PERSONA - JELENA'S INTERVIEW

Due to the debut release of The Tunisian progressive Heavy Metal band Persona, Metalzone had the chance to learn some special details about their first complete work called Elusive Reflections. Jelena Dobric, the band’s singer, is willing of giving us some important information.
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\r\nJelena Dobric - vocals
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\r\nHello Jelena my name is Jim, but you can call me Dimitri!
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\r\n  1) First of all, I would like you to tell me a few words about the very beginning of this band. Who were the founding members?
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\r\nJelena: Hi Dimitri! Big thanks for this interview. The band started in 2012, several months after I moved to Tunisia. At first it was just a project between Melik (lead guitar) and me (vocals), and we were just experimenting and composing for fun. After some time we decided to form an actual band and to begin this adventure for real. Yosri (guitar) and Youssef (drums) joined soon afterwards, followed by Walid (keyboard) and Nesrine (bass), who is the newest band member.
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\r\nMelik Melek Khelifa - Lead Guitar

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  2)  How difficult was the producing of this album?
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\r\nJelena: It wasn’t easy at all, mainly because in Tunisia you can’t find any recording studios or music producers that specialize in metal. After recording all tracks at home, we sent it to France, to Slab Sound Studio (https://www.facebook.com/slabsoundstudio) where Gwen Kerjan did a great job mixing them. What was most difficult about the whole process were many setbacks we had during the actual recording, especially because of the conditions (bedroom and no sound engineer to help us with expertise, experience and advice), and the fact that we couldn’t be physically present during the mixing. Considering all that, we’re very, very happy with the final result.
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\r\n  Yosri Ouada - Rhythm Guitar
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\r\n  3) Have you tried to sign a contract with a label?
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\r\nJelena: We have, we’ve contacted a certain number of labels and got some proposals, but we haven’t succeeded yet in finding a deal that works well for both parties.
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\r\nNesrine Mahbouli on bass
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\r\n  4) So, to the point, is there a main lyric writer? Or each member takes place?

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Jelena: That would be me – the main lyrics writer ;). Melik wrote lyrics for “He kills me more” which is one of his old songs we adapted for Persona, and it was originally called “She kills me more”. Since it’s me who composes vocal melodies, lyrics are inseparable part of that process, because together they create a particular expression that’s later incorporated into my performance.
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\r\nWalid Bessadok - Keyboards
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\r\n  5) What about the recordings? How long did it take to finish them and finally release the album?

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Jelena: I’m not exactly sure about the duration of each stage; the recording was done in spring 2014 and it lasted between one and two months (stretched because of our jobs); the mixing was done in late autumn 2014, and was finished in about 2-3 weeks, if I recall correctly. As you can see, it took us more than a year to actually release the album, and that was the period during which we were trying to contact labels, learn things about promotion and all that goes with it. After we decided to release it independently, things started moving faster.
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\r\n  Youssef Aouadi - Drums
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\r\n  6) Although is a little bit early, tell us, what reactions you receive so far?
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\r\nJelena: We’re very pleasantly surprised with all positive reactions we’ve been getting about this album, and we’d love to get a chance to tour somewhere outside of Tunisia this year, so we can play these songs for our fans abroad. All the great reviews we’ve got gave us extra motivation we’re to make more music and start working on the second album as soon as possible.
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\r\n  7) Any memorable live shows? Which are the bands that you would like to share the stage?
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\r\nJelena:  So far, we’ve performed only in Tunisia, but every concert is an amazing experience because of the atmosphere our fans create for us. So there is no gig that I could say was more special that the others. And it would certainly be awesome tour with some of the bands we love, but the genre should also match. Considering that, it would be great to share the stage with Nightwish, Lacuna Coil, Delain, Myrath, Anneke Van Giersbergen…
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\r\n  8) In order to promote your first release, are there any scheduled live shows?
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\r\nJelena: There are, there are two shows in March and two in April, all of them in Tunisia for now.
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\r\n  9) Every band has its own influences, yours?
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\r\nJelena: Our influences are quite diverse; Melik prefers thrash, death and heavy metal (Metallica, Megadeth, Death, Pantera, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd…). Yosri is more progressive/djent (Opeth, Tesseract... ) but he recently started showing a worrying amount of interest in funk music ;). Nesrine, Walid and I all love classical music, but Nesrine’s more into gothic/symphonic  metal (Nightwish, Xandria, Tristania…), Walid into symphonic (Nightwish, Epica, Within Temptation…)  and I mostly prefer progressive/power (Dream Theater, Kamelot, Leprous…) Our drummer Youssef loves everything with rich and complicated drum work (I think Mike Portnoy from Dream Theater is one of his absolute favorites).
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\r\n10) The last words are yours…
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\r\nJelena: Big thanks to all your readers who took the time to read this interview and get to know us, and also to our fans that are part of our every success. Expect more news from us quite soon: new music videos, acoustic versions of some songs from the album, new merch, meet & greet with the band… Stay tuned through our social media! Thanks again for this interview Dimitri, it was a pleasure!
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