Interview With The Legendary Venezuelan Death Metal Icons "Stratuz"

The History of formation of Stratuz takes us back to 1985 to the beautiful city of Caracas in Venezuela. The Dark Lords of Death Metal rise and was storming the metal community ever since, With numerous demos, Singles and Fabulous 4 albums with the recent Osculum Pacis which was out on April 26, 2022.

Osculum Pacis is the fourth full-length album from doom death specialists Stratuz. The album features 11 brand new tracks with a whole range of new sounds, which were composed throughout the Covid-19 pandemic against all odds.

Lyrically, the album’s tracks speak of the abuses of the church and its deafening silence in the face of so many denunciations of abuse, it speaks of the manipulation of the masses, injustice, but at the same time, it also speaks of the awakening of consciousness, of death as a process of transformation, the need to change ourselves in order to rise up and banish our own miseries, it speaks of rising up awareness of who we are.

Osculum Pacis has made a huge impact in my death metal soul very deeply, an amazing album which had the perfect orchestration and composition makes a solid metal album.

It was my pleasure to have this chat with guitarist Gerónimo Egea on the new album and much more. Enjoy the Interview and don’t forget to buy their album.

Greetings from Metalheads Forever Magazine, I’m Keith Clement the Head, how are you today?

Hi Keith, very well! Thanks for asking and for having us!

April 26th you released the most awaited album “Osculum Pacis” can you tell me about the songwriting and production behind it?

After a very long hiatus we finally had the will and the means to get the band back together in 2019 and we began writing pretty much immediately. Things got interesting very quickly when the pandemic hit and, as you all know, at first it meant a lot of involuntary free time for a lot of us, so we focused very hard on writing and producing.

We did all the recording in The Asylum, which is my humble home studio, and then we sent everything to Arturo Banus, in Chicago, for mixing and mastering. Arturo is a close friend of mine and an amazing producer. He took what we did and elevated it to a whole new level.

It was very different and kind of hard for us to have the mixing and mastering done so far away, and us not being present in the studio for that part of the process, but we were amazed and very pleased with the final result. Arturo really understood what we did, the vibe we were going for, and it was easy to work with.

What was the concept behind the album?

The album is mostly about the abuses and insane practices of the church, as well as their silence about them, but it´s also a wake-up call to break free of those chains, look inward and find each’s individual truth.

Can you tell me about the cover art of the album?

It was done by Eugeniya Bathoriya, an amazing Czech artist. For us, it represents the victims of the church, the lack of justice and their sins as an institution.

The 11 tracked album is beautifully composed and the outcome was amazing, how as a band do you feel about the outcome?

Thank you! We feel very proud of the final result. It was a lot of hard work and it feels great to hear about people liking it all over the world.

How are the touring plans coming up for this year?

I don’t want to give anything away until it’s confirmed, especially since the pandemic is still an issue, but we’re very focused and determined on taking our show to many places, home and abroad.

Last year you signed up with Sliptrick Records, how do you feel working with them?

It’s been very good so far, but it’s still early to evaluate the results.

The band’s history goes way back to 1984 with lots of ups and downs and a huge comeback again. How do you feel about the road that you have travelled so far?

It’s been a crazy ride. From my perspective there have been more ups than downs. I joined the band in 2005, but I was very close to the band even as a child because my late father produced the band’s first album, so I was around since the early 90s. Many people have come and gone since then, but that made us what we are now. The biggest “down” would have to be the long hiatus we were forced to take from 2006 to 2019 because the politics and economy in Venezuela made it very difficult for all of us for a long time, but the silver lining is that it made us return stronger than ever.

How does Stratuz look into the future?

We’re very hopeful about our future as a band. We’re not gonna rush anything but we’ll keep pushing forward.

Would you like to share some great moments so far?

The European tour in 1998, which allowed us to take our music to new frontiers with the added gratification of it being well received by the audiences, and that led us to sign a deal with the label The LSP Company in Belgium.

What would be some of the upcoming plans for the band?

For now, we’re promoting the new album so more people get to know about us. We have many big plans, but I wouldn’t want to spoil anything yet. We’ll keep everyone up to date on our social media as things develop.

Finally what would be the message for the fans?

Thank you for listening to us! Check us out if you haven’t yet and we hope to see you all live very soon!

Track listing:

01. Intro
02. Morning Star
03. Father Amorth(e)
04. Holy Grail
05. Caelibatus
06. In The Name of God
07. Back to the Sun
08. Sodomized
09. Dawn
10. Left
11. Condemned