go from Łódź to Gdańsk to buy new strings, I would just get on a train and visit Presto shop, as there was no other place closer to Łódź that would offer strings you could actually play with. Also, I knew some guys there and I had a really good friend living in Gdańsk, a real maniac. So I'd go there, having something to look forward to as well. But on a daily basis I'd use spirits, cotton wool and clean the stirngs to make them last for as long as possible. Shall I continue? In order to get my first distortion and a professional cable I had to go to West Berlin and that itself was not that easy. The border, body search – just ridiculous. It was a constant fight. There were no instruments available in Poland. We didn't expect much really, just something with strings not that far from the neck. I first used a simple distortion I'd bought from a craftsman in Łódź, on Przybyszewski St. I think. We wanted to have even the simplest amplifiers – no one would even dream of Marshal or Messa back then. I bought that first distortion in the 90's – using it was absolutely overwhelming. Today you just enter the store, you can try everything out, it's great. But I'm honestly glad I could experience it all back in the 80's, you can't just repeat that. You know, you could make a simulation of some sort, like take your aunt's guitar and lock yourself in a shed somewhere in the mountains, but what would be the point? It was hard back then, we didn't have instruments to play, a place to play, but I had this idea to play that one way, not any other, although my first songs were actually more like...  AC/DC. But it lasted only a few weeks, months maybe, until I heard 'Headhunter', an album by Krokus,  played with double kick, and that was it. Then Metallica and Slayer came, you know. I knew we had to play fast, I still think so... (laughter).

 

But you were all self-taught musicians, weren't you?

 

Sure we were! Well, I have to say I did have a few classical guitar lessons at some community centre. I  played 'We're Going on a Hunt', with the use of notes, they even put me a special stool under my foot, but it didn't seem like my thing really. So I tried to work things out myself. But what you might find surprising is the fact that, later on, some guitarists would come to take lessons from me. People like Valdi Moder, who'd later become our 'Polish Satriani'. I myself have never been attracted to virtuoso style of playing, I've always been interested in rhythms, pace changes, syncopes etc. I learnt to play while practising Imperator songs and I guess there are no other songs I could play better (laughter). We used to play some cover songs, but we stopped that. Now I think playing someone else's songs is lame and you should do that only when you don't have enough of your own material. But, of course, I've nothing against anyone doing that. As I've said, we've been there ourselves. By the way, here's a funny story. We used to play 'Circle of the Tyrants' live back then and one time, after our show, some guy came up to me and said, 'Hey, Bariel, how's it possible that Obituary played your song live?'

 

Right, they put this song on their 'Cause of Death' and it was hard to get a copy with any credits back then. 

 

Exactly. And here's another one. Some time ago Richter, our current drummer, before he joined Imperator, wrote to me after we'd met at the premiere of Imperator's first beer and asked for the lyrics of 'Święta Wojna', our song, as he wanted to cover it with his band from that time – Bestiality. I sent him the words, they recorded the song and then there was this moment when I was holding Bestiality's record in my hands, with my song on the tracklist but without any notice that it was written by Imperator. But then Richter said, 'Bariel, everybody knows it's your song.' You know, total chill, I just found it funny. But on another occasion, on the other hand, there was this guy, about twenty-five, at Black Silesia Festival, who came to me and said he'd found our name reading somewhere about the beer premiere. He'd never heard us before but he was going to check us out. So you see, in a way we're starting from scratch, we have to win a new audience. Step by step, or soul by soul, we have to grab those new maniacs and drag them to our side. 

 

We know how common people used to react to your music. But what about the authorities? We can clearly see how they react now, with their voters accordingly.  

 

As I've mentioned before, playing then was a constant fight, one with the system as well. Most people have heard the story about me having to explain myself because of some of our lyrics. It went like 'One day, when the Beast rises from the underground...' You know, back then all the song lyrics had to be checked by a censor before you were allowed to play anywhere. So one time a censor asked me, 'Young man, are you singing here about Solidarity?' 'No, Satan.', I said. 'OK then, no problem, you can play.' It was somewhere in Łódź, I still remember the colour of that guy's tie. People in the street – they didn't know what it was all about. Seeing our inverted crosses they might have thought it was just an ill-formed Black Sabbath motif. If they new Black Sabbath of course. Besides, Church stood in opposition to the authorities, so all those censors, hearing it's Satan, not Solidarity, were quite content. 

 

There are plenty of ways to reach people with your music, although with the aforementioned scene overload it's easy to get lost in the crowd. How did you manage to break through so quickly in the days of pioneer tape trading? What was your recipe for becoming a legend?

