Poland is changing, though, isn’t it?
For the better, that’s for sure. But we’re still playing catch-up with most other countries.
Is that why we have ‘loads of energy’?
My peers from the USA or Great Britain haven’t experienced changes as radical as Poles have. I was the guy from the People’s Republic of Poland; I could eat bananas twice a year. I’ve experienced a clash of ages. It’s a gift. It taught me determination.
As a teenager, I had to fight for a guitar, which was of lousy quality anyway, whereas a guy in France or England just walked into a used instruments shop and bought one for chump change. If I had been born somewhere else, we wouldn’t be talking today. On the other hand, Poland is the land of wasted talents.
Who wasted them?
People usually fall by themselves. As a kid, I saw this downfall every day. I would come back from training or a rehearsal and I would see the same guys in front of the block, often my friends: a bench, a beer, picking their noses. This is how they created their space and defined who they were. They were lazy, bored, indifferent.
You were different?
I often sat down with them on that bench, drank a few beers, but I also knew that the world was about more than that. I didn’t want to search for the meaning of life by the clotheshorse in front of the block. I felt that I wouldn’t get anywhere by standing in one place. You have to move your ass to change the world.
There was always a determination and a will to act in me and it’s still there. And I try to infect others with it. It’s my small contribution to the development of our country.
How do you infect your friends?
I’ll give you an example. Krzysztof Sadowski, a fabulous photographer who has been working with Behemoth for years now, formed a band at the age of thirty. And he said, ‘If Darski can do it, I can, too.’ He’s chasing his dreams, even though making a band work is not a piece of cake by any means.
And what if he doesn’t succeed?
He will have a clear conscience. At least he tried.
What would you do if Poland were to be invaded?
I would quickly evacuate to Argentina or some other warm country with clear, blue sea and beautiful women. Or maybe I would create some kind of diversion behind enemy lines. I’m sure I would avoid joining the army, that’s for certain.
Were you ever in the army?
On my military commission papers you can read: ‘Irregular personality. Adaptation conditions hindered.’ I should probably get a tattoo of that. When you think about it, the army is not really that much different from the church. They both cram you in their systems and grind you. I’m not saying that the army is totally unnecessary, but I wouldn’t join them anyway. It’s contrary to my worldview.
Are you a pacifist?
My love for freedom is just too big. I don’t get along with any institution whatsoever. Besides, war is death. It’s not as romantic as it used to be; nowadays it’s all business. War is just a nutrient for the media. We love watching it and reading about it. It’s like today’s coliseum, especially designed for TV. We feast on death. And the further away it is, the better.
You didn’t support ‘our boys’ in Afghanistan or Iraq?
I do understand the concept of mourning soldiers who died in Afghanistan, but making it a national tragedy is overreacting. Death is inscribed on a soldier’s life. He goes to fight, and he knows that he might not come back.
If anything, I am more touched by civilian deaths. Their only fault is that they were born in a particular place. They die because some abstract national business of one country was the reason to send some soldiers to another place on the planet.
I don’t want to take part in games like that, particularly when I know that every human being is a victim of time and space. We have no influence over where or when we are born. When I hold a globe in my hands and move my finger a few centimetres to a new country, it will turn out that people who live there are completely different. They have their own culture and habits. A few centimetres decide whether we think of them as barbarians, even though we treat their country in the most barbaric way. Who gave us the monopoly to solve this world’s problems? Earth is full of cultural and social contrasts. Why is one viewpoint supposed to be more important and better than others?
What about politicians? Do you mourn those—including then president of Poland Lech Kaczynski—who died in the Smolensk plane crash, for example?
Planes crash and people die. There is nothing extraordinary about that. Things like that just happen. I’m absolutely fed up with making a national tragedy out of the crash. When I hear about Smolensk, I see only dirty, political games. I find it all repulsive.
Is it appropriate for a Pole to say such things?
It is appropriate to pay taxes? I pay a lot. I am useful for my country.
What else do you do for Poland?
Whether I want to or not, I promote our country around the world.
Oh, really? As ‘Behemoth from Europe’?
It doesn’t matter. The word ‘Poland’ shows up in every article about us. And there are hundreds of those.
Some people claim that instead of promoting Polish culture, you bring shame to your country.
Everyone has the right to an opinion, but nobody can accuse me of not representing quality in what I do—in my niche. The rest is just a matter of taste. True, I don’t go around with a fucking loaf of bread and a jar of salt in my hands, wearing a highlander’s outfit, but you can promote culture in different ways.
The situation is quite paradoxical and perverse, because a lot of people in Poland think that I am the devil himself and a not-that-necessary evil. They would love to see me behind bars, or somewhere far away, like Madagascar. And at the same time, my band and I have been working really hard for our country. If a ‘national good’ does not describe Behemoth, then we might as well be a ‘national evil’. That sounds nice, too.
What are the effects of your hard work?
By playing on tours, you meet fans. Someone came to your show ten years ago and he comes today. People couldn’t believe that we weren’t from Sweden. ‘Poland? How come?’ Then, years later, the very same people invite me over for homemade bigos or żurek!
