written by Marko Jakob
Pix666: Hello Fabio. The most important question right at the beginning. Are you well and are you healthy?
Fabio: Yes, definitely still alive and kicking! Coronavirus had a huge impact in our lives, it didn’t hit us directly, but it cancelled all my plans and shows in the near future. I had to reschedule everything in my life, but it’s ok, it’s a journey that we all have to deal with and I’ve always been used to fight for my passion.
Pix666: You are in several bands at once, so I really don’t know where to start. But I‘ve seen that Inner Scar is about to release something very soon, so maybe let’s start with that. What is waiting for the fans and when exactly will it be released?
Fabio: I love to express myself in all the possible ways, that’s why I have many ongoing projects and collaborations. This 15th December, with Inner Scar, I’ve released a new EP entitled “Studio Sessions Vol.I” that contains 3 covers rearranged in my studio and, in the next months, I will release a brand new EP which will be the official new “Album” by Inner Scar. Well, I’ve scheduled to release the first single before the end of 2020 or in the first days of 2021 , so, you are gonna be able to listen to it very soon.
Pix666: Would you like to say a few more words about Inner Scar, who is in the band with you and how did you find together?
Fabio: Inner Scar is the most recent project and it’s based on an industrial-rock genre experimentation. Basically I consider it as a “spin off” project of my first band, The Strigas, so the team is fundamentally the same.
Pix666: Some time ago I wrote a CD review about the band FloveR, in which you are the singer too. At that time FloveR was a project that worked exclusively online. Has that fact changed in the meantime or is the way of working together still the same? What about the future of this band project?
Fabio: We planned to have some live shows, and we definitely tried to have some around Northern Europe, but due to geographical issues (we live in different countries) it has been very hard to arrange everything and make it real. Then arrived the Covid…
So, yes, nothing has changed for now and we are still working together the same way we started.
These days we’ve released our second album “Songs of Our Broken Hearts” and we are already working on our third and probably last FloveR album: “Love Archives”. The future? We will discover it together.
Pix666: Your band with the biggest fan base is, I think, The Strigas. You have been together as a band for about ten years now. What were the highlights of your band history so far? Will there be new songs from The Strigas soon?
Fabio: We are proud to have lived a plethora of memorable moments together but if I have to choose the most important ones I have to mention the times when we shared the stage with bands such as Moonspell, Behemoth, Kreator and others, during the last Total Metal Festival in Italy, our European tour in 2015 and , definitely, our Italian shows as official supporters of The 69 Eyes , in 2017.
We are in the last steps of record sessions of our next full length, which will be released with Volcano Records. Sadly we had to stop our sessions because of the Covid Crisis, but we hope to complete them soon and release the album sooner as possible!
Pix666: Which bands have inspired you? If you had the choice, would you like to be singer in which band…?
Fabio: I definitely have a lot of inspirations. I fell in love with rock when I was very young, I remember singing Europe‘s “Final Countdown” in the car with my grandparents or listening to Dire Straits with my father when I was a very little kid, but it was when I listened to H.I.M. for the first time, and then I expanded my listening to all of the Finnish rock and metal, that I found my way. Beside my special love for Finnish rock and metal, I’m also inspired by bands like Marilyn Manson, Nine Inch Nails, Alterbridge… Yes, my mind is a mess.
If I have to choose because of my heart, I probably would choose H.I.M.
Pix666: I read that you recently played a minor role in a movie. How did it came about and what was the experience like for you? Was it significantly different from shooting a music video clip?
Fabio: It’s been a great experience! I met the Director Giovanni Aloisio in the town where I live, we chatted a lot and we discovered that we share a lot of common interests such as a certain kind of movies, directors, music and imagery. He offered me the chance to be part of the soundtrack of his last short movie with one The Strigas song and this collaboration ended up with me and Liby (my wife and bass player) as actors and, again, guests as a band in the soundtrack of his last movie “Nuns: an Italian horror story”.
It’s “partly” different. I “act” in my videos, but it’s easier when it’s your music video and you mostly have to sing and not be a real actor.
I hope to not disappoint the viewers, because I’m definitely not a pro, but I would definitely do it again and again because I’ve found it a beautiful and entertaining experience.
Pix666: Are there any other bands or projects you are involved in that I haven’t discovered yet? If so, then tell us a few more words about it.
Fabio: Speaking about bands, right now my main projects are The Strigas, FloveR and Inner Scar. I’ve got some collaborations with different friends, like the guest appearance in the first album of one of the most talented producers in the world, Marco Barusso (who has worked with H.I.M., Lacuna Coil, 30 Seconds to Mars, among the others) and his band THE PRICE, on the song ‚Strange World‘.
I’m also personally involved in an interesting project called Hooplug ( www.hooplug.com ) started by my drummer, Nitro, and born to solve one of the most important issues for the touring bands: space.
It consists in an accessory that transforms the drums in a sort of “matrioshka”, capable to cram in itself, saving all the possible space, without losing sound quality and, also, adding the possibility to transform it in a “mute” instrument, with a perfect integration of triggers and MIDI signals.
We’ve also started a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign to finally make it real.
Pix666: Maybe you have some interesting hobbies, as a balance to the music?
Fabio: I’m an avid movie watcher and a very passionate gamer, since 8-bit consoles. I am a lover of cyberpunk culture since I was a kid and one of my aspirations is to write a novel based on those themes, but my busy life always denied it, so probably that will be my next hobby!
Pix666: You are from Italy – what is the general mood in the country regarding the Corona crisis right now?
Fabio: Covid hit our lives very deeply, both morally and physically, many people have lost loved ones, many others have lost their jobs, but, surprisingly, for the overwhelming majority of Italians this is not as important as changing some habits to preserve people from contagion.
This exposes a special trait of Italian people: the incurable optimism, which sometimes is good, some others it’s bad, especially when it harms others.
Pix666: Thank you very much for the interesting answers – Stay healthy! I hope to see you on tour one day.
Fabio: Thank you so much and a big metal hug to all readers!
https://innerscarofficial.com/
https://www.facebook.com/FloveRsweetRock
https://www.facebook.com/thestrigas https://www.thestrigas.com
photos © by Sara Brasak & The Strigas
