Australia’s Ne Obliviscaris in New Orleans with Rivers of Nihil and Psycroptic

Interview and photos by: Jennifer Touché

I first saw Ne Obliviscaris earlier this year when they came through Baton Rouge, and that show has been lodged in my head ever since. It’s kind of fitting being their name is Latin for “forget not.” I attended as a fairly new fan, curious more than anything, but left with a strange kind of natural high only a few bands can give. If you’ve ever experienced synesthesia, you know exactly what I mean—the sound becomes more than just an auditory experience. When I’m relaxed, it becomes cinematic waves of colors moving in sync with the music, and sometimes a sense of floating through those shifting rays.

When the New Orleans venue, Southport Hall announced that Ne Obliviscaris would be returning to South Louisiana, I knew I had to be there. This time, I wasn’t just hoping to relive that feeling—I wanted to dig a little deeper and learn more about what drives their sound and stamina on such a demanding international tour regimen this band consistently maintains.

They’re a rare kind of touring act living perpetually in motion. Their schedule crosses continents with little downtime. Their shows are two hours of intensity night after night, and yet they maintain precision with each show. It’s a discipline of passion and life sacrifices that’s not fit for just anyone. 

I arrived at the venue just as the band was wrapping up their VIP meet-and-greet session with fans. The tour manager brought me to Tim Charles just as Tim was finishing up a conversation with a fan near the merch tables. Tim is the clean vocalist and the violinist of the band. He has been with the band since the beginning in 2003. 

I followed Tim to the backstage area and into the green room, walking through a stairway with walls covered in framed photos of bands who’d played the intimate venue through the years. 

As we entered the first part of the green room, the noise from the venue faded, replaced by the sounds of the other bands’ members sprawled across couches and chairs, conversing as they decompressed before the show. We passed through that space and into another adjoining room, quieter and filled with a couch, chairs, and a coffee table where I nervously placed my microphone. I sat on the couch across from Tim, where he pulled up the chair and eased into the interview.

I asked how the flight was and how the tour had been going so far. Tim smiled, leaning back slightly as he thought about it. “Yeah, it’s been going really well,” he said. “The flight over… I mean it was okay, except we had some issues with our luggage.” He mentioned one of the members having a logistical issue due to paperwork. “He ended up arriving about twenty-four hours later than everyone else, but everyone made it here in the end.” 

We both laughed at the chaos that only touring musicians seem to accept as routine. “That’s just how it goes sometimes,” he grinned.

Tim further explains what it’s like getting back on the road again, “It’s always an interesting experience at the beginning of the tour,” he said, settling into his thoughts. “It’s a bit of a transitional time. When I’m home, most of my focus is on being a dad and handling the business side of the band, or practicing and writing. But on the tour, everything shifts—you’re suddenly performing a two-hour show every night in a different city. It’s a very different lifestyle.”

After a few days, he said, it all starts to click into rhythm. “You kind of settle in, and then it becomes a natural routine—one that I really love. I just love performing these songs for as many people as possible. If there’s someone anywhere in the world saying, ‘Hey, come here,’ I always want to make that happen.”

At the time of the New Orleans stop, Ne Obliviscaris was only a few shows into the U.S. leg, with a long road ahead. “We finish December 7 in Los Angeles,” Tim said. “Then we head across Europe for a week with Imminence. We don’t land back in Australia until Christmas Eve.”

I asked what preparation looked like for a band that tours internationally as much as they do, especially with Tim also managing the operation. He laughed quietly. “Yeah, my prep’s a bit different,” he admitted. “It’s a lot of logistics—hiring drum kits, lights, stage banners, even things like gaffer tape and batteries—and getting all of it to the first show. Then there’s marketing, social media, lighting design, working with crew, making sure everything functions.”

Only after all of that, he said, can he focus on the real point of it— ”practicing violin and singing.” These songs have been performed around the world, so the mechanics are locked in, but he keeps rehearsing them to keep it sharp. “It’s about keeping it right at the front of your consciousness.”

