News Archive 2006November 2006 We have decided to take a small brake from the studio and rehearse songs with DERIK who has already gained agility and speed. ARAMAZD’s live performance should be top notch and we plan to rehearse for couple of weeks before DERIK is fully comfortable with the material. October 2006 ARAMAZD has completed recording the demo version of “PURIFY BY FIRE”. The lyrics were written by our good friend in NYC - Mr. RAMIREZ and music was subjected to strenuous scrutiny by SERJ. The song came out very well and definitely should be of interest to our fans who long await release of any material by ARAMAZD. We shall make the song available soon in the media section of the website. September 2006 We are happy to announce that Mr. Derenik “DERIK” Vardumyan has joined ARAMAZD and will take the drums & percussion vacancy. We believe that this person has all the necessary qualities to become a full member of the band and are happy to welcome Derek into our family. Meanwhile, VARAQEL, GOREZ, TIGROM and MOLOT are busy in the studio finishing up our first demo track “PURIFY BY FIRE” off the new album. The song will be released to public within next several months. August 2006 Studio work is underway and SEKO is really getting on everyone’s nerves as one year has passed from the moment drum tracks were recorded and the project is quite far from being completed. We are all very concerned about the slow pace of the recording process but given SERJ’s and GOREZ’s affliction for perfection, time becomes an asset that is spent unsparingly. We all want ARAMAZD’s first album to be a benchmark for music production in Armenia and to have weight in the international music scene, thus requiring immense investments in terms of time and effort on behalf of every band member. It is now official that SEKO is leaving ARAMAZD, as he is unable to provide energy, thought and time in sufficient amounts in order to provide for band’s future development. SEKO has become a degrading element with negative impact on the band’s healthy atmosphere and capacity to progress. Thus ARAMAZD has decided to relieve him off the drumming duties as of August 01 st, 2006 . July 2006 Recordings continue and GOREZ spends most of the time away from the band in the studio. Meanwhile unhealthy atmosphere begins to shape around SEKO as he is demonstrating lack of interest in the project given extremely prolonged period of recording and thus his plans for “world domination” are set back further and further. Unlike other band members SEKO is happy to settle for something mediocre in terms of quality of though and technique and get quick results rather than take time needed to do the job to the maximum possible level. Let us not forget that it took SEKO three and a half months to record the drum tracks in 2005 while we all were very patient with his aptitude for moronic approach and desire to simplify everything so it could be recorded in the shortest time possible. Hopefully SERJ had enough stamina to keep the man from cutting corners and constantly pressed SEKO for hard studio labor. 07/07/06 Big plans are made for remaining half of the year as ARAMAZD needs to pick up momentum with live shows and some promotional material. We are going to team up with boyz from MDP to prepare metal assault on Armenia in Fall 2006. 03/07/06 Good news from our website’s administration. Looks like numbers are picking up and people are enjoying our site and available downloads. We shall try our best to come up with something entertaining to make you all want to come back for more. Thanks to everyone for the support. Keep up the traffic!!! 30/06/06 GOREZ is back in the studio recording third song. As usual the name of the song is not finalized yet. This tune is a heavy motherfucker with lots of sludge and sledge. Folks are welcome to bring along their deceased relatives and dead pets to be brought back to life after several listening runs in front of studio monitors. The most notorious and those with head wounds shall be assigned a headphone therapy for maximum results. Anyway we are all happy to continue recording and move forward. 23/06/06 SERJ is slowly recovering from sleepless nights, abused mind and mistreated body. We all hope he can make till the end of ARAMAZD project in one piece.
