We are pleased to offer you in this article an interview with a project that offers Cinematic Progressive Rock sounds contaminated by different genres and styles, whose new album “The Indifferent Stars” was released on October 07, 2022. Welcome Paul Sadler from Haven Of Echoes.
Hi, how are you?
I’m very well, thanks very much for asking! Feeling excited about the new release, and looking forward to seeing what the future brings.
Your genre is Cinematic Progressive Rock with different contaminations, where does your passion for these sounds come from?
Perhaps Andreas (Hack, composer and multi-instrumentalist) would be better placed to answer this, as the cinematic and more textural aspects of the sound all come from him, whereas I just write the vocals and lyrics for the most part. But I think seeing as his primary instrument is probably the keyboard/synth, it’s to a certain extent inevitable that he’d want to include a wide range of cinematic and atmospheric sounds in his compositions, with it such a versatile tool.
Your new album “The Indifferent Stars” was released on October 07, 2022, how would you describe this work?
In terms of categories, i have to admit I struggle to know where to place it, as I don’t believe it fits firmly within any particular box, but rather takes influences from many different areas. But it could loosely be described as progressive rock, that takes elements of art rock and atmospheric, even post rock, combining them all into something surprisingly accessible and melodic.
The lyrics are also very intense, what themes do they deal with?
There isn’t necessarily one theme running through the whole album (it’s certainly not a concept album), but if there were perhaps something that crops up frequently it’s the feeling of alienation and detachment that I believe many of us feel these days, despite living in a hyper-connected world. Which I realise sounds a little dark, howeverI have been conscious to offer a fairly hopeful outlook through most of the lyrics dealing with this theme, suggesting that there is always a way back. Other themes cast a critical eyes over religion (‘The Lord Giveth’), and environmental disaster (‘Endtime’) to give a few examples.
Your music is full of contaminations of different genres and styles, how do you compose the songs?
Again, Andreas would be better placed to answer this than myself! In terms of how we worked with each other, he would compose and record on each song in turn, and pass me the instrumental version, granting me full artistic license to do whatever I wish with the vocals/melodies etc. He would then refine certain aspects once the vocals were in place and he had a clear picture of the overall impact of the song. In one case this changed the mood of the song completely, but certainly for the better!
Your music is very refined and engaging, it would be interesting to hear it live, do you have plans in this regard?
This is really a question of supply and demand. As I live in the UK and Andreas is in Germany, it’s obviously not an ideal situation in terms of playing live! But if the demand for it were there I’m sure it’s something we’d love to do. So we’ll just have to see how it goes!
Music and prog are evolving, how do you see the future of your genre?
I couldn’t give you a simple answer to that question! We see a fairly common (and fairly dull) debate happening these days about ‘what is prog’, and whether a particular band is prog, or just has some Progressive elements. To be honest this kind of thing doesn’t really interest me in the slightest, music should be judged on its own merits, and I’d never dream of searching out music only within a given genre. Regardless, the future of music in general is very bright. Why wouldn’t it be? Humanity always has been and always will be an immensly creative and experimental force, so we don’t need to worry about music drying up, even if the finacial condtions for musicians isn’t exactly ideal right now!
Yours is a very interesting album full of ideas, do you already have plans for future releases?
We do indeed, and I believe Andreas is already working on new material, but having not heard it yet I can’t tell you much more than that!
The music market has changed a lot in the last few years, how difficult is it to establish yourself with a more sophisticated music genre like yours?
In a word, very! But I believe it always has been, even if the pathways to success are a little (or perhaps radically) different these days. For that reason I believe you just have to judge yourself on the quality of your work, do the necessary promotion to the extent you’re prepared to sacrifice your sanity, and not stress too much over the results!
What advice would you give to a young band approaching the modern music scene with Progressive Rock sounds?
Just make music! If music is your passion, then make it, focus on it, obsess over it, and the rest is just noise. Find a way to exist in the music world without being taken advantage of, and where you can dedicate the maximum time to doing what you want to do; creating! Oh and obviously, you know…practice. Turn up to rehearsals knowing what you’re doing, or you won’t be very popular!
As usual, I’ll leave the last question free to allow you to talk about any topic of your choice not touched upon in the previous questions.
I believe we’ve been fairly thorough! I’d just like to thank you for your time, and to your readers as well.
I thank Paul Sadler and Haven Of Echoes for the pleasant interview, wishing them all the best for the continuation of their musical career.
Read our review of their album here: https://progrockjournal.com/review-haven-of-echoes-the-indifferent-stars/