Ice Ages interview: ‘People Are Not Responsible For The Actions Of Their Leaders’
Way back in the ’90s, I discovered a small but promising label from Liechtenstein: M.O.S. Records. This label produced intriguing bands such as L’âme Immortelle, Sanguis Et Cinis, Weltenbrand, and Ice Ages. Austrian musician Richard Lederer is the mastermind behind Ice Ages, bringing the project to life and releasing its first opus in 1997. The music had a Dark-Electro sound, with its power primarily drawn from an obscure, eerie atmosphere. More than 25 years later, Ice Ages is still active, as evidenced by the seventh album, “Parasiting Dreams”, released at the end of last year. While the overall production has evolved over time, the essence and influences remain true to what Ice Ages has always stood for: Dark-Electro, infused with occasional touches of EBM and a distinct Gothic atmosphere. Below is an interview with Richard Lederer about his latest album and more. (Courtesy by Inferno Sound Diaries)
Q: In the meantime, it has now been about 30 years since you started Ice Ages. What originally inspired you to start this solo project, in addition to your other projects such as Summoning and Die Verbannten Kinder Evas? And how do you see this project evolving over the many years?
Richard: The first ICE AGES songs are as old as the first Summoning or Die Verbannten Kinder Evas songs. At that time I first got to know Dark-Electronic music when I heard the songs “Zyklon B” and “Mohawk” by Leather Strip, which had a big influence on me. Since I ‘grew up’ with Metal music and Metal bands, it was a kind of revolution for me to see that you can make dark, hard music on your own, without a band or guitars, but just with synths. I then began to dive deeply into EBM/Industrial/Electro scene, and since then I have seen Metal as a thing of the past for me personally -although I still made music with passion for my Metal project Summoning. But from that point on I stopped listening to Metal.
The development of my music was and is strongly dependent on the development of the synths that existed at the time or that I could use. At the beginning I was dependent on inflexible hardware synths that did not offer a great deal of variation. I had the vision of creating my own sounds ‘out of nothing’ all the time, but that was not possible at the beginning. It was only when computers became so powerful that you could use them to compose many tracks of complex software synths that my dream came true. I constructed my own Reaktor Ensemble and was able to create any sound I wanted using simple wave-shapes and noise waves -without any sample at all.
Q: An important aspect of your music has always remained present over the years: the dark atmosphere that resonates throughout your songs. For you, the power seems to lie more in the atmosphere than in the sheer force of rhythms, bass lines, and similar elements. How do you perceive your own approach and sound, and what are you trying to express with it?
Richard: In Metal music, everything is very much focused on the guitar and is often the only ‘melody’ instrument. I always found this kind of mono-phony to be limiting. With Ice Ages, I wanted to do the opposite (rebel, so to speak) and always try to put different melody layers on top of each other and not just have one instrument play a melody. The same applies to the rhythm. Here, too, I wanted to create more and more rhythm layers with different drum sounds.
And it is precisely this overlay of many melodic, rhythmic layers that is perceived as atmospheric, I think. The slow, steady structure of the songs, by gradually adding melody and rhythm layers, creates more of an image of a kind of musical world for me than if I produce short, concise songs with a straight beat and hardly any introduction. Of course, the massive use of reverb on the melody instruments also plays a big role to create this atmosphere.
But none of this happens because of any intention, it comes from working on the songs. Often it is only after I have finished the song that I realize how the song really turned out, because I was so immersed in the different layers and details the whole time.
Q: Last year, you released your newest album, “Parasiting Dreams”. Could you tell us a bit about the composition and production process of this album? What were you aiming to express with the lyrics and the album’s title?
Richard: Unfortunately, I’m not a lyrical type at all, which is why I let someone else write the lyrics for all my projects. But for the last album, I looked through the lyrics and noticed the line ‘on your dreams I’m parasiting’ from the song “Deceiver”, which I liked because I found the idea of your own dreams sucking you dry very interesting.
When I get the lyrics, I can’t really judge how much I like them at first because, due to my lack of lyrical talent, I always need music to get me in the mood. The only thing that counts for me when singing is the right number of syllables to optimally support the rhythm of the vocal line. I can only judge the meaning and mood of the lyrics afterwards
Q: Were there any challenges or learning moments during the creation of this album? How did you handle these, and do you still find opportunities to learn or discover something new about your own work after so many years?
Richard: I had a crisis with the older albums that caused massive time delays. But that was mainly due to sound problems. This time everything went very smoothly. But of course I learned new things again. My inspiration is actually working on my self-built virtual synth (which I mentioned before). I see the construction process and the creative process as closely connected, because when I construct my synth to add some features that came to my mind, I naturally play the keyboard to check the result, which often leads to a new melody -sometimes without planning to create a new melody.
Unlike in the past, when I had a sound library and had to switch between many sounds to find the most suitable one, now I don’t have libraries, but create each sound specifically for the song I’m working on. So it can happen that I try to create a bass line, but after working on the synth and experimenting, it turns out that this bass line has become some kind of high-short EBM melody or something like that.
Q: I found some information that your last album was released in Russia. To what extent is this accurate? Russia has long been an important scene for Electro, Gothic, and Industrial music, but how does today’s political climate impact artists? What is your perspective on this?
Richard: Since I’m no longer on a label and can do whatever I want with my music, I enjoy my freedom. So when people ask me if they can re-release my songs, I don’t have to ask a label boss, I can just let them do it -which I did. To be honest, after EBM started sounding like Eurodance music about 20 years ago, I lost interest in the scene and have no idea about it anymore. So I didn’t really know that Russia is such an important country for this scene.
So far I have not had the impression that the war personally affects Russians in the capitals -unlike Ukrainians. But that is just a personal impression that can be misleading. Personally, I hated Putin when he was waging his Russian version of the ‘war on terror’ and bombing Chechnya, just like Bush and all his criminal followers bombed Arab countries in their ‘war on terror’. And I hated Putin when he helped his friend Assad drown in blood the Syrian revolution that originally started from below by the normal, brave people. Then when he attacked Ukraine, the only difference was that this time he killed ‘white’ people -which didn’t make much difference to me. But anyway -people are not responsible for the actions of their leaders, neither in Russia nor in the US or anywhere else.
Q: What does 2025 hold for you creatively? Are there any concrete plans or projects, and do you have further dreams you’d like to pursue?
Richard: At the moment I’m consciously trying not to make music to clear my head. It’s like when a farmer has harvested a crop; he has to leave the field fallow so that the wheat can grow again 😉
I can never say when this process will end. In the past I always forced myself to interrupt the process and make music -but that never led to a good result.
Since you’re here …
… we have a small favour to ask. More people are reading Side-Line Magazine than ever but advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. Unlike many news organisations, we haven’t put up a paywall – we want to keep our journalism as open as we can - and we refuse to add annoying advertising. So you can see why we need to ask for your help.
Side-Line’s independent journalism takes a lot of time, money and hard work to produce. But we do it because we want to push the artists we like and who are equally fighting to survive.
If everyone who reads our reporting, who likes it, helps fund it, our future would be much more secure. For as little as 5 US$, you can support Side-Line Magazine – and it only takes a minute. Thank you.
The donations are safely powered by Paypal.