Work in the studio has been suspended for several days as SERJ came under tremendous stress and almost got himself a heart attack, after trying to do too many things at once: record ARAMAZD and mix BAMBIR album. Well sometimes too much music at the same time can really suck your life out… 06/06/06 ARAMAZD will post a small bootleg video clip from one of our recent “unofficial” performances. Enjoy. 05/06/2006 More good news from the studio. SHALAHO rhythm guitars are complete. It is time to do some reflection on the progress made so far and move on to the next song. GOREZ still has 5 more tunes to record so don't expect album anytime soon. 29/06/2006 We are getting positive feedback from New York , USA and especially our good friend and ally Mr. RAMIREZ who had been conspiring ideas and words of poetry for our 1 st track. Our deep respect goes to NYC support team, let the power of the sun be with you. 25/06/2006
18/05/2006 ARAMAZD deiced to include a short folk instrument part in the middle of SHALAHO in order to bring a fresh perspective to the sound. The national string and wood instruments will be recorded after all guitar and bass lines are laid down. 14/05/2006
07/05/2006 It looks like we will need more studio gear to make MOLOT's bass sound heavy as hell. Current rig (Ampeg combo with Rocktron Bluethunder preamp, Fender bass) definitely doesn't produce the results we were looking for. SERJ better quickly do some research and come up with a good bass setup given the increasing risk of being strangled by low B string. 05/05/2006 MOLOT tried recording some bass parts on 1 st track and despite good performance the overall sound of equipment and Fender bass was poor. A lot of head scratching, shoulder shrugging and far going theories on “we should have done that”. 27/04/2006 While GOREZ is recording, TIGROM and MOLOT are thinking about bass and solo arrangements for the 1 st track while VARAQEL is figuring out the best way to fit vocal lines.
Recording is going well. SHALAHO is quite fast and intense track in terms of music variations and Armenian melodic lines, adding an interesting new dimension to the album's otherwise trash-death origins. We hope it will make bodies move, heads bang and consequently spines snap under the butchering sledge of metal fury. 19/04/2006 GOREZ commenced recording of the 2 nd track tentatively named “SHALAHO”, standing for a name of famous Armenian folk dance. 15/04/2006 Positive news from the studio. GOREZ have completed rhythm work on our 1 st track. Everybody is happy to let this burden go despite recording taking many more days than originally planned. 09/04/2006 07/04/2006 GOREZ is about to complete rhythm guitars recording for our 1 st track (working title “Megadrive”). The guitars came out really killer and have laid good foundation for other instruments to do their parts. GOREZ and TIGROM are going to have a hell of a time re-learning this song for live performance as guitar lines got really intensified and twisted as compared to the demo version, thanks to SERJ and serious amounts of coffee and Red Bull. 01/04/2006 ARAMAZD is bracing for serious marketing campaign in 2006 to promote our music in Armenia and around the world. For starters we plan to carry out several “club” concerts in Yerevan during this May-June so new band members get better feel for the crowd and band’s live chemistry. Larger arena concerts are planned later on this summer once our vocalist VARAQEL is fully comfortable with all the songs. 25/03/2006 20/03/2006 VARAQEL is learning the material at a steady pace and now ARAMAZD has two songs ready with vocals. We like a lot what we hear as VARAQEL’s intelligent approach and brutal vocal delivery bring so much needed extra dimension and depth to our music. As VARAQEL’s voice gets stronger everyday and given intensive rehearsals we are planning to have six songs with vocals ready in two months time. 15/03/2006 Studio work is underway, blood and sweat. GOREZ is still recording rhythm guitars for the 1 st track. The process of getting those guitars to sound fucking tight is just way more complicated than we thought at first. We are trying to make music very intense and get close to what boys at CHIMAIRA and TESTAMENT do, so it will take some time and effort to get there. Let the metal reign!!! 