Early March (2025) Cryptosis from Enschede has released their second album. Celestial Death is another true gem, on which the band continues the musical course of the debut Bionic Swarm but has filled in the entire sound even more colorfully. A month before the release date we spoke bassist Frank te Riet via a Zoom connection. If these (in unpaid version) weren’t limited to forty minutes, the already extensive conversation would undoubtedly have been even longer. Frank has plenty to tell us about the new album…
At the end of 2023, you released the EP The Silent Call. Did it bring you what you expected? Was it mainly a sign of life, a kind of ‘hello, we’re still here’ or was it more than that and perhaps also a harbinger of things to come?
Let me go back in time. When we started as Cryptosis, we sent a demo to record labels, without mentioning our name, and then we quickly sat down with Century Media. At the time, because of COVID, it didn’t seem like the right time to release the album. “It should be good next year in March, then we’ll release it”, we said. So, we had Bionic Swarm on the shelf for a year, waiting for corona to be over. And then March 2021 came and nothing had really changed. I think it was even worse. So, we really had a big backlog in terms of promotion. We then did a livestream of the album release show.
… which generated a lot of attention for you.
Yeah, it just happened and sometimes you get an opportunity and then you have to grab it right away. We had planned a tour for promotion, but that didn’t happen because of corona. However, we did play some summer festivals in 2022. And in the end, we only started at the end of … yeah, actually the promotion of the album didn’t really start until November 2022. So that’s late: a year and a half after the album came out. Because of that we had to fight for quite a long time to get back into the picture. We played at 70,000 Tons of Metal right after that, where we got in touch with Steffen Kummerer from Obscura. He started following our band a bit. Every now and then we chat, via Instagram and stuff, with each other. And at one point he asked if we didn’t want to go on tour with Obscura and Cynic? Of course we wanted to. But we had a very old product, so to speak, to take with us. At that time, we were busy with the songwriting of a new record and realized that the style had become a bit more symphonic.
So why not choose one song from the session for the new album and record it? Let’s just record one song that we feel most comfortable with. That also gives us the chance to try it out in a live setting. At the same time we can also see right away where we still have points to attend to in writing a new record. What works well live and what doesn’t? We could experiment in this way. So that song became The Silent Call. We thought one song was a bit meager to release as a digital single. When you go on tour, it is also useful to have some material to sell. We still had a song (Master of Life) left over from Bionic Swarm sessions, which we had not put on record. Also we had done some shows in Athens in November 2022 with a very good response from the audience, which were recorded. We added two songs from those recordings to the EP to give people that really follow the band something special. That gave us a nice product to tour with.
With the EP you had a product that you could offer people something…
Yes, we thought so too. And if you’re going on tour anyway and you know that you have about 20 to 25 shows to play, it’s also nice to have a new vinyl, a limited edition or a new shirt design for that. You attract people to the merchandise stand with that. That’s what you really hope for. It’s pretty much the only way to earn some money these days. Because well, streaming … that just makes no money for the band. 0.003 cents per stream or so doesn’t really yield anything of course. If you have half a million streams, you have something like 1500 euros. And you have to eat and pay rent with three people on that. That’s not possible, is it? That’s also why I always say: people go to shows, buy the merchandise, buy the CDs. Buy the physical stuff, because that’s generally what gives a band the most pleasure. And ordering directly from the band is still the best option.
It kind of happened that way. This time I have been more involved in the songwriting than the last time. Where Bionic Swarm was a bit more guitar-oriented … actually just a series of over the top, riffs, speed and show-off, this album goes back to basics a bit more. We really looked more at what atmosphere the music evokes. Does it communicate the right story, the story we also want to tell in the lyrics? The guitar still has some of those crazy things, but every now and then it gives a bit more space to, for example, drums or a synth or a choir. Not because I wrote it myself, mind you, but it’s all a bit more balanced. Laurens and I actually write all the music together. And we had said beforehand that this time, it would be a bit more about the songs. With somewhat nicer melodies, some more recognizable parts in it, but without losing sight of the Cryptosis sound.
