Primal Fear – Ralf Scheepers

Ralf Scheepers is widely known in the metal world for his high pitched singing and trademark shriek reminiscent of Rob Halford. Formally the lead singer of Gamma Ray, Ralf now devotes his time and passion to Primal Fear.

Primal Fear celebrate their 15th anniversary with the release of their ninth studio album, ‘Unbreakable’. Metal Obsession’s Anwar Rizk sits down with Ralf Scheepers, to discuss the new album and the unbreakable bond Primal Fear have kept over the last 15 years.

Metal Obsession: Judging from the recent music polls in Europe. ‘Unbreakable’ is doing extremely well for itself.

Ralf Scheepers: Hopefully all around the world too. Europe’s always been a great market for heavy metal. Despite illegal downloading, people still go out of their way to buy these records because they want to hold it in their hands. They want to see the CD, the booklet, read the lyrics and everything else that comes with it. It’s still a great experience for a lot of people to see the progression of an album in their hands. I still believe iTunes is a good thing. People still download music in a legal way, which is always a good thing to see. I’m actually doing this at the moment. Its a great evolution of music, along with all the other platforms of music. I hope this helps a little when it comes to spreading our music across the globe. [laughs]

MO: Do you believe the shift from Nuclear Blast Records to Frontier Records has dramatically changed Primal Fear in anyway.

RS: No, not necessarily. Nuclear Blast Records never really got mixed up with the things we were doing with our music. They always trusted us. Whenever we had a different idea or wanted to try something new. They always trusted our judgement. The same can be said for Frontier Records. Nothing has really changed to be honest.

MO: Do you tend to dissect and judge your work once an album is finished?

RS: In pre-production we usually have around 15 – 20 songs written for each album. Then we chose, in our opinion, the best songs for that album. There has to be a line somewhere, you know? Its good to have a change in the music. All the songs have to fit together somehow. You can’t just do 12 up tempo melodic power metal songs on every album. They have to have a little bit of variety. Sometimes we have to many songs to use on one album and we decide to use them on the next album, perhaps. We still have a lot of ideas we can always use in the future.

The good thing about Primal Fear is that its four people writing. We all have creative hats in the band, so it gives us all the opportunity to come up with ideas very quickly. We choose democratically from the list of songs we write, what goes on each album.

MO: I sense the title ‘Unbreakable’ could be a metaphor for the band’s strong bond over the last 15 years.

RS: Absolutely! We’re going through a strong phrase at the moment. There was a time when it was quite difficult for us all. Not only externally, but internally as well. I guess its more of a statement. That nothing can stop and no one can stop us doing what we love. At times the market doesn’t always work in our favor, but we love what we do and it gives us the opportunity to tour the world. Thats the reason we keep going,  because we’re unbreakable.

MO: Are you a fan of Protools or do you prefer conventional recording methods?

RS: Lately we’ve been using Protools because its an easier process. Everyone works on their set instrumental via protool, but drums are still recorded in a real studio. A studio within a room that has four walls, I guess you could say. The recording process is now on hard disk rather than on analogue. It would be quite an effort for all of us to go back to the 24 track machines. We’d probably easily use 48 tracks now or even more to synchronize the entire master. Its quite a major effort to get things going like they were back in the early 90’s.

The biggest advantage of doing our recordings on Protools is the convenience.

MO: Your vocals on ‘Unbreakable’ are probably the strongest I’ve heard you sing. I think your vocals are just amazing, full stop. Are you cautious of your vocal range now that you’re nearing the age of 50?

RS: First of all. Thank you very much for the compliment. [laughs] The thing is, I always try to be careful with my vocals. Being a metal screamer isn’t always easy. It’s not really healthy what I do, when I scream such high notes. But you need balance it all. I always try to relax my vocals when I can. Drink lots of water and just rest when I need too. I don’t push myself.

Since I record at home I can always take my time. If I have the beats per minute in the pre-production and work out what needs to be done first, its quite easy. I can also do an entire song if the finished lyrics are in front of me. I always make sure that I have the final lyrics completed and then move to the production side of things. Now I have the advantage of taking more time with my vocals. We use to have 24 tracks written over a year. About 3 – 4 weeks of jamming and writing. The other guys would take about 10 – 12 days to record their parts and I have a couple of days to do my vocals for the entire album. Now I have about 5 months to take my time and really nail the vocals.

I’m very self critical with my work. I have a tendency to re-sing a lot of material until I’m completely 100% satisfied.

[Editors notes: “Bad Guys Wear Black” the latest single taken from Primal Fear’s brand new release, ‘Unbreakable’.]

MO: In the beginning Primal Fear’s influences mainly stemmed from Judas Priest. Was it always your intention to sound like Rob Halford?

RS: I never really wanted that in the first place. [laughs] There is a certain style which is similar to Judas Priest from certain high notes that I sing, but every person on this planet has a different voice. If it sounds similar to Rob Halford, its not intentional or on purpose, because that’s just impossible. When I open my mouth and sing, I’m Ralf Scheepers. I can only do what I do. [laughs]

I’ve meet Rob Halford many times over the years at festivals and I have got to know him quite well. I believe its very important to get to know the people you admire. All of the members in Judas Priest are absolutely nice guys. Thats what’s more important to me nowadays than the musical side of things, that personal connection.

MO: Primal Fear were fortunate enough to play with Judas Priest at Wacken last year. Do you think Halford still has it, vocally?

