Misantropia Extrema Interview (English Version)

Youre all experienced from previous bands you played in before you start this project.Which bands were those?

John:At the very beginning the band was a side-project of David (guitars) and me.
Before Aenemica David was part of a well-known rock band in the local area, called ‚Chasing Caroline‘. As for me, I played in a progressive metal band named ‚Perfect Symmetry‘, which was best-known far over the local borders, but we failed on the verge of signing a labeldeal. After the breaking up of both bands, we played together in a formation in which we couldn’t express ourselves quite right. We understand music as a creative exchange. Each member should have the possibility to bring in their own ideas, without losing the interpersonal relationships. After realizing, that this claim wasn’t given, we left the band and recruited Dima (Bass), who was playing in a metalcore band, called ‚Cometh Of Indra‘ and Fabio, who we, so to speak, freed from a cover rock band, which wasn’t really fitting to his ambitions. Daniel (Vocals), who was part of several pop rock-projects at that time, was a participant of a Sing-a-Song-Contest at a local radio station and we heard about him and contacted him. We sent him some demo-songs of us with a request to listen to them. A few hours later Daniel was confirmed as our lead singer.

Did you have a clear idea of the style you would be playing in Aenemica when you first started talking about the possibility of forming another band?

John:At first we didn’t know in which musical direction our journey would take us, especially because everyone of us is inspired by different musical backgrounds. It really took us some rehearsals and songs before we got to the point where we knew: ‚Ok. That’s cool. That’s the sound and the kind of music we wanna make!‘. Of course there are some arguments, especially in matters of the personal musical taste but I think our approach differs from other bands. We try to filter the different styles and influences of each of us and let them melt into something new without attach importance to the sound of other bands.

Did you want to avoid any kind of mistakes that young, inexperienced bands normally do,with this new project? What kind of mistakes were those?

John:I think mistakes are there to be made and, in the end, to learn from them. There are so many bands with so much potential but they fail mostly, because there wasn’t any discussion about the bands ambition. A band has to act like a team. Everyone should know his function and job and learn how to deal with the diversity in this team. Of course it is important to inform every musician about the financial aspects (equipment, studio, artwork, etc.) which are carried by the whole band. Maybe this sounds a little economic but with this 70’s rock n roll mentality you won’t get up to from rehearsals to stages today.

What are the main musical influences of the band members? Are they all “usable” in Aenemica or are you selective in the band;s composition and just use the kind ofinfluences that fit the project personality?

John:Every member of the band has its own specific influences, caused by the experiences we made with other projects in the past. We tried to create a style of music, in which every one of us could bring in his own talents and influences. The result was a style of music, which has melodic influences from pop/rock music, the energy of progressive rock/metal, riffs which are influenced by djent and some kind of metal and the lyrics and vocals, that are influenced by a mixture of styles from pop, over ballads, rnb and rockmusic.

They style youre playing in «Empty Inside» looks like a cool mixture of Textures, Tesseract and Threshold. Do you agree with this description?

John:David is a huge fan of Tesseract and so i wouldn’t disagree, if you hear influences of their music. I´m not very familiar with the music of Textures or Treshold, but I think both bands have a sound that’s based on rock music, e.g. Textures “Awake”, and we’re heading for a similar approach, adding elements of other genres, regarding to our musical backgrounds, too.

What are you dealing with, generally, In the lyrics of the songs in «Empty Inside»?

John:The lyrics deal with feelings and problems which everyone has had, or can understand. But it’s not only love. It’s also about losing someone important or the feeling of being worthless or not good enough. So we tried to build a connection between us and our listeners. It’s our aim to reach our listeners by arousing feelings while they hear our songs.

The EP is being released by Phonector. What kind of label is this?

John:Before getting in contact with Phonector, we already had two offers from indie labels which conditions didn’t fit to our understanding of how we want to release our stuff. Founding an own label wasn’t an option, too. So after intensive research on the internet we finally found Phonector, which gives us the possibility to release our stuff independently, autonomous and without the classical label structures. We are free to work with Phonector in the digital or physical distribution.

There seems to be quite a range of different ages within the band, just looking at the pictures. Is that so?

John:Hahahahaha…Funny hat catches you ;D Yes,Daniel in the early twenties and so on the youngest member. Then following David and Dima in their mid-twenties and the oldest are Fabio and me, in the early thirties. But we feel like twenties – a little more experienced.

Being you all experienced in bands before, what is your approach to live concerts? Do you try to play live as much as you can or are you careful trying to not overexpose the band too much and avoiding the gigs where youll lose money for sure?

John:I think that it is very important for every band to play live, however it should be gigs which are financial rewarding or effective in advertising for the band. There are a lot of bands never leaving the local area. For us it seems to be important to communicate quality and delight in playing without losing the professional approach. We would never do Pay-to-play gigs.

Having said that, do you have a goal for the immediate and long turn future of this project?

John: After the release of the EP, which we consider to be a bridge to the next step, we will be playing some smaller gigs with an expanded setlist. The first gig will, of course, take place in our local area. In 2015, we’re heading for playing lots of live gigs, open airs and festivals throughout Germany and releasing our, by then finished, album ‚Anatomy of Sadness‘.