 

People didn't get our music and the'd repeat over and over again, 'That's not the way to play.' You need to remember that back then most metalheads were really hungry for an alternative to the communist dullness. And that's when Imperator appeared. As our music seemed quite extreme for those times, we kind of jumped really high up on this 'underground' career ladder, despite our rather poor musical skills. I've never claimed we were great musicians. But we played very fast and that made us completely different from everything else available on the market. 'It's fucking violent', people would say (laughter). And that made us stand out. We attracted people in the days when fanzines, tapes or records were really hard to come by. We were just this weird band from Łódź, offering weird, but also, as it later turned out, intriguing music...

Tape trading, right. I think I was one of the first tape traders in Poland. I started writing with bands from the Western Europe pretty early, I used to get plenty of stuff from them. For about two years of my high school  people would come to so called Monday afternoon meetings at my place – whole crews from around Poland would visit me to read some fanzines, copy some tapes. I never set those meetings, it just kind of happened and became a regular thing. It seemed cool at the start, but at some point I had to find a way to discourage people from coming. So, instead of metal fanzines I started displaying some farming magazines I bought especially for this purpose, telling people that was the stuff I got interested in. It finally worked (laughter). Yeah, that's why I had all those farming magazines like 'Tractor' or 'Polish Farmer'. Even now, when me or other band members think something is lame, crass or just poser-like, we just say it's agrarian. But getting back to the topic, you have to remember that the flow of information was as it was, and we all did what we could. All our three demos were made kind of by accident, because an opportunity appeared. Do you get it? Because there just seemed to be an occasion! 

One time I bought a chrome tape in Pewex, it was 1986 and I paid a small fortune for it. I had to work for that tape for three day0s, doing hard chores at some greenhouses in Łódź. I decided to save this tape for an emergency. And it so happened that we wanted to play at some big event. We went to some auditions in Silesian region. They were auditioning for Metalmania 87 at that time. Someone there recorded four songs that we performed during the time they gave us. And that was our first demo. It all happened in Chorzów, in Leśniczówka (Forester's Lodge), where Dżem used to have their rehearsals. We took that tape to our friend in Bielsko-Biała, his name was Krzysztof, AKA 'Cerber'. He was another tape trader from the old days and had even better connections than me at the time. Later it turned out that after he'd heard it he spent the whole night copying that tape. He made about twenty copies and then sent them out. People from abroad couldn't believe it was stuff from Poland, from behind the Iron Curtain. And that's how it all started...

 

A few of your concerts have become part of Polish metal history, like that Jarocin show in 1986,  Białystok in 87, Pruszcz Gdański and their Drrrama in 87 or, last but not least, Ciechanów - S'thrash'ydło 91. Do you remember any other big ones?

 

As for Drrrama festivals, 'cause if I remember correctly, we played two of them, we recorded our second demo during the one in 87 – 'Deathlive'. There was an occasion, you get it, right? And we couldn't just let it go past. I also remember that during one of those two editions some football hooligans marched in and started smashing things up while we were playing. That whole fight is on tape, I've got it on a VHS somewhere, along with some songs that we played. What else, we played once with Dezerter at Hybrydy club in Warsaw. Mefisto got there on the last train and he told us he managed to get an 'E' category at a military service recruitment examination, and he didn't have to join the army. A deserter! (laughter). I think we celebrated that fact for two days. You know, it was a big thing because I was already at university so I was safe from the military service, I think he got his 'E' category in not the most honest way, and it was awesome, as being enrolled just destroyed about ninety percent of bands in the 80's. There was another cool show in Opole – even guys from TSA came up to congratulate us after our set. We had a friend in Łódź, Zielony, who'd travel with us to our shows but on that day he didn't make it to the train station. We were in the middle of our set when we saw him elbowing though the crowd, holding a bottle of Scotch and proving he'd finally arrived. We partied our asses off that night, it was awesome. When I finally got home, my mother  met me at the doorstep and asked why Marek Niedźwiecki warned people on the radio not to invite Imperator to play concerts as there would be damage at hotels. I think there was indeed time when there was a lot happening after the gigs. There was also a mini tour with Deicide, we played with Cannibal Corpse in Bydgoszcz, no one actually knew them round here at that time. Not long ago Mittloff, former Hate's drummer who's now in Riverside, refreshed my memory quite a lot while talking about old Imperator days. It was for an interview he gave for a documentary that's being made about my return. He reminded me of that one time when people walked out of the church in Częstochowa and followed me, but also why they did so and what consequences there were. Cute. There was Malbork, where we lock a whole sightseeing group from Japan in the dungeons – me and Mefisto were the most active ones after shows. We played a lot of tricks (laughter). Once, after a show with Acid Drinkers, in Bielsk I think, we plus Ślimak, their drummer, ended up at a dance in Rokendrolka club, wearing boxer shorts only. I also remember when we used their equipment in Jarocin in 1993. That was a very violent event. During our set I had to calm down that totally wild crowd  saying that if they didn't cool down, we'd stop playing. There was plenty of damage, completely uncalled for. Later on, after Mefisto and Carol left for home I stayed there with Muniek Staszczyk and Paweł Kukiz, we drank Lech beers all night because, despite prohibition, as musicians we were given some drinks. Quite a lot actually. Yeah, the 80's and the early 90's were totally crazy...

