ELYTEELYTE
ELYTE is one of the new AOR sensations hailing from Spain. Vinny Records is their label and it seems like we can expect a few AOR surprises from the country where we used to go for the sunny weather and beautiful girls. Spanish AOR is making it's way to Western Europe and ELYTE is one of the first I am presenting to you. I had an interview with ELYTE's guitarist Pablo León...
Please introduce us
your band, when did you form ELYTE and did any of you played in
bands before ELYTE?
The current line-up is: Pablo Leon (guitars and backing vocals),
Julio Rubio (vocals), David R. Forjanes (drums and backing
vocals) and Juanma Gomez (bass and backing vocals). Vlady
(keyboards) left the group after we recorded the album to pursue
a career outside music. We’ve now got a new keyboard player
but he is currently establishing himself in the band. Elyte was
formed in 1994. Since then we’ve recorded 2 demos as well as
this cd. We’ve all been playing since we were 14 in lots of
A.O.R. and melodic hard rock bands in Madrid although this is the
first time any of us has released an album.
Can you tell us all
about your debut CD?
We spent quite a lot of time making it; it was hard work! We had
a very clear idea of the sound that we wanted to produce so we
locked ourselves in the studio for 4 months to achieve it. The
whole group was involved in the production process and we believe
that we produced a good sound. We believe that it is possible to
produce good melodic hard rock in Spain, although, a little
patience is required! Half the songs are taken from the demos
although a lot of extra work has gone in to improve them. The
rest are new songs.
Your
music is 80s typed AOR, which bands influenced you?
We like A.O.R. and melodic hard rock from the late 80s and early
90s as well as many classic groups like Boston, Toto, Journey and
also current groups like Fair Warning, Danger Danger, Hugo,
Metropolis and so on. We also like other types of music such as
Symphonic Rock, Jazz-Fusion or New Age. There are songs on the
album that have a very 80s sound, although we didn’t
consciously set out to achieve this. Rather that’s the music
that comes out when we pick up the guitar although I think we
have introduced touches of present-day hard rock.
How's the scene
like for this kind of music in Spain?
Yes, there are a number of interesting bands at the moment such
as SEVEN LTD, RAFA MARTIN, ICE BLUE, 91 SUITE, FOOL’S KIN,
FAR FROM EDEN etc... Our label Vinny Records, are doing a great
job signing melodic rock bands and unleashing them to the Spanish
public. There have been, however, since the 80s, groups like
Sangre Azul, La Fase or Rafa Martin who have done a great deal
for Spanish hard rock but unfortunately these bands are no longer
together except Rafa. They gave up music because they were
disallusioned that they weren’t valued. But times have
changed and nowadays melodic rock is better received.
How
does the future look like for ELYTE?
We have plans to rerecord the cd in English and to include a few
new songs. We already have quite a few new songs that we like as
much or even more than the ones on ‘unno’ that
we’ll include on the next cd. Having said that, now is the
time to promote ‘unno’ and tour so that people get to
know this album. We hope these songs will be well received
because we have put so much effort and work into them. At
present, things are going very well for us in Spain and we are
very excited about the cd and we hope that this type of music
regains the popularity it once had.
Finally, do you
have anything to add to our readers?
Yes, I’d like to ask people who do not know our music to
listen to our demos on the Internet and if they like them, to buy
the cd because we think it’s well worth it. We’d also
like to thank everyone who has already bought the cd or read the
interview and especially you and your fancine.