Rhymes Of Destruction

Rhymes Of Destruction was formed in May '94, when Barre (vocals) and Tyne (guitars) buried their former band. It was the intention to make some new and refreshing music. After a couple of months rehearsing, they found their style, which they baptised "Symphonic Pagan Metal". As they couldn't find a keyboardplayer and a drummer, they decided to program those instruments. In this line-up they recorded their first demo (Jan '95), in very bad conditions, which sold about 270 copies. Yet, this demo was enough to convince Christophe (guitars) and Frédéric (bass) to join the band. After rehearsing a while and even playing some gigs, Rhymes of Destruction thought it was necessary to release a new product which would be more representive for the band. In Jan '96 a promotape was finished. The soundquality was better, but everything was recorded in 1 or 2 takes, therefore it was only for zines and trades. More and more pleased with the songs, Rhymes of Destruction decided to release a self-financed cd, which saw the light in November '96, together with a limited (100 ex.) split-tape with Belgium's atmospheric band Cosmic Interfluvium Of Silence. The cd received a lot of good critics, and with the help of Shiver Records (Belgium), 1300 copies were easily sold/traded. The band thought the time was right to get the cd re-released on a label with good distribution in the USA. Wild Rags Records was interested immediately and a contract was signed to release about 3000 copies. Rhymes of Destruction also released a limited (15 ex) live-tape in August '97. November '97. The band released a 3-track promotape which was sent to about 15 labels they considered as good to work with. The whole resulted in a contract with the Belgian company Shiver Records for 2 full-lenght albums. In the meantime, it became clear that there were huge communication problems with Wild Rags, resulting in a cancelling of the license deal. The second full-lenght album, A Sun Revolution, was recorded in august-september 1998. Again 6 songs accompagnied by a lot of instrumental stuff. The second album sounds more technical and experimental, and the producing is a lot heavier than "Requiem / ...". The release of the cd has been delayed a few times due to technical problems. It became all OK... The cd comes with a 16 page booklet with all the lyrics. We chose to include also the English translations of the Dutch lyrics. After the recordings of the second album, Rhymes of Destruction started the search for a live, non-computer drummer, to make the sound stronger. Wenny Verhamme was accepted as a permanent ROD-member in April 1999, but left in October 1999 due to a lack of time. Wouter was immediately accepted as the new drummer, and with him, Koen joined the band as the new keyboard player. Both new members were active in the band Sagaris. A try-out gig was planned in december 1999, together with Sagaris, resulting in a very succesful performance. In April 2000, the band spent 2 days at the Hyve studios in Aalst to record 2 new songs. These would be used to promote the band a bit more. The new line-up worked fine, until november 2000, when Frédéric announced he wanted to leave the band. Several bass players auditioned, but Rhymes decided to drop the bass and continue with the contrabass. Wanne, a friend of Wouter and Koen, was accepted as a new member. Six months of rehearsal and writing followed, and some gigs were played, but due to some health problems Christophe had to take some time away from the band, and nothing really happened until January - Februari 2002, when Rhymes of Destruction re-united and again played some pretty succesful gigs. Nevertheless, Christophe decided to leave the band in June 2002. Despite his hope for Rhymes to continue without him, the rest of the band members agreed the influence of Christophe in the band was too big to continue without him. Nothing really happened for allmost a year, while some of the former band members were busy with some other bands, but in February - March 2003, the four left 'core' members - Barre, Tyne, Wouter and Koen - missed the band so much, they decided to revive the band, just as a try-out, to see how things would work out. Due to some musical and personal differences, Wanne was not asked to rejoin the band, but Bjorn, who worked together with Tyne and Wouter in the Symphonic Opera Metal band Gyllnor, agreed to be the new guitar player and Peter, who was (and still is) active in the Technical Death Metal band Colcothar, was asked to be the new bass player. Again, some months of rehearsal followed, and the old spirit of Rhymes of Destruction seemed to be very alive and kicking. And so it came to pass that the band planned to play the Rhymesfest - an old joke between the band members - at JH Tap in Kuurne. Both Oceans of Sadness and Mortifer were contacted to be a part of it, and after some final date changes, the Rhymesfest was a fact - and turned out to be a pretty successful gig. A month after the Rhymesfest was played, Peter announced he would leave the band. He had moved in with his girlfriend, had begun a new job and couldn't find the time for it anymore. A new bass player was found in the person of Thomas Halsberghe, while plans were made to finally record the third full-length Rhymes of Destruction album. However, before this record would see the daylights the band split up somewhere in 2004.