The split between Batushka guitarist and founder Krzysztof Drabikowski and vocalist Bartłomiej Krysiuk has been going on for about two years now. The Krysiuk-led version has since signed to Metal Blade and released Hospodi in 2019, but hasn't had too much luck with touring. The Drabikowski-led version released Панихида in 2019 and had to change its name as litigation over the name Batushka goes on.
Drabikowski recently sat down with Dark Art Conspiracy to discuss the lawsuit and when the split happened. He said the lawsuit has been going on since 2019 and will resume shortly now that his solo shows are over.
“Almost nothing happened still. Court tried to avoid reading all the evidence and sent us to do mediation first. So I had to listen to all his funny ideas to fix this situation, and I had to pretend to listen to him and take his words seriously. I didn’t want him to try to block my first Kiev show [November 9, 2019] with the new album. But after that show, I stopped the mediation to make things faster. So, we will finally have a first court hearing soon, after ‘just’ one year of waiting.”
Drabikowski added that the split between he and Krysiuk happened right after the touring for the band's debut 2015 album Литоургия ended.
“The whole music was composed before Krysiuk left the band. I did half of that album even before we started playing the Литоургия album live. I recorded drums, bass and all guitars in my studio Sphieratz. Exactly the same where I recorded Литоургия.
“I waited with finishing that album, I mean with recording vocals. I knew already that I don’t want to cooperate with Krysiuk on the second album, he knew that too. I postponed it until tours with Литоургия were finished.
“When he quit just after the last gigs with my first album, I continued recording the Панихида album. In the meantime, I figured out that he wanted to cheat me. I was pissed but it wasn’t a strong enough reason to stop me from doing my things anyway. I started working on lyrics and vocals, then I invited people who are close to me to record their voices.”
Read the full interview here.
