Sentinel Daily’s resident fan of all things symphonic and powerful, Ferry Templeton, quizzes Everdawn guitarist Richard Fischer on everything currently happening in the band’s world…

The new album, Cleopatra,  has been out for a little while now – what has the early response been like from fans of the band? And how, if at all, has the response from critics differed? “At this time the response to Cleopatra has been really positive from both critics and fans alike. It’s been really nice to read the positive reviews and to receive messages from fans saying how much they enjoy the album and also that they are really digging our new singer Alina‘s vocals!”

In the old, antediluvian world before the internet, print media could make or break a band before an album had even come out, but at least those magazines had a degree of authority about them – Now, anyone with access to the web can set themselves up as a critic… Does social media help or hinder an ‘unknown’ band like Everdawn circumvent media ‘gatekeepers’ and get the message out to potential fans? “Well to be honest, social media is a must for any band well known or just starting out. It’s the main way of getting information from the band to the potential audience about their music, tour dates, videos, et cetera. For Everdawn, I believe it can help us get our music out there especially in today’s circumstances with not being able to tour and play shows to promote our album due to the pandemic. Another factor on our side is we have our manager (Intromental) and record Company (Sensory Records) helping us navigate and get our music into the proper channels for reviews and exposure”.

Tell us a little about the current lineup of the band, how it came about and writing and recording of Cleopatra? “The lineup: At the end of 2018 (while still under the moniker Midnight Eternal) Boris (Zaks, keyboards), Dan (Prestup, drums), and myself parted ways with our former singer and bass player. We felt her vocals didn’t fit the new material and in order for the band to grow and evolve we needed to part ways. We first reached out to Mike Lepond about becoming our bass player, as he was an original member in Midnight Eternal. He then agreed to come back into the fold so the next step was to find a new vocalist. Mike suggested we check out a singer named Alina Gavrilenko, as he had worked with her in a project called Diamorte. We sent a few Midnight Eternal songs for her to record vocals on and we were impressed with what she sent back. We then arranged an in-person audition so we could all be in a room together to jam and see how the chemistry would be. The jam session went well – it was as if we knew and had been playing with Alina for a long time. The new lineup was now set but unfortunately we could not continue with the name Midnight Eternal because our former singer hijacked all our social media pages. Rather than pay lawyers and court fees, we wanted to focus on the music. From this point forward we would be known as Everdawn!

As far as Writing and Recording Cleopatra: The album has been in the works for a long time now. It was originally intended to be the second Midnight Eternal album, but we all know how that ended. Some of these songs date back to 2016 (Cleopatra and Stranded In Bangalore), but for me I really started to work on my guitar parts in 2017. Most of the writing was completed by the end 2018 but we ended up working on one more song (Infinity Divine) in the beginning of 2019. By March of 2019, we started recording the album. In the fall of 2019 our album was completed”.

I’m a keen amateur historian myself, so I’m especially interested in the instrumental track Toledo 712 A.D. – what’s the inspiration there? “712 A.D. was the year when Visigothic Spain was almost fully taken over by the Moors, with Toledo being Spain’s capital at the time. The song reflects the conquest”.

Here in the UK where I am it’s unlikely we’ll see the opportunity to watch bands for a while yet – what is the situation like where you are re: live shows, and how will you promote the album further if live shows aren’t an option for the foreseeable future? “Well here in New Jersey USA, there are still no live concert events as well. As it is in the UK, it will be quite some time until live concerts return to this neck of the woods. As far as promoting the new album, we plan to film and release an official music video as well as release guitar, drum, and vocal playthrough videos of different songs from Cleopatra“.

Is there anything else you’d like to say to our readers about the album, or anything else for that matter? “What I want to let the readers know is that a lot of work went into the creation of this album and that I hope they take the time to listen through the album from start to finish and really immerse themselves in it and ultimately enjoy it! I would also like to let them know that we have been working on a new album during the pandemic and hope to record it some time this year. Please follow all our social media pages so you can keep updated with all the happenings on the Everdawn front!”

Everdawn’s Cleopatra is out now. Read Ferry’s review of the album HERE