2013/06/04

Interview: Fokkum



Fokkum is a really cool band with lovely members. Their song "Backward rituals" is the second track on Schizo Punk Compilation Vol.1. It is Ries who answered my questions. They have a really interesting sound, and I can recommend Fokkum to everyone who like short and energetic songs with much hardcore crossover. Well, here we go...


1. Ohoy! Please, introduce the band. Members, releases etc...

We are FOKKUM from the Netherlands. My name is Ries (Richard Willemse, 1970) I am the founder (1996) of this band. I play drums and am the lead-vocalist. Lisa (1979) is our distortion-bass player/back vocals and Hans (1989) does clean-bass/back vocals. We were not able to find a guitarist (we seem to be too weird), so we decided to add another bassplayer (clean sound) so Lisa could create a guitar-like (distortion) sound in our band.

We released our D.I.Y. full-length cd 'Paradise' in 2012.
We released a D.I.Y. ep 'Notice Yourself' in 2011.
We released 2 D.I.Y. split cd-rs with Resposta Simples
(Portugal), Indulgencia (Russia) in 2010.
We released our D.I.Y. demo in 2008 (the negative, angry cult hardcore cd).
We did split cd-rs with: Agamenon Project (Brazil) and Noituus (Finland).
We appeared on compilations such as: Break Out #3 (Cut-out rec, Germany), Ungovernable Resistance #4 (self-tittled U.K. radio show comp.), Freedom Punker Volume 3,4,6,8 & 10 (I made some download/burn artwork of all 10 comps), soon we are on another compilation thanks to John Aaron O'connor... And of course your Schizo comp.

We recently released some simple live-rehearsal-clips with our new line-up and new sound. Nothing fancy, just very honest recordings. Check our Facebook and Youtube.

2. What does Fokkum mean?

Fokkum is a Dutch word that doesn't really exist. It's a bastardised version of Fuck 'em. I was very angry for a while... I hated everyone (Fokkum all) especially the ones in power... Nowadays I hate no one... But I still strongly dislike those in power

3. You have lot's of influences, how would you describe your sound, and is there any special bands the influence you?


These are the bands we get musical inspiration from: Uniform Choice, Intensity, 7 Seconds, Jerry's kids, Minor threat, Doom, Extreme Noise Terror, Discharge, Final conflict, Gorilla biscuits, Skitsystem, Satanic Surfers, Wolfbrigade, GBH and many more bands... but it all started out as a mix between Doom and Uniform choice.

I would describe our style as: A mixture between Punk, hardcore, crustcore, d-beat, skatecore, punkcore, oldschool sxe-sound, short and simple lyrics. We have fast, brutal, short and simple songs which are slightly melodic with high pitched clean vocals.

We love it when there is a minimum of metal involved in our songs... we want sliding, bouncing hardcore/d-beat like in the old days... we think there are enough metalbands out there who claim to be punk and hardcore. So no double bass and breakdowns for us

4. How would you describe a perfect Fokkum gig?

Next to having a good PA sound and smoking some pot we would like to see people having respect for each other and us... A crowd that likes our music no matter what others (punk police?) say. An audience who think for them selves and doesn't follow trends and/or friends... I think it's pathetic when you only seem to get fans because you shook hands with them... like our band or don't... it's not about 'knowing' us... it's about the music and the MESSAGE !

These are our lyric themes: Conspiracies, awareness, freedom, politics, animal rights, pollution, origin of man, alternative history, anarchy, freemasons, macho-behaviour, esotherics, agnostics, spirituality (without God), positivism, bloodlines, free-thinking, Illuminati, personal experiences & feelings, social issues, manipulation, indoctrination, love, peace and more.

5. What is your plans for the summer?

After a period of searching/auditioning for a new guitarist (we kicked out our guitarist because he became extremely commercial) we finally decided to go on without a guitarist and with an extra bassplayer. After this we could begin rehearsing and re-writing again (we changed some songs a bit)...

On the beginning of July 2013 we are ready to climb the stage again... with new songs, new sound, new member... Lisa shall contact as many venues/organizers etc as possible... but as i said... nowadays it's al about knowing people, shaking hands and crawling up each others asses (conform to the standard... even in the punk scene...) to get a chance... It's pretty hard these days... is miss the old days a lot... We have confirmed 2 gigs: 29th of June in Holland and September in Belgium. But we always manage to get a bunch of gigs

We have plans to record an new fat cd at the end of the summer (2013)... again all D.I.Y. of course.

6. Contact info:


Email:fokkum@ziggo.nl

Internet:
www.fokkum.nl (our own site)
www.facebook.com/fokkum (like us)
www.facebook.com/riesenlisa (friend us)
www.youtube.com/riesfokkum (watch us)
http://fokkum.bandcamp.com (hear us)

Thank you for the opportunity you gave us, we really appreciate this! We wish you and your magazine all the best.

Ries & Fokkum.



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