When one thinks of Israel, rich religious history and sacred locations come to mind while visitors come for the culture and educational reasons. Musically speaking, the last thing you might expect to hear from The Holy Land is metal. Though, according to singer and composer Noa Gruman Israel has a modest but very dedicated and united metal scene. Though, most metalhead’s might know the country as the birthplace of Gene Simmons.
Gruman does double duty year round, helming progressive metal band Scardust while composing music for Hellscore, a 30-40 person a cappella choir covering metal tunes.
While she rocks out, banging heads with her progressive brothers, she composes the group of singers, dubbed, The Choir of Hell, arranging incredible, beautiful voices and souls around classic and modern metal songs. If you’ve ever been curious what Nightwish, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and Slipknot tunes sound like sung by 30-40 people, check them out on YouTube.
Gruman participated in the recent all-star video with Israeli group Subterranean Masquerade covering “Another Day In Paradise” by Phil Collins. The video was a grand representation of the Israeli metal scene with 20 local musicians appearing from home in the collective performance. “Subterranean Masquerade are good friends of mine and I really love this band,” Gruman says. “They invited me. I love their music; love what they’re doing and great people.”
It was a nice moment or representation for the scene. “They did something that brought everyone together under the circumstances which is a great thing.” Everyone shined putting their own take on it.
The metal scene is Israel is rather small Gruman says, “Metal is definitely not the main style here, but very united. Everyone knows each other and does projects like this. You can easily do this sort of cooperation.” Geographically, they’re kind of an Island to themselves. “Even in non-Corona days it’s not easy for us. Travel is expensive and complicated. We’re disconnected from the main scenes in the world, Europe, and the U.S. when you think about metal. It’s required to work harder and put more into your art so I think this created really dedicated and proficient people.”
Given the country’s religious history there’s no restrictions on what can be done musically. “I live near Tel Aviv. In my community I don’t feel any restrictions whatsoever. I love to visit Jerusalem. Even there I don’t feel any problems. Everyone enjoys the show.”
With two albums and an EP, Scardust came before Hellscore.
“Mist” is their newest single, with “Break the Ice,” and “Gone” as most recent.” “We released six videos in the past three months. We can’t play live or promote with concerts, so we’re promoting through videos, putting all our effort into it.”
The “Gone” video was shot in 10 different locations. “You have the concrete location under a bridge in the city where the band plays together than the underground dark place, a bomb shelter and the different locations by the sea. We wanted every member to have their own location by the sea. Lucky for us we have magnificent shores and beaches, 30-60 minutes away by car. It wasn’t that difficult, the shores are near Tel Aviv.”
“Addicted” is a very haunting watch along with companion piece “Tantibus II.” “The one in the beginning is the character from “II.” They go together, totally opposite sides of the same story. A girl or woman who sinks into addiction, the “II” character loves this feeling but the “Addicted” one tries to get her out of it.”
Both have a choir singing in a dark hallway, “The choir represents the world in between in a way. They have an exit sign above their head, very shiny and bright green representing the way out. The fact that the “II” character’s trapped in this addiction, she can’t get out. It’s a prop. We made it.” In the “Addicted,” video you’ll see they have an entrance sign.
In October 2019 they tried to hold a Scardust festival. “We wanted to do a release concert for the new album. This didn’t happen and hopefully will soon.”
In the scene they’re a higher level progressive metal band. “Just speaking of numbers we had some of the biggest shows in Israel for the progressive scene. We just wanted to have a festival where we could invite bands we love musically and emotionally. We wanted to work with the best people and make it fun. So Subterranean Masquerade was our first option along with Oceans on Orion and the choir.
Gruman also puts over Shredhead as a very different but great band.
Orphaned Land is their biggest export having played the U.S. “Yes, great friends. I sing with them regularly, the choir sings with them regularly. Being signed to a U.S. label will hopefully help Gruman and crew get to America in the future.
At the moment Covid numbers are high and they’re in full lockdown, “We can’t do anything at the moment. Everything is closed. I can’t rehearse with the choir.”