04/03/2006 New ARAMAZD lineup had played “unofficial” instrumental gig for band’s close friends at our rehearsal studio. We all had fun and lots of Kilikia beer. The music sounds really tight and heavy with MOLOT laying down saturated bass lines to SEKO’s manic percussion while GOREZ-TIGROM riffing tandem is ripping thought the mix. 01/03/2006 Work on the website has commenced. We are looking at several designs that would best fit ARAMAZD concept. Expect the website to be fully up and running prior to April 14 th, 2006 . 21/02/2006 Our new vocalist VARAQEL has commenced rehearsals of the material. We have a lot of work ahead as ARAMAZD plans to have at least six songs with vocals by summer time. We are very much impressed with VARAQEL’s musical, philosophical and personal approach. 14/02/2006 ARAMAZD has recruited Vardan “VARAQEL” Arakelyan as a lead vocalist and front-man. VARAQEL has been involved in metal music for over a decade and is widely know in Yerevan for his death metal project BEERDIGUNGS LAUTEN. Besides significant vocal capabilities VARAQEL plays rhythm guitar and we hope to utilize his talent to full extent. 10/02/2006 While GOREZ is in the studio, the rest of ARAMAZD boys are working on current set-list. SEKO and MOLOT are getting that heavy groove out of drums and bass while TIGROM pulverizes on 7-string custom axe. All in all, with everybody contributing, ARAMAZD sounds a lot heavier than before. 07/02/2006 GOREZ and SERJ have finally set up great guitar sound at the studio. We are now using SCHECTER guitars into AZG custom preamp, MARSHALL JCM 2000 and custom studio cabinet (made by TIGROM) with Celestion Vintage 30 speakers. The sound is really meaty and defined with that special ARAMAZD character in it. Still quite noisy, but we will have to live with it. 05/02/2006 ARAMAZD is relieving current vocalist Artashes Mkrtchyan from his duties in the band. Over time Artashes demonstrated lack of interest in our project and grew distant from the band and our music. We would like to thank Artashes for his time spent in ARAMAZD and would like to wish him best of luck in his solo career. 01/02/2006 GOREZ started guitar tracking at MDP’s studio in Yerevan , Armenia . We are now setting up guitar sound and thinking over the guitar parts for the upcoming ARAMAZD album. We are working closely with Sergey “SERJ” Melkonyan, who has been chosen for the role of music producer and chief sound engineer for this project. We are proud to work with SERJ, as he is a great guy and very good musician. 15/01/2006 We are slowly getting back on track after New Year’s partying and alcohol abuse. The band commenced rehearsals with MOLOT who is a very ample bassist. We hope MOLOT can quickly adapt to ARAMAZD approach and infuse new bass life into our material. 12/01/2006 ARAMAZD has recruited bassist Arthur “MOLOT” Molitvin to work on current material and record the upcoming album. MOLOT has been previously involved in numerous musical projects and we believe he can handle bass duties with honor. 05/01/2006 For reasons we cannot disclose, our good friend and bassist Arthur “CHARLIE” Arevshatyan would not be able to continue with ARAMAZD. We greatly value CHARLIE’s input into our band and would like to sincerely thank him for his effort and friendship. 01/01/2006 We would like to wish everybody a Happy New Year and hope that goals ARAMAZD has set for 2006 will be met in full. |
ARAMAZD is working on the new material in the rehearsal studio. The song doesn't have a definite name but we have a very good idea what it is about. We won't tell you more at the moment but the stuff is heavy, melodic and what most important vocally oriented so VARAQEL's voice can shine through the mix. The band decided to make new material less “obscured” by 1,000 different guitar parts per minute and focus more on groove and feeling of the music. 
GOREZ is more than halfway through SHALAHO. While SERJ is doing good job on melodic approach to guitar lines, the material may loose its brutality in a live setting due to quite complex interlacing parts. We will need to rectify that by extra rehearsals with TIGROM and MOLOT.
23/04/2006 
ARAMAZD played another “unofficial” gig for a number of friends at our rehearsal studio. The spontaneous idea crossed our minds as some of our friends started showing up and consequently we decided to throw a little surprise party. At the same time VARAQEL had a chance to demonstrate his vocal capabilities and front-man duties handling as we had two songs ready with vocals. Everybody enjoyed the music and VARAQEL impressed the crowd with his statue and devastating vocals. 
ARAMAZD has done promo photo-session with Zaven Khachikyan. The photos came out really great and Zaven got blasted away with brutal metal ARAMAZD style. We are looking forward working with Zaven again.