Maintaining downtime and life balance as much as possible is important when on the road. He stays balanced through small, deliberate habits. “Today in New Orleans, I woke up, had breakfast, checked out the venue, and then disappeared for about two hours. I went down to Harrell Park—it’s about a twenty-minute walk from here. I’ve got a basketball I bought in the U.S., and I’ll just shoot hoops for an hour and a half, get some exercise, try not to think about the show for a bit.”

The rest of his approach is pure discipline. “I don’t drink, I don’t smoke, and I try not to talk too much before and after the shows, especially after. You’ve just done tow hours—you have to let your voice warm down.” When others are our partying, he’s usually on the bus with manuka honey and a cup of herbal tea. 

He smiled as he explained his usual warm-up routine. “Sometimes people see me walking around with a straw in my mouth, blowing into a water bottle. The resistance from that helps the vocal cords relax. It’s great for warming up or down.”

When I asked if he was self-taught as a vocalist, Tim nodded. “Yeah, mostly,” he said. “I’ve had some lessons here and there with a great vocal coach in Australia, Alana K Vocal, but I learned mostly on my own. I’ve got twenty-plus years of classical violin training, and I used that knowledge to teach myself how to sing properly.”

He mentioned taking lessons with Alana in the lead-up to both Citadel and Urn to refine his technique and preserve his voice during studio sessions. “I sang in choirs as a kid—church on Sunday, that kind of thing—but I didn’t really start singing seriously until this band. I got caught up in violin through high school, and it wasn’t until Ne Obliviscaris that I found my voice again.”

That led naturally to his violin—the same one he’s been using since he was sixteen. “I was really lucky,” he said. “My parents managed to get me a good violin back then, and I’ve just kept it. Over the years, I kind of trained it to suit the music we play.”

He explained how every violin has its own personality and how his responds differently than one played strictly for classical performance. “My sister’s a professional violinist,” he said, smiling. “If sounds, it reacts differently. Hers is used to being played beautifully. Mine’s learned to handle chaos.”

That control, he said, came from years of experimentation. “It was just trial and error—seeing what sounds I could make, learning consistency so it reacts the same every time. Every instrument becomes it’s own creature…Every violin of that level has its own voice. You can’t just buy another one and expect it to sound the same.”

Ne Obliviscaris

When the conversation shifted toward how the band funds these consistent international tours and album cycles, Tim didn’t hesitate. “Back in 2014, we did our first big crowdfunding campaign,” he said. “In U.S. dollars, it came out to something like sixty-something thousand, which completely blew us away. It funded our very first world tour.”

But once that money was gone, they needed a more sustainable model. That’s where everything changed. 

“In 2016, we became the first band in the world to use Patreon as a monthly subscription service,” he said. At the time, Patreon was mostly for YouTubers. “People didn’t really know what it was for musicians. We had a lot of people criticizing us back then—saying we should ‘pay our dues’ or that we were trying to skip ahead.” 

He shook his head at the memory of it with a bit of a laugh, “You fast-forward nearly ten years, and now there are so many bands on Patreon. Even the one that criticized us back in 2016—they launched one last year.”

Through all of it, the fans stuck with them. “We’ve been getting between five and ten thousand U.S. dollars a month for almost ten years. That support has been a huge reason we’ve been able to tour the world. It’s why we can come back to the U.S. as often as we do.” 

From there, we shifted into the writing side of the band. Tim explained how different the process is now compared to the early days. “On the first couple of albums, everyone lived in Melbourne,” he said. “We’d rehearse every Sunday, sometimes a couple times a week. We’d all get in a room, bring ideas, and build the songs together.”

Everything changed once the band became international. “Since Urn—and especially Exul—hallf the band doesn’t live in Australia anymore. Benji (lead guitar) moved to France. Martino (bass-Italy) joined. Then James (harsh vocals-Chicago,U.S.). So most songwriting starts with someone sending a demo from their home studio.”

He described how a member might send anywhere from a minute to seven minutes of music as a starter idea. “Then everyone gives feedback. Maybe we love it. Maybe we ask if a riff could be stronger. Sometimes, the whole band feels it immediately, and other times it just doesn’t click. It’s all experimentation.”