The other side of her musical identity Hellscore is dubbed the choir of hell, though it’s pronounced Hell Score, not Hells Core. Slayer can be the soundtrack to hell, they can be the choir.
Their “Nightwish Medley,” is the latest video with Gruman choosing the songs. “I‘ve been planning this since I started the choir, four years ago. I wanted to choose one song from each album in order.”
Until recently Grumans’s been accepting new singers every six months, it kind of grows a bit. “If you see our YouTube channel, our first video we are maybe 12-15 people, in our latest, we’re about 40.” They filmed in a huge open clearing in a forest.
They went bright crimson, sporting red and black with their heaviest cover so far, Slipknots “Unsainted.” When she started the choir, she thought how cool would it be to go metal and achieve heavy sounds with just human voices.
For their Iron Maiden medley she asked the singers what songs they liked. Though the average member probably wasn’t around when the songs came out. The video was filmed on a roof near Tele Aviv.
While she has the floor in Scardust she lets others shine in Hellscore. “I have my stage in Scardust, so I never take someone else’s stage in Hellscore.”
There’s a few singers with bands but Hellscore’s definitely a big project for everyone. “We meet at least once a week and most of the time more than once a week because you always have more projects. You always have video, photo shoots or recording for a different band. We do other projects for other bands, definitely a huge project for everyone.”
The choir often joins Scardust on stage. “They’re the sixth member. Whenever we can afford venue space, we have the choir with us. Conducting is almost as demanding as being the lead singer. “For me to do two sets back to back would kill me. So I wouldn’t want to risk that. Kidding obviously, but sounds like a lot to me, maybe in the future.”
They hope to shoot three or four new Hellscore videos for rock and metal songs, depending on Covid conditions
Gruman’s considering composing an extreme metal song but it’s hard to write a cappella arrangements for those subgenres. “I’m looking for the metal sound when I write. It’s tricky. You have to have the exact song.” She wants the perfect song that the choir will enhance. “I’ll get there.”
Their venues are either very small clubs or huge halls, either up to 100 in clubs or 1000 people buildings. Not much in between. “For Scardust it’s a problem, we usually go for about 400-500 clubs, but they don’t exist in Israel so we go for the bigger clubs and lose money or small ones and have small sold out shows. I really hope when the pandemic ends, the scene and venues will come back to life.”
Gruman’s not involved in the everyday, mainstream culture. “All I can say is, in non-Corona times the nightlife is amazing. Especially in the center of Tele Aviv, something for everyone, the food is amazing. There’s nothing like the food in Israel. You can find anything you like in a high level.” They have McDonalds but she never indulges.
She says they have classical music, operas and theaters and a few big theatres. “In terms of culture we have everything.”
She keeps playing their first post-pandemic show in her head. “We didn’t have one show in March and a day before the show it was sold out in one of the smaller venues, 200 people. They announced there was a pandemic and couldn’t gather more than 100 people together. A day before the show, we split the audience into two groups of 100, it was crazy. Two sets, back to back in one night in front of 100 people each. The day after, they reduced the gathering number to 20 and all the shows were cancelled. The last night you were allowed to have enough people for a show was 10 months ago.”
Though, an incredible, unintentional moment happened with Hellscore a few weeks back. “We did a rehearsal with half the choir in the park in really nice weather. People walked by, stopped and started listening. When we finished, they cheered. I had this warm feeling in my body. We were actually performing in front of a live audience. It felt so amazing to have people care about what we do and react to it, it wasn’t planned.”
Gruman grew up on classical music, a classically trained pianist. It was a huge inspiration. Her father’s favorite band was Queen, and played it often growing up. She’s also a Disney girl, with Symphony X, Dream Theater and Nightwish invading later.
They would consider a live DVD when the next album comes out. A live stream is in talks or empty arena show perhaps.
In the beginning they did covers, a few years back they did a full Dream Theater tribute but have done all originals since.
Whenever they come to the U.S. they’ll be happy to perform anywhere. “I can’t wait for shows to come back and start towards this goal. Just stay safe and stay healthy.”
Photo Credit: Mariano Gonzalez
