Interview with Robbert Kok, Disavowed

- Hello, Robbert! Before the world knew about Disavowed, the band was called Nocturnal Silence. Tell us how did you meet each other? When exactly did you realize you wanted to sing in a band?
- We met during highschool and decided to start a death metal band. That happened straight after I realized that I wanted to play in a band. We made melodic death metal. After a while, we played more brutal death metal and changed our name in to Disavowed

- In 1995, you released your first Demo, "Into the Abscess". Where did you record the material? How many copies did you get and who helped you to copy them?   
- We recorded that one in a home-studio. I think we made 100 copies and printed them at a company.

- Was that name taken from Necrophobic's album title? As far as I know, along with the vocals, you used to play keyboards, so how different was your music from what you do now? 
- Yes! We took the name Nocturnal Silence from an album from Necrophobic. I still play keyboard, but I do that in my electronic project Tangent.

- In the mid 90s, was the tape-trading still popular? How did you distribute your tapes? And how did you usually discover new bands or new records?
- Tapetrading was still popular, also the trading of videotapes. We were in contact with some zines and could distribute through them. For finding new music, I read magazines and went to some CD stores which had a lot of metal.

- How often did you play live? Do you remember your first show? While still being Nocturnal Silence, did it happen for you to play outside of Netherlands? 
- We played every month in the beginning. Our first show was at our highschool! Awesome! Our first show outside of Holland was in Germany, after we signed a deal with Unique Leader

- In 1998, when you released the "Plateau" demo, had you already considered the fact of changing the band's name? When and why did it actually happen? 
- Not yet! We changed the name after the recordings of Point of Few. 

- In 2001, already as Disavowed, you released your debut full-length, "Perceptive Deception". Could you tell us about the creation of this album? How long had you been working on the material?
- We took 3 songs from our Point of Few release and the rest of the sogns were written in a year.

- How could you describe your recording sessions? Did you have any issues? How long did it take you to record all the instruments and vocals?
- Our recording sessions always start with the recording of the drums. After that we record all the guitars, bass and vocals. Then mixing and mastering starts. There are sometimes issues with the recording of instruments. Failure in gear, weird things in sounds etc..

- Looks like the album's cover was some kind of reworked version of "Plateau", wasn't it? In general, was that image image inspired by the Hellraiser's characters? How did you like cooperating with Jon Zig? 
- The Perceptive Deception is a rework of Plateau. It is an image that was in the movie Event Horizon, for just one second. I captured it and took it out.

- Being released by Unique Leader, how did it help you to promote the band? Do you think that was the exact push for Disavowed to become known worldwide? What was the feedback on the album?
- Unique Leader was and is known for brutal music. In the beginning, it only signed Deeds of flesh, Disgorge, Pyaemia and Disavowed. We had awesome feedback on the album and it really put us on the spot.

- In 2007, you released "Stagnated Existence". You did all the recordings and everything related to post-production of the album. Why did you decide to be in charge of your own material? 
- We decided to do it ourselves, to get total control. For our next album, we will do the same, but let someone else mix it. 

- How could you evaluate your work on this album now? Also, after you spent so much time on those songs, how could you comment on the band's play-style evolution?
- We are still very happy with Stagnated Existence. We did an Asian re-release with some minor changes in sound.

- When did you actually start learning about music production? When did you have a chance to practice first?  
- I started out in 1998 and I am still doing it.

- Within several years, you've been working with many bands, can you name any band that you liked working with the most?
- I like working with Obsidian and disavowed of course.

- Alright. It's been 8 years since "Stagnated Existence" was released. So what is the current status of Disavowed? Are you, guys, working on the new material?
- We are currently finishing our demo’s and we want to start recording at the end of this year!

- Thank you for this interview, Robbert. In the end, would you like to share with us your plans for the next year?
- We will play some shows outside of the country and we want to record our new album. Besides that play as much as possible! Thank you for this interview!!!