Hi there! Thanks, yeah, I think those shows have met my expectations. There was a big chance it would all work out as we had  worked really hard before the gigs. I myself can't remember how many rehearsals we'd played. It seams that I dedicated the whole 2018 to the band. First there was the line up, we finally ended up with three new members, of whom no one had any idea. I wanted to keep the new line up a secret untill mid December. I didn't want people to speculate whether I'd made the right choices. 

You know, we had a really intense rehearsal schedule. We met three times every weekend – Friday till Sunday – at least me and Richter. Since May each rehearsal was 6-8 hours long, sometimes even more. We met 45 times during the summer holidays. I didn't really know how people would take those shows. 80 per cent of the people I talked to or whose opinions I heard were  rather sceptical. They said 'Don't do it Bariel, you're going to kill the legend.' Only one fifth of those interested would say 'Fucking awesome, Bariel, it's the right call. Keep going.' I'm generally satisfied with those gigs. We had put a lot of work in the whole thing. And in December we simply did what we were supposed to. We just played. Now we're focused on the future...

 

 

 

I'd had a lot of questions since April 2018 when Nergal from Behemoth spilled the beans about Merry Christless shows including Imperator. People seemed to think that was a joke as the news was published on April's Fool. They went on asking 'So now what, you, Mefisto and Carol?' I would only say 'Wait till December, you'll see for yourselves.' Mefisto played with us for some time, it was no secret. As for Carol – I talked to him in January or February 2018 and told him I was bringing back Imperator, but  I had a different idea for the drummer. Mefisto had been playing with us till August, but then it turned out the whole thing didn't really fit in his schedule. I think it had to do with the number of rehearsals I suggested, or rather expected. There didn't seem to be another way than just to play the songs over and over again. And to play them better each time, as you can always get better as a whole band. Always.  At some point all those little mistakes are only known to the band, but they're always there. So the strategy was to reduce the amount of those mistakes as much as possible. In the end things went rather smoothly, but probably not perfectly. At some point I was really happy the gigs were coming up because otherwise we would just work ourselves to death, haha. After parting with Mefisto I got in touch with Tomek Nowok. Richter knew him and had his phone number. I'll tell you about the drummer later.  Krzysiek Świątkiewicz had already played with Imperator. I mean here the year 1995. Just ask Chris and he'll remember no other episode, haha... So, the choice here seemed  rather obvious. He's a great guitar player, he's also crazy about almost the same music I've always listened to, but most importantly, he's an awesome guy. I got in touch with him in January 2018 and said 'Listen, I'm bringing back Imperator and you're welcome to be a part of it, a really important one.' The same month I had the idea of Richter behind the drums. I'd heard plenty of suggestions of drummers playing for different bands, both form Poland and outside the country. I'd also been told about top Polish, let's say, multi-band drummers, but I said 'Wait a second, I want to check one dude first – I've got a certain feeling about him.' I met Richter in June 2016 at 'The Time Before Time' beer premiere in Warsaw. He came round and asked me to sign his record. He was an IMPA fan and never tried to hide it really.  On the day II wouldn't even think of the reunion. After a while he asked me to send him the lyrics for 'Święta Wojna' (Holy War) as he wanted to cover the song with his band, Bestiality. Then, in January, I think, I wrote him 'Hey, would you play a few songs from the album on drums?' He wrote back 'I know this album by heart.' It later turned out not to be entirely true, haha. After a few months he told me 'What was I supposed to tell you then?' So I still don't know whether he knew the album so well or not. I'm not so sure, haha. Anyway, we met. In April we started practicing. I really appreciate the energy he has brought into Imperator. I made a joke once that I had been waiting with bringing the band back to life until Richter was born – he's 23. We hadn't played for 25 years. 

And as for Novock – when things with Mefisto started to go south, I knew I had to find someone right away. I told Mef what I was planning. I went to see some gig in Łódź, in a club called Magnetofon. Devilpriest with Tomek was playing there, I came round to him and we talked. On the very next day he was in Warsaw  to see how we were doing. You  know, he might have been among those 80 per cent of people who didn't really believe this would all work out. He also wanted to talk about a possible schedule in this artistic endeavour. I emailed him the papers (the songs' scores). A week later he came back with three, almost perfectly learnt songs. It was a nice surprise to us. It was fully professional. He's also brought great energy to the band. I'm really satisfied with this line up. ..