RS: We actually missed Judas Priest perform at Wacken because we had to leave for a show in south Germany. We literally left 2 hours after we got off stage. [laughs] But I’m sure we’ll see them again soon in the near future. Its amazing to see what they’re doing considering their age. Rob Halford sounds amazing and I hope I can sound as good as he does when I reach his age. Its pretty tough what we do with our vocal chords these days. You could say we’re similar to body builders. That we work everyday to sculpt a perfect body of sound.

MO: I’ve been to Wacken twice [2010 – 2011] and its quite a surreal experience. Coming from Australia, we rarely get to see a lot of European bands on a scale as big as Wacken Open Air. I think anyone who is into metal should seriously consider going to Wacken in the near future.

RS: Absolutely. Its an amazing festival. To be honest, we’re been trying to get down to Australia for awhile. At the moment we have a few contacts with promoters and so forth to see how it will all go. We don’t want to jump into anything to quickly because there are bad promoters wherever you tour in the world. [laughs] We’d still like to get paid for our work.

You can’t really do this when flying to Australia because of the long distance. Anything can happen, so we will try and arrange a solid deal first before coming over. Thats why its taken so long. But now it seems we’re closer than before, getting there and playing for our Australian fans. I’m hoping we will be in Australia very soon.

MO: Heavy metal has now become  more socially acceptable in Australia’s culture. I think its a great time for any metal band to tour the country.

RS: Absolutely! We’ve heard so many great things about Australia.

MO: Heavy metal seems to be a common theme on each of Primal Fear’s albums. However, religion, emotion and politics seem to play a bigger role Could you share your thoughts on this?

RS: Sure! Sometimes we use those themes that are around us everyday. They come from our own personal experiences from watching the news, experiencing life and so forth. We see what is going on around us every day and we make critical decisions on certain issues affecting both us and the world. Those things come into our lyrics. We use our personal experiences and add a story which may not entirely be real, but it adds a certain element of entertainment to the lyrics which makes it easier for people to understand.

Take for example the song, ‘Born Again’ off the new album [Unbreakable]. I wrote that song after attending a funeral. The funeral was in the morning and I wrote the lyrics in the afternoon of the funeral and sang the song in the evening. It deals with a lot of personal things that affect us. Life, death and so forth.

As you mentioned before there is some political and religious lyrics in our music as well. For example, ‘Chruch of Blood’ off Jaws of Death. We sometime choose these critical issues that are happening all around and affecting us in some way, shape or form.

We aren’t a bunch of guys who want to change the world with our lyrics. That certainly isn’t us. Its not even possible anyway. [laughs] Its more of a personal journey where we can express ourselves and hopefully understand things a little easier.

MO: Looking back to your time in Gamma Ray. Most of the lyrics dealt with emotion, politics and religion. Take for example ‘One with the World’ ,’Lust for Life’ or ‘Heal Me’. Its great to see that expression of emotion continue throughout Primal Fear’s lyrics as well. 

RS: Thank you! Kai wrote about 80% of the lyrics when I was with Gamma Ray. It maybe coincidental that we also sing about these critical themes and issues surrounding us as well. [laughs]

[Editors notes: “Welcome/Lust for Life” taken from Gamma Ray”s ‘”Heading For The East” DVD.]

MO: Kai is no stranger to sharing his spirituality and personal thoughts with the world. Its a rather strong word to use. But do you consider yourself a spiritual person?

RS: That’s a very hard question to answer. I mean I’m a human being with thought. I’m not a very religious person to be honest. I do believe in a higher existence, but I don’t want to consider it as “this god” or “that god”. I don’t want to label it. I mean every country has a different god, a different religion or belief. I’m just a guy who constantly looks up and thinks “what could be out there?”. Rather than just accepting what is already given to us.

Like the song ‘Born Again’. Is there a god?

That’s the big question. I mean having thought, you do think about what will happen when you die. Yet, I don’t want to stick a label on it with a certain religion. Everybody is a free person. Everyone is entitled to make their own experience, but we should also consider what others believe in as well.

MO: What are your thoughts towards the metal scene at the moment?

RS: I believe its quite healthy at the moment. I don’t think it will go away any time soon. There seems to be a good following of metal and I don’t necessarily believe it will change for anyone. Whenever we play, people always seem to show up which is a good thing. [laughs] This genre of music isn’t as popular as the others, because its not entirely pushed by the industry. To this day, I still consider heavy metal an underground genre. But we have our dedicated fans and followers of heavy metal.

The genre seems to change so often with new bands offering something new. A lot of people thought these new bands or genres like Grunge, Nu-metal or Hardcore would destroy heavy metal, but it didn’t. I mean there are many branches of heavy metal, but people still want true heavy metal at the end of the day.

We have never really reacted towards how people feel, towards a certain genre or style. We play what we want to play because it makes us happy. We always do what we want because it feels right, you know? We always release songs and albums which we stand by 100%. We know there will always be critics. People seem to bitch about everything these days. You have to stand up for what you believe in and you also have a responsibility to your fans to deliver that message. We never worry about people who might bitch about our lyrics or something. We do it because we love to do it.

MO: Any famous last words?

RS: Thank you very much for the interview. I hope that Primal Fear can make it to Australia very soon and we hope all our Australian fans enjoy the new album [Unbreakable].

Primal Fear’s latest release, ‘Unbreakable’ is now available via Riot! Entertainment. Click here to buy it now!

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