 

Which of your concerts would you consider the biggest breakthrough for the band?

 

Actually, since that show in Jarocin in 1986 we seemed to have, let's say, a safe position in the underground. Every show we played between 89 and 93 attracted huge audiences and each of them made that position even stronger. It was natural for us to spend at least an hour talking to maniacs and giving autographs after each gig. We sometimes took pictures with our fans, but  not many of them had cameras, plus collecting pictures was quite expensive at that time. It's hard to think of some turning points in our concert history, but there was one gig that really helped us realise how serious thing we'd become in the underground. We had a tour with Kat when it turned out that after our set people would still scream 'Imperator!' and many of them would walk out to chat with us. As Carol said, Kat's manager didn't like that. So we didn't continue the tour. Good years. Things were going well, but there were still some obstacles. Dziuba from Metal Mind didn't seem to like us and it was difficult to play at his shows – OK, we managed to play a few gigs with Deicide. Anyhow, each of these shows left a positive imprint. Was there a show we fucked up? Yeah, we didn't go to Strzegom because of me – I missed the train. And there, at the venue, was an agent waiting for us to sign a contract for a show in Moscow.  Slashing Death and Vader went there, I think... We didn't get to Strzegom (I'm sure I didn't) and, in consequence, we didn't go to Mocsow. Mea culpa. But besides that one thing every show was a solid one. We had some difficulties, true, like one time with Kat I didn't play guitar because of my arm injury, I just did the vocals. But it didn't matter,  we nailed it each time and had great reception. 

 

1988 witnessed an absolutely spectacular and unprecedented phenomenon – you composed and performed live music for about 60 theatrical performances of 'Dracula', starting in Łódź. How did it come to that? 

 

I think it was late 1987 when it turned out that Mefisto's girlfriend's father,  Zdzisław Jaskuła, was the literary director of Studio Theatre in Łódź. That's how our long term relation started. I remember spending the 1987 New Year's Eve at the theatre. I guess we left a mark on that 'society', we heard anecdotes for years (laughter). We met plenty of new people and, as a consequence, we entered that clique. Ździsław's wife,  Sława Lisiecka, was (and still is, Żdzisław, sadly, has passed away) a German literature translator. Many people used to come to their (kind of open) house. They were often  representatives of so called higher culture. They organised meetings with people connected with the National Film School in Łódź, poets, politically uncomfortable artists, dissidents etc. Our visits at Ździsław and Sława's place were really important to us. We would hang out there for hours, sometimes days. It lasted for a few years. I lived five minutes from them, on the other side of Piotrowska Street. I still remember those evenings when we talked or played bridge. I was still in high school but suddenly I would bet with Andrzej Wajda for a bottle of vodka – it was all so incredible. It was the middle of PRL and out of the sudden you can get out of this surrounding mediocrity with a blast. Not every high school student could mingle with people of that sort. But I think we also had something to offer to those people, we played in a 'satanic' band and some of them didn't really know how to grasp it. One day we met Merek Rakowiecki, a director – it either happened at Ździsław's place on Wschodnia St. or at the theatre. He asked if we'd like to make music for his 'Dracula” interpretation. Me and the guys eventually made those songs! We added some pinch harmonics, some bridge work, 'audio interpretations of blood transfusion and other incredible things, you name it – it was all there. We got some advance payment and six months to complete our work. We composed all the music in about two weeks before the deadline as we'd been awfully busy with consuming that payment (laughter). The premiere was a huge success, then we performed the whole 1988/89 season live during the theatrical performances. It was an amazing experience. We worked like a regular crew at the theatre – first the were six months of preparations, with two rehearsals each day, 8 hours in total. We had to remember the whole show, line by line, to know exactly when to play each part, be it guitar, drums or howling like a wolf – that was actually my part, as only I seemed to know how to do it. When the people at the theatre found out I had planned to leave to East Germany for one week, they got so stressed about it they scheduled a recording session in the Polish Radio recording studio in Bydgoszcz, 'cause there was no one else to do the howling in my absence! Mefisto tried it, but it didn't really work, Carol just didn't even want to try. We recorded everything, the whole music, at that studio, but the tape eventually disappeared – I don't hold it in my possession, not for now at least. The performances were really successful, whole crews from around the country came to see them. Sometimes one or two of the performers – and there were only big names among them, I see those people now on covers of glossy magazines, on TV or staring in films or plays – they couldn't put up with the atypical reception of those unusual members of the audience. Professor Niemirowski from the National Film School in Łódź, who played the role of Van Helsing, stopped the performance a few times. He'd say, 'Mr. Bariel, please escort your men out of the room.' then I'd say, 'Come on, people, pull yourselves together, don't be an embarrassment.' Everyone had to keep up appearances (laughter). It was fun, always after the performance we played one of our songs, or a cover like Venom's Black Metal’ or Kreator's Tormentor’. After around eight years I was approached  again by Żdzisław Jaskuła  and offered to make music for his 'Faust' in The New Theatre (Jaskuła wa then, if I remember correctly, its director). I turned him down as I had already stopped playing. Anyways, Jaskuła came to  S'thrash'ydło festival and I think we partied a bit along with Samael, or some other band, I can't remember clearly. But I do remember that on our way back with Mefisto in Zdzisław's Audi, Mefisto's 'coffin' (bass case) occupied half of the car's space (laughter).

