Secret Rule was founded in Italy, in 2013, and makes modern Metal, mixing heavy and melodic riffs, incursions of symphonic and electronic elements, combined with Angela Di Vicenzo's vocals, have built a strong musical identity. (Versão em português)
The band also has a well elaborated planning, which allows it to release practically one album per year, despite all the difficulties of the current market, and earlier this year released "Against", via Pride & Joy Music.
The world pandemic, in which the area of concerts and entertainment was greatly affected, changed a little and postponed some plans. But Secret Rule did not stop, and in this time of isolation and quarantine, they continued to plan and publicize their work, including even releasing another album! "Quarantine Sessions - The Other Side of Us", with versions of songs by artists that the members like.
We have talked with Angela Di Vicenzo, who told us a little more about the new albums, the way the band works, taking care of various details in addition to composition and production, such as, promotional photos, social media, booking and etc., also commented on the music market, and of course, how was this pandemic period in Italy, a country that was hit hard, and measures such as a Lock Down were necessary. Check it out below:
RtM: Talking about the most recent work,
"Against", with each album the band shows news, what are the main
changes in against for the others? I personally felt that more weight was put
into the songs, keyboards are also more present.
Angela Di Vicenzo: Hi Carlos, yes, "Against" is the
natural evolution of our sound. Surely, it's a bit more heavy and aggressive
and there are more industrial sounds on this one. The real news is that we took
care of the whole production of this CD by ourselves. We thought, wrote,
recorded, mixed, and mastered everything by ourselves. We created the graphics,
prepared the photos, every little detail was handled by us. It was a great
challenge, but now we are fully satisfied with it.
RtM: The first single was "Purgatory",
which also won a video. Comment more about this song and why you chose it for
the first single?
Angela: We wanted something different. Often
in recent years, people to describe our sound put us near symphonic metal. We
found it a bit limiting, surely there are a lot of symphonic atmospheres in our
music, but not only those. The riffing is more aggressive and totally different
from symphonic bands, we use a lot of electronic loops and industrial
sounds...these are not exactly what you find in symphonic music. So, Purgatory was the right song to mark that
something had changed. This message was mostly for other people, not for us...because
we just continue to make music as we have always done.
 |
| "Today, a band before being a band must be an expert social media manager, an expert music manager, an expert promoter, and a booker then you can be a musician." |
Angela: Against is one of my favorite ones
too. The new album started from that song and concept, in fact, it's also the
album title. I suffer this world, this society. I can't understand how it’s
possible to see so much violence, racism and injustice, and how everything is
always guided by money and power. Getting back to the matter of the
manipulation of society, everything is filtered through all media forms and
worse still through the social networks. So this song is my scream inviting people
to be stronger so they can face this life every day and fight for freedom.
Deep Solitude is about the
difficulty we have in understanding our feelings. Because of this, we often end
up hurting the people we love most. We're complicated. So often we fall into
our solitude, misunderstood, unable to form and maintain relationships, but our
silence is the loudest scream we have to ask for attention.
RtM: The label Change seems to have opened new
doors, the band having a better treatment, several videos, releasing albums
regularly, we even had a special limited edition of "Against". I
would like you to comment on this and the viability of the bands to continue
launching new albums, because they do not always get a return when they
self-finance, or do not have adequate support from a label.
Angela: Today, if you wanna be a musician
you have to come from a rich family! (laughs)
This is the reality of things.
Everything we do, we do by ourselves. As I said to you, we take care of
everything and we pay for everything. Labels today, they offer very little help
for distribution, nothing else.
For example, promotion on the
webzines and magazines is not so important these days, because in most
situations, the writers are very young people who work for free or for little
money, without a musical background, without a musical culture, and your album
ends up being reviewed by guys who are eighteen and who in a good number of
cases listen to a different musical genre from what you play. Fortunately,
there are also professional writers but it has become hard for them too to
work.
Today, a band before being a band
must be an expert social media manager, an expert music manager, an expert
promoter, and a booker then you can be a musician. The World is going in this
direction and those who are not prepared for this, will have a hard life.
We make one album per year because
we want to do it. With or without a label. In the past few years we found a
good person in the owner of Pride & Joy Music, she's one of the few correct
people in this music market, surely it's very important...but with only this,
you can't survive in this World. It’s not enough.
So, we plan our activity year after
year...we know exactly what we'll do in the next 12 months. This is our secret.
Planning, scheduling, working hard every day, every hour.
 |
| " (The Song) 'Purgatory' marks that something had changed... This message was mostly for other people, not for us...because we just continue to make music as we have always done." |
Angela: During the quarantine, we planned to
release a couple of videos of cover songs. When we released the Ozzy cover
("Gets me through") and Placebo's "The bitter end", we
received a lot of requests from our fans who asked us to release a whole album
of cover songs. So, we thought we would only if we were able to do it in two
weeks...before the Quarantine ended otherwise it wouldn't have made sense.