These are trivial examples, but they show how you can interest people with your tradition or culture. I talk to these people, and I often hear that before they met us, they had thought that Poland was a post-communist concrete jungle, and suddenly it turned out that our country has a lot to offer. They brag that they visited Poland and got to know it better.
What can Poland offer to foreigners?
We have a great history. Instead of praying to it, we should show it to tourists. Let’s learn how to sell it, though. In spite of the major damage caused by World War II, we still have a lot of beautiful monuments. Polish nature is also very raw and beautiful.
What about your area? Gdańsk?
I can’t stand the fact that such an attractive city has so much odd energy that hinders its development. The Old Town is only alive during the summer for a few weeks, when this pathetic Dominican Fair is taking place. Gdańsk has been taken over by old ladies selling their embroideries and the Chinese trying to push fake clothes on suckers. Sometimes I think that nobody has any idea what potential this town has. There’s just nothing going on in the centre! After seven in the evening, the streets are empty, like there was an epidemic or something.
The best-case scenario is hordes of drunken kids. Just look at the seaports in the Netherlands. If Gdańsk had been directed in a similar way, it would have been one of the biggest attractions in Central Europe.
What about other Polish cities?
I love Krakow. I actually get the impression that our country has greatly accelerated, especially in economic terms. But sometimes I see a terrible discord between people and their surroundings.
Some time ago, I stopped at a gas station in some shithole. One of the guys who worked there recognised me and
, while smirking, asked me, ‘So, it didn’t work out with Doda for you, huh?’ There was no friendliness in it at all. It sounded like a combination of malice and frustration. By stinging someone famous, this guy could be king of the world for a moment and feel better about himself.
I just smiled and said, ‘No, it didn’t,’ and then I thought, ‘and what the fuck do you care, hillbilly?’ And then it occurred to me that people like this guy treat other nations the same way. They show their spite just so they can heal their own complexes.
I got back into my car. That same day, I drove through the newly opened section of highway between Gdańsk and Torun and I felt genuinely proud. I do realise that we should have had this road built years ago, but I was happy like a child. I only hope that culture will follow civilisation’s progress.
Have you ever considered leaving Poland, like your brother did?
I regularly leave it, but in my case it’s more of an expansion. I have my own fortress and I go out to conquer new lands. Somehow, my brother inspired me. He impressed me, but I’m not sure if I could burn all the bridges behind me so radically and not get broken by all the obstacles.
What keeps you here?
The band and music have always been a priority to me. And the band is located in Poland. If I had decided to emigrate—let’s say ten years ago—everything could have fallen apart.
Today, the world is smaller, of course. It’s not really a problem to move between Gdańsk and New York City. If I really wanted to, I could still play with the band even if I lived in another country. But I just don’t think about it. Poland is my home.
So you’re not going to Madagascar?
No. But it would be nice to live in two countries. An apartment on the Costa Blanca is not such a bad idea either, but I would always be coming back to Poland, even if it were just to run in the Polish forests. They’re especially beautiful in winter. The rigidity of our climate hardens the soul.
CHAPTER V
A REINDEER, TWO OWLS, AND A DEAD MAN
Have you ever done physical work?
During college I carried carpets for a week. It was a total misunderstanding. Later, in Spain, at my brother’s, I worked on a fucking construction site because I wanted to earn enough money to buy a new guitar. And that was when I realised that the only physical work I can stand is banging my head onstage. During a period of two months, I changed jobs five times! I was twenty, and the gods had told me to relax. I decided that I would never do physical work again, and I would never have a boss, either. It’s been fifteen years since then and I still stick to my decision.
What is your main source of income?
Concerts.
How much do you receive for one? Is it a lot?
I don’t know how much constitutes ‘a lot’, but if you’re a musician, the only way you can make your living is by playing live shows.
Not by selling records?
If you want to do something genuinely worthwhile and high quality—and that is how we always approach it—then the costs of recording, production, and promotion are so high that you don’t really earn money selling records alone.
But in the beginning, Behemoth didn’t really play shows.
We didn’t feel the need to. The process of creation was so absorbing and energy-consuming in itself that we didn’t even think of playing shows. We were kids; we were about sixteen or seventeen years old and we fell under Burzum’s and Darkthrone’s spell. They boycotted concerts by default. Their attitude perfectly fitted our vision of a band. We wanted to be even more radical than they were.
I still remember a conversation with Baal, during which we agreed that Behemoth would cease to exist the moment we signed a record deal. It was supposed to be our demonstration of intransigence. Of course, we were novices with only a few tapes from our rehearsals, and a real album was a totally abstract notion for us. Fortunately, my character changed.
You did record an album, but still didn’t play any shows.
Our appetites grew as we ate. We were recognised in a black metal capacity, but we wanted to take a step further. These were completely different times. It was 1993 when the Fuck Christ tour took place and black metal emerged from the basement. The stage was shared by Blasphemy, Immortal, and Rotting Christ, and I practically wet my pants because they were my gods! They set the whole of Europe on fire, and I couldn’t even afford to see any of the concerts. All I was left with was reviews in fanzines and promo leaflets. It was only thanks to VHS bootlegs of these shows that we slowly started to digest the thought of playing live.