 

 

Well, recently I tried again to remember why in late 1993, when things with Imperator started  to get really serious, I decided to put a halt to the band. There were a few reasons. The guys might remember it differently, but the songs we were making back then – the ones that have never seen the light of day, only being recorded sometime at Iabelin Studio – those songs had no tempo. They weren't fast. Fuck, what a nightmare. Back in late '80s nobody knew the term 'blast', we ourselves didn't use it in Impa. But who cares. I had always wanted to play as fast as possible, with fucking brutality. And Carol's drumming didn't have that. There wasn't really anyone to step in his shoes either back then – Docent (from Vader) had his hands full – and that was actually it. But to be fair – we made huge progress with Carol in those days, our playing improved much. We started playing slower than when Moloch was in the band, but deffinitely more accurately. And since the 'Dracula” recordings and theatre perfomances we played together for a few years. But even now, when working again on the bonus songs from the CD version – 'Love Is the Law' or 'The Rest Is Silence' I find the drums arrangements a bit weird. We're not going to change anything but now I finally realise I simply 

didn't want to play that way. Well, those songs are quite OK though. Now, for the first time, at least in a long time, I can bring up the song titles, like 'Elder Gods' or 'Your Accursedness'. I don't know if I'll ever go back to them. Without the tempo? I don't want to play without speed, it must have got on my nerves even more back then...

 

 

 

I think the starting point was that conversation I had with Nergal and Orion back in December 2017.  It was when they said it would be awesome if Imperator joined them during the next edition of merry Christless. I started thinking about it then. Just after that I got back to Łódź and found my guitar – there are no guides on how to get back to playing after over twenty years – and really, except for a few occasions, I hadn't played at all for 23 years. It was an experiment I had to conduct on myself. Back in 1995 we played a bit (meybe a few months) with Krzysiek Świądkiewicz, Mefisto and Paweł Socha of Tenebris behind the drums. Unfortunately, Paweł had to leave Łódź and the whole thing just died. Then there was this so called come back of Imperator in 1998, when I didn't even know that something was going on behind my back. It was totally unfair. I just consider it something that has never happened. It definitely was not Imperator. We straightened things up with Carol and Mefisto a log time ago anyway. To sum up: this time, in 2017, I really felt it was the right time for the band's come back. 

 

 

Since I haven't got anything confirmed for 100 per cent, I'm not going to give you any details yet, but I am talking to some people about it. You probably realise what it's like with booking festivals, how much time prior these thing need to be dealt with. A lot of people form booking agencies had been waiting for the shows in December 2018 and now they say 'Man, if only we had known things were so great with Imperator, we would have booked something for 2019, now it's going to be difficult.'  But we'll see what comes up this year. We've already had some offers for 2020. In all those years I've kind of moved away from the scene also in terms of managing things and I'm learning how it all works all over again. The infrastructure, the density, the possibility of travelling around the whole world, agencies, promoters, all the possible setbacks, people's good will etc. I need to get acquainted with it all. I'm already working on it but luckily there are some people helping me, who actually have some idea about this kind of things and who were present at the scene when I wasn't there. Let's just say that when I know anything I'll let you know via our Imperator fanpage. But I must say we're not really opting for semi tours and shows in the middle of nowhere. And there's still a lot of work to do – we're working on a few songs we didn't play in December. It might be March, April, maybe later – I don't know. We'll let you know. 

 

 

 

Well, the Iron Curtain might be gone, but the problem remains – we've been offered to headline a really interesting festival in the US, but it turns out only I have a visa – it's the same paradox like the one 30 years ago when it was about passports. So, pardon my French, but it's fucking killing me, 'cause the realms are exactly the same. I just hope the guys will manage to prepare all the necessary documents. You know, if it were any other country, maybe except for Australia, we would have already been booked for that show. And as for Europe, even today I got an offer form a very big festival in Europe, but then again – if only the organiser had known before, we would be thinking of 2019, not 2020, which we are working on now. But, as I've already mentioned, we are talking to some people and we are plannig expantion to the West. But we can all agree that it's only been a month since the merry Christless shows. Before those gigs I didn't make any plans or even research for that matter. In my view, it wouldn't be humble – you know, the band hasn't even played their first show in almost a quarter of a century and they're already booking shows outside the country. That would be sick...

 

 

 

It's funny you should ask about that as I actually have a contract for the reissue of 'The Time Before Time' just in front of me – I scanned it today before sending it back. It's for a very interesting label so I'm 99 per cent sure it will come out this year on a vinyl and a CD. There might be a tape as well.  It's all set, we're only thinking about the date. We'll keep you posted on that too. 

