Magnacult is a Dutch (brutal) metal band. With members from bands like Fluff and Demia.

Aggressive and overwhelming power hits you in the face when you listen to MagnaCult's debut album Synoré. This 5-piece band formed early 2005 and decided, from the start, to show their cult to the world with the release of a full length album.

When the album was written the band decided to record it themselves at their own practice room. Guitarist Tom did all the recordings and most of the editing on the record… a big job since he'd never done that before. "It was a hard job, but I'm very satisfied with the end result and it was a good learning experience for me. I had to isolate myself from the rest of the world in my own studio and work on it day and night till it was all done," Tom reveals.

The final mixing, supervising the recordings and the production was in the hands of Jochem Jacobs, known for his excellent work with Textures as producer, song writer and mixer and producer Bouke Visser. The mixing and mastering took place at their Split Second Sound Studio (Cypher, Textures, Obsidian, Malkovich). "When we were thinking of a producer Jochem was the first person that came in our minds. We all like the sound he made for Textures and the other stuff he did," guitarist D. says about picking the producer. "We knew he would be the one that could give us the sound that we were looking for," continues Tom.

The recording went very well. The drums were recorded in less than a week with almost no breaks, just keep it rolling and get those tracks on 'tape'. Musician for a living and a great jazz drummer as well, Bionic remembers that the recording of the drum tracks was like something he'd never felt before. "While laying down my drum tracks and having all the guitar, bass and vocal lines in my head the songs were shaping up in my mind and that kept me going until all was recorded the way I wanted it," Bionic says from the band's home base in Dordrecht, Holland.

Both guitarists went into the studio for about two weeks and locked themselves up until all was recorded. "We were so excited with the sound we had made with producers Jochem and Bouke that recording the guitar tracks was easy and going as planned," D. says about their time in the studio. MagnaCult's 6-string masters D. and Tom recorded each fifty percent of the guitar tracks. Both have a slightly different way of playing and a different guitar sound, which makes this album sound so massive.
"I also added some acoustic guitar parts to make some parts sound more melodic and open, and it really does fit with the songs and makes the album a bit more melodic then we intended it to be," Tom says. "I enjoy writing 'weird' clean stuff as you can hear in Kill Ignorant Humanity and Identity 676. It gives you a short time to relax your ears when you listen to the album in one run," D. continues regarding the different guitar parts on the album. The song Synoré is a song on its own on the album. It has a really catchy intro and a pounding main riff and the wahwah parts in the couplet are just excellent! "I've always been a big fan of the wahwah sound and the song Synoré was the best of all nine songs to add the wahwah pedal," Tom proudly says about this guitar part.

Bassist Spit nailed it in the studio. He recorded all 9 songs in less then 10 hours!
"Tom and I started early in the morning making the sound and then immediately went into recording mode. The rest of the band was supposed to drop by in the evening to listen to some of the tracks but when they called to see how far we were Tom and I were already having dinner hahaha," remembers Spit. While mixing the record producer Jochem suggested adding some overdrive to the bass tracks. "I remember hearing the first mixes and I was like wow this sounds massive, so we agreed with Jochem to add the overdrive in certain parts on the album," continues the long bearded bassist.

"Most of the lyrics that I write are about what goes on in my life, the world and of course the whole idea behind MagnaCult. The song Synoré is about the Cult of Magna, the unity of us as a band, a group, 5 friends who share the same musical interests," Sebastiaan reveals. "Also the other members contributed in writing lyrics and making melody lines. So next to the music everything is done as a unity and that makes this record so much more special then we could ever imagine. I like how my vocals came out on this record. The song Line Of Attack, for instance, starts of very aggressive and in the middle part I go into some kinda Alice In Chains melodically voice, where in the end of the song I go fucking nuts again. It brings out the two sides I got… the brutal metal dude going crazy and the one that likes listening to more mellow stuff as well. I hope people dig what I do, but I'm not that worried about it," says the confident vocalist.

Musically the members are influenced by many different bands that are ranging from modern metal to death metal and beyond. "We always like to challenge ourselves with what we do. Putting the ladder a step higher every time and pushing you to the limits every day again. Come up with weird counts but not to confusing and most important still keeping the groove in the songs. That was where we were aiming for while writing the material," says guitarist D. "The songs did it all for us. We weren't even thinking of record companies yet and A&R manager Manfred van Zadelhoff of Rusty Cage Records contacted us through our MySpace page. We are very proud to have inked a deal with them," Bionic says about the sudden record deal offer. "It takes our music to another level, where it is available for fans to buy it and enjoy it to the fullest. Especially in the nowadays music-scene it's good to have a label behind you who want to push you to the next level and is able to promote and distribute your record where it would otherwise not be," says D.

So with Tom and D. thrashing on the guitars, bassist Spit delivering the low-end frequencies, the overwhelming drum-rolls pounded by drummer Bionic and the talented voice of MagnaCult given to you with brutal, melodic and in-your-face singing by Sebastiaan, this band will make their mark and is sure to be noticed in the music scene.

BE PREPARED; keep your eyes and ears open… MagnaCult's debut album Synoré is going to blow you away!