Before that, you released the album Grom.
Before recording it, we felt another impulse. In the winter of 1995, I went to negotiate a deal with a label. Carsten Molitor, Solistitium’s boss, took me for a long walk in the forest. He presented to me his vision of a common tour with Behemoth, Helheim from Norway, and our buddies from Christ Agony. The idea was already there in my head. The rest was just a matter of time.
Was it difficult at first?
We began the European tour in September of 1996. Before that, just before the summer holidays, we had managed to play three shows. The first one was in Bialystok, at the Kino club. I’m not sure if the name is still the same, but I was driving past that place a few months ago. Nothing about its appearance has changed. It’s certainly not an architectural diamond. But when we stood on the stage for the very first time, we didn’t mind playing in a dingy cinema from the communist era. For us, it was the centre of the universe.
And the show itself?
It was just like all the others at that time: chaotic. We lacked skills and any basic knowledge of gear. It was all rather lopsided, but what we lacked in technical nous we made up for with our passion and determination. There was another show that we played in Germany, in some forest in Bavaria—middle of the night, cold as fuck, to about three hundred people. We went onstage all covered in pigs’ blood. It was wild.
You said you would never hurt an animal …
The blood? We got it from a butcher. Sometimes we ordered it from the gig promoters, too. For the first show in Bialystok, our friend Bart Krysiuk, the boss of the Witching Hour label, got some of it for us. He took us to some butcher’s stand at a fair where the merchant poured blood into a vodka bottle for us. A litre of it. Of course, there were pieces of meat, eyes—all kinds of gross shit mixed in.
We poured it all over ourselves. It had a liturgical meaning for us. By covering ourselves in blood, spitting it, we challenged the Eucharist, turned it upside down. I like symbols like that.
It had an aesthetic dimension, too. Let’s be honest: blood has fantastic shock value. Nowadays, after my illness, I look at blood in a very different way. It’s a personal relationship, and as if to confirm it, I keep a vial of my new blood in my fridge. I actually want to use it to paint the cover of Behemoth’s next album.
Have you ever killed something bigger than a bug?
Once I killed a pigeon. I love animals, but pigeons are not animals—they’re not even birds. They are like rats with wings, flying cockroaches. Spreading germs, shitting everywhere, making noises that fucking piss me off.
When I was studying, I lived in one of these blocks in Gdańsk. It was a small flat, about nineteen square metres in total, but it gave me independence. Unfortunately, those flying fuckers made a hiding place out of my balcony. It was five or six in the morning, and they kept fucking cooing and waking me up. I would get on the balcony and scream. They usually got the fuck out. But they would always come back. So, once, I took my bloody revenge.
I was sleeping with my window open, and then, suddenly, one of them gets in through the window and lands next to my bed. I was furious. I grabbed a guitar strap and started lashing blindly at everything around me. I hit the bastard and I kicked him out onto the balcony, but as he was trying to escape, he caught on the guardrail with his claws. Basically, they stayed on the balcony, while the rest of his body went further. I have no pangs of conscience about that.
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br /> When did you stop using blood?
I can’t remember. We used it as a prop for a few years. At that time we found ourselves in the biggest shitholes of Europe—places where we would play for a slice of pizza. None of us even asked for any remuneration. Our first tours were about ‘buy-on’—our label paid the concert organisers so that we could open for bigger bands and show ourselves to a larger audience. And it worked like that for a few years.
Baal left the band before you became really big, though?
Sooner or later, our ways had to part. He was a walking metamorphosis. During the recording sessions for Grom, he was obsessed with Type O Negative. He even looked like Peter Steel. He started playing bass, and he was even thinking of making his own music. He also sent a few vivid signals that drumming was not as enjoyable for him as it used to be. He knew Behemoth was my child anyway. I wrote all the music and most of lyrics, and he needed something of his own. So he left and founded Hellborn.
In one interview, he said that he didn’t like the direction you were going in; that there was ‘too much paint on the face and too little music’.
That’s a strange opinion when you consider that, after leaving Behemoth, he still attached a lot of weight to the visual side of his records and shows.
Did your friendship last?
We were friends when we were kids and today we are still cool. We greatly respect each other. It’s a healthy arrangement. Baal still lives to his rules and he hasn’t been drawn into the ‘bug mode’. He’s creative, and he keeps developing. He gets more tattoos on his body each year, too. He loves dogs and he hates church—how can one not like him?
Where did you find Zbyszek Prominski?
We shared a rehearsal room with the band Damnation, from Tricity. Their leader, Les, also played bass with us for a while. Damnation’s drummer was Wawrzyn. But he left the band, and in his place they took on a young and very promising drummer. It was Inferno himself. I would stay after rehearsals just to see him play. He was amazing. First I felt jealousy, then a conviction that this guy just has to be in my band.
Confessions Of A Heretic: The Sacred And The Profane: Behemoth And Beyond Page 9