So, we chose the other songs and started
immediately working on production...and in two weeks we were ready to release
the album. It was self-produced and self-released. About the production, it was
easy enough for us, because every one of us has their own studio and at the end
of the sessions...Andy mixed and mastered it. So, everything was really fun.
RtM: And from
this album, which songs did you like to do the most and why?
Angela: It's difficult to choose because all
songs are so different. Surely I like "Not Afraid" because I like its
energy and it has been a challenge for me to sing it. I'm not a rapper! LOL I
love "Back to Black" because I love that song so much!
"I think I'm Paranoid" is so energic and rock, like "The Bitter End" too! "The Swan Song" because I love Sharon's voice and I had fun in singing that song with a different approach in respect to the original version. But at the end, I like all the songs!
"I think I'm Paranoid" is so energic and rock, like "The Bitter End" too! "The Swan Song" because I love Sharon's voice and I had fun in singing that song with a different approach in respect to the original version. But at the end, I like all the songs!
 |
| "When we released Ozzy and Placebo covers, we received a lot of requests from our fans who asked us to release a whole album of cover songs." |
Angela: It's not a war climate, there is a
lot of silence instead. Everyone is living their life locked in at home, with
their family, spending their time with all those things they didn't have time
to do during their ordinary life. I did the same. I'm spending more time with
my cats Posi& Nega, I started to cook a lot of different cakes, and I worked
much more on Secret Rule.
I don't know if this virus was created or if it
really was an accident, neither explanation is difficult for me to believe. But
this has been another great challenge humanity has been called to face. There
have been stupid people (I have seen people spit on other people to terrify people
by threatening infection and those who didn't want to follow all rules) but
also a lot of solidarity and surely, I want to see the positive side of the
pandemic, the one which has moved people to take care of themselves. At this
moment we're getting back to normality and we hope to return completely to
normality for good.
RtM: And what have you been doing to pass the time,
to maintain physical and mental sanity?
Angela: I feel good at home. I watched
movies, I played with my cats and I worked with Secret Rule on new strategies.
We're always in a hurry so we took advantage of all this time to plan the next
steps to the best of our abilities. I started to exercise every day to keep in
shape and I feel much better!
RtM: And how
do you see the situation of bands and musicians in general now with this stop,
without doing shows. And I think there is still no prospect of a return in the
coming months.
Angela: Surely it's a difficult moment. For
us, it's difficult because we miss the stage and the contact with our fans. The
exchange of energy is the best side of being musicians. We had to postpone our
tours and we hope we'll be able to do them in September and December.
At the beginning of the pandemic, I saw a lot of bands expressing their money difficulties but after a while, all bands started streaming concerts and found other ways to connect with their fans. The chance to find another way to express oneself has also proved an art form, be it streaming concerts, online activities, inventing a new job, etc). As in any market and any company, a band has to accept the business risk and find other ways to survive. I think it's normal.
At the beginning of the pandemic, I saw a lot of bands expressing their money difficulties but after a while, all bands started streaming concerts and found other ways to connect with their fans. The chance to find another way to express oneself has also proved an art form, be it streaming concerts, online activities, inventing a new job, etc). As in any market and any company, a band has to accept the business risk and find other ways to survive. I think it's normal.
 |
| "For us, it's difficult because we miss the stage and the contact with our fans." |
Angela: I fell in love with "La casa de
Papel" of course and "Vis a Vis" that I've been watching all
during the pandemic. I liked a lot the actress "Najwa Nimri" present
in both the series. Then I watched "Glitch", but I think it's only for
certain people. Anyway, I liked it. So if you haven’t seen "Vis a
Vis", you should start with that :)
RtM: Ha ha ha!ok, i saw just some episodes, but i promise i will watch. Did you watch the movie "Rocket Man"?
A really cool moment is when Wilson
sayds to young Elton John that "
You gotta kill the person you were born to be in order to become the
person you want to be." what do you think about? What has the music
changed about you?
Angela: Wow! That’s so true! When I started
to sing, around age fifteen, I remember that I was soooo shy. Before going on
stage, I had to run to the toilet…sometimes I also vomited beforehand. On
stage, I was almost blocked. But I wanted to be different because I loved singing
so much. So, day after day, I had to kill my "limits" and force
myself to beat my shyness, my fears. When I looked at great singers like
Cristina Scabbia or Sharon Den Adel, I remained so enchanted by their
naturalness and spontaneity. It has been a long process and I always keep
working on myself.
RtM: Thanks for the interview, always a pleasure to
talk to you. Take care and hopefully soon we will overcome this pandemic and
good things will come after all this.
Angela: Thank you Carlos, it's the same for
me. Thank you for this space and to all the readers who support us.
Interview by: Carlos Garcia
Pride & Joy Music
Listen to "Against" on Spotify
Listen to "Quarantine Sessions" on Spotify
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