The 'Bariel Demo' from 87 has finally been released officially. Although it's been available via  streaming for years, this is the first time you can put a physical copy on your shelf. Tell us something about the origin of this recording. 

 

Well, it's something I might have done just for fun and it came to being completely by accident – that's for sure. I never really wanted to release it, but Leszek (from Oldschool Metal Maniac) convinced me it's actually worth releasing as it is still some bit of history. 'OK, Lechu, go ahead, I have full trust in you.', I thought. It all happened like this: I was hanging out at one dude's place (Jacek – he used to record something with Kazik Staszewski) and that guy had a Telecaster guitar with DS-1 Boss distortion – it was 1987, I'd never seen things like that before. Or maybe I had but I'd never actually held them in my hands. He also had some sort of 4-track recorder, with a delay and reverb effects included. You could even plug a mic to it. I just sat there, either in his kitchen or living room, and asked if I could record something. There was also a drum machine the guy had control of. And again I'd just nod to him, like to that Forst drummer at that crazy gig, to make the drum beat go fast or slow, and I recorded guitar parts and vocals to these drum parts in one take. And that's how this so called 'Bariel 87' demo was created. It was never done officially, it just leaked into the Internet somehow. I'll just say that at that time the possibility of using such amazing equipment and being able to play and record with a drum machine were just amazing, I was really excited. I think I might have sent that tape to someone in Mayhem or maybe to  Metalion from  Slayer Mag saying, 'Dude, check this out, isn't it just ridiculously awesome?'. Maybe that's how it spread... treat it only as a curiosity, nothing more. But maybe it's worth something from a, let's say, 'historical' point of view. 

 

Comparing the metal scene from the old days with the one we have today, what seems to you the most positive change? Or is there something you really miss from those years?

 

A positive thing? It really  seems that Poland has a very strong metal scene. I'm glad bands like  Vader, Decapitated, Behemoth or Hate have left an imprint on the whole world. These crews have been around all the time, we stopped at some point.It's impossible to say where we'd be if not that decision of mine over twenty years ago to put things on a halt, or to an end – maybe we'd be in the middle of a world tour, who knows. But I've never regreted things went the way they did – thanks to that I could take part in an experiment of returning to the scene after over two decades (laughter). After so many years, when I'm finally back I can see how far Poland has gone in that matter and I pay my respects to those bands. Another great thing is that today you can easily buy instruments, sign a fair contract and go play outside Poland. The problems of today are far different from those of the past. Back then there was no equipment, let alone places to play rehearsals - now you've got all those things, but at the same time there is this overload already  mentioned, a crowd of bands you have to push your way through. But then I think that if we managed to get somewhere with this slightly different sound of ours back then, those new bands which have something interesting to offer should also be able to succeed, provided they will put their hearts in it. And that's what I wish for them. Do I miss anything from the old days? Maybe people coming up to you and just robbing you off of your band shirt, leather jacket, pins and even jeans! (laughter). Because people don't do that anymore, do they? Just kidding. But seriously, I miss the crowds at gigs, that craving and madness in people. But, again, there are so many events now. For instance, when we played along with Tormentor at Black Silesia Festival, there was Venom Inc. playing somewhere near at the same time. And that happens almost every weekend. There are gigs all the time. But we can't do anything about it, can we? Back in the days you really had to wait for a concert, you counted months,  weeks, and finally days and hours even, but that will never come back I think. Yet, on the other hand, with all due respect to events like Merry Christless that gave us a great new start after all those years, there are some of those micro festivals that help you experience that atmosphere from the 80's or early 90's again. Thanks to those die hard gigs or festivals we still have that sense of what used to be so common back then. Who knows, maybe one day more people will start coming to those events. Because once in a while the cycle ends and a new one begins... Maybe some day when Imperator has toured the world a bit, I'll give you a different answer to that question (laughter). Thanks for the interview, till next time! 

Bariel.

 

Thanks and cheers Bariel!

 

Cheers.

 

Radosław Grygiel