 

 

We've made a few beers with Piwoteka, but the last time we actually worked on with Browar Spółdzielczy (People's Brewery). Me and the people from Piwoteka were friends and the other day I just threw an idea like 'Hey, why don't we make Imperator beer?' I wasn't really serious about it, but then, when I came round again after a week, Marek, a guy from the company, asked if I had any design or concept for the whole thing. You know, the label, the name of the beer etc. Somehow we started working on it pretty quickly. People made comments, obviously, like 'Now Imperator is going to make beer istead of music.' But I really wish for all those criticising us or other bands making their beer, to have enough courage to go for it. I doesn't really have to go well you know. And, of course, there must be a brewery that is willing to work on it with you. Anyways, people asked why we had decided to make beer and not, for instance, make new music or play concerts. I didn't really care about it much. I knew all those trolls or bitter people with their noses glued to their computer screens just wouldn't let go. But I don't think there was even the slightest idea, or even a thought of making a come back in those days. However, in all those year Mefisto (mostly him) kept nagging me about making a reunion. 'Come on Bariel, let's play. Let's bring back Imperator.' When we occasionally met with Carol, it would be the same. But every time I would say no. Maybe in 2017, when me and Mitloff made a rerelease of 'Eternal Might' – we had been working on it for quite a long time and it all went well (thanks again, Mitloff) – but it wasn't a definite idea at that time, I don't think so. Then I went to see a few gigs, thought to myself it would be cool to feel this energy on stage again. I think it might have started growing in me then – the time spent in the studios, coming round to other bands' rehearsals and meeting up with some people from the metal scene, and all those recurring questions like 'When are you going to play again? Why the hell did you kill the band in the first place?' But it was the meeting  with the guys from Behemoth in December 2017 when I really felt it was the time. 

 

 

 

Man, of course! It was one of the hardest decisions in my life, I knew I was risking everything. I also knew we had to play as well as it was possible, otherwise we would be eaten alive. But I felt we had to do this. Not like 'it's now or never.' I just felt this energy growing. And it was this energy that seemed to lack in previous years – I didn't know the right people to play with, I also didn't have that energy in me. But since the final days of 2017 I felt this energy coming and coming. I knew it would all take lots of hard work. I had never felt any pressure, never thought of the time passing, the time that could finally be no more. You see, we had a band practice today, after a few weeks' break – we obviously had to take some time from each other. But we were already hungry for more. I like this feeling. You're asking if I was afraid since my decision? I don't really think so. I was so concentrated on all the preparations to make this thing work that there was no room for  fear. We needed a guitar back up, we also needed trusted people who would ride with us. I had this comfort of travelling with Mitloff and his help with this mini tour was invaluable. Tomek Pawłowski was our sound engineer and we had a great rapport with him. All it needed was just a few words to get every message across. We had everything we could wish for. It was fucking awesome. We don't have a manager, we never really did, I've always been the one who would deal with all things. So when it all started to finally work properly, there was no time for stress. 'Guys, we just come out there and do our jobs.' We were also prepared thanks to those hundreds of hours spend in the rehearsal room. I definitely had to make sure my voice was alright – you know, November and December are the months when it's really easy to get an infection – maybe I was a bit afraid of that, I knew I had to look after myself in this matter. No room for a damn cold. During this whole time of our practising we were visited by only a few trusted people. All of them claimed we were heavy as hell. It was sheer bliss, haha...

But what's also important – two of the band members are, undeniably, part of the new generation – they're tolal maniacs like everyone in this new line up. They said 'Bariel, there will be a lot of people, some of them might not even have heard of Imperator. It's hard to say what the reception wiil be like.' Then I just said to them 'Gentelmen, let that not bother us at all. We just do our thing!' It all went really well. And we're still doing our thing, we're not going to stop at where we are now. But we've got our feet on the ground and we look humbly into the future. With our heads high, but without insolence...

 

 

 

You know, up until the shows, when we were working on the old songs in our rehearsal room, anytime a new riff came to my head and we would try it out I would say 'Damn, guys, it's awesome... but hey, let's leave this sort of things for later, after 16th  December.' Only now, since a month ago,  do I let myself think about these things. I've no idea when and how we're going to do this, but I will surely want to make something new. I feel good with it, I still have some new ideas. I can't say when – I'm not going to rush things. But there will be something. For now we're still working on some other old songs to make our setlist a bit longer...

 

 

I think there were two sessions. The thing is I have no mastertape from these sessions. It's  all only on some cassette tape, somewhere. It might be shocking to some, I know – completely unknown Imperator songs from the old days, maybe hidden somewhere on a CASSETTE! The DAT tape simply  wasn't bought out from the studio and it later disappeared. It does not exist anymore. But I'll try to find that cassette somewhere and I'll digitalise it, so it doesn't disappear completely, like the Dracula session did, the one we recorded at a radio studio in Bydgoszcz...

 

 

 

I'd like to thank all the people who were at the shows, who welcomed us so warmly, for their positive reaction. It was the best reward we could have ever dreamt of. It gave us a huge boost and it motivates us for futher work. A big thanks goes to all those who helped us play like we did – especially to the guys from the band, without them I wouldn't be able to do anything. My regards go to Mefisto, who had put a lot of work up until a certain moment. A massive thanks goes to the whole crew that rode with us in December 2018. Thanks to you, Radek. Thanks for an interesting talk and best wishes to Oldschool Metal Maniac!

 

Thanks!