Pic courtesy of: Symbolic "I think that over here in El Salvador and in Central America generally, people tend to under mind the local work, and we say things like “For a Salvadorian band is not bad” or even worst we just think that because is from one of our countries then it must be bad; we are not objective when it comes to evaluate our work"

CR: Thank you very much for taking the time to talk to us
César Rodas: No problem, it’s an honor and a pleasure to share with you and with the Costarrican people a little about Symbolic and the metal scene in my country.

CR: Thanks for the nice words, what do you say we begin
César Rodas: Sure no problem, like we say over here “Demole viaje”

CR: Why don’t we begin with a little introduction, why don’t you tell our readers about the music of Symbolic and its beginnings?
César Rodas: Well Symbolic started around 2001, when my brother Julio and I parted ways with a previous project that we had. That previous project was a heavy, power metal band that we founded in 1999, but we sort of dissolved it because we wanted to add more “aggressive” elements to our music, and play our own songs, since what we were doing on that previous band was playing a lot of cover songs.
In 2001 we got together with guitarist Antonio Mirón, who during that time had similar music preferences, you know he liked rock and prog metal.
At the very beginning we were a mix of power and thrash metal, with a progressive side to it.
From the start we never really wanted to just establish ourselves into one genre; the music has been changing but we still keep the same idea, to make metal, metal with classical melodies and the strength of a genre like thrash just to name one.
You know we were trying to do music that wasn’t very popular over here back in that time. A lot of bands were playing metal back then don’t misinterpret me, its just that they were playing totally different styles than what we wanted to play; so it was kind of hard to find metal musicians with similar ideas.

CR: Was it easy for you guys to find the rest of the members for Symbolic?
César Rodas: At first it was just my brother and I. There are some very good metal musicians in this country, they play metal for the love of it, but if you ask if it is easy to find good metal musicians, then no, it’s not easy.

CR: Before we start talking about your latest Split album with fellow countrymen Dreamlore, I just have to say that ….it was fucking amazing!! ! Really one of the best if not the best album that has reached my ears coming from Central America; the production, the song writing, I mean I would put that split to compete with the best productions of metal in the world market. Ok after been a little fan girl back there I must ask, what about other critics, what and how has the media received this work?
César Rodas: They have been great really, and we have been sending cd’s to some of the toughest magazines we know of, in countries like Germany, USA and Holland.
The best thing about the reviews is that they come from people that compare us to major label bands you know is not like some people that go “oh it’s good to be from Central America” the reviews are just interested in seeing if the music is good or not, not if they are from a country in specific.
I think that over here in El Salvador and in Central America generally, people tend to under mind the local work, and we say things like “For a Salvadorian band is not bad” or even worst we just think that because is from one of our countries then it must be bad; we are not objective when it comes to evaluate our work.

CR: You might be right there are a lot of media and non media people manage to underestimate the work of many of our bands simply because they are from Central America.
César Rodas: In Costa Rica there is a pretty good band, with great quality that I know of, December’s Cold Winter, their production has a great instrumental and sound quality. I guess you guys probably have a lot of other great bands that I haven’t gotten a chance to hear.

CR: Yeah we do, there are some great bands over here. To continue with the questions, what was the main goal for you guys with this Split album?
César Rodas: Well our main goal pretty much is to let people know about the metal that we do over here in El Salvador; also to try and give a little push to our scene, we have many good bands trying to do things the right way even though we live on a hostile environment for metal.

CR: I don’t want to sound like a little fan girl here, but this new production the split album, is like I told you earlier, one of the best productions I have ever heard from a Central American band
César Rodas: Thank you very much man, is good to hear that you like it.

CR: What about the production and the recording of the album, was that done by you and your brother?
César Rodas: By my brother; here in El Salvador we had some problems recording rock music, you know it never really sounded very good because of the production. We do have some good recording studios, the problem is that they are expensive and there is no one experienced enough to record rock or metal.
That’s why in 2002 we decided to learn how to record the music that we play, and so we bought some equipment; my brother really got into it, that first equipment really thought him a lot about the whole process of recording; after that and since we don’t have any place to actually study sound engineering over here, my brother has been using the internet a lot to learn as much as he can, and until last year we decided to put our own studio.

CR: What’s the name of your Studio?
César Rodas: Soundtrack Studio

CR: Have you guys recorded other bands apart from Dreamlore and Symbolic?
César Rodas: Yes, we have actually recorded a couple of other bands from El Salvador, bands with a lot of different styles, from black metal, ‘till doom atmospheric, even a pop rock band.

CR: Have you guys recorded any band from another country?
César Rodas: Actually like a month ago we recorded a band from Guatemala, they wanted to record a couple of songs.

CR: Going back to the Split, I have to say that I really liked the melodies and off course the incredible guitars; the band has a very peculiar way when placing the vocals on the songs, something like Nevermore does. Is there any specific formula when it comes to placing the vocals on the songs?
César Rodas: I think the only secret is the mind of Rodrigo Serpas, he writes his lyrics and then places then inside the music; sometimes I help out with the lyrics, but he always manages to place the lyrics in very good places.

	Pic courtesy of: Symbolic
	"I can remember one from a German webzine that qualify the split as a “jewel of the underground”; that meant a lot to us"

CR: I dare to say that the vocals have a sort of way to blend and also stand away from the regular melodies, you know, is like they sometimes match perfectly and in other segments they carry a totally different tempo, I’m saying something absolutely ridiculous or I’m close to the truth?
César Rodas: I understand what you are saying, and yes that’s pretty much one of the abilities that he has; the melodies on the vocals part ways with the guitars, and we really like that because it allows us to create a more dynamic kind of music.

