Merlin (group)

Merlin was founded in 1992 by vocalist Maria Abaza and guitarist Alexander Ioffe. As a result of a long search, they were joined by drummer Nikolai Bykov, nicknamed "Professor Grind." Before Merlin, each of the musicians had extensive experience playing in groups of different styles from hard rock to thrash metal . Musicians consider the name of their group to be the most suitable, because they wanted it to be both original and atypical for a death metal band, and easy to remember for fans. Merlin is a symbol of witchcraft and power. He is well known as a sorcerer from the legends of King Arthur , and, according to musicians, his image is best represented in Stephen King ’s book “The Dark Tower”. In addition, the word “merlin” is translated from English as “ Gyrfalcon, ” a bird of prey that tears flesh with its sharp beak and bloodied claws, which accurately reflects the style of the group; from French, “merlin” is translated as “heavy ax”, “big sledgehammer”, “cleaver”, “butcher cutter” or “hammer for slaughtering livestock in a slaughterhouse”.

Maria Abaza has a rare voice range from contralto (overlapping male baritone ) to soprano . In addition, Maria Abaza is one of the very first female growlers and screamers in the world and the first in Russia. She has a jazz education, which, as Maria herself says, helped her find her own style of singing in death metal . When Maria began to growl, she was crazy about the voice of Obituary vocalist John Tardy and even adopted something from his manner of performance.

The first Merlin demo titled “Welcome to Hell” (1992) was created in death / thrash style, but then, three months later that year, they released the second demo, “Die!”, In the death / grind direction. In 1994, the third demo, Prisoner of Death, was released, the most famous of the three. A lot of reviews were written on it in various metal magazines of the world, which carried a positive assessment. In 1997, Merlin's fundamental work was released - the Deathkoteque album, recognized as the most brutal album of that year. Eric Rutan ( Morbid Angel , Hate Eternal ) after listening to the album, said that "few men are able to do as much and at such a high level as Mary."

After some time, the album in a remastered version was released by the Canadian company GRIND IT records, Canada . In 1998, the second guitarist Artyom (Bolt) Nazarov (ex-Anal Pus), a talented guitarist with an excellent sense of rhythm, joined the group, after which the sound of Merlin became even more powerful. In 1999, the musicians received an offer from the Canadian company GWN Records to release a new album. At the beginning of 2000, the group began recording the album “They Must Die” and in May they released a true masterpiece. In September 2000, “They Must Die” was released in cassette version on the Russian company Hobgoblin, and in January 2001 a CD was released on GWN records. Merlin wanted to create a conceptual and very brutal album, and we must admit that “They Must Die” meets these requirements. In addition, Maria experimented a lot with her vocals on this album.

Merlin is active in concert and is preparing material for the new album. In June 2003, the group sits in the studio to record the next album under the working title "Brutal Constructor". The material for the album was created for almost three years. The main concept of the album is “ultra-fast and super brutal music on the verge of technical capabilities”. The recording was in full swing and a European tour was planned in support of the album “They Must Die”, when the tragic news came that on July 13, 2003, permanent drummer Nikolai Bykov died in a car accident. It was an irreparable loss for the group.

For a long time, Merlin carefully searched for a new drummer and, in the end, chose Anatoly Boychenko, who turned out to be a worthy drummer and joined the group.

The third album “Brutal Constructor” was recorded with difficulty, as it was morally difficult to do something after the death of Nicholas. Nevertheless, the musicians gathered their strength and completed the album, since Nikolai’s drum parts were recorded before the tragedy. And in 2004, a real masterpiece “Brutal Constructor” was born, which was included in the ten most brutal children's metal albums of 2004 in Europe .

The peculiarity of their third album is not only that it contains a cover version of Death ’s song “Zombie Ritual”, but also that there is a clear influence of the traditions of classical music . But this is not surprising, since Maria Abaza is very fond of classical music and composers such as Dmitry Shostakovich , Ludwig Van Beethoven and Alfred Schnittke . She grew up in a family where classical music is a tradition: Maria is the great-great-granddaughter of composer Arkady Maksimovich Abaza (author of the famous romance “Morning Misty”), and the famous composer of the 20th century, Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky, is her cousin. On the album “Brutal Constructor” you can hear a combination of classical music with modern extreme metal song - Slaughter on Ice - a cover version in the style of brutal death metal for the fifth part of Sergey Sergeyevich Prokofiev ’s cantata “Alexander Nevsky” (music for the film by Sergey Eisenstein “ Alexander Nevsky "of 1939).

Over the past few years, the composition of the group has changed more than once. Artyom “Bolt” Nazarov left in 2004, after which the young guitarist Sergey Chebanov, who played in Merlin until 2006, joined the band. In autumn 2006, instead of Sergei, the new guitarist Mikhail Karpeev began to play.

Recently the line-up changed again, and new drummer Vlad “Ravendark” Raven (ex-Thunderstorm) and guitarist Rinat joined the band.

For several years, MERLIN has been preparing material for the recording of the new album. However, for unknown reasons, the group stopped its work. At the moment, its activities are suspended.

Current squad

• Maria Abaza - vocals, bass
• Alexander Ioffe - lead guitar
• Rinat - rhythm guitar
• Vladislav "Ravendark" Crow - drums

Former members

• Nikolay Bykov - drums (1992-2003)
• Artyom "Bolt" Nazarov - rhythm guitar (1998-2004)
• Anatoly "Alchothron" Boychenko - drums (2003-2007)
• Sergey Chebanov - guitar (2004-2006)
• Mikhail Karpeev - guitar (2006-2007)

Founders

• Maria Abaza (1992 - present)
• Alexander Ioffe (1992 - present)
• Nikolai Bykov (1992-2003)

Studio Albums

• 1997: Deathkoteque
• 2000: They Must Die
• 2004: Brutal Constructor

Demos

• 1992: Welcome to Hell
• 1992: Die
• 1994: Prisoner of Death

• The official website of the group
• Official MySpace Page
• English Reviews
• MERLIN at Metallibrary (lyrics, song translations, reviews)
• MERLIN at Metal Archives

Interview

Key interviews can be found at the links below:

• Interview for Endemoniada'zine (# 19)
• Interview for Demogorgon'zine
• Interview for GWN Records
• Interview for GB'zine
• Interview for Eternal Frost'zine
• Funeral'zine interview
• Sweedish Metal Inquisition Interview
• Interview for metal kings
• Interview for Dissound Magazine
• Interview for rockhell