You definitely succeeded in that. That probably also explains the quote in the biography with the promo: ‘The biggest lesson we learned was how to create songs that really come together as complete pieces, rather than just combining riffs’.
Right? I’m a big fan of Klaus Schulze, Jean-Philippe Jarre, Massive Attack … the more electronic side of music. And because I was more involved with it, I was able to put my fingerprint on the music a bit more. It’s like an extra layer has been added to the already full sound. A lot of those orchestrations are also on Bionic Swarm, but they are mixed very much into the background. If you listen very carefully, you can hear everything that’s happening.
But now we just said: “Fuck it. This is just an extra part of the band. This has to be just as loud in the mix as the drums, the vocals, the guitar.” I personally think the guitar is a bit too far into the background. It is just not present enough. I would have liked something more, but yeah… for the rest it’s a super mix. Also because of that Celestial Death sounds even more bombastic, even grander, even more dramatic.
So if I tell you that Cryptosis is still evolving in terms of musical orientation, you agree?
Yes, absolutely. That’s also because all of us listen to very different music. We’ve been playing together in this line-up for ten years now this year. Marco is more into the old school, you know? Motörhead, AC/DC … he really likes that kind of music. But also progressive stuff, like Porcupine Tree for example. Laurens is more into the old school guitar music, like Symphony X. And I listen to a lot of black metal, thrash but there’s also a lot of electronic music in there. Yes, if you combine that, you just have a unique fingerprint, so to speak. But that also makes us a bit of outsiders, because are we really death metal? No. Are we really thrash metal? No. Are we really black? No. Progressive? Not either. So yes, we can play at all those festivals, but we’re not any of them. And that’s a curse and a blessing at the same time. There will be enough people who like it, but there will also be those who prefer to hear one clear direction. But that’s just not possible when it comes to Cryptosis. We just tried that a little bit with Bionic Swarm. But we just write music. And it comes how it comes, you know? Sometimes Laurens has a guitar riff, which I find a bit too standard. Then Laurens sends it to me, and I get to work on it. And then I put some synthesizer stuff under it or something. And then suddenly it just seems to have turned 180 degrees. But it’s still the same riff.
That’s how it should be, right? When you go on stage, you should be able to play music that comes from your heart. And not something that is artificially contrived. “Oh, this is what people want to hear.“
No, and there are already so many bands who do not play like that, no offense to them. But when I go to a death metal band, I’d rather go to Vader or Morbid Angel than to the umpteenth copy of a band. It all sounds good, but I’ve heard it all before and better. It’s like spaghetti that you heat up several times. Yes, the first time it’s still nice, but after that it becomes… the taste goes away. You lose interest in it. And that’s not what we want.
‘… with lyrics that draw a red line between the horrors of the present day and the limitless chaos of the future.’, the promo reads. Can you tell us more about the concept of this album?
We are actually at the beginning of a new era as a band. What would I call it? The technological era. Concepts such as AI and others were once futuristic themes, now they are reality. And how long has it been going on? Ten, twenty, thirty years? Actually, we have only just begun. We have not yet seen anything of what is really possible. And Celestial Death is a bit of a translation, an interpretation of that. Each song comes from a person’s perspective. How he feels. What he sees around him in the world. It is futuristic. Like before. Real science fiction. But a bit closer to yourself. To your feelings. And with that we want to make the people who listen to our music think.
Technology is not bad. We also work a lot with technology: to promote our music, to make our thing, to work more efficiently. But it can also go the other way. And that’s kind of the playing field where we try to make people feel. Think about it. We’re not against it, and we’re not really for it. But it is something and it has to be used well. It can be very situational or of the moment. There’s going to be plenty of things that are fine. But there are also things that everyone has their concerns about. And that’s what our lyrics are about.
The album was again recorded in Studio Moon Music in Utrecht. Why was that a logical choice? How long did it take to record and produce this album to your liking and if you look back on it now, would there be anything that you or the band would have changed now that it is finished?