CR: The song “Runing Out” to me sounds very a la Megadeth, was that band and the entire North American thrash metal scene a big influence in your music?
César Rodas: Yes, Megadeth is a big influence for us; you know the whole Bay Area, Exodus, Metallica in their glorious days and Testament.

CR: How did you guys handled the distribution of this record?
César Rodas: We had to do it our selves. We haven’t really had the idea to sale or commercialize the album outside our country, we are just using it as a promo tool to send to magazines and websites outside El Salvador, you know places where maybe no one has ever heard of a Salvadorian metal band.
We have been distributing the record on our shows, but like I said the main goal with this split is just to promote both bands.

CR: You know is very weird that living in Central America you get very few opportunities to actually listen to bands from other Central American countries; non the less there are some very well established scenes out here, like the Salvadorian, Panamanian and I dare to say the Costarrican…
César Rodas: True, we don’t know each other very well, I guess that is because even when Central America is a small area, our countries are very separated from each other, and besides the bands haven’t yet risk a lot to tour all over the region, is very rare when a band from another Central country visits us, and I guess that happens everywhere in Central America.

CR: It will be very cool to unite the whole Central American scene; I think that way our metal could have a bigger impact in the world.
César Rodas: It will be great if we can start touring on weekends, but that will take time and money and many bands don’t have that luxury, but still it is a nice idea.
At least over here the scene have been improving lately, there is more interest from fans towards the local bands and that’s actually kind of funny because many people tough that the interest for our local bands was going to disappear once the big names in metal could play live in our territory.
Next month (September) there will be a metal fest with bands from all over Central America, including Costa Rica, I don’t have the name of the Costarrican band, but I’m pretty sure you guys are going to be around.

CR: Symbolic’s first production was launched back in 2003 “Utopia”, what can you tell us of that work?
César Rodas: That record has quite an interesting story involve. There was some time ago a project to create a metal label over here in El Salvador, and Symbolic was one of the first bands chosen by this aspiring metal label as one of the first bands that they will produce…to make a long story short, things didn’t go according to plan and neither the album in my opinion, but you know we learned a great deal just from been able to record something on a studio, and all that we learn there we used it to improve our split, so it wasn’t all that bad.
Regarding the sound of the band in that album, I think we were still looking for our identity on that production; the whole prog metal influences of Antonio are a little more easy to hear, the album is very melodic, progressive, but I think it has some moments in which you can hear our heavier side, as well as a little glance of what we wanted to do for a future record.

CR: So you think that maybe “Utopia” was just the first step for Symbolic to reach or create the sound that you want. Do you see the album as a good example of what the band was capable at that specific period of your careers?
César Rodas: We could have done better, but is still a pretty good example of the things that we could create back then; for this new split I think we are a way more solid band you know, the writing process is so much easy now, besides we really now what we want to transmit to the people.

CR: When do you think we can expect your next full length album? Because sincerely, the only bad thing about the split is that is jut too short.
César Rodas: We expect to have a full production next year; we are right now writing new material and also doing a sort of follow up of the material on the split, but with a few variations, more aggressive, more direct, but without loosing the original sound of the band.
There will be less power metal influences and a little more thrash, still we like to maintain the melodies, I believe that is a very important aspect of the band.

CR: What has been the review that you remember the most, a review for this split album?
César Rodas: The one you guys did was pretty good; but I can remember one from a German webzine that qualify the split as a “jewel of the underground”; that meant a lot to us, also a band from Slovenia wrote me and ask for permission to play one of our songs as a cover in their concerts, that was great. Off course they could have been playing a joke on us jajajajaja.

CR: Out of curiosity, if someone wants to get one of the copies of any of your latest albums, how would they go about that?
César Rodas: They can write to us at symbolic@symbolicmetal.com, and we will send them a copy, the whole payment issue we can discuss it by email.

CR: If I’m not mistaken Symbolic had the opportunity to play with Rata Blanca a couple of years ago; how was that whole experience for you guys?
César Rodas: The band had so little time together back then, but still it was a great experience, to be next to such professionals, and to realize that the music is always the single most important thing for any band.

	Pic courtesy of: Symbolic
	"I would say is the fact that we try to write good songs, we respect the tradition of the big heavy metal bands, but we are always looking for our own way of doing things"

CR: Did you guys had “Utopia” when you played that gig?
César Rodas: Not yet, we had only a couple of demos that few people had actually listen to.

CR: So it was sort of a big debut for you guys
César Rodas: Yes it was, I guess a lot of people got to know of our existence in that gig. We got some good feedback after it was over. In that same gig another band made its debut “Gaia” pretty good band actually, after that concert we sort of became good friends.

CR: What about the famous stage fright?
César Rodas: oh, it’s always there, but after a while you kind of get use to it, you know it transforms from fright to excitement and adrenaline.

CR: I was checking out your web page, and it appears to me that many of the members of Symbolic really like Arch Enemy
César Rodas: True, well I guess that’s because of the riffs, they are very aggressive and melodic at the same time, especially on their earlier albums, but hey you know they are great musicians after all.

CR: Your brother Julio is also on Dreamlore, what’s he’s main project and how does he manages to split time on the two bands?
César Rodas: Symbolic, he does write some songs and is very active on Dreamlore but he’s main band is Symbolic

CR: César, just to begin our closure, what would you say is Symbolic’s best quality?
César Rodas: Mmmmm… tough question, right now I would say is the fact that we try to write good songs, we respect the tradition of the big heavy metal bands, but we are always looking for our own way of doing things, I’m not saying we are super original but we do try to have our own sound, always looking into our roots and the present of metal.

CR: César it has been a pleasure, I really hope that our readers get your latest work, if you have anything else to add please do…
César Rodas: Thank you for your interest and support, and thanks to all the people in Costa Rica that read Leviatán, I hope you guys will continue to unite our scenes, to show the world that Central America has good metal.