When asked about Xenoyr’s departure and how that affected the band, Tim took a breath before answering. 

“The transition with James was kind of forced on us in 2023,” he said. “Zen had to pull out of our European tour—our first tour in four years—with only two weeks’ notice.”

They scrambled to find someone. Within days, they contacted James Dorton, someone they’d known from touring with his previous band, Black Crown Initiate. “We threw him in the deep end,” Tim admitted. “We had a hundred-minute show, ten days to learn as much as possible, then three rehearsals in Finland before the tour started.”

What happened next surprised the entire band. “By the second week of the tour, he was nailing everything. All the lyrics. All the cues. Fans loved it. The show felt different, but still strong.”

From there, the decision became easy. “With Zen‘s blessing, we kept touring with James so Zen could take the time he needed.“ For a year and a half, James effectively auditioned on the road without calling it that. And when Zen officially stepped away, the band already knew what they wanted.

“We just said, ‘James, would you like to be in this band?’ And it felt right.“

But the emotional shift was severe for Tim then he let on. “Zen and I were the two founding members. He was my right-hand man. We built our lives around this band. Losing him from the road was difficult.“

He said the band’s internal dynamic changed —not in a bad way, just in a way to require adjusting. “I used to run every idea by Zen first before taking it to the guys. Without him, the structure changed. It took time to get used to.“

In January 2025, James became an official member of the band. “He was such a lovely guy, and we get along so well. Zen still supports us—He posted on Instagram telling people to come out to this U.S. tour. That connection is still strong.“

When the conversation shifted to what comes next for the band, Tim didn’t hide his excitement. “We’re definitely writing,“ he said. We don’t have a timeframe yet, maybe the second half of next year. But once we get home at Christmas, the plan is to stay home until it’s done. When the conversation shifted to what comes next for the band, Tim didn’t hide his excitement. “We’re definitely writing,” he said. “We don’t have a timeframe yet, maybe the second half of next year. But once we get home at Christmas, the plan is to stay home until it’s done—long that takes.”

They already have a collection of ideas floating between continents. “We’ve got a bunch of material, but we’re still a long way from the finish line.“ Writing happens everywhere now— Australia, France, the US, Italy—wherever each member lives.

Recording, though completely up in the air. “Last record we planned to do drums in Nashville and everything else in Australia,“ he said. “But because of Covid we ended up recording in four countries, nine Studios. So who knows this time.“

He spoke highly of the longtime producer. “Mark Lewis has done such a great job with earn and then exhale. He really pushed to get the best sound out of us.“ The band wants to work with him again, but Tim said it depends on the music.“Every engineer has strengths and weaknesses, so once the songs are written, we’ll know what suits the band best.“

When I asked what they were experimenting with anything new for the next album, he paused,  “There’s one track with a viola duet—two solo violas with piano. Very dark, very sorrowful.“

He smiled slightly, “There are some sounds that are quite different from what I’ve done before. And with James on vocals now, plus Tino writing more, there will definitely be some new directions.“

But everything remains fluid. “We just have to see how it all comes together.“

Before wrapping up the interview, I asked if there were any misconceptions about the band he wanted to clear up. “Not really,“ he said.“I just try not to listen too much of what people say. You should ignore the bottom 10% of negative comments and the top 10% telling you you’re a genius. Neither is usually true.”

Before we ended the interview, I told him one of my favorite things about their performance: how every member steps aside for the others, no one taking all the spotlight. He agreed immediately. “Absolutely, I’m lucky to be in a band with five brilliant musicians. Everyone gets their moments, but everything is in service of the song. That’s what matters.”

After the interview, I made my way back inside the venue. Fans were already lined up against the stage waiting for the first supporting act, Psycropic, an Australian technical death metal band, followed by Rivers of Nihil, and finally, Ne Obliviscaris performing both Citadel and Exul in full. 

You can purchase tickets for the tour on the band's website by clicking on the link: Ne Obliviscaris - Offical Website

Rivers of Nihil

Psycroptic