Well, Moon Music actually has a large studio in Roermond. Olaf Skoring works there, he is a guy from Twente just like us. He is originally from here, also worked here for a long time in Metropool but now lives in Utrecht and has started a branch there. But we actually recorded everything in Enschede. We rented a studio here. We did do the guitar in Roermond. So, we have never been to Utrecht.
No problem. That studio in Roermond is a great studio. The Dark Side of the Moon tape recorder is there. They really have a heavenly paradise of equipment. And Olaf is also a really good engineer and knows the best tricks. He has also been with us for a long time, he has been here for a long time as a soundman for the live shows. So, he knows us super well. He also knows exactly what we can and cannot do on our instrument. And he just knows how to get that little bit extra out of it.
We used the same studios for the mix and master as last time. We just knew exactly what we had in Frederik Folkare (who plays the guitar in Hellbutcher and Unleashed). We have spoken to him before, just face-to-face, about the music and such. He worked on our previous album and we can just work well with him. He just knows really well how to mix a certain atmosphere. I do miss that a bit elsewhere in Europe. The guy that did the mastering, Tony Linker, is also good at what he does. They just work with the biggest acts that are in metal. They work with all the headliners of festivals like Graspop Metal Meeting, Wacken Open Air, Hellfest. If you just put your material there, you just know for sure that it is in good hands. And that is just very nice, because in the end you want to get the most out of it.
Your first contract as Cryptosis was straight away with a big name in the metal scene: Century Media Records. You are one of the few Dutch acts with them. What did it bring you to the attention of a big company?
In the past, we were with some smaller labels. People who, like us, set up something in music out of passion. They did really good work, but when you’re on your own, there’s only so much you can do. And now you just work with a multinational. Century Media is also part of Sony Music and is also in the same office in Berlin. We went from five interviews for an album to 75, to 100. That’s the difference you notice right away. The distribution was actually always well organized, but now it’s just super. So, it’s all just … put it this way: you’re playing along with the big boys. It’s great that you can get in there as a small band, farmers from the east of the Netherlands.
But that doesn’t mean you don’t have to fight anymore. You have goals with your band, and it’s not like you can rest on your laurels. That’s not how it works; it’s still hard work. It’s not a matter of: we’re in and done. Nicely sitting on the couch with the three of us, and then it will happen. We see it more as extra motivation. We’ve been working on this band for so long. That it’s acknowledged by such a big player, that gives us that extra motivation to work even harder. That’s actually what it did for us. We now just have a really good team around us. Century Media, Niels from Oktober Promotions … everyone is doing really good work for us now. And those are just things that, if you’re not in there, you have to follow up on yourself. Or you have to be busy with it day and night. Metal doesn’t yield enough financially to live, so you always have to do it in the evenings. Where someone else is watching Netflix on the couch with his girlfriend, we’re busy with this.
I understand that you also have your own company. I assume you do that to make a good living? Or is it also an extra creative challenge, because life is more than just being a musician. Can you say something about that?
Yes, I do freelance graphic design. Actually, in the American sense: branding for companies, commercial and everything in between. Also, social media campaigns. That is a kind of passion that got a bit out of hand. I did that as an employee for a few years, but that does not give me enough flexibility for touring and such. So, at some point I started doing that freelance. That was about seven years ago. And that is what I do on the side. I can do an interview at eleven in the morning, like now, without having to arrange anything to be able to plan it. If I want to go on tour, I do not have to ask anyone. And I will take my laptop with me. When those other guys are partying, I sit behind the laptop to work. That does give me that flexibility. And Marco too. He does session work. Sometimes with bigger bands such as Pestilence and Flotsam and Jetsam He also gives drum lessons to, I think, about sixty students who visit him in his drum studio during the week.
So yes, you have to be a bit creative to be able to work in music. If you go on tour, you do earn something of course. But you go on tour once, maybe twice a year. Those other eight months, you have to have an income. And what many people also forget, is that if you play in a band and reach a higher level, you really have to invest a lot of serious money. Sometimes also from private funds. Therefor it is also nice if you have some money in reserve. If it is necessary, you can just do things right away.
