Nu-Nation (Modern Nu Metal from Russia)

1) Hello and welcome here! Let's introduce yourself!

Hey there! My name is Alexander, I am founder and guitarplayer of Russian metal band NU-NATION.


2) I have found you on YouTube. Well, Nu-Nation is a monicker 100% fitted with your music. There is a reference with the music you play (a very heavy and adrenalitic Nu Metal with a modern touch of Metalcore expecially for the heavy vocals, in my opinion) and, at the same time, it expresses a concept about a "new nation", a new state of mind, perharps. Why have you chosen this monicker? And how you label your music style?

Well, you've understood the main idea of our name in 100%-right way. We had some options when we just started about the name, but we didn't really like them. Once our previous drummer called me and said that he got an idea -- 'NU-NATION'. I liked it, and other members too. It sounds well and have a concept. As for our music style, now we call it 'modern nu-metal'. In fact, right now we are trying to mix different music styles we like, such as black metal, death metal, nu-metal, and make it in a modern way, with brakedowns, dropped tunning, etc. So 'nu-metal' here is a tribute to a music we started to play.


3) Can you speak about your two albums? I have seen the covers. In the first album, called "Wake up", we can see a strange man (sleeping? dead?!) with long hair: the hair seems some big roots; All around him, some moths. In the second album, we see a dark threatening creature with red eyes, watching us. The creature seems like Medusa, the ancient mythological creature from Greece. Medusa could turned to stone every men she was watching...Well, what are the meanings about these cover artworks? And what about the lyrics?

There's a kind of concept. Both creatures have dreads So, yes, the man sleeps, and the woman from the second album (yes, this creature is a woman) has just woke up. I think these covers reflect the situation in the World. Three years ago, when 'Wake Up' album was released, the beast only started to wake up from it's sleep. And when two years past a lot of things occur, so we can say that the beast is awakening. At the other hand, we all have to wake up, try to be better than we are, only in this way we can resist it. We shouldn't be indifferent to the things around us, that is the main point of our lyrics.


4) Your video "Wake up" is deeply conceptual. I appreciate it a lots. Can you speak about the making of the video? We can see some people, men, women, children, teen agers, walking in the street, slaves of some ideas: religion, economy and money dollar, fashion and politics... At the end, people take away the bandages covering their eyes... It's really suggestive... but in real lifes, unluckily, the most part of people prefer living with ideals selected by society (the "politically correct", the middle-class' values, the Television's fashion and market value...) and not thinking with their own heads! It's a really sick society, in my opinion. Maybe in the past there was more artistic and cultural values: I'm thinking about the greatest writers or painters...

We made the video by our own. Everything was made by us and our mates. Director, editor and cameraman Alissa Alexina is our friend, like all the actors We spent 2 days shooting it and about 6 month on editing. To be honest, we expected that the video would be worse, and were really surprised when we saw the final version. It doesn't look like it has a big budget and really professional, but I think that people like it because of main idea.


5) Have you already play live?

Yes, of course. I think that playing live is one of the most important things to a band. So we play a lot. Apart from local shows in our homecity St.Petersburg and our country Russia, we had 4 big tours, played in such countries like Germany, Netherlands, France, Switzerland, Belgium, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Ukraine, Belarus, Baltic countries.. We shared stage with Soulfly, Ektomorf, Betraying The Martyrs, Breakdown Of Sanity, Promethee, Overhype, etc.. And this April-May we will spend in Europe -- we have a big tour arranged.


6) At last, one question about other Russian bands! Well, Russia has got a lots of Black Metal bands, expecially. Ancient russian mithology and the landscapes are very fitted with Black's typical concept. I have listened Black Countess, actually are my fav in this kind of Symphonic Black. The Russian language in "Demonica" is simply amazing. It fits very well with Metal. In fact in my opinion "Demonica" is their best song; what a pity so few bands sing in their native language! This is true for Italian Metal, too. Few bands sing in our own language. English is good, but in my opinion sing in own language is more interesting: so your fans and followers can listen something take from your country. It's a form of culture. I am a great fan of the mithology and history from all the world, too. You know, about Russian Middle Age I have read an italian essay written by Aldo C. Marturano, about the russian witchcraft and herbalists people called "Zeleisc’ciki", and about elves, you called "ljudnik". I really love discovering ancient folklore and Literature. As I said, my favourite over all is Lermontov. "Demon" is a wonderful book. By the way, can you suggest some other names, from your country, in Metal or Rock scene, we can listen? It's really nice discovering bands

Oh, it's nice to hear that people from other countries like a culture of yours. Unfortunately, nowadays not a lot of people from Russia even read Lermontov, I won't say about discovering their own mythology and folklore. As for bands from Russia, of course there are a lot of really good bands here. If we are talking about black metal, first of all I can suggest Old Wainds (they are from Murmansk, that is very far in the north), think it's classic BM band yet. Also try to listen Tophet - it's the band where I played, as well as our bass player did, there's only 1 album, and the project is hold, but we are about to record all the songs and release a kind of anthology. There's also the band Drama, they have nice 2 albums, but now I didn't hear from them for a long time, and members of the band are now playing in other bands. And as for another styles, I will name some: Ease Of Disgust (very good death metal/deathcore from Moscow), Narada (technical death in vein of Nile, sideproject of our singer), Wildways (ex-Sarrah Where Is My Tea, metalcore/post-hardcore), Oblivion Machine (cyber metal), Fourtones (nice rock/pop-rock), and a lot of other nice bands.


7) Finish as you want our interview and thank you!

Thanks a lot for your interest in our band! It was very interesting to answer your questions that are really unusual. It's good to know that there are people who like and are interested in Russian culture and music scene. I would also like to send greetings to Italian people, hope one day we will visit your country with some shows Cheers!