What happens to Cryptosis when a new album is coming. Recordings are done and you have to wait until the album is released. Then the promotion circus starts. How does that affect you? What does that mean for your time? What does it require of you?
At the moment it is actually just a full-time job on the side. As soon as you come out of the studio, you can relax for a while. Then the album is mixed, and you actually only have to give some feedback via the computer. You discuss it a bit with each other, you just listen to it a lot in the car, on your mobile and at home on good speakers. Just to hear from different sides how the final result will be. Then I think you have about two or three months of freedom.
But then it starts. Before this whole spectacle with interviews starts, you have to make video clips. You have to come up with a concept. I also direct all those videos myself. Then you have to record a number of clips. After that you start with interviews as now (early February 2025). That’s about six or seven weeks before the album release and it’s about time to look ahead to the album release show. We have that in Enschede. For these shows we always go all out with the necessary spectacle, with a completely over-the-top production. Last time we had really mega gigantic LED screens on stage, this time we are probably going to do something with fire. That will be really cool.
After that the plan is to go on tour. We have a European tour in May and June. In July we go to South America. Then we come back to take it easy for a month. And in September, October, November we have these mini tours planned. We will play Spain, Portugal. Bulgaria, Sweden, Denmark, maybe North America. A year or two years later you have to go back to the studio for something new ideally. We often take it a bit more easy because we have noticed that writing music on tour does not really work for us. You think about things and you talk to other artists and hear different perspectives. It’s more like preliminary research. You orient yourself on things, you get new impulses. When you’re on tour, you might go to a museum that you wouldn’t normally go to, and you get ideas from that. Online I also pick up things: news reports, research that’s being done. That kind of thing. That’s pretty much the whole cycle.
Have you seen us live and do you miss a second guitarist?
I think I’ve seen you live three or four times so far. And I don’t miss that second guitarist at all. On the album you sometimes hear a second guitar line behind it, but I don’t miss that live.
If you add an extra band member, the dynamics of the group also change. Touring with three people is also efficient. If there is money, then it is also substantially more than if you have to share with four. It is also easier to get into tours. Because three punks in a night liner, that’s still quite okay. Four is already a bit more difficult. We often have an advantage there. We also actually write the music in such a way that you don’t need a second guitar. On the left and right, under a solo, there might be an extra line. But we mainly, say 95% of the album, construct it so that it is also really reproducible live by one guitarist. I also play stereo myself, with bass, where I really have a bass guitar sound on one channel. But the other side … on stage I have a kind of pedal, which emulates that a kind of orchestra is being played, but I play those tones with my bass guitar. So actually, I already have a very broad sound. And then Laurens also has stereo. So there is already a lot coming from the stage. You don’t really need another guitarist. That’s how we solve that a bit.
Sometimes get well-known session guys here in the Netherlands who call us and ask about the new album and ask if they can’t come along on tour as a second guitarist. It sometimes feels like an honor, because some guys have a great resume. That these people are interested in doing something with us… We really appreciate it, but we don’t really see the benefit of having a second guitarist.
It feels a bit like an intrusion into your dynamic as a band?
Certainly. You have been on the road together for a long time. If you were to take one of us out of that, for example because someone would quit, then you would also get a completely different band. Because the three of us are unique. We are three outsiders in the metal scene. And if you add a fourth, then all the magic is gone, I think. We always do things that are different from the others. And if we do something with two guitarists, then we become a more standard metal band formation. And it’s not really necessary. Pantera were actually only three musicians. And Nirvana, Motörhead and Rush. You can name many more. We do not really see that as necessary.
Time is merciless to us, Frank. Zoom is about to end this conversation. Is there anything else you would like to add?
Nothing different than that I hope to see many of you at our release show in Enschede (on March 29, 2025). We’re going to throw a party. And thank you; this was a beautiful, open conversation. See you in Enschede!
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